Re:About the 'Digg fraud' campaign...
on
The Zune Cometh
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· Score: 1
Saying that a new iPod is coming out is somewhat of a double-edged sword. It might hurt iPod sales in the present, but if that new iPod does come out, it will only help Apple and hurt Zune sales. In the long term, probably not a good strategy. Short term? Might work. Might not.
The use of such a stupid strategy also highlights the stupidity of Zune marketing: it bashes Apple instead of hyping how good its own product is. Does that say something about how (un)good the Zune is going to end up being?
Actually, the Pentax *istDL is compatible with the K-mount. I own one, and an old Pentax lens from the 70s does work if you change one setting. A good part of the reason that I got the *istDL was because it could use some older lenses that I own. The *ist DL is fairly cheap for a DSLR (I got mine for around $450 without lenses on Amazon), has 6 megapixels, and apparently a really good battery life.
I think one of the big trends in business right now is to cut costs. A lot of management doesn't realize that cutting costs does not mean that a project is going to do better. In fact, it has the opposite effect, especially in game development. Almost all companies that make good games (Blizzard, Square for the most part, and others that I'm not remember at the moment) don't rush them out the door and refuse to set dates for release.
However, there isn't any one way to guarantee that a game will be good (coughdaikatanacough).
I couldn't agree with you more - I had the same experiences with FFX, and I had a lot of the same ones with Kingdom Hearts 2 recently.
I bought KH2 with high expectations - the first game was great in my opinion. However, KH2 screwed it up big time. They tried to take what was good from the first game and add on more (limits, drives, different summons and magic, etc.) to make it a new experience and justify people spending $50 on the new title. However, all of the new stuff is almost completely pointless - magic is even less necessary in KH2 than KH1, and I never used the summons in either game, and the limits are almost as pointles. Drives are cool, but you can't use them for a large number of important battles - if Donald and/or Goofy aren't in your party, you can't use some or all of your drives! This is ridiculous, especially in the final boss fights.
Which brings me to my second huge gripe about KH2 - the reaction commands. These were also added to the game, since there really wasn't anything like them in KH1. And they're necessary to the game, but no two commands are the same at all. They don't trigger the same way, they don't act the same way, they don't do the same thing... It's really really annoying, especially in the final battle, which I won't spoil, but it had me almost at the point where I was going to scream and beat the living crap out of my PS2. Bad, bad SquareEnix.
KH2 isn't a horrible game, I liked the new Gummi missions (so much better than the old missions) and most of the gameplay is fine, although a little heavy on button mashing. I had wondered how IGN (I think) had given KH2 a 7.4 out of 10, but now I know why, and I'd be tempted to give it a lower score than that if I reviewed it./rant
In any case, it just bugs me that game developers continute to make the same mistakes over and over again, especially with something as important as core gameplay. And it isn't even just the smaller manufacturers, either. Shame on Square. Shame.
Alas, this doesn't have all of the Big Brother connotations that Smirnov's original jokes had, but it comes closer than a lot of other "In Soviet Russia" jokes that I've seen here...
Penny Arcade must be missing out on something in their view of Spore. If Will Wright and his development team can deliver on half of the things that they featured in the preview, this game will be the most innovative game. Ever.
I don't think that anyone has ever attempted to write a game like this before. Will Wright has a tendency to create games that are ridiculously good (and innovative), and if he keeps the pattern going, Spore will be ridiculously good. One potential issue, though, is that it's trying to do everything (Civilization, MOO, etc.). Will Wright and his team will have to work ridiculously hard to make sure that Spore does all of the things that it does really well.
It isn't the loss of the monopoly that's to blame, it's that the developers don't spend time making there games. Look at Blizzard: every game that they make has been delayed past the initial release date, and yet every one of them has been an incredibly good game that innovates. Warcraft II, Diablo, Starcraft, Diablo II, Warcraft III, and World of Warcraft have all been critically praised.
Wow, it's like people assume that because you're learning something you have to believe it. If I took a religion class, I would learn about religion but that doesn't mean I necessarily believe in religion.
I almost get the feeling the family that's suing the University of California would sue someone that posted a website that said, "Nazis weren't fascists because they didn't agree with their methods" and then provided support for their stance for being Nazi-lovers.
In another suprise move, Microsoft has stated that it will be shipping random versions of its new Windows Vista operating system to its customers who buy it. Steve Ballmer defended Microsoft's action as "trying to stay on the cutting-edge of new technology", although nay-sayers deem that Microsoft is just playing catch-up again. Another Microsoft employee, who wished to remain unnamed, said that the new decision will add some excitement over the improved graphics and (supposedly) improved security and functionality of Windows Vista.
From my understanding of the "eggs being thrown out" topic, I assumed that the eggs had something of a shelf-life while being frozen. Nearing the end of that shelf-life, when they won't be inseminated by someone looking to have a child, they could be used for stem cells. Or at least that's what I would do.
You have to remember that there are so many different types of people that read Slashdot that there will always be someone who disagrees with you. For a statement like this, a large number of people would be seriously offended and inclined to violently disagree with you. Thus, the "Troll" mod.
I seriously doubt that anyone would ever tell someone that they cannot have a child because the embryo needs to be used for stem cells. That is assuming way too much about how far scientists would go. If embryonic stem cells are ever used, they would have to be donated or, possibly as suggested above, be created from the eggs that are being thrown out from fertility clinics.
From what I read of the article, it didn't seem that the NSF wanted to rebuild the internet, just experiment with a new way of making the internet. It's even being connected to two other pseudo-internets, Internet2 and LambdaRail.
But what if size is an important consideration? I just bought a small inkjet printer for my college dorm room. Honestly, I didn't even consider getting a color laserjet printer because all of the ones that I have seen are too big for a dorm room. Are there any small color laserjet printers?
Well, and then someone else said, "There are lies, damn lies, and statistics."
Statistics, with a little tweaking and creative enclosure, can be stated to mean anything. I recieved something in the mail about buying bed linens for my dorm room which stated something along the lines of "70% of students that bought linens bought a package". Read quickly, it could be interpreted to mean that 70% of students bought linens. But that's not what it meant.
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Saying that a new iPod is coming out is somewhat of a double-edged sword. It might hurt iPod sales in the present, but if that new iPod does come out, it will only help Apple and hurt Zune sales. In the long term, probably not a good strategy. Short term? Might work. Might not.
The use of such a stupid strategy also highlights the stupidity of Zune marketing: it bashes Apple instead of hyping how good its own product is. Does that say something about how (un)good the Zune is going to end up being?
Actually, the Pentax *istDL is compatible with the K-mount. I own one, and an old Pentax lens from the 70s does work if you change one setting. A good part of the reason that I got the *istDL was because it could use some older lenses that I own. The *ist DL is fairly cheap for a DSLR (I got mine for around $450 without lenses on Amazon), has 6 megapixels, and apparently a really good battery life.
I think one of the big trends in business right now is to cut costs. A lot of management doesn't realize that cutting costs does not mean that a project is going to do better. In fact, it has the opposite effect, especially in game development. Almost all companies that make good games (Blizzard, Square for the most part, and others that I'm not remember at the moment) don't rush them out the door and refuse to set dates for release. However, there isn't any one way to guarantee that a game will be good (coughdaikatanacough).
I couldn't agree with you more - I had the same experiences with FFX, and I had a lot of the same ones with Kingdom Hearts 2 recently.
/rant
I bought KH2 with high expectations - the first game was great in my opinion. However, KH2 screwed it up big time. They tried to take what was good from the first game and add on more (limits, drives, different summons and magic, etc.) to make it a new experience and justify people spending $50 on the new title. However, all of the new stuff is almost completely pointless - magic is even less necessary in KH2 than KH1, and I never used the summons in either game, and the limits are almost as pointles. Drives are cool, but you can't use them for a large number of important battles - if Donald and/or Goofy aren't in your party, you can't use some or all of your drives! This is ridiculous, especially in the final boss fights.
Which brings me to my second huge gripe about KH2 - the reaction commands. These were also added to the game, since there really wasn't anything like them in KH1. And they're necessary to the game, but no two commands are the same at all. They don't trigger the same way, they don't act the same way, they don't do the same thing... It's really really annoying, especially in the final battle, which I won't spoil, but it had me almost at the point where I was going to scream and beat the living crap out of my PS2. Bad, bad SquareEnix.
KH2 isn't a horrible game, I liked the new Gummi missions (so much better than the old missions) and most of the gameplay is fine, although a little heavy on button mashing. I had wondered how IGN (I think) had given KH2 a 7.4 out of 10, but now I know why, and I'd be tempted to give it a lower score than that if I reviewed it.
In any case, it just bugs me that game developers continute to make the same mistakes over and over again, especially with something as important as core gameplay. And it isn't even just the smaller manufacturers, either. Shame on Square. Shame.
If you were really into austere minimalism, you wouldn't get one of these.
In Soviet Russia, Google Earth runs you!
Alas, this doesn't have all of the Big Brother connotations that Smirnov's original jokes had, but it comes closer than a lot of other "In Soviet Russia" jokes that I've seen here...
Whoops, I thought they were using a nonsense unit.
It's not gigawatts, it's jigawatts!
I've heard Lucratel. Hopefully it won't set the expectations for the new company too high.
I don't think that anyone has ever attempted to write a game like this before. Will Wright has a tendency to create games that are ridiculously good (and innovative), and if he keeps the pattern going, Spore will be ridiculously good. One potential issue, though, is that it's trying to do everything (Civilization, MOO, etc.). Will Wright and his team will have to work ridiculously hard to make sure that Spore does all of the things that it does really well.
But bikini bottoms? No bikini bottoms? They might as well tell attendees to not go to the beach while they're there for E3.
Someone messed up while writing this article. Samsung said that they were making 16Gb (gigabit) chips, not 16GB chips. TFA: http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/ 13/0243231
It isn't the loss of the monopoly that's to blame, it's that the developers don't spend time making there games. Look at Blizzard: every game that they make has been delayed past the initial release date, and yet every one of them has been an incredibly good game that innovates. Warcraft II, Diablo, Starcraft, Diablo II, Warcraft III, and World of Warcraft have all been critically praised.
Wow, it's like people assume that because you're learning something you have to believe it. If I took a religion class, I would learn about religion but that doesn't mean I necessarily believe in religion. I almost get the feeling the family that's suing the University of California would sue someone that posted a website that said, "Nazis weren't fascists because they didn't agree with their methods" and then provided support for their stance for being Nazi-lovers.
Wait, so if science isn't the study of explanations for natural phenomena, then what is?
Even intelligent design is an explanation.
I think we have a new unit of measurement. In addition to "bucks in quarters" and "libraries of congress" we now have "thousands of PCs".
In another suprise move, Microsoft has stated that it will be shipping random versions of its new Windows Vista operating system to its customers who buy it. Steve Ballmer defended Microsoft's action as "trying to stay on the cutting-edge of new technology", although nay-sayers deem that Microsoft is just playing catch-up again. Another Microsoft employee, who wished to remain unnamed, said that the new decision will add some excitement over the improved graphics and (supposedly) improved security and functionality of Windows Vista.
There are ways to get around the Apple DRMing. It's not too hard if you think about it.
From my understanding of the "eggs being thrown out" topic, I assumed that the eggs had something of a shelf-life while being frozen. Nearing the end of that shelf-life, when they won't be inseminated by someone looking to have a child, they could be used for stem cells. Or at least that's what I would do.
You have to remember that there are so many different types of people that read Slashdot that there will always be someone who disagrees with you. For a statement like this, a large number of people would be seriously offended and inclined to violently disagree with you. Thus, the "Troll" mod.
I seriously doubt that anyone would ever tell someone that they cannot have a child because the embryo needs to be used for stem cells. That is assuming way too much about how far scientists would go. If embryonic stem cells are ever used, they would have to be donated or, possibly as suggested above, be created from the eggs that are being thrown out from fertility clinics.
From what I read of the article, it didn't seem that the NSF wanted to rebuild the internet, just experiment with a new way of making the internet. It's even being connected to two other pseudo-internets, Internet2 and LambdaRail.
But what if size is an important consideration? I just bought a small inkjet printer for my college dorm room. Honestly, I didn't even consider getting a color laserjet printer because all of the ones that I have seen are too big for a dorm room. Are there any small color laserjet printers?
Maybe the afterglow of a busted fluorescent light should be interpreted as "Get the hell out of here!" intstead of "Ooh, look at the pretty lights!".
Statistics, with a little tweaking and creative enclosure, can be stated to mean anything. I recieved something in the mail about buying bed linens for my dorm room which stated something along the lines of "70% of students that bought linens bought a package". Read quickly, it could be interpreted to mean that 70% of students bought linens. But that's not what it meant.