Easy, you code the game using toolkits and librarys freely available for both platforms. Instead of using directx, code using opengl/openal/etc. Now you got spiffy code that can not only run on Windows, but can be easily ported to Linux without having to rewrite a metric buttload of code.
Why do I fear that it works? Politics. If it works, there will be a "cure" for this horrible affliction. And it will likely require stem cells from pre-term fetuses, at least initially. If there's only one thing I can think of that's worse that seeing your child die slowly and painfully in front of you while you can't do anything to help, it would be having your child die slowly and painfully in front of you, knowing that there is a cure and not being able to get the cure. The fact that it would be the "religious" right that would block you from saving your own child is just and extra bone to try and swallow.
My fear is having a child that has this disease and to find out the only cure involves the death of another child.
None of the hotels I've ever stayed in provide that; the TV's don't even have accessible A/V inputs and the cable hookups are protected with a user-proof collar.
User-proof? At Otakon, my friends and I ripped the collar off the tv in order to hook up our X-Box. All it took was a simple twist, a butter knife, and a clothing iron. Simply take the butter knife, grab the iron, and bash until the collar snaps in half.
A) Corporate entity used someone's work without their permission, solely to gain traffic. B) Corporate entity hotlinked said work so that the creator would have to foot the bandwidth bill
I don't think the creator would have mind much if he had his work used with permission and was hosted on Fuddrucker's servers. Hell, I would have taken it as an honor. This isn't a random teenager hotlinking some crazy photoshop on his Angelfire site, this is a major corporation stealing someone's work and bandwidth. Fuddruckers not only stole his work and claimed it as their own, but they stole his bandwidth at the same time. And they profited from their theft, while he was left with the bandwidth expenses.
Information should be free, but people's hard work and creativity should be rewarded. If someone is profiting off someone else's work, then the creater deserves compensation, unless he specifically allows it. I even ask permission from the site owner or creator before taking things and using them on my site. It's common curtesy. Just because it's on the Internet doesn't mean it's free to just take and profit from.
And that wasn't the point of my comment. Yes, law enforcement is going after the smugglers and organized crime syndicates. But no, the *AAs aren't taking legal action against them. If the RIAA and the MPAA went after the big piracy rings and smuggling outfits with the voracity it sobpoenas little 10-year old Johnny, then I wouldn't have much of a problem.
You can't claim the moral high ground that the *AAs are the big bullies in media if they go after the big yakuzas and mafias as much as the BT Joes.
Why are they after BT users more than the crime syndicates? Because BT users are a far more high-profile target. And BT users don't have the money or clout to get themselves out of trouble. When a BT user is charged, they usually fall on their knees begging for a settlement. When (more like if) the crime syndicates are charged, money talks and suddenly the case "disappears".
It's like asking a bully why he picks on the little guys. He's afraid of messing with kids his own size.
The system monitors the number of external connections being made and if a higher network activity is detected, the computer is disconnected to prevent the infection of further machines on the network.
My router, a Westell 327w, already has this feature. It locks up when I use the wifi for anything remotely network-intensi...NO CARRIER SIGNAL
Oh ho ho ho, it's about time he got a taste of his own medicine. Now he knows what it's like to be on the recieving end of DRM that restricts the legitimate use of media, media that customers paid for.
Notice how fast it the DRM was defeated as well. From TFA, it took Michael only a few minutes to convert the DRM-ed eBooks over to PDF. Compared to the tech support nightmare that he went through, it's obvious why DRM is and always will be, a doomed technology.
DRM does nothing except hinder the legit and paid-for use of media by honest customers, and mildly thwarts those who are determined to break it. Hopefully (but don't count on it), this will be a wake-up call to anyone seeking to implement a DRM system. When one of DRM's great apologists breaks out the "illegal" tools, you know there's a problem.
Oh ho ho... we've gone from praising DRM to circumventing it, haven't we? This is exactly the problem with DRM, when the DRM is so bad it restricts the legitimate use of the media it's protecting. I like how he praises DRM but says it's a "necessary evil" and is willing to circumvent it when it inhibits him.
Sorry Mike, you can't have your DRM and circumvent it when it's in the way too y'know.
Personally I think the CEO's resignation from head of Quark is an omen of much worse things to come for the company. When the head of the company resigns and jumps ship, it's usually a sign that the company is sinking fast.
Unless Quark acquires some brilliant new managment and turns out a revolutionary or innovative product, hopefully in time for Apple's x86 debute, I fear this is the end for Quark period.
It's a shame though, I grew up using QuarkExpress in school. I learned most of my desktop publishing skills from using QuarkExpress for the school pape. I'd hate to see the company go under, especially when they have the potential to create a great product.
But I'm not too sentimental that I won't move on if/when the death bell tolls for Quark. No matter how much we hate it, there is natural selection in the software world, and it tends to weed out the worst. Unless you can innovate (or purchase/clone/bash out of existence), you're doomed to the bargain bin.
Hmmm.. Could you control the RC car with the keyboard???? This might turn interesting
"Now son, if you want to make the car go forward, you press "w". To make it turn, you press "a" or "d". To make it frag that lame haxxor, you press "space"...
It is not that they do not want to know there is a problem, and its not that they aren't willing to fix it. It is the fact that the person did not follow proper protocols. Much of that information is under "lock and key" and allows for people with specific authorization (NDAs, bonding, security clearance, etc). By gaining access to this information w/o getting this clearance you broke their security measures. And they may have to (per their contracts, insurance, law) prosecute you. OR they just want to show that doing this sort of thing without permission (it is sort of like being a vigilante) is not acceptable.
I should have clarified this, but I was a student computer tech at the time. It was my job to fix the school computers, and I went and told them about severe security problems they had. I thought I was doing a good thing and fulfilling my job responsibilities when I notified them of the issues.
So I didn't sign form RX12512 and submit RFC 14125. So what? I was a tech, and it was my job to fix the computers. I felt it was my responsibility to expose flaws in their system and to fix things the right way, instead of just wiping the drive and imaging it again.
The Principal did not believe me, and I was asked by the "computer teacher" to demonstrate, which I did. Upon completing the demo, a change of my grade (downward, ironicaly) I was detained in the office pending arrival of the authorities.
Which is exactly what happened to me. I was a library computer tech at my school and I demonstrated to the district tech staff the many holes they had in their network. It was so bad I could easily escalade my user rights on the servers and gain admin access, allowing me to view everyone's network shares, including the staffs.
I also show them how kids were installing games and IM clients on their machines, getting by the security lockdowns imposed by Fortres, and demonstrated some setting they could change to improve security.
I was promply removed from the library tech staff for "AUP violations involving hacking and changing settings". I have also been blacklisted from all computers in my school. Not only do I no longer have a domain login, I cannot use any school computers, nor can my laptop be on school grounds.
Just goes to show you what happens when students show up paid "professionals"
Imagine Xmas morning, when the authentication servers are overloaded, it takes hours to get a new disk authorized, and new DVD players won't play old disks until you contact the call center for an upgrade authorization.
That's exactly what turned people away from digital content services like Steam. For those who bought Half-Life 2 in a box rather than off Steam, they were screwed for a few days becuase the authentication servers were overloaded and you couldn't play with-out Steam activation. That was probably the biggest driving force behind the whole steam hacking scene. The fact that people couldn't play a single-player game they have in their hand and payed for.
Companies are slow to realize that authentication-based systems don't work. There will always be a time when the servers are down or overloaded. There will always be that one customer who doesn't have internet access for one reason or another.
And what's possibly the worst reason why to have an authentication system, is that it assumes the buyer is a pirate until "verified". Why should I have to prove to the *AA that my purchase of "Scum Buster 5" or "Britney Spears Greatest Hits 11" was legit? Why should anyone else have to know, let alone a massive media giant, my purchasing patterns? Systems that require one to verify their purchase don't work, are bound to fail miserably, and are a huge threat to privacy
Now rather than having the DVD player authenticate, why can't we just have the disc activated at the Point of Sale like phone cards and such? Rather than having the DVD player call home everytime you watch it, why don't you just have the disc be inert until activated at the register when you purchase it? Have the registers have a special burner that burns the auth key onto a special region of the disc, and then have the player decrypt the stream when it plays it.
This has two boons. The *AA gets to make sure your purchase was legit, so that shoplifters and such can't just pilfer discs and pirate them. And it puts piraters at bay, because they can't just fake an auth/decrypt key.
Obviously it's too late to tag this onto DVD players now, considering how much it would break the legacy players, but have this integrated into Bluray/HD-DVD, when the quality of the content will actually rival theater quality.
And yes, I know any encryption/auth scheme will be cracked and such, but the only effective way to battle piracy is to make it so difficult to defeat, yet without hindering the consumer or making it difficult/expensive.
Although it's not my preferred souliton, it works a lot better than this proposed one. My preferred solution is to offer free downloads of movies, but in very reduced quality. The only reason I watch pirates is to gague a movie before I see it. With ticket prices in excess of $15 for new releases, word of mouth from basically paid advertisers disguised as impartial reviewers isn't going to cut it.
Of the three movies I've payed for this year, one of them I made my choice because of the pirates. I was iffy about Sin City, but after watching the horrible-quality pirates and loving it, I payed for a chance to see it in a movie theater.
Today we salute you, Mr. Moving Half-Eaten Pie. For 25 years you have been trapped in a box, forced to eat pellets all day and run from ghosts. But when you get a hold of one of those Power Pellets, you let those ghosts know who's boss
SUPERNATURAL MUNCHER~
So today, we raise an ice cold Bud to you, oh champion of the arcade, for you are, the baddest moving cheese wheel ever.
Problem is, NASA would never, EVER, use foreign technology in their beloved space program. They'd rather spend billions to develop the wheel inhouse than get it from another country.
Personally I think it's politics more than anything that's prevented a true space-shuttle replacement from ever getting off the ground. The only reason I can think of keeping around the Space Shuttle for so long was for their ego. By replacing the shuttle, it admits that "Hey, we failed at creating a cheap reusable craft."
I think what we need more than a new space shuttle is a new space program, one that doesn't suffer from groupthink and petty power politics.
Now don't quote me on this, but I recall a legal decision that allows someone to legally obtain roms for gaming platforms that have been discontinued. As long as you can't get the game system itseld easily via normal retail channels, it's legal to obtain and play roms for that platform.
Slashdot Mirror
Bet it has something to do with this
Easy, you code the game using toolkits and librarys freely available for both platforms. Instead of using directx, code using opengl/openal/etc. Now you got spiffy code that can not only run on Windows, but can be easily ported to Linux without having to rewrite a metric buttload of code.
Why do I fear that it works? Politics. If it works, there will be a "cure" for this horrible affliction. And it will likely require stem cells from pre-term fetuses, at least initially. If there's only one thing I can think of that's worse that seeing your child die slowly and painfully in front of you while you can't do anything to help, it would be having your child die slowly and painfully in front of you, knowing that there is a cure and not being able to get the cure. The fact that it would be the "religious" right that would block you from saving your own child is just and extra bone to try and swallow.
My fear is having a child that has this disease and to find out the only cure involves the death of another child.
None of the hotels I've ever stayed in provide that; the TV's don't even have accessible A/V inputs and the cable hookups are protected with a user-proof collar.
User-proof? At Otakon, my friends and I ripped the collar off the tv in order to hook up our X-Box. All it took was a simple twist, a butter knife, and a clothing iron. Simply take the butter knife, grab the iron, and bash until the collar snaps in half.
A) Corporate entity used someone's work without their permission, solely to gain traffic.
B) Corporate entity hotlinked said work so that the creator would have to foot the bandwidth bill
I don't think the creator would have mind much if he had his work used with permission and was hosted on Fuddrucker's servers. Hell, I would have taken it as an honor. This isn't a random teenager hotlinking some crazy photoshop on his Angelfire site, this is a major corporation stealing someone's work and bandwidth. Fuddruckers not only stole his work and claimed it as their own, but they stole his bandwidth at the same time. And they profited from their theft, while he was left with the bandwidth expenses.
Information should be free, but people's hard work and creativity should be rewarded. If someone is profiting off someone else's work, then the creater deserves compensation, unless he specifically allows it. I even ask permission from the site owner or creator before taking things and using them on my site. It's common curtesy. Just because it's on the Internet doesn't mean it's free to just take and profit from.
And that wasn't the point of my comment. Yes, law enforcement is going after the smugglers and organized crime syndicates. But no, the *AAs aren't taking legal action against them. If the RIAA and the MPAA went after the big piracy rings and smuggling outfits with the voracity it sobpoenas little 10-year old Johnny, then I wouldn't have much of a problem.
You can't claim the moral high ground that the *AAs are the big bullies in media if they go after the big yakuzas and mafias as much as the BT Joes.
Why are they after BT users more than the crime syndicates? Because BT users are a far more high-profile target. And BT users don't have the money or clout to get themselves out of trouble. When a BT user is charged, they usually fall on their knees begging for a settlement. When (more like if) the crime syndicates are charged, money talks and suddenly the case "disappears".
It's like asking a bully why he picks on the little guys. He's afraid of messing with kids his own size.
The system monitors the number of external connections being made and if a higher network activity is detected, the computer is disconnected to prevent the infection of further machines on the network.
My router, a Westell 327w, already has this feature. It locks up when I use the wifi for anything remotely network-intensi...NO CARRIER SIGNAL
Oh ho ho ho, it's about time he got a taste of his own medicine. Now he knows what it's like to be on the recieving end of DRM that restricts the legitimate use of media, media that customers paid for.
Notice how fast it the DRM was defeated as well. From TFA, it took Michael only a few minutes to convert the DRM-ed eBooks over to PDF. Compared to the tech support nightmare that he went through, it's obvious why DRM is and always will be, a doomed technology.
DRM does nothing except hinder the legit and paid-for use of media by honest customers, and mildly thwarts those who are determined to break it. Hopefully (but don't count on it), this will be a wake-up call to anyone seeking to implement a DRM system. When one of DRM's great apologists breaks out the "illegal" tools, you know there's a problem.
Oh ho ho... we've gone from praising DRM to circumventing it, haven't we? This is exactly the problem with DRM, when the DRM is so bad it restricts the legitimate use of the media it's protecting. I like how he praises DRM but says it's a "necessary evil" and is willing to circumvent it when it inhibits him.
Sorry Mike, you can't have your DRM and circumvent it when it's in the way too y'know.
Microsoft makes security patches? And tests them too?
Personally I think the CEO's resignation from head of Quark is an omen of much worse things to come for the company. When the head of the company resigns and jumps ship, it's usually a sign that the company is sinking fast.
Unless Quark acquires some brilliant new managment and turns out a revolutionary or innovative product, hopefully in time for Apple's x86 debute, I fear this is the end for Quark period.
It's a shame though, I grew up using QuarkExpress in school. I learned most of my desktop publishing skills from using QuarkExpress for the school pape. I'd hate to see the company go under, especially when they have the potential to create a great product.
But I'm not too sentimental that I won't move on if/when the death bell tolls for Quark. No matter how much we hate it, there is natural selection in the software world, and it tends to weed out the worst. Unless you can innovate (or purchase/clone/bash out of existence), you're doomed to the bargain bin.
Come back to me when someone's figured out if you can smoke it.
Hmmm.. Could you control the RC car with the keyboard???? This might turn interesting
"Now son, if you want to make the car go forward, you press "w". To make it turn, you press "a" or "d". To make it frag that lame haxxor, you press "space"...
Now if only OpenOffice broke Word, we'd be set. Convert the masses to OSS The Microsoft Way(TM)!
Leia Recording: "Help me Obi-wan Kenobi, you're my only hope..."
Luke: "Is there more of this message?"
R2D2: "beep beep errr rerere beeep"
C-3P0: "It appears that the tracker for this torrent is down... he says if you upgrade his bt client, he may be able to finish the torrent."
That's no tracker, it's a client!!!
In Soviet Russia, object patents you!
It is not that they do not want to know there is a problem, and its not that they aren't willing to fix it. It is the fact that the person did not follow proper protocols. Much of that information is under "lock and key" and allows for people with specific authorization (NDAs, bonding, security clearance, etc). By gaining access to this information w/o getting this clearance you broke their security measures. And they may have to (per their contracts, insurance, law) prosecute you. OR they just want to show that doing this sort of thing without permission (it is sort of like being a vigilante) is not acceptable.
I should have clarified this, but I was a student computer tech at the time. It was my job to fix the school computers, and I went and told them about severe security problems they had. I thought I was doing a good thing and fulfilling my job responsibilities when I notified them of the issues.
So I didn't sign form RX12512 and submit RFC 14125. So what? I was a tech, and it was my job to fix the computers. I felt it was my responsibility to expose flaws in their system and to fix things the right way, instead of just wiping the drive and imaging it again.
The Principal did not believe me, and I was asked by the "computer teacher" to demonstrate, which I did. Upon completing the demo, a change of my grade (downward, ironicaly) I was detained in the office pending arrival of the authorities.
Which is exactly what happened to me. I was a library computer tech at my school and I demonstrated to the district tech staff the many holes they had in their network. It was so bad I could easily escalade my user rights on the servers and gain admin access, allowing me to view everyone's network shares, including the staffs.
I also show them how kids were installing games and IM clients on their machines, getting by the security lockdowns imposed by Fortres, and demonstrated some setting they could change to improve security.
I was promply removed from the library tech staff for "AUP violations involving hacking and changing settings". I have also been blacklisted from all computers in my school. Not only do I no longer have a domain login, I cannot use any school computers, nor can my laptop be on school grounds.
Just goes to show you what happens when students show up paid "professionals"
Imagine Xmas morning, when the authentication servers are overloaded, it takes hours to get a new disk authorized, and new DVD players won't play old disks until you contact the call center for an upgrade authorization.
That's exactly what turned people away from digital content services like Steam. For those who bought Half-Life 2 in a box rather than off Steam, they were screwed for a few days becuase the authentication servers were overloaded and you couldn't play with-out Steam activation. That was probably the biggest driving force behind the whole steam hacking scene. The fact that people couldn't play a single-player game they have in their hand and payed for.
Companies are slow to realize that authentication-based systems don't work. There will always be a time when the servers are down or overloaded. There will always be that one customer who doesn't have internet access for one reason or another.
And what's possibly the worst reason why to have an authentication system, is that it assumes the buyer is a pirate until "verified". Why should I have to prove to the *AA that my purchase of "Scum Buster 5" or "Britney Spears Greatest Hits 11" was legit? Why should anyone else have to know, let alone a massive media giant, my purchasing patterns? Systems that require one to verify their purchase don't work, are bound to fail miserably, and are a huge threat to privacy
Now rather than having the DVD player authenticate, why can't we just have the disc activated at the Point of Sale like phone cards and such? Rather than having the DVD player call home everytime you watch it, why don't you just have the disc be inert until activated at the register when you purchase it? Have the registers have a special burner that burns the auth key onto a special region of the disc, and then have the player decrypt the stream when it plays it.
This has two boons. The *AA gets to make sure your purchase was legit, so that shoplifters and such can't just pilfer discs and pirate them. And it puts piraters at bay, because they can't just fake an auth/decrypt key.
Obviously it's too late to tag this onto DVD players now, considering how much it would break the legacy players, but have this integrated into Bluray/HD-DVD, when the quality of the content will actually rival theater quality.
And yes, I know any encryption/auth scheme will be cracked and such, but the only effective way to battle piracy is to make it so difficult to defeat, yet without hindering the consumer or making it difficult/expensive.
Although it's not my preferred souliton, it works a lot better than this proposed one. My preferred solution is to offer free downloads of movies, but in very reduced quality. The only reason I watch pirates is to gague a movie before I see it. With ticket prices in excess of $15 for new releases, word of mouth from basically paid advertisers disguised as impartial reviewers isn't going to cut it.
Of the three movies I've payed for this year, one of them I made my choice because of the pirates. I was iffy about Sin City, but after watching the horrible-quality pirates and loving it, I payed for a chance to see it in a movie theater.
Real Video Game Heros!
Today we salute you, Mr. Moving Half-Eaten Pie. For 25 years you have been trapped in a box, forced to eat pellets all day and run from ghosts. But when you get a hold of one of those Power Pellets, you let those ghosts know who's boss
SUPERNATURAL MUNCHER~
So today, we raise an ice cold Bud to you, oh champion of the arcade, for you are, the baddest moving cheese wheel ever.
I hope the adheshive isn't the kind that you lick. Licking 10,000+ lines of code together has to taste horribly nasty.
And imagine the Gentoo people's horror when they hear they have to lick all the code together just to compile Tux Racer. "emerge tongue" indeed
Problem is, NASA would never, EVER, use foreign technology in their beloved space program. They'd rather spend billions to develop the wheel inhouse than get it from another country.
Personally I think it's politics more than anything that's prevented a true space-shuttle replacement from ever getting off the ground. The only reason I can think of keeping around the Space Shuttle for so long was for their ego. By replacing the shuttle, it admits that "Hey, we failed at creating a cheap reusable craft."
I think what we need more than a new space shuttle is a new space program, one that doesn't suffer from groupthink and petty power politics.
Now don't quote me on this, but I recall a legal decision that allows someone to legally obtain roms for gaming platforms that have been discontinued. As long as you can't get the game system itseld easily via normal retail channels, it's legal to obtain and play roms for that platform.