How is AI, a concept that dates back to the early 1900s "our generation's"? In both cases, we have early experimental versions of AI and flying cars. Neither is anything close to what science fiction writers and fans have envisioned for the last 100 years.
I doubt NASA has a non-compete agreement, but the goal of the X-Prize is a privately funded venture. Just because a guy who worked at NASA has the knowledge to design a similar system doesn't mean that he can get the necessary money to make the prize worthwhile economically speaking.
You don't think that maybe at the time he was in Hitler Youth he knew he was going to be a priest, let alone the pope, do you? His current actions and position clearly couldn't have been influence by what he experienced as a youth.
At a pro-Tibet rally at Duke University, some 4-500 Chinese counter-protesters showed up from across the area. The two sides were shouting back and forth, waving flags and such like that, when a Chinese freshman at Duke came on the scene and recognized people she knew in both groups. She positioned herself between the two groups and attempted to get people to actually talk about the issues instead of just shouting insults back and forth. Pictures of her were taken, as was video, and they were posted to the web. As news of her actions spread around Chinese message boards, a picture of her with the Chinese word for "traitor" written on her head was posted, as was her Chinese identification number and directions to her parents' home in China. Soon thereafter a picture was taken of a bucket of feces dumped outside her parents' door, and they had told her in emails that they had gone into hiding. She has also received numerous death threats and emails telling her that she should never return to China.
The story made the New York Times and Washington Post, but I can't help if wonder if this girl has ruined her chance for a safe return to her home.
...they are patenting a process which scans files for both numeral and written out in any language numbers and high-lighting them.
Why in the hell is this even necessary?
Just FYI, character traits can easily be drawn out in a separate flowchart.
And I agree with you that a lot of character development in games is extremely weak. But then in a world devoted to Harry Potter, who's characters are about as developed as a new roll of film, what can you expect.
There are lots of ways to characterize. The easiest is by showing how the character reacts to certain events. Working with a flowchart of events it is pretty easy to tell how a well-defined character will react.
All story-telling is essentially the same. That was the point I was trying to make earlier. All stories have the same basic pattern, the way they are told is irrelevant to that. If you develop that basic pattern first, then you can adapt it to any format you want. One exercise I've done in classes for learning the different forms of fiction (i.e. novels, plays, screenwriting) is to do exactly that.
There is no reason to pity the people who don't understand storytelling, I sure as hell can't design the graphics for videogames or code them. But then you don't hire an author to do that. So you shouldn't hire a programmer to write storylines unless he's trained in that as well.
You sir, are the one putting words in MY mouth. I never said that they need someone to put words in the characters mouth. In fact, I didn't say much at all.
What I was saying, AAA (as an author), is that drafting out a decent storyline isn't really that hard to do if you put some effort into it (i.e. have ever read a good novel). What was covered in the article is nothing beyond what is covered in an intro-level fiction writing class in a university. You don't need to have a 300 page book written for the game, you need a flow chart of basic events. But like the other respondants said, it needs to flow, not get caught up in the story like FF8.
PS. you don't rate flamebait, you don't know enough about what you're talking about to be able to actually flame. Though you did a great job of totally making misplaced assumptions. Have a cookie.
WTF? Is that the newest rage amonst bored denizens of rural areas? They weren't happy with just tipping them over, now they're dragging them behind their pickups? That's just cruel!
The presence of heavily armed combat-trained and experienced troops isn't stopping bombers in Iraq.
You expect cameras to do what soldiers can't?
Hell, the people standing right next to bombers don't know that they are bombers until they go BOOM! I mean seriously people, what do you expect? It takes some serious checking to find out if someone is carrying a bomb or is a registered terrorist. It's impossible to stop someone who has no background what-so-ever.
Even if we are all genetically altered so that we can be tracked by satellites following the largest clumps of our DNA people are still going to break the law - either by just acting, or by finding some way to protect themselves from detection.
Remember the old adage: Everytime they make something idiot-proof, someone makes a better idiot.
The government is focused on protecting its citizens. Will some steps they take infringe on right to privacy? Probably. Will they abuse their power? It is the nature of government to do so. But you can't have all the advantages that we have here without some sacrifices.
The simple answer is that there is no simple or clear solution. Terrorists by their very nature hate what governments/countries stand for. As long as there are governments, there will be dissenters. blah blah blah blah blah.
Slashdot Mirror
How is AI, a concept that dates back to the early 1900s "our generation's"? In both cases, we have early experimental versions of AI and flying cars. Neither is anything close to what science fiction writers and fans have envisioned for the last 100 years.
All the fiscal conservatives are languishing away in academia
They simply twirled to the music. Waltzing is has a 1-2-3-pause beat pattern. Just because they danced TO a waltz does not mean that they waltzed.
I doubt NASA has a non-compete agreement, but the goal of the X-Prize is a privately funded venture. Just because a guy who worked at NASA has the knowledge to design a similar system doesn't mean that he can get the necessary money to make the prize worthwhile economically speaking.
A beowulf cluster of iPods?
You don't think that maybe at the time he was in Hitler Youth he knew he was going to be a priest, let alone the pope, do you? His current actions and position clearly couldn't have been influence by what he experienced as a youth.
At a pro-Tibet rally at Duke University, some 4-500 Chinese counter-protesters showed up from across the area. The two sides were shouting back and forth, waving flags and such like that, when a Chinese freshman at Duke came on the scene and recognized people she knew in both groups. She positioned herself between the two groups and attempted to get people to actually talk about the issues instead of just shouting insults back and forth. Pictures of her were taken, as was video, and they were posted to the web. As news of her actions spread around Chinese message boards, a picture of her with the Chinese word for "traitor" written on her head was posted, as was her Chinese identification number and directions to her parents' home in China. Soon thereafter a picture was taken of a bucket of feces dumped outside her parents' door, and they had told her in emails that they had gone into hiding. She has also received numerous death threats and emails telling her that she should never return to China. The story made the New York Times and Washington Post, but I can't help if wonder if this girl has ruined her chance for a safe return to her home.
don't get your hopes up. it's fiction
Don't you remember the last election in Iraq before the US entered?
It was a model of democracy that any country could only hope to mirror: 100% voter turn out...and 100% voting for Saddam.
Dark corners? Of course, we can find them too
what's the average velocity of a horse and carriage vs. the average speed of an orbiting body? African or European?
...they are patenting a process which scans files for both numeral and written out in any language numbers and high-lighting them. Why in the hell is this even necessary?
how many times slashdotters can say both "dupe" and "just because it's wiki doesn't mean it's wikipedia" for the same article.
The rss feed that it provides is this: http://news.google.com/news?q=Poland&output=rss but the required feed for a custom section on the personalized google page is .xml
I expected better internal compatibility from google.
Granted, they already have a customizable news search category, but you'd think this would work the same way.
Just Canada *ducks under the moose thrown at him and gives the mounties the slip*
That reminds me, Talk-Like-A-Pirate Day is in September (or October)!
Your sarcasm is much appreciated (seriously...it's a really sloooooow day at work). Have a good weekend yourself!
Pi Day = April 14 (3/14) Approximately Pi Day = July 22 (22/7)
And I agree with you that a lot of character development in games is extremely weak. But then in a world devoted to Harry Potter, who's characters are about as developed as a new roll of film, what can you expect.
There are lots of ways to characterize. The easiest is by showing how the character reacts to certain events. Working with a flowchart of events it is pretty easy to tell how a well-defined character will react.
All story-telling is essentially the same. That was the point I was trying to make earlier. All stories have the same basic pattern, the way they are told is irrelevant to that. If you develop that basic pattern first, then you can adapt it to any format you want. One exercise I've done in classes for learning the different forms of fiction (i.e. novels, plays, screenwriting) is to do exactly that.
There is no reason to pity the people who don't understand storytelling, I sure as hell can't design the graphics for videogames or code them. But then you don't hire an author to do that. So you shouldn't hire a programmer to write storylines unless he's trained in that as well.
You sir, are the one putting words in MY mouth. I never said that they need someone to put words in the characters mouth. In fact, I didn't say much at all.
What I was saying, AAA (as an author), is that drafting out a decent storyline isn't really that hard to do if you put some effort into it (i.e. have ever read a good novel). What was covered in the article is nothing beyond what is covered in an intro-level fiction writing class in a university. You don't need to have a 300 page book written for the game, you need a flow chart of basic events. But like the other respondants said, it needs to flow, not get caught up in the story like FF8.
PS. you don't rate flamebait, you don't know enough about what you're talking about to be able to actually flame. Though you did a great job of totally making misplaced assumptions. Have a cookie.
That's why I said Or a middle-schooler
Either one would have everything you need to tell a good basic story.
You expect cameras to do what soldiers can't?
Hell, the people standing right next to bombers don't know that they are bombers until they go BOOM! I mean seriously people, what do you expect? It takes some serious checking to find out if someone is carrying a bomb or is a registered terrorist. It's impossible to stop someone who has no background what-so-ever.
Even if we are all genetically altered so that we can be tracked by satellites following the largest clumps of our DNA people are still going to break the law - either by just acting, or by finding some way to protect themselves from detection.
Remember the old adage: Everytime they make something idiot-proof, someone makes a better idiot.
The government is focused on protecting its citizens. Will some steps they take infringe on right to privacy? Probably. Will they abuse their power? It is the nature of government to do so. But you can't have all the advantages that we have here without some sacrifices.
The simple answer is that there is no simple or clear solution. Terrorists by their very nature hate what governments/countries stand for. As long as there are governments, there will be dissenters. blah blah blah blah blah.