As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.
Commissioner Pravin Lal
"U.N. Declaration of Rights"
(To be precise)
I think we're going about this all wrong. Violent videogames aren't a PROBLEM, they are the SOLUTION -- people are just playing them in the wrong mental state. In middle school, we should just feed kids small doses of LSD, amphetamines, and pain/stress inducing agents, then FORCE them to play things like GTA. That'd cure that yearning for a bit of the ol' Ultraviolence, I tell ya.
Of course, god have mercy on the poor child who acidentally starts playing Mario instead...
Unfortunately, then you are responsible for carrying with you a 10-60 MW microwave transmitter (which must be considered disposable), so you might as well have just built a giant atomic rocket.
Actually, come to think of it, I am pro-atomic rocket across the board. I can't imagine it'd be much more dangerous for the crew than blasting them with a few megaWatts microwaves for a few hours each day...
A lot of the complaints I've read are about the lack of interactiveness of the 3D-mode windows, and how that severely degrades it's usefulness. This is all very true, and a valid criticism, but I imagine that problem will likely evaporate once Longhorn hits machines, as it uses a true 3D interface (Direct3D) as it's core rendering layer instead of the current buggy, limited, anachronistic GDI used by Windows OS' since Win 3.1.
Given that the windows become fully interactive, this may actually become a resonable interface system. Though windows become stretched and distorted as the 3D mapping warps them across the screen, the important part here is that they are navigable and visible. The area upon which the huuman fovia can actually focus is really a small percentage of our visual range, and this becomes even more useful as the size of monitors increases.
What I'd really like to see, though, is sort of an inverted version of this -- a "pin-cushion" projection, where you parameterize the entire sphere (or hemisphere) so that it fits on your desktop. Imagine a system where whatever window(s) which is(are) active or pinned are at almost full screen in the center, while the inactive ones are squashed into the sides, corners, etc. Selecting one of those inactive windows is as wasy as just moving your mouse to the edge and clicking on it, which causes it to expand out of the boarder and squash the formerly foreground window back onto the other side of the screen. If this were implemented well it could really replace the entire "toolbar" paradigm currently in use.
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As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master. Commissioner Pravin Lal "U.N. Declaration of Rights" (To be precise)
I think we're going about this all wrong. Violent videogames aren't a PROBLEM, they are the SOLUTION -- people are just playing them in the wrong mental state. In middle school, we should just feed kids small doses of LSD, amphetamines, and pain/stress inducing agents, then FORCE them to play things like GTA. That'd cure that yearning for a bit of the ol' Ultraviolence, I tell ya. Of course, god have mercy on the poor child who acidentally starts playing Mario instead...
Unfortunately, then you are responsible for carrying with you a 10-60 MW microwave transmitter (which must be considered disposable), so you might as well have just built a giant atomic rocket. Actually, come to think of it, I am pro-atomic rocket across the board. I can't imagine it'd be much more dangerous for the crew than blasting them with a few megaWatts microwaves for a few hours each day...
A lot of the complaints I've read are about the lack of interactiveness of the 3D-mode windows, and how that severely degrades it's usefulness. This is all very true, and a valid criticism, but I imagine that problem will likely evaporate once Longhorn hits machines, as it uses a true 3D interface (Direct3D) as it's core rendering layer instead of the current buggy, limited, anachronistic GDI used by Windows OS' since Win 3.1. Given that the windows become fully interactive, this may actually become a resonable interface system. Though windows become stretched and distorted as the 3D mapping warps them across the screen, the important part here is that they are navigable and visible. The area upon which the huuman fovia can actually focus is really a small percentage of our visual range, and this becomes even more useful as the size of monitors increases. What I'd really like to see, though, is sort of an inverted version of this -- a "pin-cushion" projection, where you parameterize the entire sphere (or hemisphere) so that it fits on your desktop. Imagine a system where whatever window(s) which is(are) active or pinned are at almost full screen in the center, while the inactive ones are squashed into the sides, corners, etc. Selecting one of those inactive windows is as wasy as just moving your mouse to the edge and clicking on it, which causes it to expand out of the boarder and squash the formerly foreground window back onto the other side of the screen. If this were implemented well it could really replace the entire "toolbar" paradigm currently in use.