Artificial Intelligence is a misnomer. Only a segment of the field of AI is concerned with making computers become self aware.
The majority of the field runs away from such things. Sure, even in those other fields rough human models were originally the basis (neural nets for example). But the drive is not to become more human but to simply become better.
Frankly, once you start even considering trying to make things exactly like humans, things become messy unbelievably quickly. We're computer scientists, not philosophers.
Anyway, in truth, our level of technology is still quite a ways off from even being able to do much in terms of being able to make computers think like humans, so it's largely a moot point.
Right now the issue is less of robots having a philosophical view of "Should a robot shoot a human enemy" than of "Can a robot determine if a human is there or not? Can it detect if the human is a child? Can it detect if the human is friend or foe?"
Perhaps these anti-GOP demonstrators should in fact be embracing GOP leader.
By that I mean if the GOP can 'accidentally' electronic records (and backups!) that they were specifically legally bound to keep, couldn't these demonstrators also 'accidentally' lose those records as well?
(I'm not actually advocating that they do this, I'm just pointing out that it's kind of ridiculous that even anti-GOP demonstrators keep copies of data while the GOP all too conveniently lose their data that may well be even more incriminating).
They should learn from Comedy Central and The Daily Show.
Some of the main points: 1. Other than a Flash player, you shouldn't need to download anything to watch shows (which NBC actually has done fine). Some DRM isn't necessarily a deal breaker, as long as I never notice it.
2. Whatever distributions means you use, it has to deliver the video reasonable without too many problems (which in my experience has been an issue with shows on the NBC website)
3. Put ALL the episodes of a show online, and don't take them down. If you remove them after 4 episodes, then I will be far more likely to turn to alternate methods of getting the shows, to ensure that I can watch whatever episode I want whenever I want to. (NBC currently fails this). If they're worried about DVD sales, just add in some extras and make sure the quality is very good (added value).
4. Some commercials are okay, but if you start approaching live TV levels of commercials, alternate methods of getting the shows (without commercials) look more and more attractive (NBC is okay at this so far)
If they just take care of the four issues, then there is no advantage to piracy (only danger of getting caught, and also a slightly guilty feeling). The reason piracy exists is just because it is more convenient in these 4 issues.
Except that this is not unrealistic. Just as in WoW, the world has plenty of idiots.
WoW is not necessarily bad leadership experience when you get into organizing raids.
Some notable leadership experience from WoW raids:
1. Learning how to pick team members. This includes avoiding the tons of idiots out their and fostering relationships with competent people. Additionally it forces you to figure out what skill sets are needed and available at a given time, and for you to know how different people work together.
2. Planning. Large raids take some work for getting people willing to work on a project (the raid), and do not come together instantly. You must plan out ahead of time when you are going to do things to allow people to work it into their schedule.
3. Evaluation of goals and performance. If your project (raid) fails, you must take a step back and figure out what went wrong and to come up with a strategy to avoid that problem.
4. Dealing with underperformers with tact. Yes, there are some people who just aren't quite holding up their ends of things. Sometimes they are just bad players who don't care, who should perhaps not be a part of your team anymore. Other times however, they desperately want to do better, but aren't sure. In such situations, as in life, you need to sit down with them in a non-confrontational way and talk about the problem, and work with them on how to improve. As in life, the individual and the team will improve.
5. Dealing with team morale. Things don't always go well, but you almost always have to see some good aspects of what the team is doing to let the team know that (while at the same time identifying ways to improve). When the team does a good job, you need to make sure they know that you know that they did a good job.
6. Dealing with life conflicts. People have (hopefully) lives outside of WoW, as they have lives outside of work. You have to understand that situations come up, and people can't always be where they have said they will be. At the same time, there has to be consequences for people who are complete flakes.
So, I'm not sure that WoW is actually a bad leadership training ground.
From the article, Congressman Boucher said that 'Comcast should "simply tier their offerings and engage in a pricing structure that allocates more bandwidth to those who pay more, and less to those who pay less."'
Why the hell should I have to pay more for even more unlimited bandwidth?
The issue is not just that Comcast is crippling bitTorrent, but that they are doing so to try to make their false advertising look legitimate.
There are different things that you can do with a website, so first of all it really depends on what you are intending.
PHP5 will be great for building creating more traditional websites that are driven by HTML forms, and is probably the best thing to use for such purposes.
Ruby on Rails seems to be meant for if you are planning to build AJAX apps. It's fairly easy, with a lower learning curve, but does have scalability issues. Another option that you might consider if you are looking for AJAX stuff would be GWT, the Google Web Toolkit. Larger learning curve, but very fast web apps.
Really though, comparing PHP5 and RoR seems kind of like comparing apples and oranges.
Just remember, figure out what you are trying to do first, then pick the language.
Indeed, some of the previous solutions were less than pleasant. Imagine camping with 5 other people for 6 months in an enclosed location, and *not* having a decent toilet. Chances are morale would suffer in a hurry.
As to the cost, people seem to forgot that NASA can't just run out to home depot and pick up any old toilet. Our toilet systems are dependent upon gravity to operate, which makes the basic mechanics of our toilets useless in space.
So you have to develop a toilet for space, which is naturally going to cost quite a bit, since: testing it (potentially in an airplane in free fall) is going to be costly, reliability is going to be an issue (don't want it to break down a month into a 6 month stay aboard the station), it has to be custom built (not exactly enough demand for space station toilets to justify mass production which drops the price).
Furthermore, nobody seems to have mentioned the space shuttle toilet. 20 some years ago when it was developed, it cost NASA $23.4 million (http://www.abc.net.au/science/k2/moments/s348188. htm), and of course there has been inflation since then. So it's price is actually pretty reasonable comparitively.
Dealing with AT&T is just not worth it for cheap Internet Service. Even if it were free, I don't think I'd go for it. Besides, if it goes anything like my experience getting phone service from them, that $10 will really be $25 a month with all the extra fees and surcharges they are sure to add on.
CSS is weak, but it has served to prevent the masses from being able to easily and legally copy DVDs. Because of it's weakness, it has been easy for many hardware vendors to produce DVD players. As people have said DVDs "just work". But you are seeing more problems when more complex DRM is used. You have things that consumers think are supposed to work well together not working well together (such as a lot of earlier HD stuff). By ruling that CSS is not effective enough, this will force the MPAA, etc. into using much harsher DRM (although they seem to be heading that way, it will now actually be more justified).
I'm not a big fan of DRM, but I don't think it will be going away completely any time soon, and I'd rather just have weak DRM that is an annoyance that can be fairly easily gotten around rather than draconian restrictions that will make things stop working.
Have you watched Firefly?
I saw Serenity first, and felt about the same way as you. The characters didn't seem to really have any depth. The story on its own seemed ridiculous. Everyone was saying how good it was, but to me it just seemed like someone was trying to mix sci-fi with zombie horror movies, but just had enough of a budget to produce really nice special effects, which was what people were amazed by. So I had a similar impression of it at first.
Then I watched the entire Firefly series (doesn't take all that long) and went back and watched Serenity. Then I found that it was a quite good, interesting movie. Characters dying had a far more emotional impact, since I now knew their backstories.
So the point is that the movie does not really stand alone. I'm not sure if it should be considered the best sci-fi movie because it's impact really depends on the series for the backstory.
No, that's not the problem. My point is that the amount of data on the screen with a 10-12 point font at 1200x800 resolution is just about right. Any larger font (or reduced resolution) would result in too little data on the screen (as in lines of text viewable at a single time). The issue then is the smallest screen that this amount of data is still reasonably viewable at.
I do imagine that before too long we will have these types of ultra portable computers, but I don't think the time has come yet. I have (and am writing this on) a 3 pound computer with a 12 inch screen (1280x800). If the screen were any smaller, I'd start to have a lot of problems seeing things. The resolution could be reduced to adjust for this, but 1280x800 already seems like the minimum resolution that I can stand. I think a lot of other people are in the same boat in feeling that the screens and resolutions should not be reduced beyond this, and judging by the smallest models of laptops that most companies sell (and presumably have found a market for), the market seems to agree. This means that these companies are persuing the wrong problem in trying to find the smallest screen, since most people will only accept a 10-12 inch screen at minimum. The right question is how to fit a 10-12 inch screen into a smaller space for transportation. I imagine that before too long we will have monitors that are able to fold (or perhaps bend) that will solve this problem. The problem with this is that when folded up, you will have several layers of the screen on top of each other, and I think that at present, the current thickness of screens are still too thick to make this practical.
Similarly, we will have to use folding keyboards, but I've already seem some, so that element is already in place.
So that leaves us with having to develop thin, folding screens.
A few Myspace usernames and passwords isn't such a big deal.
I say (in the name of security) we request that CNN.com be taken down, I mean they have an entire special section Devoted to how to rob a bank! (http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/presents/index.ro b.bank.html)
And how about we shut down government websites too. I mean that 9/11 report (and lots of other reports) could be used to help terrorists figure out how to attack us!
Mainly in that you can minimize different sections. Now if only it would let you drag those sections around to be in a better order for you instead of their current piece of junk organization.
Perhaps that's coming. Who knows.
It also is starting to feel cluttered. Perhaps they'll let you get rid of sections and create buttons in case you want to see those.
Wow, I could really see this being useful for building your own robotics. It seems like it could provide a really nice off the shelf solution at a much smaller size than using a full laptop.
Cheating by plagiarization, or sneaking in notes to exams are clearly a bad forms of cheating. The student is obviously not even trying to learn and do the work. However, copying off of another student's work can get a lot murkier, and is not necessarily bad. Definitions of cheating are usually kept rather broad. Why? Because it helps protect the professor.
For instance, let's say that student A and student B have both been working on 20 math problems separately. They decide to compare answers (often considered officially cheating, but in reality a good way of learning), they find that they have different answers on one question. They discuss it and realize that student B was correct for that question. So student A copies the answer to that question off of student B. Technically cheating, but learning has been achieved.
So why doesn't the professor allow this as part of the cheating policy? Well let's say the prof. does allow it in the cheating policy, but then has a student who copies half of the problems from another student and is caught. They can then argue that the cheating policy is vague, and the prof may be powerless. So the net result (at least in my experience in CS), is that cheating policies are officially kept very strict so as to give a prof leeway to come down hard on people cheating to just not do work, but profs allow and expect small amounts of cheating if students are learning from it. The funny thing is that it tends to be a fairly open thing. All too often I've been in classes where the official policy is that no student is allowed to receive any help from/work with any other student in the class, but at the beginning of a class a student will begin with 'We were talking about question x and had some questions about it.' and the prof is all too happy to see that students have been actively trying to figure out the material, even if there was a bit of technical cheating involved.
To reiterate, it just depends upon the intentions of the students when they cheat.
1. It's cheaper.
While it may be cheaper (although from the sounds of it the PS3 may only be slightly so), it is also not upgradable. Graphics starting to look a bit old? Well tough luck on a console until a new console comes out and you have to shell out money for an entirely new system, even if the processor, etc. works well. On a PC (at least a desktop), you can just replace the graphics card.
2. Every game is guaranteed to work
Good point, although if your computer isn't more that 3-4 years old, this isn't likely to be a problem. By this amount of time, you would still likely have to buy a new console to play the most recent games.
3. You needn't tweak
This may be true, but it's not an entirely good thing. If you have less money to spend on your PC, you may not have the best parts, but through a bit of tweaking you can still play games. If you do have a ton of money, you can get the best parts and tweak a bit so you can play those games at nicer settings, and you can also upgrade parts as desired.
4. Lots of console exclusives
Granted, and this is probably the most valid point. Although I will say that there are some PC exclusives that people tend to use (Word, Excel, etc). People with consoles still tend to have to buy PC's anyway for these. If you are a really hardcore gamer, the availablity of exclusive games available on consoles will make the difference.
5. Xbox Live. Aside from Battlefield 2, I can't think of any online game that's currently better on PC.
How about PC only? Might I introduce you to a game called World of Warcraft? 7 million people reportedly enjoy it. While consoles may be better for FPS's, I would say that PC's with mouse and keyboard are better for social interaction in such games, and also lend themselves to be more easily updated with fresh content (i.e. WoW patches/expansions that can update the game fairly extensively).
6. Backwards compatibility
And how are people enjoying playing their Super Nintendo cartridges on their game cubes? Yes, perhaps Sony may be doing a better job of this, but others aren't. In addition you're paying for it.
7. Virus, adware, and spyware free
Chances are (especially given that this person wrote an article) that the author uses some sort of Word Processor, which means they are using a PC, which means that they already have to deal with these things. My suggestion to the author? Just be careful and stop visiting his midget porn websites. People tend to get into trouble most frequently when they voluntarily go to really questionable websites.
8. Games look better in high-def...from the couch.
The author even admits that PC's can do higher resolution graphics and modern TV's have digital inputs that will let you watch stuff from your computer on your TV (heck, there are a number of TV/Monitors out on the market these days). There are tons of wireless devices for PC's out on the market. You can play/work on your TV on your couch using your PC if you so choose. You can then switch back to your desk if you so choose and use your higher resolution monitor. The choice is yours with a PC. Not so with a console.
9. Controllers are more comfortable
So buy a comfortable, wireless controller for your PC. There's a ton of variations out there for you to choose from.
10. Controller innovation (Citing the Wii)
But wait a second, wasn't the author just talking about the backwards compatibility of the Sony Playstation? Can I play my old Super Nintendo games on it? Are you saying you want me to buy both a PS3 and a Wii (heck, there goes the price advantage of the consoles).
Most of the reasons given for using a console are just BS. If you are a hardcore gamer and need those exclusive games, then that's the reason to go for a console. Additionally if you are away from home and looking for a bit of gaming, then the handheld consoles are going to be hard to beat.
1. It's cheaper.- While it may be cheaper (although from the sounds of it the PS3 may only be slightly so), it is also not upgradable. Graphics starting to look a bit old? Well tough luck on a console until a new console comes out and you have to shell out money for an entirely new system, even if the processor, etc. works well. On a PC (at least a desktop), you can just replace the graphics card.
2. Every game is guaranteed to work
Good point, although if your computer isn't more that 3-4 years old, this isn't likely to be a problem. By this amount of time, you would still likely have to buy a new console to play the most recent games.
3. You needn't tweak
This may be true, but it's not an entirely good thing. If you have less money to spend on your PC, you may not have the best parts, but through a bit of tweaking you can still play games. If you do have a ton of money, you can get the best parts and tweak a bit so you can play those games at nicer settings, and you can also upgrade parts as desired.
4. Lots of console exclusives
Granted, and this is probably the most valid point. Although I will say that there are some PC exclusives that people tend to use (Word, Excel, etc). People with consoles still tend to have to buy PC's anyway for these. If you are a really hardcore gamer, the availablity of exclusive games available on consoles will make the difference.
5. Xbox Live. Aside from Battlefield 2, I can't think of any online game that's currently better on PC.
How about PC only? Might I introduce you to a game called World of Warcraft? 7 million people reportedly enjoy it. While consoles may be better for FPS's, I would say that PC's with mouse and keyboard are better for social interaction in such games, and also lend themselves to be more easily updated with fresh content (i.e. WoW patches/expansions that can update the game fairly extensively).
6. Backwards compatibility
And how are people enjoying playing their Super Nintendo cartridges on their game cubes? Yes, perhaps Sony may be doing a better job of this, but others aren't. In addition you're paying for it.
7. Virus, adware, and spyware free
Chances are (especially given that this person wrote an article) that the author uses some sort of Word Processor, which means they are using a PC, which means that they already have to deal with these things. My suggestion to the author? Just be careful and stop visiting his midget porn websites. People tend to get into trouble most frequently when they voluntarily go to really questionable websites.
8. Games look better in high-def...from the couch.
The author even admits that PC's can do higher resolution graphics and modern TV's have digital inputs that will let you watch stuff from your computer on your TV (heck, there are a number of TV/Monitors out on the market these days). There are tons of wireless devices for PC's out on the market. You can play/work on your TV on your couch using your PC if you so choose. You can then switch back to your desk if you so choose and use your higher resolution monitor. The choice is yours with a PC. Not so with a console.
9. Controllers are more comfortable
So buy a comfortable, wireless controller for your PC. There's a ton of variations out there for you to choose from.
10. Controller innovation (Citing the Wii)
But wait a second, wasn't the author just talking about the backwards compatibility of the Sony Playstation? Can I play my old Super Nintendo games on it? Are you saying you want me to buy both a PS3 and a Wii (heck, there goes the price advantage of the consoles).
Most of the reasons given for using a console are just BS. If you are a hardcore gamer and need those exclusive games, then that's the reason to go for a console. Additionally if you are away from home and looking for a bit of gaming, then the handheld consoles are going to be hard to beat.
Hmm, look at it this way:
Spying to find out who other people are calling, and justifying it by not having actually listened to the phone calls.
Sound familiar? Sound like the logic of a certain President?
Sadly, this actually is "The American Way" now.
Sorry to reply to my own post, but I had another idea upon further consideration. There are 3 elements to this problem: 1. Stop bots from figuring out the captcha 2. Slow down human bots to the point that they are not cost effective 3. Don't terribly inconvenience your actual human users
It hit me that the trick is largely to make it use up some time, but yet entertain your actual users so they don't notice it as much. A small game would work well. People seem to like flash games.
A captcha in the form of a Flash game of Hearts (just one hand and against 3 computer opponents) would probably work well. To the right and left of your cards, there would be a 'Restart' button in case the user was bored and wanted to play another round, and also to trip up potential robots clicking around randomly. Each card played is shown for a second before the next card can be played. At the end of the hand, the user can submit the form. Voila, your captcha causes robots major problems, massively reduces the number of captchas a human bot can 'solve', and keeps your actual users slightly entertained (and since the results of how they played doesn't matter, there is no danger of them getting the captcha 'wrong').
Use Flash's ability to do limited 3-D stuff. Show a single letter for a minimum of 3 seconds (requiring the user to rotate the image with the mouse to be able to identify the letter. At the end of that 3 second minimum time, they can click a button to go on to the next letter (or they can take longer if needed). Do this for 5 letters. So it will require at least 15 seconds, which will slow humans down a bit to make life harder for people using sweatshops and will almost make things incredibly harder for people to develop bots for.
In addition to this, keep track of IP's requesting the captcha and only permit 10 per hour from an IP address.
Before you ask for the supervisor, you might try talking to another one of their representatives again. Make sure that you get the person's name and ask about where the call center is at. I've worked in a Helpdesk position or two, and have noticed that when you know the name of the representative helping you, you have a lot more power and it can change the dynamic of the interaction. Instead of the big company being evil and unaccomadating, the representative knows that if you aren't satisfied, their name will likely come up. If they aren't helpful, then talk to the supervisor (making sure to mention the representative's name). I doubt in this case that the supervisor will be helpful, but it may be worth a try.
Always remember to get names and locations when getting tech support, talking with customer service, or purchasing something by phone.
If you are ever stuck on a severely locked down Windows computer (that's has almost no codecs), use MPlayer!
I tried a lot of programs in trying to be able to watch some of my videos (in several different formats). Unfortunately I was rather stuck because pretty much all other windows players depend on codecs being already installed on your computer (and try to install DLL's). Yeah, MPlayer has no real interface in Windows at the moment, but it rocks in that it doesn't need codecs and doesn't require admin priveleges to use.
Slashdot Mirror
Artificial Intelligence is a misnomer. Only a segment of the field of AI is concerned with making computers become self aware.
The majority of the field runs away from such things. Sure, even in those other fields rough human models were originally the basis (neural nets for example). But the drive is not to become more human but to simply become better.
Frankly, once you start even considering trying to make things exactly like humans, things become messy unbelievably quickly. We're computer scientists, not philosophers.
Anyway, in truth, our level of technology is still quite a ways off from even being able to do much in terms of being able to make computers think like humans, so it's largely a moot point.
Right now the issue is less of robots having a philosophical view of "Should a robot shoot a human enemy" than of "Can a robot determine if a human is there or not? Can it detect if the human is a child? Can it detect if the human is friend or foe?"
Squeezing with your trigger finger is the new Alt-F4!
Perhaps these anti-GOP demonstrators should in fact be embracing GOP leader. By that I mean if the GOP can 'accidentally' electronic records (and backups!) that they were specifically legally bound to keep, couldn't these demonstrators also 'accidentally' lose those records as well? (I'm not actually advocating that they do this, I'm just pointing out that it's kind of ridiculous that even anti-GOP demonstrators keep copies of data while the GOP all too conveniently lose their data that may well be even more incriminating).
They should learn from Comedy Central and The Daily Show.
Some of the main points:
1. Other than a Flash player, you shouldn't need to download anything to watch shows (which NBC actually has done fine). Some DRM isn't necessarily a deal breaker, as long as I never notice it.
2. Whatever distributions means you use, it has to deliver the video reasonable without too many problems (which in my experience has been an issue with shows on the NBC website)
3. Put ALL the episodes of a show online, and don't take them down. If you remove them after 4 episodes, then I will be far more likely to turn to alternate methods of getting the shows, to ensure that I can watch whatever episode I want whenever I want to. (NBC currently fails this). If they're worried about DVD sales, just add in some extras and make sure the quality is very good (added value).
4. Some commercials are okay, but if you start approaching live TV levels of commercials, alternate methods of getting the shows (without commercials) look more and more attractive (NBC is okay at this so far)
If they just take care of the four issues, then there is no advantage to piracy (only danger of getting caught, and also a slightly guilty feeling). The reason piracy exists is just because it is more convenient in these 4 issues.
Except that this is not unrealistic. Just as in WoW, the world has plenty of idiots.
WoW is not necessarily bad leadership experience when you get into organizing raids.
Some notable leadership experience from WoW raids:
1. Learning how to pick team members. This includes avoiding the tons of idiots out their and fostering relationships with competent people. Additionally it forces you to figure out what skill sets are needed and available at a given time, and for you to know how different people work together.
2. Planning. Large raids take some work for getting people willing to work on a project (the raid), and do not come together instantly. You must plan out ahead of time when you are going to do things to allow people to work it into their schedule.
3. Evaluation of goals and performance. If your project (raid) fails, you must take a step back and figure out what went wrong and to come up with a strategy to avoid that problem.
4. Dealing with underperformers with tact. Yes, there are some people who just aren't quite holding up their ends of things. Sometimes they are just bad players who don't care, who should perhaps not be a part of your team anymore. Other times however, they desperately want to do better, but aren't sure. In such situations, as in life, you need to sit down with them in a non-confrontational way and talk about the problem, and work with them on how to improve. As in life, the individual and the team will improve.
5. Dealing with team morale. Things don't always go well, but you almost always have to see some good aspects of what the team is doing to let the team know that (while at the same time identifying ways to improve). When the team does a good job, you need to make sure they know that you know that they did a good job.
6. Dealing with life conflicts. People have (hopefully) lives outside of WoW, as they have lives outside of work. You have to understand that situations come up, and people can't always be where they have said they will be. At the same time, there has to be consequences for people who are complete flakes.
So, I'm not sure that WoW is actually a bad leadership training ground.
From the article, Congressman Boucher said that 'Comcast should "simply tier their offerings and engage in a pricing structure that allocates more bandwidth to those who pay more, and less to those who pay less."' Why the hell should I have to pay more for even more unlimited bandwidth? The issue is not just that Comcast is crippling bitTorrent, but that they are doing so to try to make their false advertising look legitimate.
There are different things that you can do with a website, so first of all it really depends on what you are intending. PHP5 will be great for building creating more traditional websites that are driven by HTML forms, and is probably the best thing to use for such purposes. Ruby on Rails seems to be meant for if you are planning to build AJAX apps. It's fairly easy, with a lower learning curve, but does have scalability issues. Another option that you might consider if you are looking for AJAX stuff would be GWT, the Google Web Toolkit. Larger learning curve, but very fast web apps. Really though, comparing PHP5 and RoR seems kind of like comparing apples and oranges. Just remember, figure out what you are trying to do first, then pick the language.
Indeed, some of the previous solutions were less than pleasant. Imagine camping with 5 other people for 6 months in an enclosed location, and *not* having a decent toilet. Chances are morale would suffer in a hurry. As to the cost, people seem to forgot that NASA can't just run out to home depot and pick up any old toilet. Our toilet systems are dependent upon gravity to operate, which makes the basic mechanics of our toilets useless in space. So you have to develop a toilet for space, which is naturally going to cost quite a bit, since: testing it (potentially in an airplane in free fall) is going to be costly, reliability is going to be an issue (don't want it to break down a month into a 6 month stay aboard the station), it has to be custom built (not exactly enough demand for space station toilets to justify mass production which drops the price). Furthermore, nobody seems to have mentioned the space shuttle toilet. 20 some years ago when it was developed, it cost NASA $23.4 million (http://www.abc.net.au/science/k2/moments/s348188. htm), and of course there has been inflation since then. So it's price is actually pretty reasonable comparitively.
Dealing with AT&T is just not worth it for cheap Internet Service. Even if it were free, I don't think I'd go for it. Besides, if it goes anything like my experience getting phone service from them, that $10 will really be $25 a month with all the extra fees and surcharges they are sure to add on.
CSS is weak, but it has served to prevent the masses from being able to easily and legally copy DVDs. Because of it's weakness, it has been easy for many hardware vendors to produce DVD players. As people have said DVDs "just work". But you are seeing more problems when more complex DRM is used. You have things that consumers think are supposed to work well together not working well together (such as a lot of earlier HD stuff). By ruling that CSS is not effective enough, this will force the MPAA, etc. into using much harsher DRM (although they seem to be heading that way, it will now actually be more justified).
I'm not a big fan of DRM, but I don't think it will be going away completely any time soon, and I'd rather just have weak DRM that is an annoyance that can be fairly easily gotten around rather than draconian restrictions that will make things stop working.
Have you watched Firefly?
I saw Serenity first, and felt about the same way as you. The characters didn't seem to really have any depth. The story on its own seemed ridiculous. Everyone was saying how good it was, but to me it just seemed like someone was trying to mix sci-fi with zombie horror movies, but just had enough of a budget to produce really nice special effects, which was what people were amazed by. So I had a similar impression of it at first.
Then I watched the entire Firefly series (doesn't take all that long) and went back and watched Serenity. Then I found that it was a quite good, interesting movie. Characters dying had a far more emotional impact, since I now knew their backstories.
So the point is that the movie does not really stand alone. I'm not sure if it should be considered the best sci-fi movie because it's impact really depends on the series for the backstory.
No, that's not the problem. My point is that the amount of data on the screen with a 10-12 point font at 1200x800 resolution is just about right. Any larger font (or reduced resolution) would result in too little data on the screen (as in lines of text viewable at a single time). The issue then is the smallest screen that this amount of data is still reasonably viewable at.
I do imagine that before too long we will have these types of ultra portable computers, but I don't think the time has come yet. I have (and am writing this on) a 3 pound computer with a 12 inch screen (1280x800). If the screen were any smaller, I'd start to have a lot of problems seeing things. The resolution could be reduced to adjust for this, but 1280x800 already seems like the minimum resolution that I can stand. I think a lot of other people are in the same boat in feeling that the screens and resolutions should not be reduced beyond this, and judging by the smallest models of laptops that most companies sell (and presumably have found a market for), the market seems to agree. This means that these companies are persuing the wrong problem in trying to find the smallest screen, since most people will only accept a 10-12 inch screen at minimum. The right question is how to fit a 10-12 inch screen into a smaller space for transportation. I imagine that before too long we will have monitors that are able to fold (or perhaps bend) that will solve this problem. The problem with this is that when folded up, you will have several layers of the screen on top of each other, and I think that at present, the current thickness of screens are still too thick to make this practical. Similarly, we will have to use folding keyboards, but I've already seem some, so that element is already in place. So that leaves us with having to develop thin, folding screens.
A few Myspace usernames and passwords isn't such a big deal. I say (in the name of security) we request that CNN.com be taken down, I mean they have an entire special section Devoted to how to rob a bank! (http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/presents/index.ro b.bank.html)
And how about we shut down government websites too. I mean that 9/11 report (and lots of other reports) could be used to help terrorists figure out how to attack us!
Mainly in that you can minimize different sections. Now if only it would let you drag those sections around to be in a better order for you instead of their current piece of junk organization. Perhaps that's coming. Who knows. It also is starting to feel cluttered. Perhaps they'll let you get rid of sections and create buttons in case you want to see those.
Wow, I could really see this being useful for building your own robotics. It seems like it could provide a really nice off the shelf solution at a much smaller size than using a full laptop.
Cheating by plagiarization, or sneaking in notes to exams are clearly a bad forms of cheating. The student is obviously not even trying to learn and do the work. However, copying off of another student's work can get a lot murkier, and is not necessarily bad. Definitions of cheating are usually kept rather broad. Why? Because it helps protect the professor.
For instance, let's say that student A and student B have both been working on 20 math problems separately. They decide to compare answers (often considered officially cheating, but in reality a good way of learning), they find that they have different answers on one question. They discuss it and realize that student B was correct for that question. So student A copies the answer to that question off of student B. Technically cheating, but learning has been achieved.
So why doesn't the professor allow this as part of the cheating policy? Well let's say the prof. does allow it in the cheating policy, but then has a student who copies half of the problems from another student and is caught. They can then argue that the cheating policy is vague, and the prof may be powerless. So the net result (at least in my experience in CS), is that cheating policies are officially kept very strict so as to give a prof leeway to come down hard on people cheating to just not do work, but profs allow and expect small amounts of cheating if students are learning from it. The funny thing is that it tends to be a fairly open thing. All too often I've been in classes where the official policy is that no student is allowed to receive any help from/work with any other student in the class, but at the beginning of a class a student will begin with 'We were talking about question x and had some questions about it.' and the prof is all too happy to see that students have been actively trying to figure out the material, even if there was a bit of technical cheating involved.
To reiterate, it just depends upon the intentions of the students when they cheat.
1. It's cheaper.
While it may be cheaper (although from the sounds of it the PS3 may only be slightly so), it is also not upgradable. Graphics starting to look a bit old? Well tough luck on a console until a new console comes out and you have to shell out money for an entirely new system, even if the processor, etc. works well. On a PC (at least a desktop), you can just replace the graphics card.
2. Every game is guaranteed to work
Good point, although if your computer isn't more that 3-4 years old, this isn't likely to be a problem. By this amount of time, you would still likely have to buy a new console to play the most recent games.
3. You needn't tweak
This may be true, but it's not an entirely good thing. If you have less money to spend on your PC, you may not have the best parts, but through a bit of tweaking you can still play games. If you do have a ton of money, you can get the best parts and tweak a bit so you can play those games at nicer settings, and you can also upgrade parts as desired.
4. Lots of console exclusives
Granted, and this is probably the most valid point. Although I will say that there are some PC exclusives that people tend to use (Word, Excel, etc). People with consoles still tend to have to buy PC's anyway for these. If you are a really hardcore gamer, the availablity of exclusive games available on consoles will make the difference.
5. Xbox Live. Aside from Battlefield 2, I can't think of any online game that's currently better on PC.
How about PC only? Might I introduce you to a game called World of Warcraft? 7 million people reportedly enjoy it. While consoles may be better for FPS's, I would say that PC's with mouse and keyboard are better for social interaction in such games, and also lend themselves to be more easily updated with fresh content (i.e. WoW patches/expansions that can update the game fairly extensively).
6. Backwards compatibility
And how are people enjoying playing their Super Nintendo cartridges on their game cubes? Yes, perhaps Sony may be doing a better job of this, but others aren't. In addition you're paying for it.
7. Virus, adware, and spyware free
Chances are (especially given that this person wrote an article) that the author uses some sort of Word Processor, which means they are using a PC, which means that they already have to deal with these things. My suggestion to the author? Just be careful and stop visiting his midget porn websites. People tend to get into trouble most frequently when they voluntarily go to really questionable websites.
8. Games look better in high-def...from the couch.
The author even admits that PC's can do higher resolution graphics and modern TV's have digital inputs that will let you watch stuff from your computer on your TV (heck, there are a number of TV/Monitors out on the market these days). There are tons of wireless devices for PC's out on the market. You can play/work on your TV on your couch using your PC if you so choose. You can then switch back to your desk if you so choose and use your higher resolution monitor. The choice is yours with a PC. Not so with a console.
9. Controllers are more comfortable
So buy a comfortable, wireless controller for your PC. There's a ton of variations out there for you to choose from.
10. Controller innovation (Citing the Wii)
But wait a second, wasn't the author just talking about the backwards compatibility of the Sony Playstation? Can I play my old Super Nintendo games on it? Are you saying you want me to buy both a PS3 and a Wii (heck, there goes the price advantage of the consoles).
Most of the reasons given for using a console are just BS. If you are a hardcore gamer and need those exclusive games, then that's the reason to go for a console. Additionally if you are away from home and looking for a bit of gaming, then the handheld consoles are going to be hard to beat.
1. It's cheaper.- While it may be cheaper (although from the sounds of it the PS3 may only be slightly so), it is also not upgradable. Graphics starting to look a bit old? Well tough luck on a console until a new console comes out and you have to shell out money for an entirely new system, even if the processor, etc. works well. On a PC (at least a desktop), you can just replace the graphics card. 2. Every game is guaranteed to work Good point, although if your computer isn't more that 3-4 years old, this isn't likely to be a problem. By this amount of time, you would still likely have to buy a new console to play the most recent games. 3. You needn't tweak This may be true, but it's not an entirely good thing. If you have less money to spend on your PC, you may not have the best parts, but through a bit of tweaking you can still play games. If you do have a ton of money, you can get the best parts and tweak a bit so you can play those games at nicer settings, and you can also upgrade parts as desired. 4. Lots of console exclusives Granted, and this is probably the most valid point. Although I will say that there are some PC exclusives that people tend to use (Word, Excel, etc). People with consoles still tend to have to buy PC's anyway for these. If you are a really hardcore gamer, the availablity of exclusive games available on consoles will make the difference. 5. Xbox Live. Aside from Battlefield 2, I can't think of any online game that's currently better on PC. How about PC only? Might I introduce you to a game called World of Warcraft? 7 million people reportedly enjoy it. While consoles may be better for FPS's, I would say that PC's with mouse and keyboard are better for social interaction in such games, and also lend themselves to be more easily updated with fresh content (i.e. WoW patches/expansions that can update the game fairly extensively). 6. Backwards compatibility And how are people enjoying playing their Super Nintendo cartridges on their game cubes? Yes, perhaps Sony may be doing a better job of this, but others aren't. In addition you're paying for it. 7. Virus, adware, and spyware free Chances are (especially given that this person wrote an article) that the author uses some sort of Word Processor, which means they are using a PC, which means that they already have to deal with these things. My suggestion to the author? Just be careful and stop visiting his midget porn websites. People tend to get into trouble most frequently when they voluntarily go to really questionable websites. 8. Games look better in high-def...from the couch. The author even admits that PC's can do higher resolution graphics and modern TV's have digital inputs that will let you watch stuff from your computer on your TV (heck, there are a number of TV/Monitors out on the market these days). There are tons of wireless devices for PC's out on the market. You can play/work on your TV on your couch using your PC if you so choose. You can then switch back to your desk if you so choose and use your higher resolution monitor. The choice is yours with a PC. Not so with a console. 9. Controllers are more comfortable So buy a comfortable, wireless controller for your PC. There's a ton of variations out there for you to choose from. 10. Controller innovation (Citing the Wii) But wait a second, wasn't the author just talking about the backwards compatibility of the Sony Playstation? Can I play my old Super Nintendo games on it? Are you saying you want me to buy both a PS3 and a Wii (heck, there goes the price advantage of the consoles). Most of the reasons given for using a console are just BS. If you are a hardcore gamer and need those exclusive games, then that's the reason to go for a console. Additionally if you are away from home and looking for a bit of gaming, then the handheld consoles are going to be hard to beat.
Hmm, look at it this way: Spying to find out who other people are calling, and justifying it by not having actually listened to the phone calls. Sound familiar? Sound like the logic of a certain President? Sadly, this actually is "The American Way" now.
Sorry to reply to my own post, but I had another idea upon further consideration. There are 3 elements to this problem: 1. Stop bots from figuring out the captcha 2. Slow down human bots to the point that they are not cost effective 3. Don't terribly inconvenience your actual human users It hit me that the trick is largely to make it use up some time, but yet entertain your actual users so they don't notice it as much. A small game would work well. People seem to like flash games. A captcha in the form of a Flash game of Hearts (just one hand and against 3 computer opponents) would probably work well. To the right and left of your cards, there would be a 'Restart' button in case the user was bored and wanted to play another round, and also to trip up potential robots clicking around randomly. Each card played is shown for a second before the next card can be played. At the end of the hand, the user can submit the form. Voila, your captcha causes robots major problems, massively reduces the number of captchas a human bot can 'solve', and keeps your actual users slightly entertained (and since the results of how they played doesn't matter, there is no danger of them getting the captcha 'wrong').
Use Flash's ability to do limited 3-D stuff. Show a single letter for a minimum of 3 seconds (requiring the user to rotate the image with the mouse to be able to identify the letter. At the end of that 3 second minimum time, they can click a button to go on to the next letter (or they can take longer if needed). Do this for 5 letters. So it will require at least 15 seconds, which will slow humans down a bit to make life harder for people using sweatshops and will almost make things incredibly harder for people to develop bots for. In addition to this, keep track of IP's requesting the captcha and only permit 10 per hour from an IP address.
Before you ask for the supervisor, you might try talking to another one of their representatives again. Make sure that you get the person's name and ask about where the call center is at. I've worked in a Helpdesk position or two, and have noticed that when you know the name of the representative helping you, you have a lot more power and it can change the dynamic of the interaction. Instead of the big company being evil and unaccomadating, the representative knows that if you aren't satisfied, their name will likely come up. If they aren't helpful, then talk to the supervisor (making sure to mention the representative's name). I doubt in this case that the supervisor will be helpful, but it may be worth a try. Always remember to get names and locations when getting tech support, talking with customer service, or purchasing something by phone.
If you are ever stuck on a severely locked down Windows computer (that's has almost no codecs), use MPlayer! I tried a lot of programs in trying to be able to watch some of my videos (in several different formats). Unfortunately I was rather stuck because pretty much all other windows players depend on codecs being already installed on your computer (and try to install DLL's). Yeah, MPlayer has no real interface in Windows at the moment, but it rocks in that it doesn't need codecs and doesn't require admin priveleges to use.
That's not a moon, it's the galaxies largest paint ball!