My experience of gaming is that it actually teaches you a huge amount about teamwork and leadership. Some of the better FPS Clans rely on both of those extensively in fact - well-drilled clan fireteams operates in very similar fashion to a military (or at least professional paintball) platoon (eg. fire-and-movement principle, etc.). And if you'd ever tried running a clan, well you'd know all about the leadership it demands.
Get in shape however - very true, gaming hinders your fitness, bigtime. Commitment? Well, there is commitment of sorts, but perhaps not in the same frame of reference as sport. As for getting laid - I think in South Korea there's probably no shortage of groupies, but elsewhere I daresay you're right... although your improved grip strength from all that mousing may prove useful in the interim;-)
Disclaimer: I've represented my country in sport. I've also played in FPS clans extensively in national comps.
The MySpaces age increase is probably largely due to the fact that it's now used by every Tom, Dick, and Harry marketing person to advertise their new movie, product, or music.
You're going to have to do a lot better than that if you want me to believe Tom and Harry have started using it now too...
I think it's more the "This +5 sword of malicious wounding proudly brought to you by Ginsu. It slices, it dices, it even juliennes! But wait, purchase in the next 15 minutes and we will throw in not one, not two, but six steak knives of +3 grievous bodily harm, absolutely free! And all this can be yours for the low low price of 29 95!" part that he's worried about...
Probably a fair bit, as far as Iraq is concerned. Plenty of US Corporations scored very lucrative rebuilding contracts thanks to the invasion. Not to mention the knock-on effect for the US public and industry of forcibly minimising oil price rises.
As for the DOI, a very brief search of their website shows the following statistics:
DOI raises more than $6.3 billion in revenues collected from energy, mineral, grazing, timber, recreation, land sales, etc.
Energy projects on federally managed lands and offshore areas supply about 30 percent of the nation's energy production.
Produce more than 55,000 different maps.
Manages about 8,506 active oil and gas leases on 45 million acres.
Deliver irrigation water to one of every five western farmers and provide water for 31 million people.
Sounds like they produce quite a few things, actually. Perhaps you meant to question their efficiency...
If I'm on my *personal* computer and I instant message a friend, I have an understanding that the content is destined to travel directly from point A (my IP address) to point B (the receiver's IP address). Yes, it will travel through other people's routers and networks on the way, but it's generally assumed that such traffic isn't subject to review by humans, in-transit.
Garbage - there are plenty of IM services that are not peer-to-peer. And even if they are, you can bet that such traffic IS subject to review by humans. Ever heard of tcpdump or ethereal?
Sorry, but even Sen. Stevens has a better understanding of the net than you - at least he worked out it was a series of tubes. Chatting over IM is more like sending someone a postcard in another country. You're trusting the the postal staff at both ends (and the convicted fraudsters serving out their community service at the mail-sorting centres) not to do anything with the supplied information. If you send sensitive information that way, you're merely hoping that the signal gets lost among all the noise, and sooner or later you're gonna get burned. Security by obscurity does not work - security by trivial obscurity works even less.
..and if a botnet Pharmer has a hundred thousand "users", all who vote as legit users for a month, and then all who suddenly mark as "legit" the messages he is personally sending out? You'll need a huge number of legitimate users to drown out the bots, and even then it'll be a struggle to keep up.
...and how many people use a non-acrobat PDF reader, or convert to postscript? Again, probably not many, but I bet there's a few, especially on here. And surely either of those would get around it. Even better, block traffic from any Acrobat app at your firewall...
Funny you should mention it... Duke Nukem Forever is doing just that, and look how well they're doing. Extrapolate the timeline and the cost of development, and I expect a DVD copy will retail for, say, a bajillion dollars or thereabouts...
You sir must be a terrorist for disagreeing with the establishment. We will be coming to get you, right after we track down this "Moral-Laden" of which you speak... presumably he's Osama's third-cousin-twice-removed, or something. Don't suppose you could tell us where he is, by any chance?
Good luck with that, seriously, it's nice to know there are a few optimists left. Personally I'm putting my money on the tried-and-true Darwinesque "survival of the fittest" existence to continue. People, societies, companies and humanity in general will only cooperate/compete fairly when (a) it is beneficial for everyone to do so (which almost never happens), and/or (b) there is no other option but to cooperate/compete fairly. Life has evolved that way for millions of years, why expect it to change in your lifetime?
Kill the water heater except immediately before showering.
Or get a power-shower. Or, even better, shower at the gym. I do it because (a) it forces me to stay in the habit of going to the gym every morning, and (b) someone else pays for my hot water. Sure, I pay a gym membership, but I would pay it anyway (at the same price) just to keep fit.
Simple, inefficient solution: save your own energy, use someone else's.
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My experience of gaming is that it actually teaches you a huge amount about teamwork and leadership. Some of the better FPS Clans rely on both of those extensively in fact - well-drilled clan fireteams operates in very similar fashion to a military (or at least professional paintball) platoon (eg. fire-and-movement principle, etc.). And if you'd ever tried running a clan, well you'd know all about the leadership it demands.
;-)
Get in shape however - very true, gaming hinders your fitness, bigtime. Commitment? Well, there is commitment of sorts, but perhaps not in the same frame of reference as sport. As for getting laid - I think in South Korea there's probably no shortage of groupies, but elsewhere I daresay you're right... although your improved grip strength from all that mousing may prove useful in the interim
Disclaimer: I've represented my country in sport. I've also played in FPS clans extensively in national comps.
Obligatory...
"People can come up with statistics to prove anything... Forfty percent of all people know that" - Homer
Now you're just taking the piss...
There are many here who would argue that is an entirely natural and understandable reaction...
OR to put it another way, we all stand on the shoulders of midgets.
You're going to have to do a lot better than that if you want me to believe Tom and Harry have started using it now too...
C'mon, this is Slashdot. Next you'll be expecting me to read the articles too!
I think it's more the "This +5 sword of malicious wounding proudly brought to you by Ginsu. It slices, it dices, it even juliennes! But wait, purchase in the next 15 minutes and we will throw in not one, not two, but six steak knives of +3 grievous bodily harm, absolutely free! And all this can be yours for the low low price of 29 95!" part that he's worried about...
Not to mention his mathematics are suspect: 3.99 is 133 times 0.03, not 100...
As for the DOI, a very brief search of their website shows the following statistics:
Sounds like they produce quite a few things, actually. Perhaps you meant to question their efficiency...
Garbage - there are plenty of IM services that are not peer-to-peer. And even if they are, you can bet that such traffic IS subject to review by humans. Ever heard of tcpdump or ethereal?
Sorry, but even Sen. Stevens has a better understanding of the net than you - at least he worked out it was a series of tubes. Chatting over IM is more like sending someone a postcard in another country. You're trusting the the postal staff at both ends (and the convicted fraudsters serving out their community service at the mail-sorting centres) not to do anything with the supplied information. If you send sensitive information that way, you're merely hoping that the signal gets lost among all the noise, and sooner or later you're gonna get burned. Security by obscurity does not work - security by trivial obscurity works even less.
I agree. C'mon SanDisk, did you have to jump into bed with Satan, Lucifer and Beelzebub all at the same time?
..and if a botnet Pharmer has a hundred thousand "users", all who vote as legit users for a month, and then all who suddenly mark as "legit" the messages he is personally sending out? You'll need a huge number of legitimate users to drown out the bots, and even then it'll be a struggle to keep up.
...and how many people use a non-acrobat PDF reader, or convert to postscript? Again, probably not many, but I bet there's a few, especially on here. And surely either of those would get around it. Even better, block traffic from any Acrobat app at your firewall...
Funny you should mention it... Duke Nukem Forever is doing just that, and look how well they're doing. Extrapolate the timeline and the cost of development, and I expect a DVD copy will retail for, say, a bajillion dollars or thereabouts...
Even if the memory did mutate, I'd bet London to a brick it'd still throw fewer errors than the RAM in this piece of s### Dell box...
Bah. Even if it answered Rumsfeld, it's still smarter than most of the voting public. Who needs a Turing test to prove intelligence?
In fact, the Good Book® is currently available free-of-charge from a seedy motel-room nightstand near you...
You sir must be a terrorist for disagreeing with the establishment. We will be coming to get you, right after we track down this "Moral-Laden" of which you speak... presumably he's Osama's third-cousin-twice-removed, or something. Don't suppose you could tell us where he is, by any chance?
Good luck with that, seriously, it's nice to know there are a few optimists left. Personally I'm putting my money on the tried-and-true Darwinesque "survival of the fittest" existence to continue. People, societies, companies and humanity in general will only cooperate/compete fairly when (a) it is beneficial for everyone to do so (which almost never happens), and/or (b) there is no other option but to cooperate/compete fairly. Life has evolved that way for millions of years, why expect it to change in your lifetime?
What will happen first?
Sarcasm tag? Sorry, XML was yesterday's buzzword...
Or get a power-shower. Or, even better, shower at the gym. I do it because (a) it forces me to stay in the habit of going to the gym every morning, and (b) someone else pays for my hot water. Sure, I pay a gym membership, but I would pay it anyway (at the same price) just to keep fit.
Simple, inefficient solution: save your own energy, use someone else's.
Exactly. And it's not like PostGRESQL or MySQL cost a hell of a lot either, what with being free and all...