Consider that Bill wants the PC (and Media Centre) to be at the heart of the future home.
+5 Insightful.
Nobody else has mentioned it.
Gates has pimped home theater convergence for a decade. With the line between flatscreen monitors and TVs already blurred, prime-time shows available for download, an HTPC enthusiast community writing the playbook, and the media player as the crown jewel of Vista, the stars are aligned for it to finally (FINALLY!) happen. Given the mainstream foothold FOSS has found (finally finally?), it's not a minute too soon. I'd bet anything the first effort at a truly digital living room will happen in Vista's generation, and it'll either be Gates's Normandy or his Waterloo.
So naturally he wants us to think digital storage. It keeps Windows in the loop.
Currently Jacko has all the cards: he's on CNN and whispering in the ears of Congress, possibly the Democrats' '08 presidential nominee. The gaming community is confined to, well, here.
Now, the bigger this fight gets, the better chance the fight has of catching media attention. Which inevitably means a gamer gets press coverage--America loves a good catfight.
Now, how awesome would it be to have Mike & Jerry on CNN talking about free expression in video games? Dare I dream, arguing in public with Jack Thompson? They're smarter than him. They have more charisma than him. They have a children's charity; he is a puritanical scumbag lawyer.
There is nowhere, I repeat, nowhere the public discourse about boundary-pushing games can go but up. This has happened in every industry Thompson and his ilk took on, because artists asserted their right to free expression. Ice T, Jello Biafra, George Carlin, Lenny Bruce.
GTA and games like it are this decade's offensive entertainment, but they have no Champion. This is dangerous. This time Thompson came strapped with statistics, which look like scientific proof to a politician. This is dangerous. The political left is sucking up to social conservatives; that's dangerous.
I don't know Thompson's stated goals. The Chatterbox interview (linked above) doesn't clarify them. But the man has, this very minute, all the influence he needs to get legislation passed. I probably wouldn't like his legislation, and nobody is standing up to him. We cannot afford to ignore him and hope he goes away. One does not do that when one's rights are threatened.
A PA post put it best: this thing happens every few years, and after much hollering, someone reminds them we live in America and everyone shuts up. It's high time for that reminder. I can't think of a more apropos source than creators of a new and delightful medium that fuses gaming with that other innocent children's entertainment, comic books. As far as I'm concerned this is Jack Thompson vs. The Beatles, and my little flag is a-waving.
Maintaining classic pieces in the museum's collection has grown difficult lately, not for lack of funding, but due to a dark and sinister force known as my wife.
Whats even worse is that some dumbass company is going to capitulate and then they'll all be forced to cave.
TFA:
"Labels scored a victory in music videos, however, after a battle that was sparked by the grandson of Doug Morris, Universal Music's CEO. Early this year Morris noticed his grandson repeatedly watching a video of 50 Cent, a Universal artist, for free. Morris investigated and discovered his labels were supplying the videos free of charge to promote record sales. Yet Yahoo, AOL and other sites were awash in ad revenue because of the huge audiences the videos helped draw (recently Yahoo CEO Terry Semel revealed that Yahoo expects to stream 5 billion videos this year.) Morris demanded payments--a fee for each time a Universal Music video was played and a cut of the ad money. Yahoo balked, and Morris pulled Universal's videos. After weeks of declining traffic, Yahoo capitulated. One Universal Music exec estimates revenue from the new agreement to be worth $10 million or more to the company. Warner Music is now trying to extend the concept to the emerging video-search business."
I see that's one possible reading: we are taught that the Chinese resent their oppressive government. It will therefore surprise us that the Chinese have national pride.
Another reading (what I responded to) is standard-fare partisan mudslinging: liberal academia hates America. The phrase "university indoctrination" set me off. It's ambiguous whether we're "indoctrinated" to project our orientation on the Chinese, or lack pride in our own country.
Grammatically, your reading is the correct one, but it makes little sense. "I thought Chinese people preferred Chinese solutions until I went to college"? What's taught in university to make us conclude China has no national pride? If anything, an educated person should imagine the Chinese outlook in a way that's more authentic, less naive and western-centric.
Apologies to parent if I misread him, but I don't see the reasoning.
Chinese people are proud of their country. This comes as a strange thought to most people who went through university indoctrination in the West
Couldn't resist the swipe?
You realize you've said:
1) being proud of America means you probably didn't go to college
2) the model patriotic citizen in his natural, unbrainwashed state is communist Chinese.
Opening a box on which a "contract" is printed has been given force of law. That's the issue here. Vendor convenience is redefining legal notions of property and obligation.
It started with shrinkwrap EULAs. Now we're renting ink cartridges. Either Lexmark is overstepping its bounds, or Pepsi, Bic, and other disposable-goods manufacturers should get in on the action. Think how much money every business could save on raw materials if the law propped up such absurd "agreements" at point-of-sale.
By replying to this post, you agree that I will take legal custody of your firstborn child. G'head.
Marriage is clearly an act of ones religion, the governments civil bonds are something added after the fact.
That's the fallacy. You assume one definition of marriage, with a preacher, in a church, is universal. It's not. To wit, atheists marry. It is clearly not an act of their religion.
Marriage is a social contract, with socially enforced responsibilities and privileges. This is the respect in which a tribal bonding is isomorphic to a Catholic wedding, even if none of the ritual trappings overlap.
Human society cannot help but lay down rules for who may procreate with whom. Government cannot help but enforce these rules. Therefore it is impossible for government to "butt in" where marriage is concerned; its legal definition is inevitable wherever two or more families coexist.
You are basically saying we should oppress the church..marriage in a legal sense is *not* faith-neutral, it is biased to one particular religion.
You'll kindly explain how it's oppression for me to call a thing X when you'd like it called Y. Then tell me which "one particular religion" the legal meaning of marriage is biased towards.
Why the hell don't we just divorce the religious concept of marriage from the government completely?
We already did. It's called the establishment clause. Some people have trouble with the idea that a legal marriage contract is distinct from a religious marriage ceremony.
Whether two adults can sign such a contract is a matter of equality before the law; what we call that contract is a matter of political correctness. If it were possible to Ctrl-F all federal and state laws and replace "marriage" with "abracadabra," there would be no issue here. However, that is impossible. The religious right is as keenly aware of that fact as the gay community is.
So what has to give is the legal meaning of the word marriage. As left-bashers are so fond of saying, you don't have the right not to be offended.
it is the most elegant solution I've seen put forward to remove history's error...Go ahead and get married to 50 women at once in your church, but just take one in front of the government to mingle your assets, etc...you don't have to expect the state to allow a legal contract between your dog and you
You talk like this is some genius new idea rather than the status quo. You already can't marry your dog because dogs can't sign contracts. The IRS already doesn't let you file jointly with your multiple wives. How you got modded up for suggesting grass be green is beyond me.
Darn my cynicism, but isn't it high time someone reminded us that after all those Mardi Gras parties, God's wrath was due? I mean, the total absence of hellfire and damnation surrounding this tragedy is kind of stunning. Given 9/11, the tsunami...
I dunno, did Pat Robertson use up all his jerk-quota before the hurricane hit shore?
Slashdot Mirror
I thought a previous +5 Insightful comment was merely funny. This one is fracking brilliant.
Consider that Bill wants the PC (and Media Centre) to be at the heart of the future home.
+5 Insightful.
Nobody else has mentioned it.
Gates has pimped home theater convergence for a decade. With the line between flatscreen monitors and TVs already blurred, prime-time shows available for download, an HTPC enthusiast community writing the playbook, and the media player as the crown jewel of Vista, the stars are aligned for it to finally (FINALLY!) happen. Given the mainstream foothold FOSS has found (finally finally?), it's not a minute too soon. I'd bet anything the first effort at a truly digital living room will happen in Vista's generation, and it'll either be Gates's Normandy or his Waterloo.
So naturally he wants us to think digital storage. It keeps Windows in the loop.
Anybody think the name Vista was an accident?
I see what you did there.
Currently Jacko has all the cards: he's on CNN and whispering in the ears of Congress, possibly the Democrats' '08 presidential nominee. The gaming community is confined to, well, here.
Now, the bigger this fight gets, the better chance the fight has of catching media attention. Which inevitably means a gamer gets press coverage--America loves a good catfight.
Now, how awesome would it be to have Mike & Jerry on CNN talking about free expression in video games? Dare I dream, arguing in public with Jack Thompson? They're smarter than him. They have more charisma than him. They have a children's charity; he is a puritanical scumbag lawyer.
There is nowhere, I repeat, nowhere the public discourse about boundary-pushing games can go but up. This has happened in every industry Thompson and his ilk took on, because artists asserted their right to free expression. Ice T, Jello Biafra, George Carlin, Lenny Bruce.
GTA and games like it are this decade's offensive entertainment, but they have no Champion. This is dangerous. This time Thompson came strapped with statistics, which look like scientific proof to a politician. This is dangerous. The political left is sucking up to social conservatives; that's dangerous.
I don't know Thompson's stated goals. The Chatterbox interview (linked above) doesn't clarify them. But the man has, this very minute, all the influence he needs to get legislation passed. I probably wouldn't like his legislation, and nobody is standing up to him. We cannot afford to ignore him and hope he goes away. One does not do that when one's rights are threatened.
A PA post put it best: this thing happens every few years, and after much hollering, someone reminds them we live in America and everyone shuts up. It's high time for that reminder. I can't think of a more apropos source than creators of a new and delightful medium that fuses gaming with that other innocent children's entertainment, comic books. As far as I'm concerned this is Jack Thompson vs. The Beatles, and my little flag is a-waving.
On Mike! On Scott! Go Jerry go!!
my journal: Hot Coffee
in the hall closet.
Maintaining classic pieces in the museum's collection has grown difficult lately, not for lack of funding, but due to a dark and sinister force known as my wife.
We had SCHWARZENEGGER MOVIES.
Whats even worse is that some dumbass company is going to capitulate and then they'll all be forced to cave.
TFA: "Labels scored a victory in music videos, however, after a battle that was sparked by the grandson of Doug Morris, Universal Music's CEO. Early this year Morris noticed his grandson repeatedly watching a video of 50 Cent, a Universal artist, for free. Morris investigated and discovered his labels were supplying the videos free of charge to promote record sales. Yet Yahoo, AOL and other sites were awash in ad revenue because of the huge audiences the videos helped draw (recently Yahoo CEO Terry Semel revealed that Yahoo expects to stream 5 billion videos this year.) Morris demanded payments--a fee for each time a Universal Music video was played and a cut of the ad money. Yahoo balked, and Morris pulled Universal's videos. After weeks of declining traffic, Yahoo capitulated. One Universal Music exec estimates revenue from the new agreement to be worth $10 million or more to the company. Warner Music is now trying to extend the concept to the emerging video-search business."
I'll take your word on the movie...never before has a trailer so completely failed to interest me in a film :p
our early ancestors' struggles against adverse weather and predators have led us to instinctually focus on what is wrong or out of place
My mother...is the ubermensch.
Okay, you're paranoid.
The government has your prints on file if you've been arrested.
The government has no business whatsoever holding your DNA.
*everyone turns around and stares*
What? I said shit.
No you didn't. You said 'shazbot.'
I...left the stove on. *runs*
A New Kind of Elevator.
They start shipping them with those 2TB DVD recorders in October.
The people they trot out now to fly the shuttle all look like Volvo drivers
When car #1 explodes and car #2 has the same malfunction that caused car #1 to explode, Evil Knieval is not the image you aim for.
Forgive the source.
b roussard.mov
http://www.michaelmoore.com/_images/splash/aaron_
It's "playwright," there, Bill.
I see that's one possible reading: we are taught that the Chinese resent their oppressive government. It will therefore surprise us that the Chinese have national pride.
Another reading (what I responded to) is standard-fare partisan mudslinging: liberal academia hates America. The phrase "university indoctrination" set me off. It's ambiguous whether we're "indoctrinated" to project our orientation on the Chinese, or lack pride in our own country.
Grammatically, your reading is the correct one, but it makes little sense. "I thought Chinese people preferred Chinese solutions until I went to college"? What's taught in university to make us conclude China has no national pride? If anything, an educated person should imagine the Chinese outlook in a way that's more authentic, less naive and western-centric.
Apologies to parent if I misread him, but I don't see the reasoning.
Imagine calling it "10^(10^100).com." Talk about bad branding. Heck, you'd have to label the search button "I'm feeling lucky."
Chinese people are proud of their country. This comes as a strange thought to most people who went through university indoctrination in the West
Couldn't resist the swipe?
You realize you've said:
1) being proud of America means you probably didn't go to college
2) the model patriotic citizen in his natural, unbrainwashed state is communist Chinese.
I sort of envy that level of single-mindedness.
And missing the point beats FUD?
Opening a box on which a "contract" is printed has been given force of law. That's the issue here. Vendor convenience is redefining legal notions of property and obligation.
It started with shrinkwrap EULAs. Now we're renting ink cartridges. Either Lexmark is overstepping its bounds, or Pepsi, Bic, and other disposable-goods manufacturers should get in on the action. Think how much money every business could save on raw materials if the law propped up such absurd "agreements" at point-of-sale.
By replying to this post, you agree that I will take legal custody of your firstborn child. G'head.
He's done it before and he will do it again.
Check the status bar (or view the source code of your HTML-formatted mail) to see where those links are gonna take you.
You've been had by identity thieves. You should contact Paypal's customer service department immediately.
Aye captain! Sheepshank the mainsails and run up the jolly roger!
Marriage is clearly an act of ones religion, the governments civil bonds are something added after the fact.
That's the fallacy. You assume one definition of marriage, with a preacher, in a church, is universal. It's not. To wit, atheists marry. It is clearly not an act of their religion.
Marriage is a social contract, with socially enforced responsibilities and privileges. This is the respect in which a tribal bonding is isomorphic to a Catholic wedding, even if none of the ritual trappings overlap.
Human society cannot help but lay down rules for who may procreate with whom. Government cannot help but enforce these rules. Therefore it is impossible for government to "butt in" where marriage is concerned; its legal definition is inevitable wherever two or more families coexist.
You are basically saying we should oppress the church..marriage in a legal sense is *not* faith-neutral, it is biased to one particular religion.
You'll kindly explain how it's oppression for me to call a thing X when you'd like it called Y. Then tell me which "one particular religion" the legal meaning of marriage is biased towards.
Why the hell don't we just divorce the religious concept of marriage from the government completely?
We already did. It's called the establishment clause. Some people have trouble with the idea that a legal marriage contract is distinct from a religious marriage ceremony.
Whether two adults can sign such a contract is a matter of equality before the law; what we call that contract is a matter of political correctness. If it were possible to Ctrl-F all federal and state laws and replace "marriage" with "abracadabra," there would be no issue here. However, that is impossible. The religious right is as keenly aware of that fact as the gay community is.
So what has to give is the legal meaning of the word marriage. As left-bashers are so fond of saying, you don't have the right not to be offended.
it is the most elegant solution I've seen put forward to remove history's error...Go ahead and get married to 50 women at once in your church, but just take one in front of the government to mingle your assets, etc...you don't have to expect the state to allow a legal contract between your dog and you
You talk like this is some genius new idea rather than the status quo. You already can't marry your dog because dogs can't sign contracts. The IRS already doesn't let you file jointly with your multiple wives. How you got modded up for suggesting grass be green is beyond me.
Darn my cynicism, but isn't it high time someone reminded us that after all those Mardi Gras parties, God's wrath was due? I mean, the total absence of hellfire and damnation surrounding this tragedy is kind of stunning. Given 9/11, the tsunami...
I dunno, did Pat Robertson use up all his jerk-quota before the hurricane hit shore?