Unfortunately, although you do point out the benefits of having even a self-signed cert, the average user is going to go the page see something that looks like either an error or a "you are being hacked!" message, depending on how much they read and how much they know (particularly if they're using firefox). That's the point when the average person is going to hit back or go to a different site completely.
In short, until browsers change their behaviour when confronted by a self-signed cert they will never gain widespread acceptance and use with a non-technical crowd.
It should be noted that the "Please-Trust-Us-Not-To-Steal-All-Your-Personal-Data-That-Is-Being-Proxied-And-Modified-By-Our Servers-Including-HTTPS-Traffic" system is designed to save battery life by doing encryption on RIM servers instead of the device. It should be further noted that this is an option that can be disabled so that people who it makes uncomfortable (like you) can have it performed on their device. Seems like FUD to me.
I'd characterize that as largely true with one notable exception - the second DLC pack (The Pitt) offered a pretty ambiguous moral choice that didn't result in positive or negative karma for either of the two main possible outcomes. The choice was definitely not clear-cut, and contained lots of room for interpretation as to what the morally "better" choice was.
I have been sitting and working on programming while watching a friend play that content for the first time, and he sat in the pause screen for a good ten minutes thinking about all of the outcomes. Even after he had decided, he felt guilty about the choice he made. Upon discussion, he said he also would have felt guilty but for different reasons for the other choice.
You're largely right, but not categorically so.
Ok, but it's difficult to download a distribution of check a checksum with *no* connection.
The point I was trying to make was that saying "use SSL" isn't necessarily a solution in all cases, and in certain cases might even be just as likely to result in a modified or crippled version of the distribution.
Sorry, re-reading that I wasn't clear. Wouldn't it be possible for a malicious third party to trick you into negotiating a SSL connection with a proxy instead of the remote server? Granted, they'd either have to compromise a root certificate authority key to make it invisible, but they could just disallow ALL SSL traffic unless you accept said certificate provided by them.
Ok, what about a situation where all traffic is routed through a specific, malicious third party and there is no previously existing certificate information. Couldn't they fake data from a CA if you have no data to start with trusting? Then they could masquerade as the distro server by having the routing server be the endpoint of the ssl connection while simultaneously opening another ssl connection to the true server, making the request to the true server, editing it as necessary, and then sending it back over the initial, masqueraded link?
Ah, but couldn't a malicious third party intercept your request to their servers and replace the listed MD5 checksum with a different checksum for the modified distribution?
You implement your own compiler in assembly, on open chips, and then you compile a checked version of gcc with the compiler you built and go on from there.
Considering you can already override textures in-game by adding a couple of folders to the installation directory and adding the textures to it (see badgewhore's map-patch, for example), that would be a reasonable expectation of the way they'd do it.
1 - NCSoft has said they'll be vetting each ad before they allow it to be placed in-game.
2 - What is your cut? More game content faster. The studio will be able to afford more staff which will let them push out new content at an accelerated rate, and adding more content makes you $x per month you pay to them worth more to you.
In response to both this and the other AC above it - It's hardly going to be an "endless sea of advertrash" because they've stated that they're not going to change the layout of the zones, and the zones with billboards don't have them frequently enough for that to happen. In addition, there are many zones without billboards since they wouldn't be appropriate for the setting - I don't expect that these would have advertising spaces entered.
To the previous AC - it shouldn't cause lag because they're using (from the sounds of it) a similar method to one of the programs called Splasher that changes certain in-game textures. My expectation is that the ads would be downloaded while the game is updating and would simply replace some in-game textures that already exist. The next time you start up the game you would get different ads. Because you're just swapping one texture for another one I don't think it would be able to cause lag.
In response to the general tone of this conversation - NCSoft has just pumped a whole *lot* of money into CoH now that Marvel Universe Online has been canned. They might be looking for some more money to support costs they've already incurred or they might just be hoping to be able to maintain all of the additional staff they've brought on. I think they're smart enough to know there would be a mass cancellation of accounts should they make the ads mandatory.
Come now. With a good HDTV and a good sound system (ie not the speakers built into the tv) there is a significant, noticeable difference between the HD formats and DVD. Granted, I don't see one between the quality of BRD vs HDDVD, but I'm behind BRD simply for its technical merits.
I agree... Call me a conspiracy theorist but I'm starting to think that a good deal of the Vista gaming shittyness and DX10 pushing has more to do with driving xbox360 sales than anything else.
On the other hand, I can see a resurgence of the HOSTS file hack which was popular around the time Kazaa was - essentially redirecting a list of known ad-servers to a garbage IP. Like 127.0.0.1 for home computers. Add an autoupdater and you're set.
Check your facts, please. Through combinations of certain badges, you can receive "Accolades" which give a variety of bonuses from increased health or regeneration to special powers. It's an interesting mechanic, and it's unfortunate that the original poster seems to be convinced that it's a new one.
I'd chalk your post up to simple trolling if you didn't seem so ignorant about your subject.
Personally, I think the naming scheme of Vista (and XP, for that matter) are deceptive enough as it is.
Be that as it may, AFAIK in most larger stores there's usually a fairly large chunk of the Vista promo display that does have a comparison grid between the different versions.
Unless it's clearly reiterated that what's really being advertised is the "Professional" or "Ultimate" (or whatever) version
Both advertised versions were for Vista Home - "Vista Capable" implied "Home Basic" while "Vista Premium Ready" indicated Home Premium. At no point did anything imply that it could run the Ultimate edition or anything other than the two I just listed.
I'm not trying to be an apologist for MS here, but just because a consumer didn't take the time to look at any of the widely available information or, you know, ask someone in the store doesn't make it Microsoft's fault that they didn't understand what they were buying.
I'd like to point out that Microsoft *did* in fact have "Vista Version X Compatible" stickers - just not in so many words. There was a "Vista Capable" sticker, as well as a "Vista Premium Ready" sticker, where the former indicated that the system would run Vista Home Basic, and the latter indicated that it could run Home Premium (with Aero) and higher. On that basis alone, this lawsuit doesn't hold much water, since MS did indicate to consumers which version was supported.
They're ok. But they're not popular enough to make that much of an impact. This is more a systemic problem than a problem that can be fixed by pointing at one or two people and saying "Hey, look at them". Granted, they, along with LaPorte, are probably among the best. I find Sessler and Webb tend to bash the game in their review and then give it a decent star rating anyway.
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Unfortunately, although you do point out the benefits of having even a self-signed cert, the average user is going to go the page see something that looks like either an error or a "you are being hacked!" message, depending on how much they read and how much they know (particularly if they're using firefox). That's the point when the average person is going to hit back or go to a different site completely.
In short, until browsers change their behaviour when confronted by a self-signed cert they will never gain widespread acceptance and use with a non-technical crowd.
It should be noted that the "Please-Trust-Us-Not-To-Steal-All-Your-Personal-Data-That-Is-Being-Proxied-And-Modified-By-Our Servers-Including-HTTPS-Traffic" system is designed to save battery life by doing encryption on RIM servers instead of the device. It should be further noted that this is an option that can be disabled so that people who it makes uncomfortable (like you) can have it performed on their device. Seems like FUD to me.
I'd characterize that as largely true with one notable exception - the second DLC pack (The Pitt) offered a pretty ambiguous moral choice that didn't result in positive or negative karma for either of the two main possible outcomes. The choice was definitely not clear-cut, and contained lots of room for interpretation as to what the morally "better" choice was. I have been sitting and working on programming while watching a friend play that content for the first time, and he sat in the pause screen for a good ten minutes thinking about all of the outcomes. Even after he had decided, he felt guilty about the choice he made. Upon discussion, he said he also would have felt guilty but for different reasons for the other choice. You're largely right, but not categorically so.
Ok, but it's difficult to download a distribution of check a checksum with *no* connection.
The point I was trying to make was that saying "use SSL" isn't necessarily a solution in all cases, and in certain cases might even be just as likely to result in a modified or crippled version of the distribution.
Sorry, re-reading that I wasn't clear. Wouldn't it be possible for a malicious third party to trick you into negotiating a SSL connection with a proxy instead of the remote server? Granted, they'd either have to compromise a root certificate authority key to make it invisible, but they could just disallow ALL SSL traffic unless you accept said certificate provided by them.
Ok, what about a situation where all traffic is routed through a specific, malicious third party and there is no previously existing certificate information. Couldn't they fake data from a CA if you have no data to start with trusting? Then they could masquerade as the distro server by having the routing server be the endpoint of the ssl connection while simultaneously opening another ssl connection to the true server, making the request to the true server, editing it as necessary, and then sending it back over the initial, masqueraded link?
Ah, but couldn't a malicious third party intercept your request to their servers and replace the listed MD5 checksum with a different checksum for the modified distribution?
You implement your own compiler in assembly, on open chips, and then you compile a checked version of gcc with the compiler you built and go on from there.
Obviously. :p
Also, if you're looking for a question and answer style reference, you can ask specific questions at http://stackoverflow.com/
Considering you can already override textures in-game by adding a couple of folders to the installation directory and adding the textures to it (see badgewhore's map-patch, for example), that would be a reasonable expectation of the way they'd do it.
1 - NCSoft has said they'll be vetting each ad before they allow it to be placed in-game.
2 - What is your cut? More game content faster. The studio will be able to afford more staff which will let them push out new content at an accelerated rate, and adding more content makes you $x per month you pay to them worth more to you.
In response to both this and the other AC above it - It's hardly going to be an "endless sea of advertrash" because they've stated that they're not going to change the layout of the zones, and the zones with billboards don't have them frequently enough for that to happen. In addition, there are many zones without billboards since they wouldn't be appropriate for the setting - I don't expect that these would have advertising spaces entered.
To the previous AC - it shouldn't cause lag because they're using (from the sounds of it) a similar method to one of the programs called Splasher that changes certain in-game textures. My expectation is that the ads would be downloaded while the game is updating and would simply replace some in-game textures that already exist. The next time you start up the game you would get different ads. Because you're just swapping one texture for another one I don't think it would be able to cause lag.
In response to the general tone of this conversation - NCSoft has just pumped a whole *lot* of money into CoH now that Marvel Universe Online has been canned. They might be looking for some more money to support costs they've already incurred or they might just be hoping to be able to maintain all of the additional staff they've brought on. I think they're smart enough to know there would be a mass cancellation of accounts should they make the ads mandatory.
Come now. With a good HDTV and a good sound system (ie not the speakers built into the tv) there is a significant, noticeable difference between the HD formats and DVD. Granted, I don't see one between the quality of BRD vs HDDVD, but I'm behind BRD simply for its technical merits.
Ok, but if you look at sales you'll still find that the 360 is doing better than the PS3 (unfortunately), so something's driving sales.
I agree... Call me a conspiracy theorist but I'm starting to think that a good deal of the Vista gaming shittyness and DX10 pushing has more to do with driving xbox360 sales than anything else.
On the other hand, I can see a resurgence of the HOSTS file hack which was popular around the time Kazaa was - essentially redirecting a list of known ad-servers to a garbage IP. Like 127.0.0.1 for home computers. Add an autoupdater and you're set.
Check your facts, please. Through combinations of certain badges, you can receive "Accolades" which give a variety of bonuses from increased health or regeneration to special powers. It's an interesting mechanic, and it's unfortunate that the original poster seems to be convinced that it's a new one. I'd chalk your post up to simple trolling if you didn't seem so ignorant about your subject.
I'd like to point out that Microsoft *did* in fact have "Vista Version X Compatible" stickers - just not in so many words. There was a "Vista Capable" sticker, as well as a "Vista Premium Ready" sticker, where the former indicated that the system would run Vista Home Basic, and the latter indicated that it could run Home Premium (with Aero) and higher. On that basis alone, this lawsuit doesn't hold much water, since MS did indicate to consumers which version was supported.
They're ok. But they're not popular enough to make that much of an impact. This is more a systemic problem than a problem that can be fixed by pointing at one or two people and saying "Hey, look at them". Granted, they, along with LaPorte, are probably among the best. I find Sessler and Webb tend to bash the game in their review and then give it a decent star rating anyway.
This shouldn't come as a surprise to *anyone*. We've known this for a long time.