It wouldn't take much power, could run resource hungry apps via an ssh tunnel to a real box and be and be relatively cheap to produce.
That would require a ubiquitous wireless internet connection everywhere on the planet or maybe FiOS rolled out to everyhome to get the extreme bandwidth needed.
I'm not saying it won't happen, but I'd give it a time frame of 5 years when internet is available on every square inch of the planet. (and that might be an optimistic figure)
With solid state memory, won't you never have to reboot the OS?
Although, I doubt it will be in his key note tomorrow for a new product release, I think Steve Jobs has a plan for something like this. I remember a few years back in either 2000 or 2001 that he discussed boot times and how they wanted to someday get that to 0 because people waste hours (if not days) per year waiting for their computers to boot.
Two reasons I see they are doing this is they know Windows Vista will support something and if they can get their version out the door first and secondly, if they have flash ram built into the system as part of the OS it will be harder to put the newer versions of OS X on non-Mac hardware mostly because the OS expects the flash memory to be there.
Besides, they've got buttloads of Flash to do this already from the Nanos. Chances are this will be in tandem of whatever Intel is doing with their hardware.
But I doubt we will see anything in stores until 2007.
Let's see, 4 hours daily playing game in a lonely room, 8-10 hours sleep, 8 hours work (lol), 2 hours meals. Getting a life: Priceless
24 hours a day playing a game in a crowded room, 10 seconds of sleep between map loads, 5 minutes drinking Red Bull and No-Doze every 12 hours. Dying of heart failure on the way to the bathroom after 96 hours of this: Priceless
When I decry public funding of science, I'm blasted because people say that the free market won't pay for certain research. Now I see a more evil side of it -- and I fear that we'll see more investigations like this if I'm right. What can we do to combat humanity's deep need for self preservation in a scientist having the same human drives, especially when it is funded straight out of our pocket involuntarily?
There can be two sides to this issue.
1. If the research is funded with government money, it can be influenced by politics. 2. If the research is funded with private money, it can be influenced by its investors.
Think of it like a global warming research sponsored by a congressman who is lobbied by an oil company vs a TCO of Windows vs Linux research sponsored by Microsoft.
Both could have potential bias and complications.
Personally, I believe both private and public research can be beneficial. Take DARPA for example. I for one believe DARPA is the shining example of public research gone right. It is backed by public money, but often uses the private sector as a major part of its research. Take the recent Grand Challenge for example.
So I think there is a place for public funding at least to get the ground work. After all, the Manhattan and Apollo Project were publicly funded.
However, if you believe government funded projects are a waste of your tax money, then you can do what I do... Donate to a private non-profit research group that is tax deductible. I realized if I donate enough money to either Wikipedia or the Singularity Institute I could just write off all my taxes next year. Even though I don't get more money than I would have not donating, it means the IRS will have to give me a larger refund, hence putting my money where I want it to go and not where a congressman does.
Anything this guy has ever written should be trashed.
The same could be said about Dr. Josef Mengele who commited far worse atrocities against humanity, but some of the kwoledged gain by his gruesome work is still used today in medical schools albeit as mear reference to the insides of a living being.
One can acheive those kind of things when you are doing live vivisections on human beings.
To throw away knowledge even if it was gained through horrible acts is almost as bad of a sin by trying not to better the world and correct wrongs with that knowledge. Its almost as if you declare those who were damned to this cruel fate, that their suffering and loss means nothing to the living and you are going to throw them away to the trash dump of history without trying to save another human life.
Hopefully the panel will go out and actually try to reproduce his results rather than having a political debate of whether not it is.
His business ethics are questionable, but if there is some truth to this then they should be able to follow a scientific method in order to prove or disprove the falsification of the findings.
If we don't believe that those laws are right, then it is up to us the people to motivate our respective politicians to change those laws.
You mean the corporate lobbyists, right? Lord knows the people can't be trusted to make the right decisions when influencing members of congress.
Until then you have to play within the bounds of the laws, or face the consenquences as described by them.
Secondly, laws only apply to those who get caught or can't afford to hide behind a corporate charter or a good lawyer.[/sarcasm]
But seriously, in China the only thing they've got going for them that the US has a serious problem with is that their government isn't setup to be affected by potential abuses by money interests.
It may eventually happen, but they authoritarians usually aren't influenced by money when they control the system. (Although, give me a shoddy special interest pork barrel overkill US system anyday over an authoritarian system)
This means it can be proven false which means there is the possibility that it can be proven true.
Rather, if I say there is a Flying Speghetti Monster that created reality 6 seconds ago and that all your memories are created by his all powerful noodley appendage, you have no way to falsify this.
This of course means with Falsibility in play, I have no way to prove that there is FSM...
I'm not normally on the "bash slashdot" bandwagon, but...come on. Since when are completely unsubstantiated claims that it might be possible someday to violate fundamental physical laws news?
Actually, it old news...
Physical laws break down under certain situations. You know... As you get really close to the speed of light or try to look at the singularity of the big bang as it happens or a black hole, you find that your models break down and you have to use something else. Heck that is what baffles most Quantum Physicists today.
Not that I think its going to happen anytime soon, but I'd applaud anyone who actually tries to prove our current models to be false even if they are a crackpot.
Sub-atomic particles are constantly appearing and disapearing all the time in our universe, so could be possible they are going somewhere else, however I don't think a magnetic fields have anything to do with it.
[rant] To digress wildly, why are doctors the only breed that give you an appointment after a week and *then* make you wait for 2 hours in the waiting room. Would you take the same shit if it was your carpenter or lawyer? Someone should sue their egotistical asses, i tell you.[/rant]
And I forgot to point out that if your lawyer or carpenter is late, you don't sue them either. You simply get a new lawyer or carpenter. If you doctor, lawyer, or carpenter really screws up something that causes you direct damages then you sue them.
In any case, most doctors/researchers have such an inflated ego or god complex that they would not even think twice before trampling an individual's basic human values.
I have never met a doctor that has a god complex. I've seen politicians on TVs who may suffer from this, but most doctors I have met generally respect the patient because they sincerley wish to make them better.
Secondly, an individual basic humans values should not include willfully waste of things that would ease the suffering of other humans. This goes against the teachings of all major religions.
I'm not going to debate whether or not the original cause is moral or not, but the waste of material because someone believes the oringal is wrong is definatley immoral.
So you're saying time outs for children or detention in schools don't work?
Time outs and detention compared to federal prision? What planet are you living on?
If detention in schools was like our prisons we'd have no discipline in any schools whatsover. That and the kids would be smuggling drugs up their ass and looking over their shoulders waiting for someone to track to jab a shank in their back from a toothbrush they made.
If prisons were an orderly system of good conduct and education like high school detention then yeah... It would work and prisoners would be reformed. But obviously, the guards have to wear body armor and do full body cavity searches for a reason.
And yeah thats what I just said about the bannings. I'm not saying it would be a police state because of the exact reason that they would loose customers if they were so ban happy for ban everyone instead of putting him in a quiet room for a while. I'd rather have a game company use orderly time outs than summary bannings anyday.
If tomorrow you awoke to find watching the news in which a fascist/socialist/communist group overthrew the govnerment with the support of the army and declared that all freedoms we once enjoyed were curtailed would you agree or no? Not only that they have outlawed the religion you believe in (whatever it is even if it is aetheism)
Now you are the rule breaker... But what if everyone is now prejudice against you because of what you believe in. It is the same as rascism. People don't hate the color of your skin, they hate your culture... They hate what you believe in... It just so happened that the color of the skin was just an easy reference point for the ignorant to make an assumption on who you were and what you believed in.
People need to realize rules are not always good rulesets (exscuse the pun) for morality. They are hopefully a basis for what we believe to be right and wrong and good and bad, but sometimes those things that we believe in are no longer the rule of law and the rules have to be broken.
That is when the rule breakers become heros in our history.
I'm not really justifying whatever the guy did but... You have to keep in mind that not all rule breakers are bad people and often are the people that we need in our world.
Personally if I worked at Second life, after reading this article I'd perm ban the guy. People like this never learn, until the judge sentences them to life in prison. And policing them is a boring and thankless job, with lots of abuse thrown in.
No. People don't learn anything in prison. If nothing more it teaches them more things they need to learn in order to fuck people over when they get out. My room mates brother when to prision for a while for drugs and when he got out he knew more connections and more methods of getting it when he got out. He ended back in after a while though.
He still hasn't learned his lesson and none of those people do. They just blame the system and keep on doing what they only know to do.
The American prision systems teaches people nothing... Other how to join with the gangs, get more connection and street and learning "street cred knowhow" ( and how to not be bitch at night). Its only good for keeping people off the streets (especially murders forever) and keeping unemployement low.
No one learns there lesson in prison save a handful of people who find jesus before they get the chair.
Secondly, you don't even know what he did. His violation might have been just saying inapropriate language. It would be like a police officer gave a summary execution on the spot when he pulled you over for speading. If you want real life justice in a MMOG you'd need a full time legal system, player lawyers, player jurors, employee judges... And for Christs sake... We don't play MMOGs to have Second Lawsuit Online.
Sheesh... You people need to stop judging least you might end up at the wrong end of the law someday. (Oh well you thought file sharing and circumvention of your own property wasn't wrong? Too bad says the judge! Off to the fudge packer prison plant with you!).
Oh and another reason they may not be so ban happy is becomes some Second life accounts can cost up to $100 + dollars. If someone is paying your company that much income per month you tend to put up with disruptive shit. I've worked for companies who've put up with more for less with their customers.
Sheesh... You'd think with all these anal comments screaming ban the guy, you'd think he wasn't playing a game but stole money from a real life orphanage. Relax... Don't be so vindictive... And play some single player games until you grow a thick skin and sense of humor (and humanity) so you can just laugh these people instead of getting pissed at them 24/7.
I'm not sure leaving people in a cornfield is really such a good idea, since as the article suggests this is almost something to look forward to. Instead, it would make sense to punish users with something they would fear: a loss of stats and/or items.
Punishing people on an online world won't get them to change their behavior.
We have death penalty for murder, but that doesn't stop murders does it? In online games punishment must be education and not vindication because:
1.) The player is playing a game. He has no fear of real life death or personal loss no matter how much you punish them... If you punish painfully it will only piss off the person without getting them to change the errors of their ways. 2.) Punishment by admins makes even behaving players live in fear that they must follow invisible unsaid rules. They no longer play a game, but rather Second Gulag which they report offenses to the Soviet state in hopes of punishing other players (I've seen this in Ultima Online in which two guilds used favors from GMs in order to attempt to ban other players from both sides) 3.) Players are a community and will tell others about the "punishment" and if you piss them off they'll write extensive blogs and wage campaigns on web sites against your company and give you bad publicity. Sure there are limits to this... I mean if you ban a player who constantly destroys the game play experience for other s 24/7 then that is reasonable, but if you start banning for minor offenses then you'll rack up a horde of sympathetic persons who start bad mouthing your gaming company.
Lastly... This is the more important one of all these reasons... 4.) Second life guarentees intellecutal property rights to the things that players create in the game This mean monetary value as well. This maybe a Unique aspect of this MMOG but if you start banning people willy nilly you might over minor things or removing personal property you might get a lawsuit on your hand. Second life has an unreasonable (IMO) game economy of $500,000 of real money per month. This isn't something you can just dick around with.
His punishment was boredom, and... we pay him in "fame"?
gee. How... nice of us. Go rulebreakers, then!
Most of mankinds famous persons are rule breakers. Rosa Parks... Gahndi... Jesus... Martin Luther King... Bonnie and Clyde... The Guy who shot Franz Ferdinand... Monica Lewinski...
Oh wait... Well I don't know if would want to be famous for what Monica did.
Well, she's still famous. *coughs*
But still you aren't going to famous for following the rules of mankind. You have to do something outside the norm rather than being anal retentive old stiffs bitching about people who break the rules.
Do you remember any famous people that are remembered for complaining about people who break rules? And you can't use J. Edgar Hoover because he wore womens underwear at the FBI.
Unless that leader was an impartial robotic AI supercomputer that also happens to be Buddhist that can be impatial and have NPOV to all topics of mankind, then those leaders are going to have POV.
And with those opinionated leaders you are going to get opinionated articles. It is human nature. I hate to be a libertarian here, but you have to let the wiki market decide the articles produced and have no regulation other than the wiki editors of anyone who views the article (and those times when blatant vandalism is going on) or otherwise it aint a wiki anymore and you'd have an over glorified blog.
Wiki works for what it is as a general source of knowledge of the average opinion of mankind. And realize it isn't an end all authoritarian source for topics... Its nothing more than a jumping board for most collective knowledge.
For all those anti-wiki naysayers, quit your bitchin and if you have a better idea lets see you put it online.
he's the respected journalist who wrote an op-ed in USAToday complaining that slanderously wrong information about him was in Wikipedia for four months
You know I'd seriously doubt the compentancy of a journalist who can't find the [Edit] link on a webpage.
FPS type games aren't going to be interesting to an outsider, no matter how you dress it up.. unless, maybe it's something like Battlefield 2-- THAT could possibly work, being somewhat 'relevant' to even the common man.
What would sell this to the common man if they had celebreties that would scream and shout while playing... I hear Robin Williams likes Battlefield 2 and he likes to play as a Sniper
Slashdot Mirror
It wouldn't take much power, could run resource hungry apps via an ssh tunnel to a real box and be and be relatively cheap to produce.
That would require a ubiquitous wireless internet connection everywhere on the planet or maybe FiOS rolled out to everyhome to get the extreme bandwidth needed.
I'm not saying it won't happen, but I'd give it a time frame of 5 years when internet is available on every square inch of the planet. (and that might be an optimistic figure)
With solid state memory, won't you never have to reboot the OS?
Although, I doubt it will be in his key note tomorrow for a new product release, I think Steve Jobs has a plan for something like this. I remember a few years back in either 2000 or 2001 that he discussed boot times and how they wanted to someday get that to 0 because people waste hours (if not days) per year waiting for their computers to boot.
Two reasons I see they are doing this is they know Windows Vista will support something and if they can get their version out the door first and secondly, if they have flash ram built into the system as part of the OS it will be harder to put the newer versions of OS X on non-Mac hardware mostly because the OS expects the flash memory to be there.
Besides, they've got buttloads of Flash to do this already from the Nanos. Chances are this will be in tandem of whatever Intel is doing with their hardware.
But I doubt we will see anything in stores until 2007.
Let's see, 4 hours daily playing game in a lonely room, 8-10 hours sleep, 8 hours work (lol), 2 hours meals. Getting a life: Priceless
24 hours a day playing a game in a crowded room, 10 seconds of sleep between map loads, 5 minutes drinking Red Bull and No-Doze every 12 hours. Dying of heart failure on the way to the bathroom after 96 hours of this: Priceless
When I decry public funding of science, I'm blasted because people say that the free market won't pay for certain research. Now I see a more evil side of it -- and I fear that we'll see more investigations like this if I'm right. What can we do to combat humanity's deep need for self preservation in a scientist having the same human drives, especially when it is funded straight out of our pocket involuntarily?
There can be two sides to this issue.
1. If the research is funded with government money, it can be influenced by politics.
2. If the research is funded with private money, it can be influenced by its investors.
Think of it like a global warming research sponsored by a congressman who is lobbied by an oil company vs a TCO of Windows vs Linux research sponsored by Microsoft.
Both could have potential bias and complications.
Personally, I believe both private and public research can be beneficial. Take DARPA for example. I for one believe DARPA is the shining example of public research gone right. It is backed by public money, but often uses the private sector as a major part of its research. Take the recent Grand Challenge for example.
So I think there is a place for public funding at least to get the ground work. After all, the Manhattan and Apollo Project were publicly funded.
However, if you believe government funded projects are a waste of your tax money, then you can do what I do... Donate to a private non-profit research group that is tax deductible. I realized if I donate enough money to either Wikipedia or the Singularity Institute I could just write off all my taxes next year. Even though I don't get more money than I would have not donating, it means the IRS will have to give me a larger refund, hence putting my money where I want it to go and not where a congressman does.
Why bother investigating?
Anything this guy has ever written should be trashed.
The same could be said about Dr. Josef Mengele who commited far worse atrocities against humanity, but some of the kwoledged gain by his gruesome work is still used today in medical schools albeit as mear reference to the insides of a living being.
One can acheive those kind of things when you are doing live vivisections on human beings.
To throw away knowledge even if it was gained through horrible acts is almost as bad of a sin by trying not to better the world and correct wrongs with that knowledge. Its almost as if you declare those who were damned to this cruel fate, that their suffering and loss means nothing to the living and you are going to throw them away to the trash dump of history without trying to save another human life.
Hopefully the panel will go out and actually try to reproduce his results rather than having a political debate of whether not it is.
His business ethics are questionable, but if there is some truth to this then they should be able to follow a scientific method in order to prove or disprove the falsification of the findings.
You don't see people actually "excited" about a Microsoft event
"Developers!!! Developers!!! Developers!!! Developers!!! Developers!!! Developers!!! Developers!!! Developers!!! Developers... AARRRRGH!"
*throws a chair at the apathetic audience*
Title and summary are completely different.
They were trying to think different.
If we don't believe that those laws are right, then it is up to us the people to motivate our respective politicians to change those laws.
You mean the corporate lobbyists, right? Lord knows the people can't be trusted to make the right decisions when influencing members of congress.
Until then you have to play within the bounds of the laws, or face the consenquences as described by them.
Secondly, laws only apply to those who get caught or can't afford to hide behind a corporate charter or a good lawyer.[/sarcasm]
But seriously, in China the only thing they've got going for them that the US has a serious problem with is that their government isn't setup to be affected by potential abuses by money interests.
It may eventually happen, but they authoritarians usually aren't influenced by money when they control the system. (Although, give me a shoddy special interest pork barrel overkill US system anyday over an authoritarian system)
Ususually when the software and the phrases "life support" or "nuclear weapons" are together in the same sentence.
Are you saying the theory appears likely to be proven valid?
No he means the theory is falsifiable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsifiable
This means it can be proven false which means there is the possibility that it can be proven true.
Rather, if I say there is a Flying Speghetti Monster that created reality 6 seconds ago and that all your memories are created by his all powerful noodley appendage, you have no way to falsify this.
This of course means with Falsibility in play, I have no way to prove that there is FSM...
I'm not normally on the "bash slashdot" bandwagon, but...come on. Since when are completely unsubstantiated claims that it might be possible someday to violate fundamental physical laws news?
Actually, it old news...
Physical laws break down under certain situations. You know... As you get really close to the speed of light or try to look at the singularity of the big bang as it happens or a black hole, you find that your models break down and you have to use something else. Heck that is what baffles most Quantum Physicists today.
Not that I think its going to happen anytime soon, but I'd applaud anyone who actually tries to prove our current models to be false even if they are a crackpot.
Err, what? I hope this is a joke...
Sub-atomic particles are constantly appearing and disapearing all the time in our universe, so could be possible they are going somewhere else, however I don't think a magnetic fields have anything to do with it.
This product shouldn't be called "Raptor". It should be called "Schrodinger".
I dunno about that... Every time I looked inside my hard drive, my data would always die.
No more having to draw maps on the fly and using beer caps for the the orcs.
Hrm... But then again... Having cheetos/dorritos encrusted fingers on this table may be problematic.
How much is this thing going to cost?
[rant] To digress wildly, why are doctors the only breed that give you an appointment after a week and *then* make you wait for 2 hours in the waiting room. Would you take the same shit if it was your carpenter or lawyer? Someone should sue their egotistical asses, i tell you.[/rant]
And I forgot to point out that if your lawyer or carpenter is late, you don't sue them either. You simply get a new lawyer or carpenter. If you doctor, lawyer, or carpenter really screws up something that causes you direct damages then you sue them.
I think your being a bit vindicative here.
In any case, most doctors/researchers have such an inflated ego or god complex that they would not even think twice before trampling an individual's basic human values.
I have never met a doctor that has a god complex. I've seen politicians on TVs who may suffer from this, but most doctors I have met generally respect the patient because they sincerley wish to make them better.
Secondly, an individual basic humans values should not include willfully waste of things that would ease the suffering of other humans. This goes against the teachings of all major religions.
I'm not going to debate whether or not the original cause is moral or not, but the waste of material because someone believes the oringal is wrong is definatley immoral.
So you're saying time outs for children or detention in schools don't work?
Time outs and detention compared to federal prision? What planet are you living on?
If detention in schools was like our prisons we'd have no discipline in any schools whatsover. That and the kids would be smuggling drugs up their ass and looking over their shoulders waiting for someone to track to jab a shank in their back from a toothbrush they made.
If prisons were an orderly system of good conduct and education like high school detention then yeah... It would work and prisoners would be reformed. But obviously, the guards have to wear body armor and do full body cavity searches for a reason.
And yeah thats what I just said about the bannings. I'm not saying it would be a police state because of the exact reason that they would loose customers if they were so ban happy for ban everyone instead of putting him in a quiet room for a while. I'd rather have a game company use orderly time outs than summary bannings anyday.
No. No, it's not.
If tomorrow you awoke to find watching the news in which a fascist/socialist/communist group overthrew the govnerment with the support of the army and declared that all freedoms we once enjoyed were curtailed would you agree or no? Not only that they have outlawed the religion you believe in (whatever it is even if it is aetheism)
Now you are the rule breaker... But what if everyone is now prejudice against you because of what you believe in. It is the same as rascism. People don't hate the color of your skin, they hate your culture... They hate what you believe in... It just so happened that the color of the skin was just an easy reference point for the ignorant to make an assumption on who you were and what you believed in.
People need to realize rules are not always good rulesets (exscuse the pun) for morality. They are hopefully a basis for what we believe to be right and wrong and good and bad, but sometimes those things that we believe in are no longer the rule of law and the rules have to be broken.
That is when the rule breakers become heros in our history.
I'm not really justifying whatever the guy did but... You have to keep in mind that not all rule breakers are bad people and often are the people that we need in our world.
Personally if I worked at Second life, after reading this article I'd perm ban the guy. People like this never learn, until the judge sentences them to life in prison. And policing them is a boring and thankless job, with lots of abuse thrown in.
No. People don't learn anything in prison. If nothing more it teaches them more things they need to learn in order to fuck people over when they get out. My room mates brother when to prision for a while for drugs and when he got out he knew more connections and more methods of getting it when he got out. He ended back in after a while though.
He still hasn't learned his lesson and none of those people do. They just blame the system and keep on doing what they only know to do.
The American prision systems teaches people nothing... Other how to join with the gangs, get more connection and street and learning "street cred knowhow" ( and how to not be bitch at night). Its only good for keeping people off the streets (especially murders forever) and keeping unemployement low.
No one learns there lesson in prison save a handful of people who find jesus before they get the chair.
Secondly, you don't even know what he did. His violation might have been just saying inapropriate language. It would be like a police officer gave a summary execution on the spot when he pulled you over for speading. If you want real life justice in a MMOG you'd need a full time legal system, player lawyers, player jurors, employee judges... And for Christs sake... We don't play MMOGs to have Second Lawsuit Online.
Sheesh... You people need to stop judging least you might end up at the wrong end of the law someday. (Oh well you thought file sharing and circumvention of your own property wasn't wrong? Too bad says the judge! Off to the fudge packer prison plant with you!).
Oh and another reason they may not be so ban happy is becomes some Second life accounts can cost up to $100 + dollars. If someone is paying your company that much income per month you tend to put up with disruptive shit. I've worked for companies who've put up with more for less with their customers.
Sheesh... You'd think with all these anal comments screaming ban the guy, you'd think he wasn't playing a game but stole money from a real life orphanage. Relax... Don't be so vindictive... And play some single player games until you grow a thick skin and sense of humor (and humanity) so you can just laugh these people instead of getting pissed at them 24/7.
I'm not sure leaving people in a cornfield is really such a good idea, since as the article suggests this is almost something to look forward to. Instead, it would make sense to punish users with something they would fear: a loss of stats and/or items.
Punishing people on an online world won't get them to change their behavior.
We have death penalty for murder, but that doesn't stop murders does it? In online games punishment must be education and not vindication because:
1.) The player is playing a game. He has no fear of real life death or personal loss no matter how much you punish them... If you punish painfully it will only piss off the person without getting them to change the errors of their ways.
2.) Punishment by admins makes even behaving players live in fear that they must follow invisible unsaid rules. They no longer play a game, but rather Second Gulag which they report offenses to the Soviet state in hopes of punishing other players (I've seen this in Ultima Online in which two guilds used favors from GMs in order to attempt to ban other players from both sides)
3.) Players are a community and will tell others about the "punishment" and if you piss them off they'll write extensive blogs and wage campaigns on web sites against your company and give you bad publicity. Sure there are limits to this... I mean if you ban a player who constantly destroys the game play experience for other s 24/7 then that is reasonable, but if you start banning for minor offenses then you'll rack up a horde of sympathetic persons who start bad mouthing your gaming company.
Lastly... This is the more important one of all these reasons...
4.) Second life guarentees intellecutal property rights to the things that players create in the game This mean monetary value as well. This maybe a Unique aspect of this MMOG but if you start banning people willy nilly you might over minor things or removing personal property you might get a lawsuit on your hand. Second life has an unreasonable (IMO) game economy of $500,000 of real money per month. This isn't something you can just dick around with.
His punishment was boredom, and... we pay him in "fame"?
gee. How... nice of us. Go rulebreakers, then!
Most of mankinds famous persons are rule breakers. Rosa Parks... Gahndi... Jesus... Martin Luther King... Bonnie and Clyde... The Guy who shot Franz Ferdinand... Monica Lewinski...
Oh wait... Well I don't know if would want to be famous for what Monica did.
Well, she's still famous. *coughs*
But still you aren't going to famous for following the rules of mankind. You have to do something outside the norm rather than being anal retentive old stiffs bitching about people who break the rules.
Do you remember any famous people that are remembered for complaining about people who break rules? And you can't use J. Edgar Hoover because he wore womens underwear at the FBI.
Blame its lack of real leadership.
I think the point was its lack of leadership.
Unless that leader was an impartial robotic AI supercomputer that also happens to be Buddhist that can be impatial and have NPOV to all topics of mankind, then those leaders are going to have POV.
And with those opinionated leaders you are going to get opinionated articles. It is human nature. I hate to be a libertarian here, but you have to let the wiki market decide the articles produced and have no regulation other than the wiki editors of anyone who views the article (and those times when blatant vandalism is going on) or otherwise it aint a wiki anymore and you'd have an over glorified blog.
Wiki works for what it is as a general source of knowledge of the average opinion of mankind. And realize it isn't an end all authoritarian source for topics... Its nothing more than a jumping board for most collective knowledge.
For all those anti-wiki naysayers, quit your bitchin and if you have a better idea lets see you put it online.
he's the respected journalist who wrote an op-ed in USAToday complaining that slanderously wrong information about him was in Wikipedia for four months
You know I'd seriously doubt the compentancy of a journalist who can't find the [Edit] link on a webpage.
FPS type games aren't going to be interesting to an outsider, no matter how you dress it up.. unless, maybe it's something like Battlefield 2-- THAT could possibly work, being somewhat 'relevant' to even the common man.
What would sell this to the common man if they had celebreties that would scream and shout while playing... I hear Robin Williams likes Battlefield 2 and he likes to play as a Sniper