The grandparent (modded as flamebait, which I don't think is entirely deserved) points out that a significant portion of our incarcerated population is due to drug-related charges (posession, sales), rather than murders and the like. I think that this is entirely apropos. What matters (as they pointed out) is not the incarceration rate but rather the violent crime rate.
It's also problematic (I think) to lump together firearm deaths from accidents with deliberate attacks made with them, when talking specifically about violent crime. Deliberate attacks could be made (by anyone who cares enough to murder or assault) with other tools, if firearms aren't available. For example, I seem to recall stories of gangs of kids in Britain who use knives, rocks, and heavy boots to terrorize people. Sure, guns would make it even easier, but they're still a threat without the guns. People who want to kill others will use the tools available to them: Guns, bombs, knives, cars, pipes, bats, angry dogs, sabotaged parachutes.
It is far easier to kill someone with a shot from a gun than it is to achieve the same with an axe, a shovel, hatchet, etc
Almost-bullshit but not quite. Yes, it's easier. A few good chest shots, and chances are they're going to die soon. (Inability to breathe, blood loss, trauma, etc.) Still, it's not exactly hard to kill someone with the others:
When using a bladed object, a good cut to the soft fleshy bits at the neck will do it. Most people will be too shocked from being attacked to think about running away, giving you a few more seconds to perforate them soundly in the midsection, as well. If the person is sleeping, it's even easier. When using a heavy object (axe, shovel, bat), a hard blow to the back of the head (or probably anywhere on the skull) will likely concuss them enough to knock them down, and then you can crush it (if it isn't already). Humans have been doing this since those weapons were invented.
Yes, strength is required, but nearly all of us have seen enough movies, CSI, or other similar shows to be able to know how to cause fatal injuries. The human body, while tough in some ways, is still fragile vs a determined attacker with tools. Death may not happen as quickly as with a firearm, but given an ambush situation at close range (or an unsuspecting victim), I imagine any of us would have no trouble killing another person. A firearm just makes it easier to do at range (which makes it easier in general).
Scary thoughts.:-( Thankfully, I have enough grasp of reality and ethical behavior that I would never do such a thing. (Excepting, of course, self defense.)
I've always found it easier to get the paper at home when it is in the "over" orientation. I'll switch it if it's the other way.
On the other hand, the first time my son (11 months) was in the bathroom, and playing with the toilet paper, he LOVED to spin the roll. When I swapped it to an "under" orientation, it didn't unroll as he played with it. Unfortunately, the next time he played iwth it, he figured out how to get it to unroll no matter which way I placed it, so it's back to the preferred method.;)
When at a more public restroom, where there are dispensers with multiple stacked rolls, I actually find "under" to be easier: getting the starting piece is often easier, as the upper roll almost invariably has fallen on top of the one you're using. Using an "under" alignment, you can roll the roll backwards, and have a usable flap come out the top... whereas with the "over" alignment, the grabbable portion (when back-rolling to find the end) is smaller or harder to grab.... after writing this, I feel like I've spent too much time thinking about this.;)
the first new music that was really compelling to me in my teenage years was Suicidal Tendencies, GBH, the Dead Kennedys, and Minor Threat. Then I discovered Metallica and Slayer, and I ran in that direction. Then one day somebody played me a Black Sabbath record from the 1970s. My reaction? It's crap. It sounds like crap, it's too slow, it's not "heavy," the singing is weak and silly. Well, look -- I was wrong. And really not a single one of those bands I mentioned would have come around had it not been for Black Sabbath.
So... initially, you'd experienced works by artists who were heavily influenced (and may never have existed without) Black Sabbath. When you heard Black Sabbath, you were unimpressed. What were you wrong about? Do you like Sabbath now, and if so, what made your opinion change? Is it merely respect for their ground-breaking actions, or do you actually enjoy the music now?
I ask this because I have no experience with the bands. (Well, I enjoy Metallica and some more recent metal bands.) It sounds remarkably similar to this hypothetical situation: "I'd been programming all my life in Java and Python, and then someone showed me Assembler. It sucked - it was too detail-oriented, and didn't let me abstract enough... I was wrong." I'll admit that I don't enjoy coding in assembler (and wouldn't consider myself skilled), but I can respect it on its merits, and understand its role in the evolution of programming languages. But, does that make an initial dislike of it wrong? (A little, I think... but it's not like it's completely unfounded.)
Back to music. If someone comes up with radical new ideas, which others build upon to build awesome stuff, does that make their work inherently awesome? I don't think it does. It might be that their ideas were excellent, but the execution was flawed, or the technology wasn't around to leverage it fully. I'm not trying to claim that Black Sabbath's work is crap.:) Just trying to understand if your present appreciation is due to intellectual recognition of their formative role, or due to actual enjoyment of the music (... though, I'm not sure if one can really separate those). (As a counterexample, I recognize the Beatles' formative role in musical history and culture, but haven't really heard anything that I would want to actively listen to.)
Personally I find them to be tremendously overrated too, and not a patch on many of their contemporaries
While I am not really a fan of their music (nor do I know a lot about it), I will share that my father -- who has always loved playing guitar -- told me that the chord progressions they used were much more complex (perhaps novel? I don't know/remember) than many others that preceded them. He felt they innovated, musically speaking.
He might be wrong, but he's my dad, so I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt there.;)
Well if you can't access it in any way, then why would it matter?
The drive's firmware is what keeps track of where the "good" and "bad" sectors are on the drive. Presumably, if you took the platters out, and put them in a different drive, it would have no idea which were the good or bad sectors, and therefore WOULD let you read those sectors. No guarantees that what it reads was what was originally there, but I'd be surprised if it didn't let you read them.
Even the best encryption will eventually fall to a determined enough adversary with enough resources to throw at the problem.
No, actually that's not a certainty. In order for what you said to be true there would have to be fundamental weaknesses in ever cryptographical scheme ever conceived, now or in the future. If we find even one decent algorithm, free of shortcuts, then by using a large enough key it is possible to ensure that your data is not decoded before the death of the sun.
You're not actually disagreeing with him. Your argument us that we currently do not have the resources to throw at the problems. If, however, we DID, the problems would be solvable. This seems pedantic, but I don't think it is. Increases in processing power, mathematics research, and the like continue to advance. Crypto is always about managing the value of information vs the cracking power of the opposition. The only reason things are "uncrackable" is merely because no one has the resources to commit. People have been wrong before about the resources necessary to crack their crypto, and I wouldn't be surprised if they were wrong again.
DES and other schemes were considered "uncrackable" by non-government entities... until someone built a dedicated machine for it. If something is valuable enough, someone will work to find a way. As someone else pointed out, the value of this data was in the hundreds of millions of dollars. I'm certain that the Secret Service could easily employ some skilled engineers, mathematicians, and computer scientists to build a cracking machine which is a threat to many non-paranoid users.
It's possible that he could have used a key size that was sufficiently large to be uncrackable, and (more importantly) a bug-free implementation which didn't have any weaknesses to cryptanalysis. However, he apparently didn't.
While I like the idea of a maintenance-free mouth, I would REALLY hate the loss of feeling. I have had a couple of root canals, and those teeth have a distinctly different (lesser) amount of sensitivity to touch.
While it's certainly polite to offer to move to a different room, it's another matter entirely to ASK someone to sequester themself. It says, "I disapprove of what you are doing, and want you not to expose my guests to it".
I'd walk out of any family gathering where my wife was insulted in such a way. Such a departure might very well have been preceded directly by a sharp slap in the face to whoever was so insulting. If my wife and I are not welcome at your house -- and believe me, asking us to sequetester our child for feeding is not very welcoming -- then we're getting the fuck out of there.
I realize it's not really fashionable, but I'd like to address some things you wrote, as i do not agree with them. (:
[T]yranny is a form of Greek government under which a single person makes all decisions. This law was voted into place by the public before we switched to representative government, and has been validated by thousands of judges and tens of thousands of independant juries.... The English weren't a tyranny when we were subject to them, nor was their treatment of us tyrannical.
The founding fathers of the US, when they declared their independence, would disagree that England wasn't a tyranny. The Declaration of Independence says, "The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world." Yes, absolute tyranny, which for the colonies in America was the way the King's rule was seen. I won't touch the origins of sex offender laws, though I believe they do not (in general) predate the US Constitution. Even if they had, many other unjust laws have predated the Constitution. Age is no basis for holding to a law.
Granted, I don't think a law like this is a good example of tyranny... but it sets precedent which makes tyrannical practices more publically accepted.
People have a right to liberties regardless of their identity, but not regardless of their actions or history. You can't be denied your rights because of your race, your gender, your religion, but you sure as hell can for sticking it in some kid's butt.
Felons, in the US, cannot vote, can't hold public office or posses/buy firearms, and some other things. NOWHERE does the Constitution say that felons lose the other rights that all people have -- protection against unreasonable search, etc. More importantly, punishment should be just.
Sex offender lists are more than "these are felons convicted of sex crimes". Peeing in public is, as far as I know, not a felony -- but CAN land you on the list. Moreover... what's the point of letting people out of prison, if we don't feel that they've served their time? Whether you believe prison should be about punishment or rehabilitation, I believe it's reprehensible to feel that criminals should be permanently persecuted for past mistakes. Prison is the punishment, or fines for non-felonies. A lifetime of shunning? Please. I thought we moved past that Puritan practice of branding adulterers and other criminals for life. (I know, it wasn't just the Puritans.)
Hitler used same tactics
No, he didn't. Godwin isn't spoken here.
German people to go along with his fascist rule
Hitler was totalitarian. Mussolini was the fascist. There's a pretty big difference.
Hitler's political leanings are immaterial to the tactics he used. The tactics which the GP is referring to is the gradual taking away of rights of people that aren't popular. Sex offenders are a perfect example of social pariahs: No one wants to be the one to say, "Hey wait, these men and women still have rights"; no one wants to say, "Perhaps this is a too-extreme punishment" for some of them (I refer to public urinators, not to rapists). As someone else said, no politician will ever help them, or back down, because they will be branded as "soft on pedophiles".
Sex offenders are not a racial group... but the parent poster never said that they were. He merely said that they were an unpopular group.
Yeah, we're Nazis because we ignore a part of the constitution that isn't actually there, and making sex offenders give up their passwords is very similar to murdering six and a half million people.
WRONG. You're setting up a straw man argument. Americans are similar
As much as I hate Word, for the Average User, it's certainly easy to use that way. They generally DO NOT CARE about file size.
One of the NICE things in Word's favor is the cropping tools are really nice for narrowing the image to what you want to show. (Of course, it saves the whole image anyways... )
I use a screen capturing application, but how many users will know how to do that, when this solution works, and works well?
I agree. I watch Yatzee partly for the hilarious quick-flashes of funny pictures justaposed with his criticism. I often rewind to re-watch something, as when I'm only listening to it, it's about one third as funny (or informative).
More importantly, I watch his stuff because the things he complains about are things which I often find annoying. He is the Mr. Cranky of Videogames. Chances are, if something about a game pissed you off, he'll have mentioned it. More importantly, he also will compare games to others that have similar flaws (e.g., his comments about STALKER).
I rarely use his review as a "buy/don't buy" indicator; I certainly read more reviews. Still, it helps give a counterpoint to the "zomg awesome!", as he tends to report once the shiny patina has worn a bit, and after he's discovered the annoying bits. For example, I agreed with pretty much everything he said about STALKER. Not always in the degree that he lambasted them, but pretty much every criticism was so spot-on, that I was laughing about it.
It seems almost like his reviews are more funny if you've played the game, and can commisserate. And, as Portal's review indicates, when something DOES do good stuff, he certainly admits it.:)
Bravo, Yahtzee, though you likely will never read this. I appreciate your work.
What is the point of repeating the content you already mastered?... What do I need to get better at?
Avoiding Failure at a tricky Point (Reload, fail. Reload, fail. Reload, fail. Reload, fail. Reload, success!) or Avoid Failure at in the appropriate context (in the flow of the level)
I edited slightly to show how I tend to treat saving in a game. I frequently start out trying to go for the latter, and quickly retreat into quickload-itis. Whether it's re-loading until I can kill that patrol in Far Cry, or get past some segment without losing health, or until I've managed to get the short series of jumps from Ledge A to Ledge B and then to Ledge C right that One Time, I inevitably end up spamming attempts until I've gotten it just right.
I'm not sure I've learned it, though, or mastered it. Sure, sometimes there's a particularly annoying portion of a level, where developers cheat, or where it's just a very slim margin of failure on a jump. I feel that I'm missing something, though, compared to if I were not depending on that crutch. Call of Duty 4's auto-reload mechanic is something I rather like, yet at the same time it's still a quicksave disguised. On harder difficulties, I was frequently finding myself loading, trying something, and failing -- repeating that checkpoint eight or ten times before getting to the next one. In a sense, I feel that I was lying to myself, a little: I didn't "beat" the level, I managed to squeak by a successive series of checkpoints. Unfortunately, I don't really have the inclination to go back and try to master it. (The hidden airliner level at the end is a good example of a place that has no save points in the middle, that I remember, and so it really challenges me to improve.)
Repeating a gauntlet often sucks, especially when you've mastered the early part (which is now a time sink), but are wiping on the later part. As long as it's not the only way things get done, though, I still think it has value.
I think that, for games like Prince of Persia, where the game is wrapped as "storytelling", or a game where time manipulation plays a part, the ability to go back and rewind is VERY nice. (I still found myself not using that feature much in Sands of Time, though, since it was just depleting a different player resource.) However, rather than rewind a set amount (what if your mistake was just before that?), or restarting to a quicksave (or milestone), I think it would be really neat if the degree of setback was randomized. Always to a semi-safe spot (so, before you've jumped, and probably not in the middle of a fight), but to a time that is maybe 15 seconds ago, or 30, or 60. This preserves a "storytelling" or similar integrated play feeling, but helps prevent the repeated tedium of "jump, jump, jump, flip, jump -- and now the hard part I haven't mastered yet". It'd make players like me actually re-play some, so that we'd likely end up learning more.
Then again, button-mashing quicksave monkeys (like me!) will still find it frustrating, especially when it kicks you back to a point you had trouble with previously.;)
Will blacklisting the CA (locally on my machines) make any difference? (Perhaps a better question is, can I as an end-user do anything to protect myself from certificates issues from CAs that have not upgraded to better hashing?)
I tried putting my father on Ubuntu this past summer, with miserable results.
-- Importing his mail (since he did not want to lose it) was troublesome. I've talked about e-mail bankruptcy with him, but I don't think he's ready to do it deliberately. -- ITunes. Damn ITunes and its DRMed music, he can't play it in Ubuntu. That makes it a failure in his eyes, as playing his music is one of the only things he DOES on the computer (besides e-mail and web surfing). (I've since learned more about drm-stripping tools, but they need to be run from Windows... which was screwed up on his system.) I've been unable to convince him that paying $800+ to upgrade his entire collection (at 30 cents per song) to the DRM-free versions of the songs. -- There wasn't really a way I could get ITunes to run on Ubuntu. Yes, I expect that one could do it with Wine.. but there's no out-of-the box easy way to set that up. It'd be fantastic to say, "Hey, install Wine, and now lets go install some commonly used apps that you probably want". (I realize this would be a configuration and licensing nightmare, hehe, but it'd make the process easier.) -- In the end, it was easier to say "fuck it", delete the Linux partition, and just install a brand new copy of XP. I felt dirty doing it, and it pissed me off to no end ("Yeah now you have to install drivers... yes, go to this web page on your laptop...") that there were so many minor pains in the ass along the way. Couple this with my father needing/wanting to be hand-held the entire time, and I was at a very very high frustration level.
NEXT time his computer shoots craps? Sure, I might have him install Ubuntu. I am skeptical that it will be any less frustrating than installing windows was (we just did that this past week), except for the excellent driver support that Linux has. (I don't mean that sarcastically, either.)
The biggest hurdle, though, is his "But I don't want to learn anything new! this works fine!" mentality. It's why he keeps wanting to use Outlook, for example. How can I counter this, fight this, or convince him otherwise? I don't know how to use Amarok or any of the Linux music library management software, nor do I know of good ITunes Store alternatives (I know they exist, but I don't listen to music much). At least with Thunderbird my argument can be, "I use it, so I can help you use it". I want to tell him "buy a Mac", but it's not really something he can afford.:( It worked great for my mother, but my dad is just unwilling to step out of his shell a tiny bit and LEARN something different.
I apologize for venting my frustration. Still, I'd really LIKE to see my father using a Linux system, with a nifty interface and all that jazz, but I've had such a rough time the last time I tried it that I don't think I'll be successful next time I get the chance. I'm hopeful that some of you will have insightful advice on how I can do it better next time.:)
It's "open" but it's not one of those operating systems that people are going to WANT to switch from Windows. Why? The only serious issue with OpenSolaris I can think of is a lack of third party support
Many people will say, "will it play my ITunes collection?" -- and then ask why they should pay an extra $500 or so to upgrade their whole collection to be DRM-free. It's the main reason my father is back to Windows XP, rather than Ubuntu.
But, signed by whom? A central authorizing agency? That's just asking to be brute-forced or otherwise stolen. Combine that with the fact that the weak point in encryption is often the implementation, and it's possible that nefarious persons could find (and exploit) a hardware flaw.
If someone made sex robots, they would certainly sell. Many people are hospitalized for trying to do it with industrial equipment, for goodness' sake. I wouldn't want one, but you bet many would.
If it was "discovered" that a huge percentage of homosexual behavior was directly caused by chemical pollution, I don't know which community would go crazy the most, the homosexuals or the religious folks. You'd suddenly find the vast religious right pushing for environmental controls that even current greens would think are extreme
So: - Pollution prevention programs and other environmental reforms increase in public desirability and effect. - The harm from such toxins is reduced for the society at large, whether gay or not. - We still have gay people. Presumably, those who continue to be gay will derive happiness from it.
It seems like the world would benefit from this. The genetic harms that would be prevented (or at least reduced) in the "crusade" to prevent gayness (which I doubt would work) seems like a great result.
You get only one life and one death. The life can be spent once only, the death can be deferred, but the life cannot be "saved" and the death cannot be prevented.
Bullshit.
While it's entirely true that we only get one life, the "saving lives" idea (in this case) is not about preventing deaths, but preventing unnatural deaths. If my body (with the help of science;)) can live to 80 or more years, and if I'm responsible enough to take good care of my self, it's a tragedy to be killed early by something preventable, or by someone else. What's lost is not a life, but the rest of a life. If a child is killed by a drunk driver, what is lost are: (for starters)
- the child's next 50+ years of experiences - the contributions to society she or he may have made
THAT is what one means when we say a "life" was lost. Not that someone merely died. Yes, death happens. I don't mourn the massing (much) of older people who have lived rich lives; I'd certainly mourn more the passing of a child who has not yet fulfilled the opportunity of living.
What's the difference between your wife using a taser or a hand gun to defend herself? Far as I can tell, both are defensive - one is merely less lethal than the other
When facing a single attacker, sure -- a taser makes a good deterrent. When Facing a group of attackers, "who wants to be the first to get tasered" is a much weaker deterrent than "who wants to be shot first?". One has a potential permanent result, and one does not.
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The grandparent (modded as flamebait, which I don't think is entirely deserved) points out that a significant portion of our incarcerated population is due to drug-related charges (posession, sales), rather than murders and the like. I think that this is entirely apropos. What matters (as they pointed out) is not the incarceration rate but rather the violent crime rate.
It's also problematic (I think) to lump together firearm deaths from accidents with deliberate attacks made with them, when talking specifically about violent crime. Deliberate attacks could be made (by anyone who cares enough to murder or assault) with other tools, if firearms aren't available. For example, I seem to recall stories of gangs of kids in Britain who use knives, rocks, and heavy boots to terrorize people. Sure, guns would make it even easier, but they're still a threat without the guns. People who want to kill others will use the tools available to them: Guns, bombs, knives, cars, pipes, bats, angry dogs, sabotaged parachutes.
Almost-bullshit but not quite. Yes, it's easier. A few good chest shots, and chances are they're going to die soon. (Inability to breathe, blood loss, trauma, etc.) Still, it's not exactly hard to kill someone with the others:
When using a bladed object, a good cut to the soft fleshy bits at the neck will do it. Most people will be too shocked from being attacked to think about running away, giving you a few more seconds to perforate them soundly in the midsection, as well. If the person is sleeping, it's even easier. When using a heavy object (axe, shovel, bat), a hard blow to the back of the head (or probably anywhere on the skull) will likely concuss them enough to knock them down, and then you can crush it (if it isn't already). Humans have been doing this since those weapons were invented.
Yes, strength is required, but nearly all of us have seen enough movies, CSI, or other similar shows to be able to know how to cause fatal injuries. The human body, while tough in some ways, is still fragile vs a determined attacker with tools. Death may not happen as quickly as with a firearm, but given an ambush situation at close range (or an unsuspecting victim), I imagine any of us would have no trouble killing another person. A firearm just makes it easier to do at range (which makes it easier in general).
Scary thoughts. :-( Thankfully, I have enough grasp of reality and ethical behavior that I would never do such a thing. (Excepting, of course, self defense.)
I've always found it easier to get the paper at home when it is in the "over" orientation. I'll switch it if it's the other way.
On the other hand, the first time my son (11 months) was in the bathroom, and playing with the toilet paper, he LOVED to spin the roll. When I swapped it to an "under" orientation, it didn't unroll as he played with it. Unfortunately, the next time he played iwth it, he figured out how to get it to unroll no matter which way I placed it, so it's back to the preferred method. ;)
When at a more public restroom, where there are dispensers with multiple stacked rolls, I actually find "under" to be easier: getting the starting piece is often easier, as the upper roll almost invariably has fallen on top of the one you're using. Using an "under" alignment, you can roll the roll backwards, and have a usable flap come out the top... whereas with the "over" alignment, the grabbable portion (when back-rolling to find the end) is smaller or harder to grab. ... after writing this, I feel like I've spent too much time thinking about this. ;)
So... initially, you'd experienced works by artists who were heavily influenced (and may never have existed without) Black Sabbath. When you heard Black Sabbath, you were unimpressed. What were you wrong about? Do you like Sabbath now, and if so, what made your opinion change? Is it merely respect for their ground-breaking actions, or do you actually enjoy the music now?
I ask this because I have no experience with the bands. (Well, I enjoy Metallica and some more recent metal bands.) It sounds remarkably similar to this hypothetical situation: "I'd been programming all my life in Java and Python, and then someone showed me Assembler. It sucked - it was too detail-oriented, and didn't let me abstract enough... I was wrong." I'll admit that I don't enjoy coding in assembler (and wouldn't consider myself skilled), but I can respect it on its merits, and understand its role in the evolution of programming languages. But, does that make an initial dislike of it wrong? (A little, I think... but it's not like it's completely unfounded.)
Back to music. If someone comes up with radical new ideas, which others build upon to build awesome stuff, does that make their work inherently awesome? I don't think it does. It might be that their ideas were excellent, but the execution was flawed, or the technology wasn't around to leverage it fully. I'm not trying to claim that Black Sabbath's work is crap. :) Just trying to understand if your present appreciation is due to intellectual recognition of their formative role, or due to actual enjoyment of the music (... though, I'm not sure if one can really separate those). (As a counterexample, I recognize the Beatles' formative role in musical history and culture, but haven't really heard anything that I would want to actively listen to.)
While I am not really a fan of their music (nor do I know a lot about it), I will share that my father -- who has always loved playing guitar -- told me that the chord progressions they used were much more complex (perhaps novel? I don't know/remember) than many others that preceded them. He felt they innovated, musically speaking.
He might be wrong, but he's my dad, so I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt there. ;)
People actually have radios?
The drive's firmware is what keeps track of where the "good" and "bad" sectors are on the drive. Presumably, if you took the platters out, and put them in a different drive, it would have no idea which were the good or bad sectors, and therefore WOULD let you read those sectors. No guarantees that what it reads was what was originally there, but I'd be surprised if it didn't let you read them.
You're not actually disagreeing with him. Your argument us that we currently do not have the resources to throw at the problems. If, however, we DID, the problems would be solvable. This seems pedantic, but I don't think it is. Increases in processing power, mathematics research, and the like continue to advance. Crypto is always about managing the value of information vs the cracking power of the opposition. The only reason things are "uncrackable" is merely because no one has the resources to commit. People have been wrong before about the resources necessary to crack their crypto, and I wouldn't be surprised if they were wrong again.
DES and other schemes were considered "uncrackable" by non-government entities ... until someone built a dedicated machine for it. If something is valuable enough, someone will work to find a way. As someone else pointed out, the value of this data was in the hundreds of millions of dollars. I'm certain that the Secret Service could easily employ some skilled engineers, mathematicians, and computer scientists to build a cracking machine which is a threat to many non-paranoid users.
It's possible that he could have used a key size that was sufficiently large to be uncrackable, and (more importantly) a bug-free implementation which didn't have any weaknesses to cryptanalysis. However, he apparently didn't.
While I like the idea of a maintenance-free mouth, I would REALLY hate the loss of feeling. I have had a couple of root canals, and those teeth have a distinctly different (lesser) amount of sensitivity to touch.
The temporary nature of one's code (especially since we almost always underestimate the lifespan) is no excuse for being sloppy.
While it's certainly polite to offer to move to a different room, it's another matter entirely to ASK someone to sequester themself. It says, "I disapprove of what you are doing, and want you not to expose my guests to it".
I'd walk out of any family gathering where my wife was insulted in such a way. Such a departure might very well have been preceded directly by a sharp slap in the face to whoever was so insulting. If my wife and I are not welcome at your house -- and believe me, asking us to sequetester our child for feeding is not very welcoming -- then we're getting the fuck out of there.
I realize it's not really fashionable, but I'd like to address some things you wrote, as i do not agree with them. (:
The founding fathers of the US, when they declared their independence, would disagree that England wasn't a tyranny. The Declaration of Independence says, "The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world." Yes, absolute tyranny, which for the colonies in America was the way the King's rule was seen. I won't touch the origins of sex offender laws, though I believe they do not (in general) predate the US Constitution. Even if they had, many other unjust laws have predated the Constitution. Age is no basis for holding to a law.
Granted, I don't think a law like this is a good example of tyranny... but it sets precedent which makes tyrannical practices more publically accepted.
Felons, in the US, cannot vote, can't hold public office or posses/buy firearms, and some other things. NOWHERE does the Constitution say that felons lose the other rights that all people have -- protection against unreasonable search, etc. More importantly, punishment should be just.
Sex offender lists are more than "these are felons convicted of sex crimes". Peeing in public is, as far as I know, not a felony -- but CAN land you on the list. Moreover ... what's the point of letting people out of prison, if we don't feel that they've served their time? Whether you believe prison should be about punishment or rehabilitation, I believe it's reprehensible to feel that criminals should be permanently persecuted for past mistakes. Prison is the punishment, or fines for non-felonies. A lifetime of shunning? Please. I thought we moved past that Puritan practice of branding adulterers and other criminals for life. (I know, it wasn't just the Puritans.)
Hitler's political leanings are immaterial to the tactics he used. The tactics which the GP is referring to is the gradual taking away of rights of people that aren't popular. Sex offenders are a perfect example of social pariahs: No one wants to be the one to say, "Hey wait, these men and women still have rights"; no one wants to say, "Perhaps this is a too-extreme punishment" for some of them (I refer to public urinators, not to rapists). As someone else said, no politician will ever help them, or back down, because they will be branded as "soft on pedophiles".
Sex offenders are not a racial group... but the parent poster never said that they were. He merely said that they were an unpopular group.
WRONG. You're setting up a straw man argument. Americans are similar
As much as I hate Word, for the Average User, it's certainly easy to use that way. They generally DO NOT CARE about file size.
One of the NICE things in Word's favor is the cropping tools are really nice for narrowing the image to what you want to show. (Of course, it saves the whole image anyways ... )
I use a screen capturing application, but how many users will know how to do that, when this solution works, and works well?
I agree. I watch Yatzee partly for the hilarious quick-flashes of funny pictures justaposed with his criticism. I often rewind to re-watch something, as when I'm only listening to it, it's about one third as funny (or informative).
More importantly, I watch his stuff because the things he complains about are things which I often find annoying. He is the Mr. Cranky of Videogames. Chances are, if something about a game pissed you off, he'll have mentioned it. More importantly, he also will compare games to others that have similar flaws (e.g., his comments about STALKER).
I rarely use his review as a "buy/don't buy" indicator; I certainly read more reviews. Still, it helps give a counterpoint to the "zomg awesome!", as he tends to report once the shiny patina has worn a bit, and after he's discovered the annoying bits. For example, I agreed with pretty much everything he said about STALKER. Not always in the degree that he lambasted them, but pretty much every criticism was so spot-on, that I was laughing about it.
It seems almost like his reviews are more funny if you've played the game, and can commisserate. And, as Portal's review indicates, when something DOES do good stuff, he certainly admits it. :)
Bravo, Yahtzee, though you likely will never read this. I appreciate your work.
I edited slightly to show how I tend to treat saving in a game. I frequently start out trying to go for the latter, and quickly retreat into quickload-itis. Whether it's re-loading until I can kill that patrol in Far Cry, or get past some segment without losing health, or until I've managed to get the short series of jumps from Ledge A to Ledge B and then to Ledge C right that One Time, I inevitably end up spamming attempts until I've gotten it just right.
I'm not sure I've learned it, though, or mastered it. Sure, sometimes there's a particularly annoying portion of a level, where developers cheat, or where it's just a very slim margin of failure on a jump. I feel that I'm missing something, though, compared to if I were not depending on that crutch. Call of Duty 4's auto-reload mechanic is something I rather like, yet at the same time it's still a quicksave disguised. On harder difficulties, I was frequently finding myself loading, trying something, and failing -- repeating that checkpoint eight or ten times before getting to the next one. In a sense, I feel that I was lying to myself, a little: I didn't "beat" the level, I managed to squeak by a successive series of checkpoints. Unfortunately, I don't really have the inclination to go back and try to master it. (The hidden airliner level at the end is a good example of a place that has no save points in the middle, that I remember, and so it really challenges me to improve.)
Repeating a gauntlet often sucks, especially when you've mastered the early part (which is now a time sink), but are wiping on the later part. As long as it's not the only way things get done, though, I still think it has value.
I think that, for games like Prince of Persia, where the game is wrapped as "storytelling", or a game where time manipulation plays a part, the ability to go back and rewind is VERY nice. (I still found myself not using that feature much in Sands of Time, though, since it was just depleting a different player resource.) However, rather than rewind a set amount (what if your mistake was just before that?), or restarting to a quicksave (or milestone), I think it would be really neat if the degree of setback was randomized. Always to a semi-safe spot (so, before you've jumped, and probably not in the middle of a fight), but to a time that is maybe 15 seconds ago, or 30, or 60. This preserves a "storytelling" or similar integrated play feeling, but helps prevent the repeated tedium of "jump, jump, jump, flip, jump -- and now the hard part I haven't mastered yet". It'd make players like me actually re-play some, so that we'd likely end up learning more.
Then again, button-mashing quicksave monkeys (like me!) will still find it frustrating, especially when it kicks you back to a point you had trouble with previously. ;)
Will blacklisting the CA (locally on my machines) make any difference? (Perhaps a better question is, can I as an end-user do anything to protect myself from certificates issues from CAs that have not upgraded to better hashing?)
I tried putting my father on Ubuntu this past summer, with miserable results.
-- Importing his mail (since he did not want to lose it) was troublesome. I've talked about e-mail bankruptcy with him, but I don't think he's ready to do it deliberately.
-- ITunes. Damn ITunes and its DRMed music, he can't play it in Ubuntu. That makes it a failure in his eyes, as playing his music is one of the only things he DOES on the computer (besides e-mail and web surfing). (I've since learned more about drm-stripping tools, but they need to be run from Windows... which was screwed up on his system.) I've been unable to convince him that paying $800+ to upgrade his entire collection (at 30 cents per song) to the DRM-free versions of the songs.
-- There wasn't really a way I could get ITunes to run on Ubuntu. Yes, I expect that one could do it with Wine.. but there's no out-of-the box easy way to set that up. It'd be fantastic to say, "Hey, install Wine, and now lets go install some commonly used apps that you probably want". (I realize this would be a configuration and licensing nightmare, hehe, but it'd make the process easier.)
-- In the end, it was easier to say "fuck it", delete the Linux partition, and just install a brand new copy of XP. I felt dirty doing it, and it pissed me off to no end ("Yeah now you have to install drivers... yes, go to this web page on your laptop...") that there were so many minor pains in the ass along the way. Couple this with my father needing/wanting to be hand-held the entire time, and I was at a very very high frustration level.
NEXT time his computer shoots craps? Sure, I might have him install Ubuntu. I am skeptical that it will be any less frustrating than installing windows was (we just did that this past week), except for the excellent driver support that Linux has. (I don't mean that sarcastically, either.)
The biggest hurdle, though, is his "But I don't want to learn anything new! this works fine!" mentality. It's why he keeps wanting to use Outlook, for example. How can I counter this, fight this, or convince him otherwise? I don't know how to use Amarok or any of the Linux music library management software, nor do I know of good ITunes Store alternatives (I know they exist, but I don't listen to music much). At least with Thunderbird my argument can be, "I use it, so I can help you use it". I want to tell him "buy a Mac", but it's not really something he can afford. :( It worked great for my mother, but my dad is just unwilling to step out of his shell a tiny bit and LEARN something different.
I apologize for venting my frustration. Still, I'd really LIKE to see my father using a Linux system, with a nifty interface and all that jazz, but I've had such a rough time the last time I tried it that I don't think I'll be successful next time I get the chance. I'm hopeful that some of you will have insightful advice on how I can do it better next time. :)
I would imagine that trying to run OSX on non-64-bit hardware would be a recipe for disappointment.
Many people will say, "will it play my ITunes collection?" -- and then ask why they should pay an extra $500 or so to upgrade their whole collection to be DRM-free. It's the main reason my father is back to Windows XP, rather than Ubuntu.
But, signed by whom? A central authorizing agency? That's just asking to be brute-forced or otherwise stolen. Combine that with the fact that the weak point in encryption is often the implementation, and it's possible that nefarious persons could find (and exploit) a hardware flaw.
If someone made sex robots, they would certainly sell. Many people are hospitalized for trying to do it with industrial equipment, for goodness' sake. I wouldn't want one, but you bet many would.
So:
- Pollution prevention programs and other environmental reforms increase in public desirability and effect.
- The harm from such toxins is reduced for the society at large, whether gay or not.
- We still have gay people. Presumably, those who continue to be gay will derive happiness from it.
It seems like the world would benefit from this. The genetic harms that would be prevented (or at least reduced) in the "crusade" to prevent gayness (which I doubt would work) seems like a great result.
Would you care to elaborate? I'm genuinely curious.
Bullshit.
While it's entirely true that we only get one life, the "saving lives" idea (in this case) is not about preventing deaths, but preventing unnatural deaths. If my body (with the help of science ;)) can live to 80 or more years, and if I'm responsible enough to take good care of my self, it's a tragedy to be killed early by something preventable, or by someone else. What's lost is not a life, but the rest of a life. If a child is killed by a drunk driver, what is lost are: (for starters)
- the child's next 50+ years of experiences
- the contributions to society she or he may have made
THAT is what one means when we say a "life" was lost. Not that someone merely died. Yes, death happens. I don't mourn the massing (much) of older people who have lived rich lives; I'd certainly mourn more the passing of a child who has not yet fulfilled the opportunity of living.
When facing a single attacker, sure -- a taser makes a good deterrent. When Facing a group of attackers, "who wants to be the first to get tasered" is a much weaker deterrent than "who wants to be shot first?". One has a potential permanent result, and one does not.