I'm serious. Some peoples' entire goal in life is to piss in every still-crispy bowl of corn flakes they can find; all they want to do is ruin the fun for everyone else.
These people cannot be reasoned with, because given the opportunity, they will do it again.
They can be imprisoned for life, sure. But we're better off if they're dead.
I knew one day the world would come to its senses and launch all the Macs into outer space as a protective barrier against asteroids and extraterrestrials!
We teach people that midnight is the first instant of each day. Midnight in 24-hour format is 00:00. Considering that the time goes 00:00, 00:01,... 23:58, 23:59, and there is no 24:00, then 00:00 is the beginning of each day. It would take a little effort, but people would (presumably) get used to it. I figured out the concept myself (someone asked, what day does midnight fall on? and I thought about it for about 5 seconds) and I'm sure most people would understand it. Especially if you just told them with authoritah, "Midnight is the first instant of the day."
I agree; Daylight Savings Time isn't really a useful thing any more. In fact, it's just annoying. Serves no good purpose. I wish it would go away.
However with time zones, it's a little trickier. I agree that it meets my penchant for consistency to say that I wish there were no time zones.
Here's a problem with that, though. Let's say we all run on UTC instead. All clocks and watches are set to UTC. This means that sunrise in Los Angeles, instead of being at maybe 0600, occurs at 1400. This is fine, people would get used to it.
But unless people change their schedules to no longer be diurnal (active during daylight), problems occur. Let's say we have no time zones, but everything else stays the same. What time is "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" on? People want to watch it after work. If it's always on at the same time (let's say, 0400 UTC), well, some people are working at 0400 UTC, or already asleep. Right now, TV shows aren't all shown at the same time. Buffy is on at 8 pm, which means that it gets shown for four consecutive hours in the USA. 0100 UTC on the East Coast, 0200 in Central, 0300 in Mountain, and 0400 in Pacific.
Now keep in mind, my goal here is to find a solution to situations like this. I'm not saying you're wrong, I think that between us we should be able to come up with an answer to "how do we deal with things that happen at certain times of day?" Another example: fireworks celebrations. Those can't happen during the day, cause they look like crap. They have to happen when it's dark. So they can't all happen at the same time, it has to be specific to the area of the planet. I can't think of any other examples right now but I'm sure there must be some:)
So what do you think? Is this a tractable problem? I sure hope so:)
Last I knew, electricity doesn't move at the speed of light. Electrons (or the holes) have a much lower speed through conductors than 150,000km/sec, AFAIK.
Hmm, you've got a good point, but it also draws the following question: Should I be required to get into the TMBG community if I want to hear TMBG's music?
I can't be as glib as you, but you have just demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of the second law of thermodynamics, which states (in one phrasing) that in any process, entropy in a closed system will always increase. It says nothing about order or chaos; this is a typical Creationist straw-man argument that attacks the Second Law for things IT DOES NOT SAY. Perhaps you can find me a physics textbook that says that the Second Law specifies that order *always* devolves into chaos? Entropy refers to the amount of usable energy in a system. Repeat after me: IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH CHAOS OR ORDER.
I'm willing to bet that you think that given the planet Earth, the fact that life evolves upon it means that entropy has decreased. You know what? You're right. Entropy has decreased.
LOCALLY.
The Earth is not a closed system. Entropy in an open system may decrease to zero, as long as there is an equal or greater increase somewhere else to make up for it. The energy that went to "ordering" the "chaotic" matter on Earth to cause Life, CAME FROM THE SUN. The TOTAL entropy of the universe still increases, even though locally it may increase.
I suggest you go read a couple of physics textbooks on thermodynamics (since you obviously haven't... I mean "order from chaos"? COME ON, dude, this isn't 1500!) before you try to make this argument again.
Maybe it's because I've been coding 14 hours a day for the last 8 days, but I swear to god I thought you wrote "sexwithgrandmas.com with your midget sitting next to you."
System Shock was released in September 1994. That's six years ago, not ten. That's a significant difference in computer time.
Is there something wrong with enjoying "twitching at pixels," as you put it? I highly enjoy Quake (and derivatives). I also highly enjoyed System Shock, Half-Life, Starcraft, Diablo, EverQuest, Command & Conquer, and a whole raft of other games that have nothing in common except that I find them FUN.
But seriously, how can you compare songs like "What's my age again" to songs like Don Mclean's "Vincent", or "Windmills of my mind", or Donovan's "Catch the Wind", or "Diamonds and Rust", or "Sounds of Silence", "bridge over troubled water", or at least half a dozen of Cat Steven's earlier songs (e.g. "sad lisa", "matthew and son"), or John Lennon's "working class hero".. and really, we're just scraping the tip of the iceberg here.
Speak for yourself. Most of that music I find deadly boring. Naturally, these are just one person's opinions.:)
Most of the songs I listed in the 20 (and I never said they were the 20 best songs, where did you get that idea?) I like listening to a hell of a lot more than 60s stuff. There's a lot of 60s/early 70s stuff I DO like (like The Doors, some Beatles, Hendrix, Steely Dan, and more) but for the most part I just don't find music from that era very interesting. And for what it's worth, your opinion is no more valid than mine.
Now it would be dense for me to claim that a lot of that music isn't a) very well done, b) important in terms of musical history, and c) highly influential, but that doesn't mean that I have to agree that it's "better" in the conventional sense than, say, Joe Satriani. In fact, right now I'm listening to my current favorite song, "Motorcycle Driver" by Satriani.
I've had plenty of experience with classic rock and folk and pop. Usually, I don't like it. Are you going to tell me I'm wrong? Do you think I'm trying to tell you that you're wrong? How the hell can you be intellectually justified in saying "These are just my opinions" and then implying that I'm somehow wrong to say that a modern song is, IN MY OPINION, better than an equivalent song from the 60s?
Thanks for your opinion, but we weren't trying to come up with the ultimate list of great songs. The point was, he didn't even TRY to think of anything.
Personally, I think Primus sucks. Never listened to Midnight Oil. If I'd thought of DMB before some of the others, I would have put "Ants Marching." Now, are you gonna argue that my musical taste is wrong? Cause if so, you're utterly and completely off-topic.
I would tend to think that, at least in the case of games, it's not so much that they were necessarily more creative given smaller constraints -- although in general I would admit that this is true; if you have a goal and very limited resources, you have to be creative or you will fail -- but one other thing to keep in mind was how novel everything was. People used to play Pong, PONG for Chrissakes, for hours and hours, but that was when it first came out. Nowadays, I'd be amazed by anyone who'd seen any other games, was introduced to Pong, and found it that absorbing.
Yes, I'm sure it could happen, my point is that novelty often has an attraction that vanishes over time.
"Jeremy", Ten, Pearl Jam
"Smells Like Teen Spirit", Nevermind, Nirvana
"Champagne Supernova", (What's the Story) Morning Glory, Oasis
"Black Hole Sun", Superunknown, Soundgarden
"My Hero", The Colour and the Shape, Foo Fighters
"Enter Sandman", Metallica, Metallica
"Break Stuff", Significant Other, Limp Bizkit
"Closer", The Downward Spiral, Nine Inch Nails
"Devil's Haircut", Odelay, Beck
"Come Out and Play", Smash, The Offspring
"You Oughta Know", Jagged Little Pill, Alanis Morisette
"Everything Zen", Sixteen Stone, Bush
"People of the Sun", Evil Empire, Rage Against the Machine
"Plush", Core, Stone Temple Pilots
"Would", Dirt, Alice in Chains
"Tonight, Tonight", Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, Smashing Pumpkins
"Under the Bridge", Blood Sugar Sex Magik, Red Hot Chili Peppers
"What's My Age Again?", Enema of the State, Blink 182
"Connection", Elastica, Elastica
"Man in the Moon", Automatic for the People, R.E.M.
I did this off the top of my head. No references. Gimme a break, dude, your line about "no one can think of a top 20 list for the 90s". What, you expect me to believe that there was no notable music in the last 10 years? What the hell are you smoking? You think music wasn't driven by commercial interests until the 1990s? You think back in the 60s that everything was driven by highfalutin visions of peace and happiness and artistic creativity? Bullshit. Things were as money-driven then as they are now; the only difference is, the people doing that driving have gotten a lot better at it.
As for comics, there you're right. Comics certainly take up much less of the page, and are less colorful, than they used to be. Having not read many large-format comics from the past, I'm not in any position to comment on them.
Right, but if you intercept someone's RSA-encrypted message, you don't get the key.
SDMI would HAVE to provide you with the key, so that you could decrypt and listen to the music! I was incomplete before; what I should have said was, "They give you the encrypted data, the decryption algorithm, AND THE KEY".
You're right, I didn't really mention that. I was just trying to head off the tendency of people to say things like, "Bah, nowadays the graphics make everyone ignore things like story and content and plot! Back in my day, every game had the depth of Shakespeare!" which is hogwash.
You completely missed the point.:) (For one thing, no matter who I named, you would never agree that they were as great as Dylan, and my perception is that you're biased to think that Dylan is so great that none could ever surpass him.)
I don't personally listen to much folk music (although I got plenty of Dylan as a kid, thanks to my dad; and personally, I think Dylan's writing is very good, but I don't care for the music itself at all), so I couldn't personally provide an answer to that question. But let's use a different example: say, The Doors, as influential a band as I can think of. Rock and roll has progressed a lot since the Doors were around. Ray Manzarek (keyboards) is a friend of the family, he comes over and watches football with my dad all the time.
When the Doors came along, there hadn't really been anything like them. They were groundbreaking, they were revolutionary. Thirty years hence, we have seen quite a lot of development in rock music. If the Doors had not existed back in the late 60s, someone else would have (probably) filled their role. Now pretend that Jim Morrison is 21 years old at UCLA, and it's the year 1998. He starts a band with Ray and John Sizemore and Robbie Krieger, and they call themselves the Doors and sound exactly like the real Doors did back in the real 1960s. Do you honestly think they would be as famous or influential as they were in reality? OF COURSE NOT! The Doors were great, but a lot of the stuff they did has been extensively copied, modified, and improved upon since their time. If they came along with that now, everyone would wonder where they'd been for the last 30 years.
I'll agree that sometimes there are individual people/movies/games that will be SO good as to defy comparison even years down the road. I don't personally think Dylan is among them (of course, this is now in the realm of personal opinion). I've listened to a fair amount of Dylan, and I don't like him all that much. I recognize why he's so famous, and I can appreciate it; and his lyrics are definitely well-thought and, dare I say it, masterful. But I don't like his music, which is, thankfully, my choice.:)
Come on, do you honestly think that Dylan would be as influential if he started his career today?
Let's see. We'll take some data, encrypt it, and then not only will we GIVE YOU THE ENCRYPTED DATA, we will also GIVE YOU THE SOFTWARE TO DECRYPT IT. And they don't expect anyone to be able to decrypt the data? What the hell is wrong with these people?
The *reason* that the classic Star Wars movies are more satisfying to watch than the new one is because we grew up with them. (Well, for me, anyway, I'm assuming you're roughly my age, early-to-mid-20s.) I first saw Star Wars not until I was 12 years old (I might have seen it much younger but I can't recall ever having seen it before that first time), and my GOD I was blown away. I had seen Empire and Jedi as a kid (2 and 5 years old) but couldn't really remember them at all.
BUT, I was only 12 years old. It had a huge impact on me. Now when I watch Star Wars, it's with a much more critical eye. I see the places where I think things might have been done better, or could have been improved, but I still have a nostalgic fondness for the movie. Also, Star Wars had the advantage of being something that no one had ever seen before: it really WAS groundbreaking. (What annoys me to no end is people who expected Episode I to be as groundbreaking as ANY of the classic trilogy, when we've had 20 years of clones, knockoffs, and (yes) movies that improved upon the original. It's hard to do what Star Wars did, let alone twice.)
My point is, there's a good reason why the original Star Wars satisfies me more than Episode I: it's because of nostalgia. And I recognize this. At www.rottentomatoes.com, they collect movie reviews. Each review is rated as being either positive or negative, and then they tally the percentage of positive reviews, and give the movie that final score.
When the Star Wars Trilogy was rereleased in 1997, they went and collected all the reviews for the rerelease:
Star Wars: 93%
The Empire Strikes Back: 97%
Return of the Jedi: 83%
Then they went back and found the ORIGINAL REVIEWS for those three films when they came out:
Star Wars: 79%
The Empire Strikes Back: 52%
Return of the Jedi: 31%
If this isn't nostalgia at work, then I don't know what is. (Disclaimer: I love Star Wars and I think all FOUR movies are excellent, however, I am trying to point out what time and nostalgia will do to our perceptions).
I don't think that there's any fundamental difference between our perception of old games and old movies. Things that we loved in our youth, we tend to be nostalgic over. We forget their faults and glorify them. This is the Nostalgia Problem.
This is exactly my point. There are indeed plenty of excellent games from the past; my claim is that there are (at least proportionally) just as many now as there were then. I'm not saying new games are better than old games, or vice-versa; I'm saying we need to beware the twin traps of, "There were more great games back then than there are now" (there were not) and "The best games of the past were [inherently|uniformly] better than the best games of today" (they were not).
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I'm serious. Some peoples' entire goal in life is to piss in every still-crispy bowl of corn flakes they can find; all they want to do is ruin the fun for everyone else.
These people cannot be reasoned with, because given the opportunity, they will do it again.
They can be imprisoned for life, sure. But we're better off if they're dead.
Maybe this is a bit extreme... but fuck 'em.
Uh... oops. I mean, um... go, Apple! Yeah! Woo!
Bah! The only thing we have to worry about from Permafrost is the Ice Giants and Lady Vox.
We teach people that midnight is the first instant of each day. Midnight in 24-hour format is 00:00. Considering that the time goes 00:00, 00:01, ... 23:58, 23:59, and there is no 24:00, then 00:00 is the beginning of each day. It would take a little effort, but people would (presumably) get used to it. I figured out the concept myself (someone asked, what day does midnight fall on? and I thought about it for about 5 seconds) and I'm sure most people would understand it. Especially if you just told them with authoritah, "Midnight is the first instant of the day."
I agree; Daylight Savings Time isn't really a useful thing any more. In fact, it's just annoying. Serves no good purpose. I wish it would go away.
:)
:)
However with time zones, it's a little trickier. I agree that it meets my penchant for consistency to say that I wish there were no time zones.
Here's a problem with that, though. Let's say we all run on UTC instead. All clocks and watches are set to UTC. This means that sunrise in Los Angeles, instead of being at maybe 0600, occurs at 1400. This is fine, people would get used to it.
But unless people change their schedules to no longer be diurnal (active during daylight), problems occur. Let's say we have no time zones, but everything else stays the same. What time is "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" on? People want to watch it after work. If it's always on at the same time (let's say, 0400 UTC), well, some people are working at 0400 UTC, or already asleep. Right now, TV shows aren't all shown at the same time. Buffy is on at 8 pm, which means that it gets shown for four consecutive hours in the USA. 0100 UTC on the East Coast, 0200 in Central, 0300 in Mountain, and 0400 in Pacific.
Now keep in mind, my goal here is to find a solution to situations like this. I'm not saying you're wrong, I think that between us we should be able to come up with an answer to "how do we deal with things that happen at certain times of day?" Another example: fireworks celebrations. Those can't happen during the day, cause they look like crap. They have to happen when it's dark. So they can't all happen at the same time, it has to be specific to the area of the planet. I can't think of any other examples right now but I'm sure there must be some
So what do you think? Is this a tractable problem? I sure hope so
Last I knew, electricity doesn't move at the speed of light. Electrons (or the holes) have a much lower speed through conductors than 150,000km/sec, AFAIK.
Hmm, you've got a good point, but it also draws the following question: Should I be required to get into the TMBG community if I want to hear TMBG's music?
It depends. Will lying get them more money? :)
I'm willing to bet that you think that given the planet Earth, the fact that life evolves upon it means that entropy has decreased. You know what? You're right. Entropy has decreased.
LOCALLY.
The Earth is not a closed system. Entropy in an open system may decrease to zero, as long as there is an equal or greater increase somewhere else to make up for it. The energy that went to "ordering" the "chaotic" matter on Earth to cause Life, CAME FROM THE SUN. The TOTAL entropy of the universe still increases, even though locally it may increase.
I suggest you go read a couple of physics textbooks on thermodynamics (since you obviously haven't... I mean "order from chaos"? COME ON, dude, this isn't 1500!) before you try to make this argument again.
I think I need a day off.
Oh, that's boxING. Nevermind.
Is there something wrong with enjoying "twitching at pixels," as you put it? I highly enjoy Quake (and derivatives). I also highly enjoyed System Shock, Half-Life, Starcraft, Diablo, EverQuest, Command & Conquer, and a whole raft of other games that have nothing in common except that I find them FUN.
Can I be the naive yet loyal second-in-command who sacrifices his life so the rest of the band of rebels can get away during Act 2?
Speak for yourself. Most of that music I find deadly boring. Naturally, these are just one person's opinions. :)
Most of the songs I listed in the 20 (and I never said they were the 20 best songs, where did you get that idea?) I like listening to a hell of a lot more than 60s stuff. There's a lot of 60s/early 70s stuff I DO like (like The Doors, some Beatles, Hendrix, Steely Dan, and more) but for the most part I just don't find music from that era very interesting. And for what it's worth, your opinion is no more valid than mine.
Now it would be dense for me to claim that a lot of that music isn't a) very well done, b) important in terms of musical history, and c) highly influential, but that doesn't mean that I have to agree that it's "better" in the conventional sense than, say, Joe Satriani. In fact, right now I'm listening to my current favorite song, "Motorcycle Driver" by Satriani.
I've had plenty of experience with classic rock and folk and pop. Usually, I don't like it. Are you going to tell me I'm wrong? Do you think I'm trying to tell you that you're wrong? How the hell can you be intellectually justified in saying "These are just my opinions" and then implying that I'm somehow wrong to say that a modern song is, IN MY OPINION, better than an equivalent song from the 60s?
Personally, I think Primus sucks. Never listened to Midnight Oil. If I'd thought of DMB before some of the others, I would have put "Ants Marching." Now, are you gonna argue that my musical taste is wrong? Cause if so, you're utterly and completely off-topic.
Oh, no! I've been trolled! Oh, wait, I don't care.
Yes, I'm sure it could happen, my point is that novelty often has an attraction that vanishes over time.
"Jeremy", Ten, Pearl Jam
"Smells Like Teen Spirit", Nevermind, Nirvana
"Champagne Supernova", (What's the Story) Morning Glory, Oasis
"Black Hole Sun", Superunknown, Soundgarden
"My Hero", The Colour and the Shape, Foo Fighters
"Enter Sandman", Metallica, Metallica
"Break Stuff", Significant Other, Limp Bizkit
"Closer", The Downward Spiral, Nine Inch Nails
"Devil's Haircut", Odelay, Beck
"Come Out and Play", Smash, The Offspring
"You Oughta Know", Jagged Little Pill, Alanis Morisette
"Everything Zen", Sixteen Stone, Bush
"People of the Sun", Evil Empire, Rage Against the Machine
"Plush", Core, Stone Temple Pilots
"Would", Dirt, Alice in Chains
"Tonight, Tonight", Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, Smashing Pumpkins
"Under the Bridge", Blood Sugar Sex Magik, Red Hot Chili Peppers
"What's My Age Again?", Enema of the State, Blink 182
"Connection", Elastica, Elastica
"Man in the Moon", Automatic for the People, R.E.M.
I did this off the top of my head. No references. Gimme a break, dude, your line about "no one can think of a top 20 list for the 90s". What, you expect me to believe that there was no notable music in the last 10 years? What the hell are you smoking? You think music wasn't driven by commercial interests until the 1990s? You think back in the 60s that everything was driven by highfalutin visions of peace and happiness and artistic creativity? Bullshit. Things were as money-driven then as they are now; the only difference is, the people doing that driving have gotten a lot better at it.
As for comics, there you're right. Comics certainly take up much less of the page, and are less colorful, than they used to be. Having not read many large-format comics from the past, I'm not in any position to comment on them.
SDMI would HAVE to provide you with the key, so that you could decrypt and listen to the music! I was incomplete before; what I should have said was, "They give you the encrypted data, the decryption algorithm, AND THE KEY".
This statement could have been made accurately in every year for the past 20.
That's my point. Most games DO suck. They always have. They always will.
You're right, I didn't really mention that. I was just trying to head off the tendency of people to say things like, "Bah, nowadays the graphics make everyone ignore things like story and content and plot! Back in my day, every game had the depth of Shakespeare!" which is hogwash.
I don't personally listen to much folk music (although I got plenty of Dylan as a kid, thanks to my dad; and personally, I think Dylan's writing is very good, but I don't care for the music itself at all), so I couldn't personally provide an answer to that question. But let's use a different example: say, The Doors, as influential a band as I can think of. Rock and roll has progressed a lot since the Doors were around. Ray Manzarek (keyboards) is a friend of the family, he comes over and watches football with my dad all the time.
When the Doors came along, there hadn't really been anything like them. They were groundbreaking, they were revolutionary. Thirty years hence, we have seen quite a lot of development in rock music. If the Doors had not existed back in the late 60s, someone else would have (probably) filled their role. Now pretend that Jim Morrison is 21 years old at UCLA, and it's the year 1998. He starts a band with Ray and John Sizemore and Robbie Krieger, and they call themselves the Doors and sound exactly like the real Doors did back in the real 1960s. Do you honestly think they would be as famous or influential as they were in reality? OF COURSE NOT! The Doors were great, but a lot of the stuff they did has been extensively copied, modified, and improved upon since their time. If they came along with that now, everyone would wonder where they'd been for the last 30 years.
I'll agree that sometimes there are individual people/movies/games that will be SO good as to defy comparison even years down the road. I don't personally think Dylan is among them (of course, this is now in the realm of personal opinion). I've listened to a fair amount of Dylan, and I don't like him all that much. I recognize why he's so famous, and I can appreciate it; and his lyrics are definitely well-thought and, dare I say it, masterful. But I don't like his music, which is, thankfully, my choice. :)
Come on, do you honestly think that Dylan would be as influential if he started his career today?
Let's see. We'll take some data, encrypt it, and then not only will we GIVE YOU THE ENCRYPTED DATA, we will also GIVE YOU THE SOFTWARE TO DECRYPT IT. And they don't expect anyone to be able to decrypt the data? What the hell is wrong with these people?
BUT, I was only 12 years old. It had a huge impact on me. Now when I watch Star Wars, it's with a much more critical eye. I see the places where I think things might have been done better, or could have been improved, but I still have a nostalgic fondness for the movie. Also, Star Wars had the advantage of being something that no one had ever seen before: it really WAS groundbreaking. (What annoys me to no end is people who expected Episode I to be as groundbreaking as ANY of the classic trilogy, when we've had 20 years of clones, knockoffs, and (yes) movies that improved upon the original. It's hard to do what Star Wars did, let alone twice.)
My point is, there's a good reason why the original Star Wars satisfies me more than Episode I: it's because of nostalgia. And I recognize this. At www.rottentomatoes.com, they collect movie reviews. Each review is rated as being either positive or negative, and then they tally the percentage of positive reviews, and give the movie that final score.
When the Star Wars Trilogy was rereleased in 1997, they went and collected all the reviews for the rerelease:
Star Wars: 93%
The Empire Strikes Back: 97%
Return of the Jedi: 83%
Then they went back and found the ORIGINAL REVIEWS for those three films when they came out:
Star Wars: 79%
The Empire Strikes Back: 52%
Return of the Jedi: 31%
If this isn't nostalgia at work, then I don't know what is. (Disclaimer: I love Star Wars and I think all FOUR movies are excellent, however, I am trying to point out what time and nostalgia will do to our perceptions).
I don't think that there's any fundamental difference between our perception of old games and old movies. Things that we loved in our youth, we tend to be nostalgic over. We forget their faults and glorify them. This is the Nostalgia Problem.
This is exactly my point. There are indeed plenty of excellent games from the past; my claim is that there are (at least proportionally) just as many now as there were then. I'm not saying new games are better than old games, or vice-versa; I'm saying we need to beware the twin traps of, "There were more great games back then than there are now" (there were not) and "The best games of the past were [inherently|uniformly] better than the best games of today" (they were not).