You do realize that now you could have 30x as many of them before your computer slows to a crawl. I somehow think that you should be unhappy about this.
The way that you describe it, STO will be an single-player game with other people. You'll be able to adventure and have fun, but only WITH friends. Not against them. While this appeals to, the market has shown that it alone will not attract most people. There needs to be head-to-head competition. Unless of course they never want to reach WoW's marketshare.
How close is close? Is 162k close to 164k? Sounds like it is to me. From the examples in the discussion cited, it seems that anything over 4k is at risk, not just things 'near' a 4k boundary.
I would even hazzard to guess that the size matters not at all, but rather the contents of the files. If the contents match a certain pattern, the compression goes awry and adds the garbage to the end. (Accidentally overwriting the real data.)
The problem is that for every one of you who would do it right, safe, proper, etc etc... There's dozens who would do it improperly and injure people, probably accidentally. Those laws exist to protect your customers, and by extension, you. (If a customer is hurt by your neglect, you're going to get sued and lose your small business.) And as this lawsuit proves, if you don't put in the wheelchair accessible restroom immediately, you could be sued into putting it in while your business is operating, and you may not have the capital at that point, either. It would be much worse to have the business up and running, and then lose it, rather than just be prevented from doing it wrong in the first place.
As stiff as we all feel those laws are, they are necessary to protect everyone.
"If the Target.com web site doesn't suit you, shop elsewhere. Target isn't that great anyway. Encourge others not to shop at Target and write the company to tell them why you aren't shopping there. It's a lot more effective than a law suit."
How about:
"If you don't like sitting in the back, ride someone else's bus."
And:
"If you don't like segregated restrooms, use someone else's."
And:
"If the Target store doesn't work with your wheelchair, shop elsewhere."
I don't particularly care for this lawsuit and what it implies. I like how litigious our society has become even less. But everyone has rights and stores that are open to the 'public' need to actually be accessible to the public. I think it would have been a lot better to raise a stink on the internet first by getting bloggers/slashdot/the media/etc to put up articles about it. And if that failed, then go for the lawsuit. But I think we've proven that if you can get something on Slashdot, stuff will happen. (Maybe not exactly what you wanted, but people will notice and heads will roll.)
Wow, that's great. My father is all 'that's not right' but I"m going to buy a stamp and do that. I'm sick of the garbage. The worst around here is that several small newspapers deliver to EVERYONE like that with a 'current resident' address. Besides being annoying, other mail can get inside the newspaper and get lost.
A Demonstration!? Before you start screaming and harrassing a company, maybe, just maybe, you should give them some time to respond. In this case, the company has responded in record time and it still wasn't enough to stop this radical from freaking out. Nothing shouts 'unstable' like organizing protests at the drop of a hat.
People are going to hate me for this, but I'm seriously considering it. I've wanted to create games for a long time, and I've even helped code/design simple ones that never went any where... But if this makes it even easier, and will work on the x360 also (which I just purchased last week) then I think I could have some fun with it. And of course, there's no investment until I actually want to publish on the 360.
I'm assuming that selling the content I create is not an option on the free XNA IDE, tho. Not that that's a real problem with the level of game I'm likely to create.
So you're saying that while he was in the US, he shut his company down or somehow else prevented US citizens from illegally using his site?
He WAS in the US while breaking this law.
I was leaning towards his rights until I found out that his site lists US phone numbers and EST calling times, and 77% of his business is from the US. It isn't like he's got a few people he didn't manage to keep off the site. He actively encourages them to break the law.
Disclaimer: I stole those facts from above posts. They could be totally wrong. But I doubt it.
I don't think the plot was actively bad, just short and... average. It's definitely not an example of a game driven by plot. It's an example of the (American) game driven by action that has a plot merely so it can proceed to more action.
At the risk of totally hitting a tangent, Horror films are the same way. Japanese horror films are about 'omg that's a horrible thing to happen' where American horror films are about 'scare them, scare them! quick, more plot so we can scare them some more!'.
1 man in 1775 standing in the street and screaming 'I'll be free or die!' did not get the attention of England. That would have been handled locally and been done with. It was many, many people doing that got the point across.
I'm that one man. I'm doing what I believe in, and I'm happy doing it. Even is my choice is probably career-suicide. (I don't think it is, actually, but that's not the point.)
If techies in general want to make mega-corp managers listen, they'll all have to help me scream. They can do that by refusing to work for people who are idiots.
If they don't, they won't. And nothing will change.
I honestly don't expect to hear many others screaming along with me. Truth is, most people count themselves happy to have a job at all, even if they aren't happy and that job is ruining their lives. Until they see that they CAN get a job that makes them happy, we'll all be stuck in this mess. (This doesn't just apply to the tech industry, by the way.)
Some say "BUT!! BUT!! Once you kill Nefarian he isn't REALLY dead!"
Yea, well, once you read a good book, guess what, you can read it again. This is no different really.
Wow. I had never actually thought about it like that before. (This is not sarcastic.) I think a game that truly understood this concept could be very nice.
There's been tons of games that use it unwittingly. WoW, Everquest, Asheron's Call, etc. And of course, every offline game uses it for the concept of the whole game, as you can simply play it again from scratch. But none have really presented it like this.
It's kind of funny, too, since there's been more than a few games that start off 'telling a tale' and then give you control. Some even show a book with printed pages in the beginning.
This is more of 'reading a chapter again' than a whole book, in MMOs, but still. I really like the concept.
In severity and importance, yes, this is different than the American Revolution. But the basic idea is the same: If you care about it, stand up for it.
Nobody is asking you to DIE for this belief. The 'sacrifice' you will have to give is also different in severity from the revolution.
I'm not saying that the IT department is always right and management is always wrong. But they should at least value the input of the department as a whole. Instead, they make IT-related decisions based on facts that are totally unrelated to the performance of the department and their systems. Most of the time, their decision is adequate and the company can continue. But rarely is the decision ideal.
I -chose- not to work for a mega-corp. (Translation: Didn't send them resumes.) I've already taken the first step in standing up and being heard.
If you don't want to be heard, don't try to be. But don't complain that you weren't.
"Here's a tip: I've never heard the phrase "surprise, surprise" uttered by somebody who wasn't a condescending prick. If you're not trying for hostility, you might want to avoid that one."
You need to get out more, then. There's plenty of 'non-prick' people that use that statement. It's called sarcasm, in case you hadn't figured that out yet. And you think I suddenly turned nasty, maybe you shouldn't call someone a 'condescending prick'.
I totally disagree with your Oblivion bit, too. Oblivion was a great game that I had a ton of fun with, but the plot had little to do with it. Just for fun, try to write a book where the main character is off to save the world, and head's to Town A. On the way, though, they suddenly go to town M and join the mage's guild. They do a lot of totally unrelated things, then join the fighter's guild. Again, unrelated stuff. Then they go back and become grand master of the mage's guild. Then they head to Town A and do everything totally as if the 2 guilds they joined have NOTHING to do with saving the world.
Every single editor in the world would murder you for the completely pointless 2/3 of the story that have NOTHING to do with the plot. Filling pages with words isn't plot. It has to MEAN something to the overall picture to be considered part of the plot.
The 'plot' in Oblivion wouldn't make a good short story, let alone a novel. Good Japanese RPGs, if they didn't COME from a manga/anime, often get turned into an anime. It's because they are based on plot.
Yeah, you go ahead and do that. Ohhh, that's right, you can't because it doesn't do x360 yet. It will 'in the future'. Yeah, sure. Call me when it happens.
And you continue to support that religion by allowing those you work for to support it.
I work in a fairly small company, but it didn't take ANY EFFORT AT ALL to convince the management and owners that Windows was bad. Most of the tech department uses linux (1 Mac) and all the servers are linux. All of customer service is Mac. We have 3 machines that we can remote into if we absolutely HAVE to use IE to do our job. Once IE runs on Mac, we'll be investing in that CodeWeavers software heavily and ditching the Windows machines.
I understand it's quite a bit harder to convince management in a huge mega-corporation. One way to convince them is to simply refuse to work for a mega-corp that doesn't listen. Once they find they can't get decent people without listening to them, they'll listen.
Maybe you're the one who's truly wearing The Emporer's Clothes?
They'll never have to deal with the lack of a good tech team if you keep working for them.
Stand up for what you believe in. Yes, it'll take a little personal sacrifice. But that's what the US is built on. I think in the end you'll even find you are happier.
That like asking 'Isn't it legal to break the law when there's nobody and nothing around to get hurt?' No, it's still not legal. There is no 'I didn't do it to break the law' clause in the DMCA. Circumventing the protection, for any reason, by any method, is against the law now in the US.
The real shame here is that MS doesn't EVER license their devkits to anyone unless they are a serious game developer and can front a huge amount of cash. For that matter, Sony and Nintendo don't, either.
I'm sure they are afraid some 'pirate' is going to use the official devkit to figure out how to fake the encryption and all that. But they usually figure all that mess out anyhow, or find an even better way to circumvent the protection, so there really isn't much point.
Slashdot Mirror
You do realize that now you could have 30x as many of them before your computer slows to a crawl. I somehow think that you should be unhappy about this.
(Yes, I do realize he is joking. So am I.)
In other words: Peace doesn't sell.
The way that you describe it, STO will be an single-player game with other people. You'll be able to adventure and have fun, but only WITH friends. Not against them. While this appeals to, the market has shown that it alone will not attract most people. There needs to be head-to-head competition. Unless of course they never want to reach WoW's marketshare.
"close to a multiple of 4K in size"
How close is close? Is 162k close to 164k? Sounds like it is to me. From the examples in the discussion cited, it seems that anything over 4k is at risk, not just things 'near' a 4k boundary.
I would even hazzard to guess that the size matters not at all, but rather the contents of the files. If the contents match a certain pattern, the compression goes awry and adds the garbage to the end. (Accidentally overwriting the real data.)
The problem is that for every one of you who would do it right, safe, proper, etc etc... There's dozens who would do it improperly and injure people, probably accidentally. Those laws exist to protect your customers, and by extension, you. (If a customer is hurt by your neglect, you're going to get sued and lose your small business.) And as this lawsuit proves, if you don't put in the wheelchair accessible restroom immediately, you could be sued into putting it in while your business is operating, and you may not have the capital at that point, either. It would be much worse to have the business up and running, and then lose it, rather than just be prevented from doing it wrong in the first place.
As stiff as we all feel those laws are, they are necessary to protect everyone.
"If the Target.com web site doesn't suit you, shop elsewhere. Target isn't that great anyway. Encourge others not to shop at Target and write the company to tell them why you aren't shopping there. It's a lot more effective than a law suit."
How about:
"If you don't like sitting in the back, ride someone else's bus."
And:
"If you don't like segregated restrooms, use someone else's."
And:
"If the Target store doesn't work with your wheelchair, shop elsewhere."
I don't particularly care for this lawsuit and what it implies. I like how litigious our society has become even less. But everyone has rights and stores that are open to the 'public' need to actually be accessible to the public. I think it would have been a lot better to raise a stink on the internet first by getting bloggers/slashdot/the media/etc to put up articles about it. And if that failed, then go for the lawsuit. But I think we've proven that if you can get something on Slashdot, stuff will happen. (Maybe not exactly what you wanted, but people will notice and heads will roll.)
Or maybe they just hadn't heard of it until now. I certainly hadn't.
Wow, that's great. My father is all 'that's not right' but I"m going to buy a stamp and do that. I'm sick of the garbage. The worst around here is that several small newspapers deliver to EVERYONE like that with a 'current resident' address. Besides being annoying, other mail can get inside the newspaper and get lost.
A Demonstration!? Before you start screaming and harrassing a company, maybe, just maybe, you should give them some time to respond. In this case, the company has responded in record time and it still wasn't enough to stop this radical from freaking out. Nothing shouts 'unstable' like organizing protests at the drop of a hat.
We tried that in our 'little town' and the answer was 'they've paid to have it delivered, and we have to deliver it.'
I sense another Ask Slashdot in the making...
Dear Slashdot, how do I measure bandwidth usage...?
Seriously, I think that's a pretty basic point and the fact that he didn't bother says a lot about the likelihood of this mission being a success.
He can't hire a consultant for 1 DAY !! to figure this problem out properly, instead of throwing money at it and hoping it works? Good freaking luck.
The point... Hmm... Fun, adventure, killing shit. No, I think I got the point.
People are going to hate me for this, but I'm seriously considering it. I've wanted to create games for a long time, and I've even helped code/design simple ones that never went any where... But if this makes it even easier, and will work on the x360 also (which I just purchased last week) then I think I could have some fun with it. And of course, there's no investment until I actually want to publish on the 360.
I'm assuming that selling the content I create is not an option on the free XNA IDE, tho. Not that that's a real problem with the level of game I'm likely to create.
So you're saying that while he was in the US, he shut his company down or somehow else prevented US citizens from illegally using his site?
He WAS in the US while breaking this law.
I was leaning towards his rights until I found out that his site lists US phone numbers and EST calling times, and 77% of his business is from the US. It isn't like he's got a few people he didn't manage to keep off the site. He actively encourages them to break the law.
Disclaimer: I stole those facts from above posts. They could be totally wrong. But I doubt it.
So make it work on LINUX and OSX, or PEOPLE WILL DIE.
I seriously doubt not seeding will stop distribution of this.
I hadn't realized it wasn't free forever, myself. But $99/hr! I think you mean $99/yr ;)
I so wish I had mod points. I loved that movie.
Are you arguing for or against me?
... average. It's definitely not an example of a game driven by plot. It's an example of the (American) game driven by action that has a plot merely so it can proceed to more action.
I don't think the plot was actively bad, just short and
At the risk of totally hitting a tangent, Horror films are the same way. Japanese horror films are about 'omg that's a horrible thing to happen' where American horror films are about 'scare them, scare them! quick, more plot so we can scare them some more!'.
You've missed the point again.
1 man in 1775 standing in the street and screaming 'I'll be free or die!' did not get the attention of England. That would have been handled locally and been done with. It was many, many people doing that got the point across.
I'm that one man. I'm doing what I believe in, and I'm happy doing it. Even is my choice is probably career-suicide. (I don't think it is, actually, but that's not the point.)
If techies in general want to make mega-corp managers listen, they'll all have to help me scream. They can do that by refusing to work for people who are idiots.
If they don't, they won't. And nothing will change.
I honestly don't expect to hear many others screaming along with me. Truth is, most people count themselves happy to have a job at all, even if they aren't happy and that job is ruining their lives. Until they see that they CAN get a job that makes them happy, we'll all be stuck in this mess. (This doesn't just apply to the tech industry, by the way.)
Some say "BUT!! BUT!! Once you kill Nefarian he isn't REALLY dead!"
Yea, well, once you read a good book, guess what, you can read it again. This is no different really.
Wow. I had never actually thought about it like that before. (This is not sarcastic.) I think a game that truly understood this concept could be very nice.
There's been tons of games that use it unwittingly. WoW, Everquest, Asheron's Call, etc. And of course, every offline game uses it for the concept of the whole game, as you can simply play it again from scratch. But none have really presented it like this.
It's kind of funny, too, since there's been more than a few games that start off 'telling a tale' and then give you control. Some even show a book with printed pages in the beginning.
This is more of 'reading a chapter again' than a whole book, in MMOs, but still. I really like the concept.
In severity and importance, yes, this is different than the American Revolution. But the basic idea is the same: If you care about it, stand up for it.
Nobody is asking you to DIE for this belief. The 'sacrifice' you will have to give is also different in severity from the revolution.
I'm not saying that the IT department is always right and management is always wrong. But they should at least value the input of the department as a whole. Instead, they make IT-related decisions based on facts that are totally unrelated to the performance of the department and their systems. Most of the time, their decision is adequate and the company can continue. But rarely is the decision ideal.
I -chose- not to work for a mega-corp. (Translation: Didn't send them resumes.) I've already taken the first step in standing up and being heard.
If you don't want to be heard, don't try to be. But don't complain that you weren't.
"Here's a tip: I've never heard the phrase "surprise, surprise" uttered by somebody who wasn't a condescending prick. If you're not trying for hostility, you might want to avoid that one."
You need to get out more, then. There's plenty of 'non-prick' people that use that statement. It's called sarcasm, in case you hadn't figured that out yet. And you think I suddenly turned nasty, maybe you shouldn't call someone a 'condescending prick'.
I totally disagree with your Oblivion bit, too. Oblivion was a great game that I had a ton of fun with, but the plot had little to do with it. Just for fun, try to write a book where the main character is off to save the world, and head's to Town A. On the way, though, they suddenly go to town M and join the mage's guild. They do a lot of totally unrelated things, then join the fighter's guild. Again, unrelated stuff. Then they go back and become grand master of the mage's guild. Then they head to Town A and do everything totally as if the 2 guilds they joined have NOTHING to do with saving the world.
Every single editor in the world would murder you for the completely pointless 2/3 of the story that have NOTHING to do with the plot. Filling pages with words isn't plot. It has to MEAN something to the overall picture to be considered part of the plot.
The 'plot' in Oblivion wouldn't make a good short story, let alone a novel. Good Japanese RPGs, if they didn't COME from a manga/anime, often get turned into an anime. It's because they are based on plot.
No, it takes more people to move a bigger rock. Duh.
If only 1 person is trying to get through to the mega-corp, they aren't going to hear. Open your ears for this one:
It only works if most of the competent people stand up for themselves.
Do you honestly believe that we'd be a free country if only 1 person had fought back in 1776? NO. It took most of them.
This is no different. You get to either A Try to do something about it or B Deal with it and stop whinging.
Yeah, you go ahead and do that. Ohhh, that's right, you can't because it doesn't do x360 yet. It will 'in the future'. Yeah, sure. Call me when it happens.
And you continue to support that religion by allowing those you work for to support it.
I work in a fairly small company, but it didn't take ANY EFFORT AT ALL to convince the management and owners that Windows was bad. Most of the tech department uses linux (1 Mac) and all the servers are linux. All of customer service is Mac. We have 3 machines that we can remote into if we absolutely HAVE to use IE to do our job. Once IE runs on Mac, we'll be investing in that CodeWeavers software heavily and ditching the Windows machines.
I understand it's quite a bit harder to convince management in a huge mega-corporation. One way to convince them is to simply refuse to work for a mega-corp that doesn't listen. Once they find they can't get decent people without listening to them, they'll listen.
Maybe you're the one who's truly wearing The Emporer's Clothes?
They'll never have to deal with the lack of a good tech team if you keep working for them.
Stand up for what you believe in. Yes, it'll take a little personal sacrifice. But that's what the US is built on. I think in the end you'll even find you are happier.
That like asking 'Isn't it legal to break the law when there's nobody and nothing around to get hurt?' No, it's still not legal. There is no 'I didn't do it to break the law' clause in the DMCA. Circumventing the protection, for any reason, by any method, is against the law now in the US.
The real shame here is that MS doesn't EVER license their devkits to anyone unless they are a serious game developer and can front a huge amount of cash. For that matter, Sony and Nintendo don't, either.
I'm sure they are afraid some 'pirate' is going to use the official devkit to figure out how to fake the encryption and all that. But they usually figure all that mess out anyhow, or find an even better way to circumvent the protection, so there really isn't much point.