I'm not sure how Americans see this, but I can usually predict the end of American movies while European or Asian movies are much more unpredictable. So yeah, you know, if in an American movie there's a male and a female character you know what's going to happen. There are exceptions of course, e.g. LOTR (but then again, Tolkien wasn't really an American).
That's not really fair, nor accurate. Big budget movies, aimed to appeal to as many people as possible (and most often in the cases of blockbusters, that means 14 year olds) do have a very predictable plot.
Smaller budget movies tend to have better stories and unpredictable plot. There's plenty of US made movies that have excellent stories, writing, acting and directing. Indeed probably the best movies made currently are US independent ones.
European movies almost never have enough budget to have large focus groups and test audiences ruin the plot with something predictable. The few movies that do have large budgets tend to have very predictable plots. There's plenty of well-funded EU movies that are utter crap.
It's also worth remembering too that many, if not most US big budget studio movies are actually funded by Germans, or consortiums that include plenty of Europeans. To describe them as US isn't entirely accurate. Avatar's production company is Fox, which is owned by an Australian.
I am not going to vote with my pocketbook that plot, craft, and character development don't matter, and that all that matters is effects.
As a cinematographer, I'm not going to see it either. I have no interest in VFX movies, all the chromakey work on them is far too boring to work on -- it completely limits what the camera can do (as well as what actors can do, very few work well with chromakey).
VFX based movies are not filmmaking -- it's working in an office job. I got into movies to be on set, to do creative things with light. VFX kills all of that stone dead.
By all accounts I've read or heard the story and acting in this film is very poor -- it's just VFX porn with 3D smurfs. I can look at a computer game if I wanted that.
The work he did on Alien is amazing. I think it remains the best-written screenplay I've ever seen. Not so much about the story, but the way in which it is written.
If anyone out there is interested in writing for the screen, find a copy of Alien and study it. It's a minimalist masterpiece, only the absolutely necessary words are there to describe scenes. That sounds simple and obvious, but it's really very rare indeed. Most screenwriters tend to add too much description and direction.
Can this order really be enforced? What country's laws is Wikipedia bound by?
The order can't be enforced, as the Wiki Foundation is based in Florida. However, if you RTFA it says the Wiki Foundation has already caved in and agreed to reveal the IP address.
Which is great news for anyone in somewhere like China "anonymously" editing Wikipedia. Doing so could easily cost you your life if it's The Wiki Foundation's whim to expose you to your Government that day.
There's at least some possibility that this isn't a blackmailer but a whistleblower. Just another reason to question the practices of what goes on in the Wiki Foundation. Just another potential blow to truth at the hands of Wikipedia.
I could start martial arts training or yoga, but Wikipedia is much more available.
I think as a deletionist, you'd probably be better off learning a martial art. Chances are if you ever admit in public that you are a wikiadmin, you ARE going to need those martial arts skills pretty quickly.
I wonder when the first wikipedia related murder will occur. There must be a large (and ever-growing) number of people that would love to meet a wikiadmin somewhere dark, without witnesses.
Hmm, I wonder if this is more a publicity stunt in relation with their current funds drive?
Yes, that's definitely very insightful. For the past few years, in November and December, wikipedia does its annual scrounging for more money -- and oddly there's been a rash of wikipedia-related articles at the same time. Sometimes pro, sometimes negative. But bad publicity is still publicity and still part of the marketing machine.
Hmmm... no wikipedia articles for weeks, if not months, and as soon as the begging cap comes out, out come the articles. Yep, Jimmy Wales may be many things, but sure he knows how to make a buck.
Wales states that there's a drive for more accuracy -- hence the rules. The problem is that wikiadmins are not interested in precision. Protected articles may well be accurate as perceived by their agenda and groupthink, but that does not mean they are precise, nor necessarily true.
The rise and power of the wikiadmins was always going to sound the death knell for truth. It just seems to be happening faster than many expected.
No kidding! Mars, space amazon girls, and a load of fun, what's not to like. Plus, it gets Harold off the tedious yawn-fest soap opera that is Flashforward and back into doing good work.
This does not seem to be a good thing. I find that Google already brings up far too much noise in the form of forum posts. All this does is add a whole new level of noise.
I dare say Demi Moore will find this useful, but I do not want this at all. I guess I now have to add a "-twitter" along with the "-ebay -amazon -wikipedia", etc qualifiers in order to actually find something of value.
Email is useful for formal communication, for a long term record of something -- e.g. for CYA. It is also possible to get some work done by only checking mail at certain points of the day.
IM, Twitter, Facebook etc really are of very limited use in a business situation -- they are slower and clumsier than a phone conversation or face to face. Probably useful in situations where no phone is available (or VOIP for international calls) or for quick mass distributed maessages, but other than that they are inferior communication systems -- people just like them, that's all.
Nothing kills productivity more than IM. I'm astonished that businesses use it, it makes very little sense.
That's absolutely right. Twitter had nothing of consequence to do this whatsoever. This article is just Twitter's insidious marketing dept trying to cash in (again).
The Guardian newspaper actually tried to create the Streisand Effect here. They got a tame MP to table a question in Parliament to expose what was happening. They effectively challenged the libel lawyers to try and stop the reporting of it. And of course the lawyers fell for it. Pretty neat stitch up.
The Guardian then leaked it to the international press and prominent bloggers -- such as Guido Fawkes. Sure people reported it on Twitter too, especially Stephen Fry who is a sock puppet for the Guardian and the left wing, but it wasn't the tweets that changed anything, it was the International press and the reaction in Parliament.
What most of us want is NO ADS. They're annoying, distracting and whole purpose for being is to manipulate people.
Actually... no, not exactly. There are ads people like: the Aflac duck ones, for example. The problem is that advertisers are for the most part, a talentless bunch of hacks. And a bunch of hacks that have no ethics whatsoever. Why society has tolerated them for so long remains a complete mystery to me. I've never met an advertising exec, but I'd really love to -- not sure he'd enjoy it though.
It's perfectly possible to produce ads that entertain and inform people. There's actually absolutely no need to distract, deceive, manipulate, nor irritate.
But yes... targeting is unacceptable in most circumstances, unless the ad is targeted to specific groups of people enjoying a particular activity -- car ads during sports games or on sports websites for example. (though car ads are actually some of the most irritating, almost all of those involve lies.) Targeting individuals should be a criminal offense.
Slashdot Mirror
The Clangers home world!
250% of what? 1? 10? 10,000?
Let's not use hyperbole like "skyrocketed" without actual numbers shall we? Even skim read TFA, don't see the actual numbers there either.
Smells like astroturf. Smells a LOT like astroturf.
I've nothing against Android, but I've never ever seen anyone with a phone that uses it. Have, however, seen 100s with iphones.
... is the only "Dancing with the Stars" I'd ever want to see.
I had thought that since "idle" was one of /.'s worst discoveries of 2009, that it would no longer be around in 2010.
Sadly, this seems not to be the case.
That's not really fair, nor accurate. Big budget movies, aimed to appeal to as many people as possible (and most often in the cases of blockbusters, that means 14 year olds) do have a very predictable plot.
Smaller budget movies tend to have better stories and unpredictable plot. There's plenty of US made movies that have excellent stories, writing, acting and directing. Indeed probably the best movies made currently are US independent ones.
European movies almost never have enough budget to have large focus groups and test audiences ruin the plot with something predictable. The few movies that do have large budgets tend to have very predictable plots. There's plenty of well-funded EU movies that are utter crap.
It's also worth remembering too that many, if not most US big budget studio movies are actually funded by Germans, or consortiums that include plenty of Europeans. To describe them as US isn't entirely accurate. Avatar's production company is Fox, which is owned by an Australian.
Did someone just say "Jehovah"?
As a cinematographer, I'm not going to see it either. I have no interest in VFX movies, all the chromakey work on them is far too boring to work on -- it completely limits what the camera can do (as well as what actors can do, very few work well with chromakey).
VFX based movies are not filmmaking -- it's working in an office job. I got into movies to be on set, to do creative things with light. VFX kills all of that stone dead.
By all accounts I've read or heard the story and acting in this film is very poor -- it's just VFX porn with 3D smurfs. I can look at a computer game if I wanted that.
Of the average /.er's face, admittedly no, no thanks... however, as always with new technology, just think of the porn possibilities!!!
You've obviously never owned a Ford. I'd be willing to bet current wireless standards will be around longer than most new Fords.
The work he did on Alien is amazing. I think it remains the best-written screenplay I've ever seen. Not so much about the story, but the way in which it is written.
If anyone out there is interested in writing for the screen, find a copy of Alien and study it. It's a minimalist masterpiece, only the absolutely necessary words are there to describe scenes. That sounds simple and obvious, but it's really very rare indeed. Most screenwriters tend to add too much description and direction.
The order can't be enforced, as the Wiki Foundation is based in Florida. However, if you RTFA it says the Wiki Foundation has already caved in and agreed to reveal the IP address.
Which is great news for anyone in somewhere like China "anonymously" editing Wikipedia. Doing so could easily cost you your life if it's The Wiki Foundation's whim to expose you to your Government that day.
There's at least some possibility that this isn't a blackmailer but a whistleblower. Just another reason to question the practices of what goes on in the Wiki Foundation. Just another potential blow to truth at the hands of Wikipedia.
I think as a deletionist, you'd probably be better off learning a martial art. Chances are if you ever admit in public that you are a wikiadmin, you ARE going to need those martial arts skills pretty quickly.
I wonder when the first wikipedia related murder will occur. There must be a large (and ever-growing) number of people that would love to meet a wikiadmin somewhere dark, without witnesses.
Yes, that's definitely very insightful. For the past few years, in November and December, wikipedia does its annual scrounging for more money -- and oddly there's been a rash of wikipedia-related articles at the same time. Sometimes pro, sometimes negative. But bad publicity is still publicity and still part of the marketing machine.
Hmmm... no wikipedia articles for weeks, if not months, and as soon as the begging cap comes out, out come the articles. Yep, Jimmy Wales may be many things, but sure he knows how to make a buck.
Wales states that there's a drive for more accuracy -- hence the rules. The problem is that wikiadmins are not interested in precision. Protected articles may well be accurate as perceived by their agenda and groupthink, but that does not mean they are precise, nor necessarily true.
The rise and power of the wikiadmins was always going to sound the death knell for truth. It just seems to be happening faster than many expected.
Chinese, really? It translates things into a non-existent language? Maybe it can translate into Indian some day too.
6. The ability to walk in a straight line.
I'm SO sick of being bumped into every minute of every day in the city center.
The article was posted by samzenpus. All his articles belong in idle -- or better yet, digg or some other website.
No kidding! Mars, space amazon girls, and a load of fun, what's not to like. Plus, it gets Harold off the tedious yawn-fest soap opera that is Flashforward and back into doing good work.
...I use a Mac. How is it possible that it is in its 4th version, but there's still no Mac version of the browser?
This is like the situation with Google Earth which only eventually showed up in a Mac version a few years after the Windows version.
This does not seem to be a good thing. I find that Google already brings up far too much noise in the form of forum posts. All this does is add a whole new level of noise.
I dare say Demi Moore will find this useful, but I do not want this at all. I guess I now have to add a "-twitter" along with the "-ebay -amazon -wikipedia", etc qualifiers in order to actually find something of value.
"First Public White-Space Network Is Alive"
I think you mean "live". If it's "alive" we have some real problems ahead of us.
Absolutely right.
Email is useful for formal communication, for a long term record of something -- e.g. for CYA. It is also possible to get some work done by only checking mail at certain points of the day.
IM, Twitter, Facebook etc really are of very limited use in a business situation -- they are slower and clumsier than a phone conversation or face to face. Probably useful in situations where no phone is available (or VOIP for international calls) or for quick mass distributed maessages, but other than that they are inferior communication systems -- people just like them, that's all.
Nothing kills productivity more than IM. I'm astonished that businesses use it, it makes very little sense.
That's absolutely right. Twitter had nothing of consequence to do this whatsoever. This article is just Twitter's insidious marketing dept trying to cash in (again).
The Guardian newspaper actually tried to create the Streisand Effect here. They got a tame MP to table a question in Parliament to expose what was happening. They effectively challenged the libel lawyers to try and stop the reporting of it. And of course the lawyers fell for it. Pretty neat stitch up.
The Guardian then leaked it to the international press and prominent bloggers -- such as Guido Fawkes. Sure people reported it on Twitter too, especially Stephen Fry who is a sock puppet for the Guardian and the left wing, but it wasn't the tweets that changed anything, it was the International press and the reaction in Parliament.
Actually... no, not exactly. There are ads people like: the Aflac duck ones, for example. The problem is that advertisers are for the most part, a talentless bunch of hacks. And a bunch of hacks that have no ethics whatsoever. Why society has tolerated them for so long remains a complete mystery to me. I've never met an advertising exec, but I'd really love to -- not sure he'd enjoy it though.
It's perfectly possible to produce ads that entertain and inform people. There's actually absolutely no need to distract, deceive, manipulate, nor irritate.
But yes... targeting is unacceptable in most circumstances, unless the ad is targeted to specific groups of people enjoying a particular activity -- car ads during sports games or on sports websites for example. (though car ads are actually some of the most irritating, almost all of those involve lies.) Targeting individuals should be a criminal offense.
ah... that because no-one is using Yahoo. They rolled out a new portal the other day, did anyone notice? No.