Re:Doesn't it strike you as a bit odd
on
Xbox 360 Very Unstable
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· Score: 3, Insightful
Obviously they would have caught errors on this scale in testing. This must have been a manufacturing error, not a design error.
That still doesn't let them off the hook. They are responsible for their quality control too. But I imagine they will iron this out shortly and offer full exchanges on returned units. Sony had similar issues with flimsy PSP's at launch too.
I'm totally with you on this one. I had more than my fair share of major issues with VIA's hardware on a few different platforms. I avoid their products whenever possible.
While I am not going to undermine the importance of story, I do have to add that original design is also very important. As much as I hate to admit it, the fact that Pixar's movies are in 3-D plays a big role in how large an audience their movies get. Disney's early successes had much to do with technical and design innovation. People are curious and they want to see something new. These days, the Disney look was getting a bit stale, and I'm not sure just fixing their storytelling alone would have improved things much.
So, while I think Disney has been amazingly shortsighted by completely closing down it's 2D animation unit, it should be clear to anyone that they needed to put way more emphasis on 3D techniques. No modern animation studio can survive without a strong 3D system.
However, their hamfisted way of moving into 3D deserves all the derision it can get. They destroyed not just a department, but an established development program that took decades to establish. People spent their entire careers developing their skills at Disney. John Lasseter, Tim Burton and many other awesome animators and directors grew out of the Disney program. And Disney scuttled it for a short term grab at a popular style. It was an amazingly retarded decision and I don't know if they will every recover from it.
Pixar on the other hand, has done everything right. The company is a University and the employees are immersed in a culture of shared knowledge. Artists can take free classes in any number of artistic disciplines. It wouldn't suprise me at all if, in a couple years, we actually see Pixar release a 2-D animated film (in as much as the term means anything at that point) with more traditionally drawn frames. And while Disney gets the easy credit for distributing the Miyazaki films, it has been John Lasseter at Pixar who has championed them, and it was Pixar who handled the english version of 'Howl's Moving Castle.'
Honestly, I don't see why this is news. This is virtually how ALL comic artists and companies came into exsistence. The great thing about comics is that they are relatively cheap to produce (not including the time required to write and draw them). Almost ALL comic book companies started as small independent publishers "bucking the system." What makes these companies big is the quality of their content. And certainly, there are a LOT of crappy comics out there. But there are a good number of small, quality comics publishers out there, and new ones are created every day. Popular indie favorites are Top Shelf, Monkeysuit, Dark Horse, and Fantagraphics, among others. In June, check out the MoCCA show in NYC, or the SPX show in September, for two big conventions celebrating indie comic publishers. The overall level of quality never ceases to amaze me.
This is a poorly argued point even for Dvorak. Whether or not the buy-out is a good move for Adobe, the idea that they would pay 3.4 bil for a company just to avoid Microsoft is fairly ludicrous.
And his assertion that Flash is the program that "powers those annoying web animations" is about as stupid as saying Photoshop is responsible for "those dumb pictures."
Personally, I am excited about the prospect of Adobe developing Macromedia's assets. Much of Macromedia's products never hit their targets squarely, neither designers nor developers. The artistic feature set of Flash never radically grew from the state it was in when it was called "FutureSplash" when Macromedia bought it, and as a development platform it underperformed.
Adobe certainly has it's fair share of duds in it's portfolio but they have nicely developed their bedrock products, version after version. Some may complain about bloat in Photoshop, but I can say as someone who uses it every day that their feature set is well thought out. And it remains one of the most elegant pieces of software ever assembled. Perhaps Illustrator, Premiere Pro, and After Effects haven't developed as quickly as some would like, but they remain excellent pieces of software. And Adobe has managed to update them smartly.
It remains to be seen as to whether they can manage web design and development as well as video and print, but I am excited as to the prospects of making even better dumb web animations.
I was thinking along the same lines...
Yesterday Dhaos made the argument that "common carrier" status protected ISP's from being prosecuted based upon the content of their users traffic, and that it would be unlikely that they would sign any agreement with the RIAA that would compromise that.
Would blocking zombied computers also jeopardize this status? Certainly if they are aware that traffic coming from a particular computer was spam they could also tell if it was illegally traded copyrighted material?
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Obviously they would have caught errors on this scale in testing. This must have been a manufacturing error, not a design error. That still doesn't let them off the hook. They are responsible for their quality control too. But I imagine they will iron this out shortly and offer full exchanges on returned units. Sony had similar issues with flimsy PSP's at launch too.
I'm totally with you on this one. I had more than my fair share of major issues with VIA's hardware on a few different platforms. I avoid their products whenever possible.
Seriously. Congratulations. That was a hard fought victory. They totally derserve it.
Steve Ballmer is so mean he once threw a chair at a man just for snorin' too loud!
- no more piracy - unfettered development - destroy Windows - sell hardware? It's the last one that's a tough nut to crack.
I don't think the future will play out so artfully. It'll be more like a crappy movie like this http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0164184/
The story ITSELF should have been modded +5 Troll before the first post.
While I am not going to undermine the importance of story, I do have to add that original design is also very important. As much as I hate to admit it, the fact that Pixar's movies are in 3-D plays a big role in how large an audience their movies get. Disney's early successes had much to do with technical and design innovation. People are curious and they want to see something new. These days, the Disney look was getting a bit stale, and I'm not sure just fixing their storytelling alone would have improved things much.
So, while I think Disney has been amazingly shortsighted by completely closing down it's 2D animation unit, it should be clear to anyone that they needed to put way more emphasis on 3D techniques. No modern animation studio can survive without a strong 3D system.
However, their hamfisted way of moving into 3D deserves all the derision it can get. They destroyed not just a department, but an established development program that took decades to establish. People spent their entire careers developing their skills at Disney. John Lasseter, Tim Burton and many other awesome animators and directors grew out of the Disney program. And Disney scuttled it for a short term grab at a popular style. It was an amazingly retarded decision and I don't know if they will every recover from it.
Pixar on the other hand, has done everything right. The company is a University and the employees are immersed in a culture of shared knowledge. Artists can take free classes in any number of artistic disciplines. It wouldn't suprise me at all if, in a couple years, we actually see Pixar release a 2-D animated film (in as much as the term means anything at that point) with more traditionally drawn frames. And while Disney gets the easy credit for distributing the Miyazaki films, it has been John Lasseter at Pixar who has championed them, and it was Pixar who handled the english version of 'Howl's Moving Castle.'
Honestly, I don't see why this is news. This is virtually how ALL comic artists and companies came into exsistence. The great thing about comics is that they are relatively cheap to produce (not including the time required to write and draw them). Almost ALL comic book companies started as small independent publishers "bucking the system." What makes these companies big is the quality of their content. And certainly, there are a LOT of crappy comics out there. But there are a good number of small, quality comics publishers out there, and new ones are created every day. Popular indie favorites are Top Shelf, Monkeysuit, Dark Horse, and Fantagraphics, among others. In June, check out the MoCCA show in NYC, or the SPX show in September, for two big conventions celebrating indie comic publishers. The overall level of quality never ceases to amaze me.
This is a poorly argued point even for Dvorak. Whether or not the buy-out is a good move for Adobe, the idea that they would pay 3.4 bil for a company just to avoid Microsoft is fairly ludicrous. And his assertion that Flash is the program that "powers those annoying web animations" is about as stupid as saying Photoshop is responsible for "those dumb pictures." Personally, I am excited about the prospect of Adobe developing Macromedia's assets. Much of Macromedia's products never hit their targets squarely, neither designers nor developers. The artistic feature set of Flash never radically grew from the state it was in when it was called "FutureSplash" when Macromedia bought it, and as a development platform it underperformed. Adobe certainly has it's fair share of duds in it's portfolio but they have nicely developed their bedrock products, version after version. Some may complain about bloat in Photoshop, but I can say as someone who uses it every day that their feature set is well thought out. And it remains one of the most elegant pieces of software ever assembled. Perhaps Illustrator, Premiere Pro, and After Effects haven't developed as quickly as some would like, but they remain excellent pieces of software. And Adobe has managed to update them smartly. It remains to be seen as to whether they can manage web design and development as well as video and print, but I am excited as to the prospects of making even better dumb web animations.
I was thinking along the same lines... Yesterday Dhaos made the argument that "common carrier" status protected ISP's from being prosecuted based upon the content of their users traffic, and that it would be unlikely that they would sign any agreement with the RIAA that would compromise that. Would blocking zombied computers also jeopardize this status? Certainly if they are aware that traffic coming from a particular computer was spam they could also tell if it was illegally traded copyrighted material?