Combining the fingerprint with a physical token sounds like a great idea... assuming you can convince all customers to manipulate that token using only their toes, so as not to leave fingerprints all over it. Its like requiring a password from everyone who presents a credit card to you -- handily recorded on the reverse side of the credit card in case they forget it!
The scary thing is people actually DO that... but thats largely to "prove" physical access to the card in the context of an Internet transaction.
You're right about peak oil, but for God's sakes -- wind, solar, and fusion powering society within five years? How does that get to +5. We haven't sustained a single fusion reaction which had a positive net energy output anywhere, ever, in the history of mankind. Well, OK, we have... but suffice it to say the process takes NIMBY to a whole new level.
You know what the alternative to oil is that will stop the Peak Oil doomsday scenario from occuring? Its... more oil. Saudi Arabia has proven reserves of, what, 200 billion barrels as of two weeks ago (I think they just added another 200 billion). But there is an asterix to that statistic: thats the oil we know about which is economical to extract at the current market price for oil. Every time the price of oil increases a single cent and sustains the increase the world's supply of oil increases -- no, really! It brings in more oil that we couldn't have profitably extracted before. And, after a certain point, that increase eventually activates other sub-optimal technologies (I'm looking at you, solar -- not quite ready for primetime yet but you would be if electricity costed about 125% its current price) or will overcome people's near-religious aversion to nuclear power.
The controls are more like a beat-'em-up action game... than like a fighting game. Comparisons always use "than" . "Then" is for sequences and causation.
"The thing that allows" -- subject and verb should agree, and later in the sentence the thing is a fact, singular.
"lacking"
one character's move list
The thing that showed me just how bad this game is was the IGN review of it; when IGN (normally very producer-biased) gives an EA product a 4.8 out of 10 there is something terribly wrong with it. Semicolon instead of a comma there. Punctuation is your friend.
There is no "special interest" for scam artists, or even really for spammers. Thats why these laws get passed about as frequently as resolutions commemorating new Foreign Legion Posts or peans to Mom's American Apple Pie. And with about as much effect, because the civil legal system is singularly incapable of pinning a real life identity to a phisher and then suing them, regardless of putting redundant laws into place to enable you to do so (you still have, lets see, fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud, and probably a raft of torts to get them with even without Phisher Fraud).
The currency conversion was right into Australian dollars at the Australian newspaper which published it, then the editor or submitted included the US before the $ sign. Check the original link, its not in the article. This apparent extra-special-effort-to-screw-up-the-copy-paste job went unnoticed despite the fact that the name of the paper is The Australian.
Of the price of a $40 game (new) the store makes, what, $25 and the publisher gets closer to $15. On a used game, the publisher gets $0, the store makes $30, and the customer-turned-supplier makes about $5 (or credit with a cash value of about $5). So its easy to see why stores love this system. But where does the value to the customer come from? Its either from the publisher, or from the customer-turned-supplier -- they had the game, and thats all the customer cares about. The store is just a convinient matchmaker for the transaction between has-the-game and wants-the-game. And they take a ginormous cut for that service. Which means that has-the-game has an enormous incentive to be the next Steam/Stardock Games/Wildtangent etc and put their product directly in the hands of the customer, bypassing the middleman and keeping his cut for themselves.
This is also why you see everyone and their mother trying to sell services, not products (WoW subscription = Blizzard collects 100% of $15 a month, War3 box sale = Blizzard collects 30% of boxed price, once, no matter how many times that box changes hands).
I don't know where it was widely heralded as that, since it was a mega-hit in their #1 market and fairly successful worldwide. They had, lets see, 500,000 paying subscribers? Numbers like that easily justify the business case for an MMORPG even if yours doesn't turn out to be WoW.
Now the game had its faults, but I had fun with it for a couple of months. Then came the WoW:)
Yeah, you'll be SO effective at persuading massive numbers of objectors to contribute thousands of dollars to defense funds when they're too cheap to buy songs for 99 cents on iTunes.
[quote]In fact, I'd say that the developers will incorporate user-generated content in the official patch system.[/quote]
Keep dreaming. There isn't a legal department in the country that would sign off on that. Typically, if you send unsolicited ideas to an IP maker they discard them unread just to avoid liability.
Then wouldn't the other half be a failure? Thats like saying I've stopped driving my car because, without fail, one trip in a million causes death. Granted, the other 999,999 were perfectly safe -- but you can count on the deadly trip to be deadly. Its unsurvivable, works every time, consider your ticket punched, etc.
Here is the trouble with that: in the Chinese context, there isn't yet the legal or financial infrastructure to support country-wide deployment of a subscription based service. Outside the coastal big cities access to credit cards and other means of proving identity and automating payment online is too low to permit most players to actually play. Pay per usage, on the other hand, is easy -- you just have the player pay the Internet cafe operator and then collect the charge from him.
Now, they might decide to go the Japanese route. Credit card adoption in Japan is also far below the US, which has resulted in there being a plethora of microcurrencies for use in buying things on the Internet -- you can generally buy them at convinience stores (walk four feet in any direction in Japan and you will hit a convinience store, so this works out fairly well for folks who use it -- I just use my credit card). In the Chinese case, however, investment in making a microcurrency provider is awfully risky -- if someone figures out how to print your microcurrency like they print CD keys thats literally printing money out of your pocket, and there are any number of steps in the distribution chain where they're vulnerable to attack (e.g. at every stage at the Internet, at the end retailer, at the distributor, on the truck from the distributor to the retailer, in the database, etc).
There should be a comma between 'uppity' and 'howling'.
There should be a comma between 'howling' and 'condescending'.
'response' should be 'respond'.
'voila' should be capitalized.
The text should read: 'via [a|the] redundant' OR 'via redundant networks'.
There should be a period after '(tm)'.
This +5 Funny has been brought to you by my six year old cousin, who pointed out that "He should start every sentence with a big letter and end it with a period, question mark, or exclamation point." English isn't even her first language.
53 years after SpamAssassin 17.2 and the Comprehensive Death Penalty for Electronic Terrorism Bill lick unsolicited bulk email for good, historians will be baffled at why Dubya was SO interested in a substance called "v1agr@".
Its all a question of "What threats are you worried about?" I'm going to go out on a limb here: for some people, post it notes on the monitor are perfectly secure. I'm one of them on my home machine, although I don't use them. I live in a crime-free neighborhood in an almost crime-free country (Japan) and my computer is locked in my apartment that a) only I have access to and b) is watched constantly by my lovably nosy Japanese neighbors and c) if someone gains physical access to the computer I'm "#%$"#$&#$ed anyhow because they can do far more damage by stealing all my possessions, including the computer, than by getting past my boot screen to be able to, uh, play my iTunes collection and access the Internet. My security threat is that someone compromises my computer or, more likely, one or more of the hundred or so services I have a logon with remotely. So long as the password is good enough to defeat that threat, it doesn't matter if its on my monitor -- I've been thinking of just making a list of very strong passwords and putting them up in my room, because this would let me be a lot more secure than I am at the moment (a small number of passwords repeated among dozens of sites, segregated by amount of damage disclosure could cause me).
Same with my work machine. We were, until this year (when our company added an Information Security practice and decided our old model was not exactly a compelling advertisement for the practice), ridiculously lax on password standards. Default passwords were you username, which was your first or last name, and they were used by probably 80% of the company. This would have been fairly disastrous, if it weren't for the fact that we're in a Japanese office and you can't get three centimeters inside the door without being noticed by 175 people and accosted by either a security guard or a secretary. (Our network security, on the other hand, compares favorably to my old job with an American TLA)
How many users EVER have to choose operating systems, though? For most users for which this is going to be a problem, they'll get "Whatever Dell includes with the model". You buy their gratuitously overpriced gaming rig, you get Windows extreme, otherwise you get Windows Basic with an optional $50 upgrade to Windows Advanced, which is explained with a little pop-up window (click the question mark to hear "Buy this for $50 or $2 a month -- its like Windows, except better integration with your DVD drive, etc").
For corporate buyers, they're only going to be picking between two editions, and they've got professionals to advise them. And if they didn't, they could bend the ear of salesman to "customize a solution which is responsive to their needs" or some other flimflam.
Aside from your solution being squarely in the realm of science fiction at the moment, while folks need hands now, people with disabilities don't want to screamed at every time they look down that they're something other than human (they get that enough from other people, sad but true). The hand is an assistive technology, true, but the goal should be that it "just works" and does so as unobtrusively as possible, so that it doesn't stick out any more than, say, glasses, contacts, cochlear implants, or hearing aids. Having your hand appear the consistency of frying eggs when attempting to pick up your glass at dinner time does not fulfill this important design goal.
Other than just being right, I have no facts to back up my claim. I can give you examples of authorities on the subject who mention that my facts are actually facts, if thats what you're looking for. Like the Bureau of Labor Statistics, for example (thats a Google de-PDFization). They describe in detail the exceptions to the general employment at-will assumption ("public policy", "implied contract", and "covenant of good faith and fair dealing" -- note this third one is the most favorable to the employee and is only accepted in 11 states, while the broadest exception, public policy, is accepted almost everywhere but it just covers the minor excluded cases I've already talked about).
Or do your own favorite Google for employment at-will.
From: Nugent, Katrina
Subject: My lunch...
Yesterday I put my lunch in the fridge on Level 19 which included a packet of ham, some cheese slices and two slices of bread which was going to be for my lunch today.
Over night it has gone missing and as I have no spare money to buy another lunch today, I would appreciate being reimbursed for it.
From: Bird, Melinda
Sent: Thursday, 1 September 2005 9:55 AM
Subject: RE: My lunch...
Katrina
There are items fitting your exact description in the level 20 fridge. Are you sure you didn't place your lunch in the wrong fridge yesterday?
Regards
Melinda
From: Nugent, Katrina
To: Bird, Melinda
Subject:
Melinda
Probably best you don't reply to all next time, would be annoyed to the lawyers.
The kitchen was not doing dinner last night, so obviously someone has helped themselves to my lunch.
Really sweet of you to investigate for me!
Katrina Nugent
From: Bird, Melinda
To: Nugent, Katrina
Subject: RE:
Katrina
Since I used to be a float and am still on the level 19 email list I couldn't help but receive your ridiculous email - lucky me!
You use our kitchen all the time for some unknown reason and I saw the items you mentioned in the fridge so naturally thought you may have placed them in the wrong fridge.
Thanks I know I'm sweet and I only had your best interests at heart. Now as you would say, "BYE"!
Regards
Melinda
From: Nugent, Katrina
To: Bird, Melinda
Subject: RE:
I'm not blonde!!!
From: Bird, Melinda
To: Nugent, Katrina
Subject: RE:
Being a brunette doesn't mean you're smart though!
From: Nugent, Katrina
To: Bird, Melinda
Subject: RE:
I definitely wouldn't trade places with you for "the world"!
-----Original Message-----
From: Bird, Melinda
Sent: Thursday, 1 September 2005 10:19 AM
To: Nugent, Katrina
Subject: RE:
I wouldn't trade places with you for the world...I don't want your figure!
From: Nugent, Katrina
To: Bird, Melinda
Subject: RE:
Let's not get person "Miss Can't Keep A Boyfriend".
I am in a happy relationship, have a beautiful apartment, brand new car, high pay job...say no more!!
From: Bird, Melinda
To: Nugent, Katrina
Subject: RE:
Oh my God I'm laughing! happy relationship (you have been with so many guys), beautiful apartment (so what), brand new car (me too), high pay job (I earn more)....say plenty more.....I have five guys at the moment! haha.
From: fellow staff member 1
ok this is the last one, it's getting too intense
By the way, Slashdot, I hate you for not allowing me to quote this vapid tripe properly because of that stupid "your comment has too characters per line" message. Now I have to just continue to pad this paragraph out to get past the lameness filter. Pad pad pad. And more padding.
Slashdot Mirror
The scary thing is people actually DO that... but thats largely to "prove" physical access to the card in the context of an Internet transaction.
You know what the alternative to oil is that will stop the Peak Oil doomsday scenario from occuring? Its... more oil. Saudi Arabia has proven reserves of, what, 200 billion barrels as of two weeks ago (I think they just added another 200 billion). But there is an asterix to that statistic: thats the oil we know about which is economical to extract at the current market price for oil. Every time the price of oil increases a single cent and sustains the increase the world's supply of oil increases -- no, really! It brings in more oil that we couldn't have profitably extracted before. And, after a certain point, that increase eventually activates other sub-optimal technologies (I'm looking at you, solar -- not quite ready for primetime yet but you would be if electricity costed about 125% its current price) or will overcome people's near-religious aversion to nuclear power.
"a lot", not allot.
The controls are more like a beat-'em-up action game ... than like a fighting game. Comparisons always use "than" . "Then" is for sequences and causation.
"The thing that allows" -- subject and verb should agree, and later in the sentence the thing is a fact, singular.
"lacking"
one character's move list
The thing that showed me just how bad this game is was the IGN review of it; when IGN (normally very producer-biased) gives an EA product a 4.8 out of 10 there is something terribly wrong with it. Semicolon instead of a comma there. Punctuation is your friend.
I think that about covers it.
There is no "special interest" for scam artists, or even really for spammers. Thats why these laws get passed about as frequently as resolutions commemorating new Foreign Legion Posts or peans to Mom's American Apple Pie. And with about as much effect, because the civil legal system is singularly incapable of pinning a real life identity to a phisher and then suing them, regardless of putting redundant laws into place to enable you to do so (you still have, lets see, fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud, and probably a raft of torts to get them with even without Phisher Fraud).
The currency conversion was right into Australian dollars at the Australian newspaper which published it, then the editor or submitted included the US before the $ sign. Check the original link, its not in the article. This apparent extra-special-effort-to-screw-up-the-copy-paste job went unnoticed despite the fact that the name of the paper is The Australian.
This is also why you see everyone and their mother trying to sell services, not products (WoW subscription = Blizzard collects 100% of $15 a month, War3 box sale = Blizzard collects 30% of boxed price, once, no matter how many times that box changes hands).
Now the game had its faults, but I had fun with it for a couple of months. Then came the WoW :)
Hmm... Space marine... vampires! New genre!
Yeah, you'll be SO effective at persuading massive numbers of objectors to contribute thousands of dollars to defense funds when they're too cheap to buy songs for 99 cents on iTunes.
Keep dreaming. There isn't a legal department in the country that would sign off on that. Typically, if you send unsolicited ideas to an IP maker they discard them unread just to avoid liability.
Then wouldn't the other half be a failure? Thats like saying I've stopped driving my car because, without fail, one trip in a million causes death. Granted, the other 999,999 were perfectly safe -- but you can count on the deadly trip to be deadly. Its unsurvivable, works every time, consider your ticket punched, etc.
Now, they might decide to go the Japanese route. Credit card adoption in Japan is also far below the US, which has resulted in there being a plethora of microcurrencies for use in buying things on the Internet -- you can generally buy them at convinience stores (walk four feet in any direction in Japan and you will hit a convinience store, so this works out fairly well for folks who use it -- I just use my credit card). In the Chinese case, however, investment in making a microcurrency provider is awfully risky -- if someone figures out how to print your microcurrency like they print CD keys thats literally printing money out of your pocket, and there are any number of steps in the distribution chain where they're vulnerable to attack (e.g. at every stage at the Internet, at the end retailer, at the distributor, on the truck from the distributor to the retailer, in the database, etc).
There should be a comma between 'howling' and 'condescending'.
'response' should be 'respond'.
'voila' should be capitalized.
The text should read: 'via [a|the] redundant' OR 'via redundant networks'.
There should be a period after '(tm)'.
This +5 Funny has been brought to you by my six year old cousin, who pointed out that "He should start every sentence with a big letter and end it with a period, question mark, or exclamation point." English isn't even her first language.
53 years after SpamAssassin 17.2 and the Comprehensive Death Penalty for Electronic Terrorism Bill lick unsolicited bulk email for good, historians will be baffled at why Dubya was SO interested in a substance called "v1agr@".
Same with my work machine. We were, until this year (when our company added an Information Security practice and decided our old model was not exactly a compelling advertisement for the practice), ridiculously lax on password standards. Default passwords were you username, which was your first or last name, and they were used by probably 80% of the company. This would have been fairly disastrous, if it weren't for the fact that we're in a Japanese office and you can't get three centimeters inside the door without being noticed by 175 people and accosted by either a security guard or a secretary. (Our network security, on the other hand, compares favorably to my old job with an American TLA)
For corporate buyers, they're only going to be picking between two editions, and they've got professionals to advise them. And if they didn't, they could bend the ear of salesman to "customize a solution which is responsive to their needs" or some other flimflam.
Will Slashdot let me escape the lameness filter with ?
Thats what I get for repeating a security bulletin without testing it, I suppose.
Unfortunately (?), Slashdot autorepairs the URL in a way which defeats the attack. But you can still see an example of it at his website.
Don't click me, I will crash your browser session!
Soviet Russia Patents You
Aside from your solution being squarely in the realm of science fiction at the moment, while folks need hands now, people with disabilities don't want to screamed at every time they look down that they're something other than human (they get that enough from other people, sad but true). The hand is an assistive technology, true, but the goal should be that it "just works" and does so as unobtrusively as possible, so that it doesn't stick out any more than, say, glasses, contacts, cochlear implants, or hearing aids. Having your hand appear the consistency of frying eggs when attempting to pick up your glass at dinner time does not fulfill this important design goal.
(I'm actually a Republican, but kicking Cheney around is good bi-partisan fun.)
Or do your own favorite Google for employment at-will.