This is exactly what I did and as you say they just give you a new one.
Regarding your brother having to sign in, that can be fixed. You can either phone up MS and get them to shift the licenses and complain so that they give you some MS points as an apology or you can do it yourself without the complaint on xbox.com
The retailers don't lose out when you return it to them, they just return it to Microsoft and claim back off of them. As such there's no real loss for the retailer in accepting returns and offering replacements.
I know there's probably not much point saying this to you seeing as you've decided to troll about the console without seeming to have actually ever owned one, but when it comes to I find it's still the better console for the games I like (I have a Wii and also a PS3 as well now - I finally caved despite the lack of price drop).
When repairs are free and fast I don't see the big deal, yeah we shouldn't have to be without our consoles for a couple of days, but it's still the console I find that I keep going back to regardless and I figured I'd rather be without a console I enjoy for a few days now and then but keep playing it a ton when I do have it than it is to have something like the Wii sat gathering dust because you can only play so many party games, and a lot of the other games simply aren't as good on the Wii (FPS games, arcade games for example).
The PS3 is a more solid piece of hardware for sure, but I've only had it a few months now and have long completed all the games I wanted to play on it (MGS4 etc.). The PS3 would have more longevity for me if I didn't also have a 360 because of the cross-platform games, but I'd rather buy them on the 360 due to often getting the option of better DLC, getting Live integration and achievements etc.
Bitch all you want about the fact the console fails, the fact it inconveniences you for maybe a few days in 2 to 3 years is really not a big deal when it keeps you coming back the rest of the time.
It's for this reason that Microsoft will continue to keep increasing it's lead on the PS3 at least.
FWIW, I've had my 360 since 2006, prior to the v2 consoles I had to get mine replaced due to the RROD issue 3 times, but here in the UK it was in statutory warranty each time so I could just return it to the shop, get it replaced there and then and come home with a brand new console with fresh new controllers. I've not had to get a replacement since the v2 consoles and I've not even heard of this E74 error so I'd wage a bet the majority of problems are resolved now judging from personal experience and that of friends with 360s. It was a pain having to get the licenses for my DLC transferred back then but that's a process you can do now automatically (meaning you can move content to a different console now if you wish). When I did have to phone up though I was given 3200 MS points each time which was nice. Effectively the failure left me with a net gain when the only inconvenience was a 10 minute journey to the retailer for a swap over and a quick phone call to an MS free phone number in the worst case. In all honesty, personally, and I mean personally, due to the experience I've had I'm not even sure I'd have been happier if my consoles hadn't failed - I'd have worn controllers and would be down about £80 worth of Microsoft points.
I'm not totally defending the failures and I realise in other countries where consumer laws are less helpful meaning you actually have to send the console away it must be more of a pain but I really find the hardware failures a relatively minor fault when you look at it objectively. I've not found having downtime with the console any worse than say paying for an MMO subscription and having the servers bugger up for a few days (or weeks in the case of the old European Dark Age of Camelot servers), I've also not found it any worse than having to deal with crippling DRM on PC games which has prevented me playing some of them despite being legitimately purchased when I've wanted to.
The thing is, despite the failures, the 360 is still the best console for many. It doesn't have the following of the Wii but it still has a hefty userbase and is increasing it's lead week on week on the PS3 quite well right now. For me, right now, the 360 and the DS are definitely my two favourite gaming systems.
This bit made me chuckle. Sucks doesn't it? Usually US customers are on the right side of the fence, but here in the UK and many other countries we are screwed time and time again in this way whether it's DVD region meaning we never get a film or get it months and months later, higher prices for UK customers on the likes of iTunes and Steam or content/promotions on Microsoft's XBox live.
The internet is a worldwide thing, it's stupid to still be working with pre-internet business models in this way because if the content isn't available despite people being willing to pay for it then yeah, we're gonna resort to piracy. In fact, it's not even just about the internet - this is all about globalisation, these companies love to use globalisation to get cheap labour and fiddle their taxes and that sort of thing but god forbid it ever offer any benefit to the consumer.
I still really have little sympathy for the music industry and so on. Piracy is just the negative karma these people deserve.
Personally, I'm not convinced that having something visible to a passer by or even a photographer is quite the same as having every detail photographed and plastered on the net for everyone to see.
The guy in TFA makes a good point when he talks about break ins. Criminals can now scout areas from the comfort of their home. At least if they have to go past your house and look in and take photos themselves then there may be witnesses that someone was acting suspiciously. Of course, because they don't have to be there and can do it from their own home they can spend all the time in the world examining photos for entry points, on how to evade security lights and so on. If someone spent ages looking at every inch of someone's house in the street then someone is going to ask questions, just like someone might ask questions if they take a photo themselves.
I'm not saying I'm totally against street view, but I don't think it's as clear cut as "Well if you don't want people seeing it, don't have it on display". I think the key difference is that if people wanted to go and be nosy they at least had to get off their arse and make the fucking effort which was enough to deter most snoopers but now they can do it regardless.
That said, from what I understand Google have removed some images where people have requested their property not be on display, so perhaps the best course of action rather than turning the vehicle around when it'll probably just come back some other time is to let them take photos and have everyone complain to have their house picture removed and leave a big chunk missing from the system.
To be honest though, I'm not actually sure what everyone's house being photographed even achieves, that's the bigger question for me. I can understand major city centres such as London and so on because it can be used for advertising in conjunction with Google maps and people can have the chance to see these major cities. Purely residential streets though? does it even actually achieve anything?
"Obviously, in the US this would be plainly moronic, since it is, indeed, the case, that in public there is no expectation of privacy."
I think this is part the issue though, I think this goes beyond privacy. If someone walks up to your house and keeps constantly photographing it or plasters photos of your house and stuff on the internet it's borderline harassment. The fact Google blurs faces and is willing to remove photos suggests they accept that at best they have a moral duty to respect people and their property but possibly even that there are legal implications for what they are doing.
It talks about how the FBI has been called like it's a major disaster.
I can picture it now:
FBI: Hello FBI?
MPAA: THE NEW WOLVERINE FILM HAS BEEN LEAKED
FBI: SHIT, EVERYONE DROP THEIR RAPE CASES, THEIR KIDDIE PORN CASES, THEIR TERRORIST CASES, THE NEW WOLVERINE FILM HAS BEEN LEAKED WE MUST FIND OUT WHO DID THIS
It's just the way the leak of a film gets more news coverage than more serious stories. It's like it's an international tragedy. I mean seriously, a film with chunks missing, temporary sound, CGI missing and so on. There are companies every day that have their security breached and IP stolen. Why does it get international coverage when it's a half-finished movie?
The real response from the FBI should be:
FBI: Here's your case number, take your ticket and get to the back of the queue
On a side note the BBC also said that Fox has had the download of the new film taken down now - that baffled me a bit, I doubt very much they've managed to get it removed from the whole internet, if they have they're the first company in history to achieve such a thing!
Re:I hear lots of negative criticism about Linux.
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Linux Needs Critics
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"Mostly from uneducated haters, but there's no lack of it."
I think that's exactly what TFA is talking about. You throw it away as being from uneducated haters but why would someone be an uneducated hater? Has the community not done enough to educate them sensibly? Do they have a proper issue and it's just being ignored?
When people hate something you can almost always find out why by talking to them reasonably and either correct their misunderstandings or realise that yes, there is a valid issue and look at fixing it.
Writing them off as uneducated haters though, means you're just going to continue to have a lot of uneducated haters.
It's not just Linux though, it's just the fanboy attitude in general.
The fanboy mindset is an odd one. You defend something you love or attack something you hate no matter how little you owe the company or creators, in fact, if you paid for it, they fucking owe you and if they did a shit job then yes they should hear about it. If as an example scenario Nintendo mess something up in a Wii update then people should have every right to complain about it and voice their frustration at the problem - fanboys telling them to stop whining or shut up achieves what? It lets the company get away easier with not fixing a problem. Surely pressuring companies into fixing problems is in everyones interests even if it doesn't effect you personally right now it might in future!
I know OSS is a different beast, people do it off their own backs in their spare time, but as the saying goes, if a jobs worth doing it's worth doing right. What's the point developing an application and releasing it along with the source code for everyone to use if no one wants to use it because you wont listen to their criticisms?
The problem is this, people take criticism as a personal attack even if it's just a product they purchased that someone is complaining about. Similarly people write code are often defensive in the face of criticism.
But you have to step back and look at why you're doing it, if you are just developing something for yourself and release it as a courtesy but without a care of what other people think then yeah, no problem just ignore the criticism and put a note up along with the downloads saying "Not interested in feedback". If you are developing it with the aim of user adoption then you have to accept criticism, sure not all is valid but sometimes we see projects where nearly the entire userbase is up in arms and are still ignored! If half the userbase is up in arms and half are defensive of a change then make it an option but convince people to move over to the change by making it worthwhile and phase it out. Don't just ignore half your fanbase and cut a popular feature out outright!!
Linux does need it's critics, everyone producing something needs their critics in fact. They're valuable for continued improvement and sure sometimes they come up with idiotic ideas but other times it's you, the developer that doesn't understand what your user actually wants and the sooner all developers accept this the better. I know full well I can write good code, I know full well I can design applications, but what I can't ever possibly claim to know is what my users want because I am not them.
Well no, the reason a lot of games fail is because there are other games like them that are simply better.
If you look at something like Brothers in Arms Hells Highway, it's not a terrible game, but it's simply not as good as Call of Duty. Similarly Medal of Honour was worse again.
They're often copying ideas that have been done a thousand times before without actually improving on them, simply imitating with a crapper version to try and cash in on people playing the superior version who may want more.
When a company has checked whether there is demand for a game they want to make they also have to make sure that demand isn't being filled in a superior way by another developer they can't compete against.
This isn't a problem that effects just the games industry - a lot of companies that produce goods have to commit to building prototypes and test the water with them to see if they'll be successful but also make sure they can beat the competition.
Even Hollywood when making films faces the same issue and films that are flops ultimately almost always are because there are better alternatives out there that cover the same theme. Games are no different. Good products succede, crap products fail. Awareness of your market and the ability to put together a good team with competent people make all the difference here. Put together a crap team without knowing your market and pretend you wont fail is cheating yourself and your team.
Queen is just a hereditary title and can be used like any other title including social titles like Mr, Dr, Sir, Mrs and so on.
Using the term Queen Elizabeth without specifying which Queen Elizabeth is no less correct than referring to someone called Paul who is a Dr. as Dr. Paul. The only reason you'd want to specify is if there were multiple Dr. Pauls you could be referring to, but seeing as the summary quite clearly points out he met a living Queen there is no room for ambiguity and so there is no need to refer to her as Queen Elizabeth II.
Using Queen Elizabeth is merely an informal way of referring to her.
If you were writing a book on English Queens then yes, you would be wise to use Queen Elizabeth II to make it clear who is being referred to. As we're talking about someone visiting the living Queen of England, no, there is no need.
Maybe people need to be more assertive in trying to reverse that argument? Start spreading the idea that anyone for filtering is just hiding the fact abuse continues to happen anyway only that it's pushed underground.
Start using arguments such as anyone defending the filter is allowing child porn to continue as a dirty little secret that's kept out of the publics minds and that they're basically okaying it as long as the general public doesn't stumble across it or know about it.
It's eqaully a bit of a stretch, but they're not playing a game of truths and facts here.
That said it may not even be necessary, whilst people like the guy you mention are already using this kind of argument it doesn't seem to be getting them far for the most part. Governments seem to finally be getting the idea that these plans aren't such a good idea and are backing down a bit. Perhaps just keeping up the pressure as is is good enough!
"I've also ready that being bilingual or a polyglot is beneficial to thinking and memory skills."
The problem is, so are many other skills.
"I cannot attest as to whether or not English buys you anything over Russian or Chinese as far as resources available on the web but I will argue that someone who has Russian as a first language and Chinese as a second will most likely be better off to code than someone with merely English as a first language (Disclaimer: I am the latter)."
But learning a language takes time, what makes you think that programmers who only speak one language didn't spend the additional time bilingual programmers spent learning two languages learning something even more relevant and beneficial that similarly improves their skills?
The problem with studies such as that suggesting being bilingual improves you memory or cognitive skills is that they are only testing for and comparing that. As a counter argument, I would argue that someone who spent their time learning only English and the rest of their time learning math, comp. sci. or programming will be better off to code than someone who used much of that time learning a second language.
Learning a second language has it's advantages, particularly in international business. But to suggest the cognitive/memory benefits it gives are something that comes for free without the expense of other knowledge or benefits you could've otherwise gained in the same time is to use the results of a test with a specific set of parameters designed to constrain the problem to look for a specific result in an environment with far more factors and variables.
I only speak one language but find mathematical logic, number theory my strongest areas of math and have always done exceedingly well in as have I in computer science and software development. My girlfriend is multi-lingual, speaking English, French and German fluently but also with some ability to speak Dutch, Spanish and Italian. She's done amazingly well for herself with this skill (her employers in the UK have always loved her for it because not many UK staff are ever even bilingual, let alone speak multiple languages), but logic and math are areas she really, really struggles with and absolutely hates the subjects because of it. You can't make any overall conclusion on how useful knowing additional languages is by just comparing the two of us like this but at very least you can say that being bilingual or speaking multiple languages doesn't seem to necessarily guarantee strong logic skills.
"Now all they need to do is come up with a foolproof way to determine if their game will be crap before they spend millions making it."
Again just like every other industry in the world then?
It's called market research. Too many games companies seem to forego that and just build the game the lead designer thinks would be cool without actually checking with any potential customers to see if they'd like it too.
Effectively these people end up spending $25million on a game they'd like, without asking anyone else if they'd like it too.
I'm not sure what's going on but recently the PRS seems to have awoken.
They've been on a massive collecting spree lately, going after everyone from builders playing a portable radio as they build an extension on a house through to staff of big businesses playing the radio in the office to this sort of thing.
I can only guess they've see how much cash the RIAA has racked in with it's threats of litigation against file sharers and is simply going for the same tactic en-masse (although it's always done this, just not to the degree it is now).
I didn't realise that there were limits on where you can and can't play the radio to be honest. I figure if they're going to broadcast unencrypted radio signals through the air then it shouldn't be illegal to pick them up whether it's at a stables, in an office or at a building site. With CDs I can kind of understand as the packaging can come with a licensing agreement you're told to accept before opening and/or using but there are no agreements with radio.
I'm not actually sure how strong the PRS' demands are, I was under the impression the radio stations already pay royalties to the PRS. This snippet from a Wikipedia entry was interesting:
"Further problems arise with the tactics used by the PRS in the United Kingdom because BBC radio is publicly financed through the TV licence fee and everyone has the right to listen to it free of charge."
The PRS exists to collect royalties for public performances. I would've thought there's a strong argument that it's the radio stations that are carrying out the public performances, not the radio stations AND the people receiving it at the other end.
Still it seems to work, the Wikipedia entry said they gained something like £562million in royalties in the last year too.
I'm not saying we shouldn't question theories, as long as the theories are worth questioning.
Regarding the cornflakes idea, the question was that why don't bigger flakes end up at the bottom of the packet rather than the small ones when the big ones are heavier and hence should be at the bottom?
It doesn't take a genius to realise that small ones can fall through gaps of big ones but big ones can't fall through the gaps of small ones.
Now did we really need to fund a study to come up with that conclusion?
If you are going to make a huge expensive game, make it worth buying.
The problem is this, there's a lot of games out there with massive budgets that are simply crap.
I'm not really sure the complaint in the article is exactly. They seem to be effectively complaining that the market doesn't reward games that have had a massive budget but are still crap? Well isn't that just the way business is? if you spend a fortune developing something that no one wants then you fail?
There's a reason we've always had certain studios come back time and time again with new releases - id Software, Blizzard, Square Enix etc. It's because they produce good games people want, even if they do spend a fortune developing them.
I don't see how it's a crisis that market forces affect the games industry like they affect everyone else exactly? What are they saying? That we should have to be more open to funding shite we don't actually want?
Expanding on your point - the key is to make games fun and that people want, whether it's a high budget or low budget production. What consumers wont tolerate are games that aren't fun even if companies have spent $25 million on them - that's their problem. Huge, expensive games are still perfectly valid and I'd certainly be sad if we didn't get anymore Call of Dutys, Gears of Wars, Half-Lifes and that sort of thing, but they still require the fun factor than smaller games require too.
Is that the only way we can play the role though? with side quests? I think developers often use it as a lazy way out.
Why not just have the main quest line be a lot more strongly related to your actions earlier in the main storyline and have a proper branching storyline.
I think what gets me really is the rigidity of the side questions - as you say, better AI could make a big difference. I find it somewhat inexcusable in this day and age that we have quests as mindless and dull as "Hi I'm Jim. Will you go to location X and kill monsters Y for you?" and you go and do it and come back and he says "Oh wow well done you killed it, here's 10 gold". It's that kind of side questing we need to get away from. I guess what I'm getting at is that I don't think you should even realise you're doing a side quest similar to what you were getting at I think. You should walk through the world and hear a scream for help and go and help. Not see a guy stood there like a gormless twit who when you walk up to he says unconvincingly "Oh no. My girlfriend has been kidnapped. Please head North West and kill the evil turd monster to rescue her. Oh, reward is 10 gold again by the way".
What about if you walk into a firefight on Fallout between two factions, and you end up having to fight for what side you wandered in on and simply the side you wandered in on defines who you end up having to fight for else they shoot you? How about that faction when you fight with them if only to save your life becomes friendly to you and helpful after like current faction systems but without the "Go to A to fight for faction a or go to B to fight for faction b". Don't like the faction you stumbled upon to help and wanted to work with the other guys? No problem! Go to the other faction camp and offer to betray those guys.
It needs to be a lot more free flowing, it needs to happen without you specifically going to questgiver X to get quest Y. It needs to be part of the world as you say.
FWIW, I do some AI development at work (for business not games though) and modern AI is certainly a lot more capable than the crap we have in games today. Even without any advanced AI implementations better decisions trees are more than enough to create far more convincing AI in most AAA RPGs today.
I think Mass Effect is the best attempt I've seen in recent years, whilst it still had the side quest setup, the main storyline did at least force you to make decisions on the fly that would change the outcome of the rest of the storyline somewhat.
The problem is that there's a big difference between questioning a theory that may be wrong and consistently challenging a theory that may be wrong with an even more stupid, entirely unprovable idea.
The latter doesn't help anyone, because providing an unprovable counter just isn't scientific and hence has no place in science.
A proper scientific view should question for sure, but not with utterly stupid ideas like Creationism which is unprovable because that just wastes everyone's time and holds everyone back.
This is the crux of the problem with Darwinism and what Creationists miss - yes it's just a theory, but most importantly, there is yet to be any other alternative theory that hasn't been disproven or is even provable to start with.
I don't think anyone is saying we shouldn't question Darwinism, they're just pointing out quite rightly that there exists no valid alternative theory.
Yes, they like the dog because it's probably the cruelest twist in the game. They think hey we'll hype the dog up so everyone wants to see what the dog does and play around with it THEN WE'LL FUCKING KILL IT.
At the end you get the choice between saving your dog who gets shot dead, everyone else in the world who died or getting 1 million gold.
So what they did was made the dog pretty fucking integral into the game, but made you feel like a selfish dick for reviving him rather than all the other innocents that died.
Molyneux is a dog killing bastard and he uses it against you and that's what he meant when he talks about bringing emotion to games! Me being a good guy thought hey, I'll choose sacrifice and sacrifice the god damn dog for everyone else and all I got was a letter of thanks from everyone. If I'd known that I'd have got my dog back or taken the £1million and let the damn peasants stay dead.
Seriously though, the dog was quite fun to play around with. The game itself was far, far too short though but that seems to be par for the course with these sorts of games now, Fallout 3 was the same - the main storyline last about 5 seconds and the rest of the gameplay time is filled with boring side quests that are as repetitive as the crap in MMOs. Ironically I got bored of MMOs because the content in single player or coop games was much more rich and interesting, but that doesn't seem to be the case anymore. Frankly I'd quite happily say goodbye to the side quests altogether and have them work on the main storyline more for these sorts of games. Games like Deadspace show how awesome games can be if you just focus on the storyline.
It could be worse, money could be pumped into studies to see why the large cornflakes don't fall to the bottom of the packet when they're heavier because some idiot doesn't get it that the small parts fall through the gaps whereas the large parts can't.
Oh wait, no, that was has been funded and done.
Apparently we sometimes have to pay for studies to confirm what common sense and logic already told us. Just don't ask me why, I think it's just the way of the world.
I used to need glasses as a kid, now, 15 years of online gaming later I've had 20/20 vision for over 8 years.
Of course, that doesn't prove anything, my eyes could've just naturally corrected themselves. Either way though one thing is for sure, staring at a monitor or TV didn't make my eyesite worse like my grandparents always told me it would;)
Honestly though I wonder if my eyes ever were bad. When I was a kid and told I needed glasses my eye checks were always at commercial opticians. Eye tests over the last few years were always done by impartial eye doctors as part of my job giving me free eye checkups because I work with computers. I wonder if the original diagnosis of me requiring glasses was simply a good old case of conflict of interest in that of course commcercial opticians are going to tell me I need glasses, because then they get to sell me some! The impartial eye doctors however had nothing to gain either way because he wasn't also selling me glasses so just gave me the truth.
You sound like you're basically just trolling, because clearly you don't actually know what the feeling in Britain is about all that's been going on. Particularly with this comment:
"The backlash is gaining; in the UK, it never started."
Sorry, but that's complete and utter bullshit. Recently there has been a lot of coverage about government plans, particularly with regard to their various databases to try and make the government back down on them. In the local council elections last year as well, Labour lost a massive amount of it's territory because people were sick of what Labour has been doing to this country. In the general election next year, it seems fairly clear cut that Labour is going to lose by quite a decent amount. We also had people like David Davis give up and re-win his position in parliament as a referendum and protest against anti-terror laws. It also seems like an absolute certainty that whichever party gets in next (almost certainly the Conservatives) will repeal many of the laws Labour has created that trample rights and allowed for the creation of the database state.
Furthermore and much more interestingly in recent weeks, Jacqui Smith, the home secretary who most people see as one of the main instigators for the trampling of rights, the illegal databases and so on has been under a sustained attack. Someone - be it someone in opposition, a leak in the home office, or possibly even members of the security services are gaining access to information that is being used to engineer her downfall. With the relevation yesterday that her husband had been using her MP expenses (for which she is already under fire over) to pay for porn films it seems she is very close to being finished.
Not only has the UK backlash started, it's in full swing. Real action such as repealing of laws can't happen until the next election next year because Labour have a majority that lets them vote in whatever law changes they want unchallenged but that doesn't mean the opposition and citizens haven't already made their mind up, similarly even the EU parliament and European courts have slammed Labour on many issues. Even Labour itself looks set to back down on some things now because it realises that no one is on it's side any longer.
"the decision to split from England ~230 years ago appears to have been an excellent one nonetheless."
Yes it does, because otherwise if they'd given you the vote then we might have ended up with George Bush overseeing us as well as you for the last 8 years.
Seriously, I understand if all you ever read is Slashdot that you might get the impression that nothing positive is happening on the UK front against Labour's attempts at oppression, but if you'd actually been following what's really going on in the UK from other news sources who cover stuff other than just the negative, alarmist stuff that Slashdot mostly seems to (not that that's totally a bad thing - it's great we're made aware of the issues) then you wouldn't come up with such clueless statements as "The backlash is gaining; in the UK, it never started.".
Slashdot Mirror
This is exactly what I did and as you say they just give you a new one.
Regarding your brother having to sign in, that can be fixed. You can either phone up MS and get them to shift the licenses and complain so that they give you some MS points as an apology or you can do it yourself without the complaint on xbox.com
The retailers don't lose out when you return it to them, they just return it to Microsoft and claim back off of them. As such there's no real loss for the retailer in accepting returns and offering replacements.
I know there's probably not much point saying this to you seeing as you've decided to troll about the console without seeming to have actually ever owned one, but when it comes to I find it's still the better console for the games I like (I have a Wii and also a PS3 as well now - I finally caved despite the lack of price drop).
When repairs are free and fast I don't see the big deal, yeah we shouldn't have to be without our consoles for a couple of days, but it's still the console I find that I keep going back to regardless and I figured I'd rather be without a console I enjoy for a few days now and then but keep playing it a ton when I do have it than it is to have something like the Wii sat gathering dust because you can only play so many party games, and a lot of the other games simply aren't as good on the Wii (FPS games, arcade games for example).
The PS3 is a more solid piece of hardware for sure, but I've only had it a few months now and have long completed all the games I wanted to play on it (MGS4 etc.). The PS3 would have more longevity for me if I didn't also have a 360 because of the cross-platform games, but I'd rather buy them on the 360 due to often getting the option of better DLC, getting Live integration and achievements etc.
Bitch all you want about the fact the console fails, the fact it inconveniences you for maybe a few days in 2 to 3 years is really not a big deal when it keeps you coming back the rest of the time.
It's for this reason that Microsoft will continue to keep increasing it's lead on the PS3 at least.
FWIW, I've had my 360 since 2006, prior to the v2 consoles I had to get mine replaced due to the RROD issue 3 times, but here in the UK it was in statutory warranty each time so I could just return it to the shop, get it replaced there and then and come home with a brand new console with fresh new controllers. I've not had to get a replacement since the v2 consoles and I've not even heard of this E74 error so I'd wage a bet the majority of problems are resolved now judging from personal experience and that of friends with 360s. It was a pain having to get the licenses for my DLC transferred back then but that's a process you can do now automatically (meaning you can move content to a different console now if you wish). When I did have to phone up though I was given 3200 MS points each time which was nice. Effectively the failure left me with a net gain when the only inconvenience was a 10 minute journey to the retailer for a swap over and a quick phone call to an MS free phone number in the worst case. In all honesty, personally, and I mean personally, due to the experience I've had I'm not even sure I'd have been happier if my consoles hadn't failed - I'd have worn controllers and would be down about £80 worth of Microsoft points.
I'm not totally defending the failures and I realise in other countries where consumer laws are less helpful meaning you actually have to send the console away it must be more of a pain but I really find the hardware failures a relatively minor fault when you look at it objectively. I've not found having downtime with the console any worse than say paying for an MMO subscription and having the servers bugger up for a few days (or weeks in the case of the old European Dark Age of Camelot servers), I've also not found it any worse than having to deal with crippling DRM on PC games which has prevented me playing some of them despite being legitimately purchased when I've wanted to.
The thing is, despite the failures, the 360 is still the best console for many. It doesn't have the following of the Wii but it still has a hefty userbase and is increasing it's lead week on week on the PS3 quite well right now. For me, right now, the 360 and the DS are definitely my two favourite gaming systems.
"This is my annoyance as a US customer"
This bit made me chuckle. Sucks doesn't it? Usually US customers are on the right side of the fence, but here in the UK and many other countries we are screwed time and time again in this way whether it's DVD region meaning we never get a film or get it months and months later, higher prices for UK customers on the likes of iTunes and Steam or content/promotions on Microsoft's XBox live.
The internet is a worldwide thing, it's stupid to still be working with pre-internet business models in this way because if the content isn't available despite people being willing to pay for it then yeah, we're gonna resort to piracy. In fact, it's not even just about the internet - this is all about globalisation, these companies love to use globalisation to get cheap labour and fiddle their taxes and that sort of thing but god forbid it ever offer any benefit to the consumer.
I still really have little sympathy for the music industry and so on. Piracy is just the negative karma these people deserve.
Personally, I'm not convinced that having something visible to a passer by or even a photographer is quite the same as having every detail photographed and plastered on the net for everyone to see.
The guy in TFA makes a good point when he talks about break ins. Criminals can now scout areas from the comfort of their home. At least if they have to go past your house and look in and take photos themselves then there may be witnesses that someone was acting suspiciously. Of course, because they don't have to be there and can do it from their own home they can spend all the time in the world examining photos for entry points, on how to evade security lights and so on. If someone spent ages looking at every inch of someone's house in the street then someone is going to ask questions, just like someone might ask questions if they take a photo themselves.
I'm not saying I'm totally against street view, but I don't think it's as clear cut as "Well if you don't want people seeing it, don't have it on display". I think the key difference is that if people wanted to go and be nosy they at least had to get off their arse and make the fucking effort which was enough to deter most snoopers but now they can do it regardless.
That said, from what I understand Google have removed some images where people have requested their property not be on display, so perhaps the best course of action rather than turning the vehicle around when it'll probably just come back some other time is to let them take photos and have everyone complain to have their house picture removed and leave a big chunk missing from the system.
To be honest though, I'm not actually sure what everyone's house being photographed even achieves, that's the bigger question for me. I can understand major city centres such as London and so on because it can be used for advertising in conjunction with Google maps and people can have the chance to see these major cities. Purely residential streets though? does it even actually achieve anything?
"Obviously, in the US this would be plainly moronic, since it is, indeed, the case, that in public there is no expectation of privacy."
I think this is part the issue though, I think this goes beyond privacy. If someone walks up to your house and keeps constantly photographing it or plasters photos of your house and stuff on the internet it's borderline harassment. The fact Google blurs faces and is willing to remove photos suggests they accept that at best they have a moral duty to respect people and their property but possibly even that there are legal implications for what they are doing.
Well yes, isn't context a wonderful thing?
Luckily taking a visit to Queen Elizabeth out of context is quite hard when only one is alive.
It talks about how the FBI has been called like it's a major disaster.
I can picture it now:
FBI: Hello FBI?
MPAA: THE NEW WOLVERINE FILM HAS BEEN LEAKED
FBI: SHIT, EVERYONE DROP THEIR RAPE CASES, THEIR KIDDIE PORN CASES, THEIR TERRORIST CASES, THE NEW WOLVERINE FILM HAS BEEN LEAKED WE MUST FIND OUT WHO DID THIS
It's just the way the leak of a film gets more news coverage than more serious stories. It's like it's an international tragedy. I mean seriously, a film with chunks missing, temporary sound, CGI missing and so on. There are companies every day that have their security breached and IP stolen. Why does it get international coverage when it's a half-finished movie?
The real response from the FBI should be:
FBI: Here's your case number, take your ticket and get to the back of the queue
On a side note the BBC also said that Fox has had the download of the new film taken down now - that baffled me a bit, I doubt very much they've managed to get it removed from the whole internet, if they have they're the first company in history to achieve such a thing!
"Mostly from uneducated haters, but there's no lack of it."
I think that's exactly what TFA is talking about. You throw it away as being from uneducated haters but why would someone be an uneducated hater? Has the community not done enough to educate them sensibly? Do they have a proper issue and it's just being ignored?
When people hate something you can almost always find out why by talking to them reasonably and either correct their misunderstandings or realise that yes, there is a valid issue and look at fixing it.
Writing them off as uneducated haters though, means you're just going to continue to have a lot of uneducated haters.
It's not just Linux though, it's just the fanboy attitude in general.
The fanboy mindset is an odd one. You defend something you love or attack something you hate no matter how little you owe the company or creators, in fact, if you paid for it, they fucking owe you and if they did a shit job then yes they should hear about it. If as an example scenario Nintendo mess something up in a Wii update then people should have every right to complain about it and voice their frustration at the problem - fanboys telling them to stop whining or shut up achieves what? It lets the company get away easier with not fixing a problem. Surely pressuring companies into fixing problems is in everyones interests even if it doesn't effect you personally right now it might in future!
I know OSS is a different beast, people do it off their own backs in their spare time, but as the saying goes, if a jobs worth doing it's worth doing right. What's the point developing an application and releasing it along with the source code for everyone to use if no one wants to use it because you wont listen to their criticisms?
The problem is this, people take criticism as a personal attack even if it's just a product they purchased that someone is complaining about. Similarly people write code are often defensive in the face of criticism.
But you have to step back and look at why you're doing it, if you are just developing something for yourself and release it as a courtesy but without a care of what other people think then yeah, no problem just ignore the criticism and put a note up along with the downloads saying "Not interested in feedback". If you are developing it with the aim of user adoption then you have to accept criticism, sure not all is valid but sometimes we see projects where nearly the entire userbase is up in arms and are still ignored! If half the userbase is up in arms and half are defensive of a change then make it an option but convince people to move over to the change by making it worthwhile and phase it out. Don't just ignore half your fanbase and cut a popular feature out outright!!
Linux does need it's critics, everyone producing something needs their critics in fact. They're valuable for continued improvement and sure sometimes they come up with idiotic ideas but other times it's you, the developer that doesn't understand what your user actually wants and the sooner all developers accept this the better. I know full well I can write good code, I know full well I can design applications, but what I can't ever possibly claim to know is what my users want because I am not them.
Well no, the reason a lot of games fail is because there are other games like them that are simply better.
If you look at something like Brothers in Arms Hells Highway, it's not a terrible game, but it's simply not as good as Call of Duty. Similarly Medal of Honour was worse again.
They're often copying ideas that have been done a thousand times before without actually improving on them, simply imitating with a crapper version to try and cash in on people playing the superior version who may want more.
When a company has checked whether there is demand for a game they want to make they also have to make sure that demand isn't being filled in a superior way by another developer they can't compete against.
This isn't a problem that effects just the games industry - a lot of companies that produce goods have to commit to building prototypes and test the water with them to see if they'll be successful but also make sure they can beat the competition.
Even Hollywood when making films faces the same issue and films that are flops ultimately almost always are because there are better alternatives out there that cover the same theme. Games are no different. Good products succede, crap products fail. Awareness of your market and the ability to put together a good team with competent people make all the difference here. Put together a crap team without knowing your market and pretend you wont fail is cheating yourself and your team.
Queen is just a hereditary title and can be used like any other title including social titles like Mr, Dr, Sir, Mrs and so on.
Using the term Queen Elizabeth without specifying which Queen Elizabeth is no less correct than referring to someone called Paul who is a Dr. as Dr. Paul. The only reason you'd want to specify is if there were multiple Dr. Pauls you could be referring to, but seeing as the summary quite clearly points out he met a living Queen there is no room for ambiguity and so there is no need to refer to her as Queen Elizabeth II.
Using Queen Elizabeth is merely an informal way of referring to her.
If you were writing a book on English Queens then yes, you would be wise to use Queen Elizabeth II to make it clear who is being referred to. As we're talking about someone visiting the living Queen of England, no, there is no need.
Yeah but then you just repeat what he said until he gets annoyed, stamps his feet and runs off crying ;)
Maybe people need to be more assertive in trying to reverse that argument? Start spreading the idea that anyone for filtering is just hiding the fact abuse continues to happen anyway only that it's pushed underground.
Start using arguments such as anyone defending the filter is allowing child porn to continue as a dirty little secret that's kept out of the publics minds and that they're basically okaying it as long as the general public doesn't stumble across it or know about it.
It's eqaully a bit of a stretch, but they're not playing a game of truths and facts here.
That said it may not even be necessary, whilst people like the guy you mention are already using this kind of argument it doesn't seem to be getting them far for the most part. Governments seem to finally be getting the idea that these plans aren't such a good idea and are backing down a bit. Perhaps just keeping up the pressure as is is good enough!
That's been my experience too.
In the South of France and the North coast the French have always been lovely and helpful to me.
Paris however is like dickhead central.
"I've also ready that being bilingual or a polyglot is beneficial to thinking and memory skills."
The problem is, so are many other skills.
"I cannot attest as to whether or not English buys you anything over Russian or Chinese as far as resources available on the web but I will argue that someone who has Russian as a first language and Chinese as a second will most likely be better off to code than someone with merely English as a first language (Disclaimer: I am the latter)."
But learning a language takes time, what makes you think that programmers who only speak one language didn't spend the additional time bilingual programmers spent learning two languages learning something even more relevant and beneficial that similarly improves their skills?
The problem with studies such as that suggesting being bilingual improves you memory or cognitive skills is that they are only testing for and comparing that. As a counter argument, I would argue that someone who spent their time learning only English and the rest of their time learning math, comp. sci. or programming will be better off to code than someone who used much of that time learning a second language.
Learning a second language has it's advantages, particularly in international business. But to suggest the cognitive/memory benefits it gives are something that comes for free without the expense of other knowledge or benefits you could've otherwise gained in the same time is to use the results of a test with a specific set of parameters designed to constrain the problem to look for a specific result in an environment with far more factors and variables.
I only speak one language but find mathematical logic, number theory my strongest areas of math and have always done exceedingly well in as have I in computer science and software development. My girlfriend is multi-lingual, speaking English, French and German fluently but also with some ability to speak Dutch, Spanish and Italian. She's done amazingly well for herself with this skill (her employers in the UK have always loved her for it because not many UK staff are ever even bilingual, let alone speak multiple languages), but logic and math are areas she really, really struggles with and absolutely hates the subjects because of it. You can't make any overall conclusion on how useful knowing additional languages is by just comparing the two of us like this but at very least you can say that being bilingual or speaking multiple languages doesn't seem to necessarily guarantee strong logic skills.
"Now all they need to do is come up with a foolproof way to determine if their game will be crap before they spend millions making it."
Again just like every other industry in the world then?
It's called market research. Too many games companies seem to forego that and just build the game the lead designer thinks would be cool without actually checking with any potential customers to see if they'd like it too.
Effectively these people end up spending $25million on a game they'd like, without asking anyone else if they'd like it too.
True :) Maybe they figure if they all tell us it enough we'll actually start to believe it?
Quite where they expect us to get the money for shite we don't want when most of us can't even afford everything we do want though I don't know!
I'm not sure what's going on but recently the PRS seems to have awoken.
They've been on a massive collecting spree lately, going after everyone from builders playing a portable radio as they build an extension on a house through to staff of big businesses playing the radio in the office to this sort of thing.
I can only guess they've see how much cash the RIAA has racked in with it's threats of litigation against file sharers and is simply going for the same tactic en-masse (although it's always done this, just not to the degree it is now).
I didn't realise that there were limits on where you can and can't play the radio to be honest. I figure if they're going to broadcast unencrypted radio signals through the air then it shouldn't be illegal to pick them up whether it's at a stables, in an office or at a building site. With CDs I can kind of understand as the packaging can come with a licensing agreement you're told to accept before opening and/or using but there are no agreements with radio.
I'm not actually sure how strong the PRS' demands are, I was under the impression the radio stations already pay royalties to the PRS. This snippet from a Wikipedia entry was interesting:
"Further problems arise with the tactics used by the PRS in the United Kingdom because BBC radio is publicly financed through the TV licence fee and everyone has the right to listen to it free of charge."
The PRS exists to collect royalties for public performances. I would've thought there's a strong argument that it's the radio stations that are carrying out the public performances, not the radio stations AND the people receiving it at the other end.
Still it seems to work, the Wikipedia entry said they gained something like £562million in royalties in the last year too.
I'm not saying we shouldn't question theories, as long as the theories are worth questioning.
Regarding the cornflakes idea, the question was that why don't bigger flakes end up at the bottom of the packet rather than the small ones when the big ones are heavier and hence should be at the bottom?
It doesn't take a genius to realise that small ones can fall through gaps of big ones but big ones can't fall through the gaps of small ones.
Now did we really need to fund a study to come up with that conclusion?
If you are going to make a huge expensive game, make it worth buying.
The problem is this, there's a lot of games out there with massive budgets that are simply crap.
I'm not really sure the complaint in the article is exactly. They seem to be effectively complaining that the market doesn't reward games that have had a massive budget but are still crap? Well isn't that just the way business is? if you spend a fortune developing something that no one wants then you fail?
There's a reason we've always had certain studios come back time and time again with new releases - id Software, Blizzard, Square Enix etc. It's because they produce good games people want, even if they do spend a fortune developing them.
I don't see how it's a crisis that market forces affect the games industry like they affect everyone else exactly? What are they saying? That we should have to be more open to funding shite we don't actually want?
Expanding on your point - the key is to make games fun and that people want, whether it's a high budget or low budget production. What consumers wont tolerate are games that aren't fun even if companies have spent $25 million on them - that's their problem. Huge, expensive games are still perfectly valid and I'd certainly be sad if we didn't get anymore Call of Dutys, Gears of Wars, Half-Lifes and that sort of thing, but they still require the fun factor than smaller games require too.
Is that the only way we can play the role though? with side quests? I think developers often use it as a lazy way out.
Why not just have the main quest line be a lot more strongly related to your actions earlier in the main storyline and have a proper branching storyline.
I think what gets me really is the rigidity of the side questions - as you say, better AI could make a big difference. I find it somewhat inexcusable in this day and age that we have quests as mindless and dull as "Hi I'm Jim. Will you go to location X and kill monsters Y for you?" and you go and do it and come back and he says "Oh wow well done you killed it, here's 10 gold". It's that kind of side questing we need to get away from. I guess what I'm getting at is that I don't think you should even realise you're doing a side quest similar to what you were getting at I think. You should walk through the world and hear a scream for help and go and help. Not see a guy stood there like a gormless twit who when you walk up to he says unconvincingly "Oh no. My girlfriend has been kidnapped. Please head North West and kill the evil turd monster to rescue her. Oh, reward is 10 gold again by the way".
What about if you walk into a firefight on Fallout between two factions, and you end up having to fight for what side you wandered in on and simply the side you wandered in on defines who you end up having to fight for else they shoot you? How about that faction when you fight with them if only to save your life becomes friendly to you and helpful after like current faction systems but without the "Go to A to fight for faction a or go to B to fight for faction b". Don't like the faction you stumbled upon to help and wanted to work with the other guys? No problem! Go to the other faction camp and offer to betray those guys.
It needs to be a lot more free flowing, it needs to happen without you specifically going to questgiver X to get quest Y. It needs to be part of the world as you say.
FWIW, I do some AI development at work (for business not games though) and modern AI is certainly a lot more capable than the crap we have in games today. Even without any advanced AI implementations better decisions trees are more than enough to create far more convincing AI in most AAA RPGs today.
I think Mass Effect is the best attempt I've seen in recent years, whilst it still had the side quest setup, the main storyline did at least force you to make decisions on the fly that would change the outcome of the rest of the storyline somewhat.
The problem is that there's a big difference between questioning a theory that may be wrong and consistently challenging a theory that may be wrong with an even more stupid, entirely unprovable idea.
The latter doesn't help anyone, because providing an unprovable counter just isn't scientific and hence has no place in science.
A proper scientific view should question for sure, but not with utterly stupid ideas like Creationism which is unprovable because that just wastes everyone's time and holds everyone back.
This is the crux of the problem with Darwinism and what Creationists miss - yes it's just a theory, but most importantly, there is yet to be any other alternative theory that hasn't been disproven or is even provable to start with.
I don't think anyone is saying we shouldn't question Darwinism, they're just pointing out quite rightly that there exists no valid alternative theory.
Yes, they like the dog because it's probably the cruelest twist in the game. They think hey we'll hype the dog up so everyone wants to see what the dog does and play around with it THEN WE'LL FUCKING KILL IT.
At the end you get the choice between saving your dog who gets shot dead, everyone else in the world who died or getting 1 million gold.
So what they did was made the dog pretty fucking integral into the game, but made you feel like a selfish dick for reviving him rather than all the other innocents that died.
Molyneux is a dog killing bastard and he uses it against you and that's what he meant when he talks about bringing emotion to games! Me being a good guy thought hey, I'll choose sacrifice and sacrifice the god damn dog for everyone else and all I got was a letter of thanks from everyone. If I'd known that I'd have got my dog back or taken the £1million and let the damn peasants stay dead.
Seriously though, the dog was quite fun to play around with. The game itself was far, far too short though but that seems to be par for the course with these sorts of games now, Fallout 3 was the same - the main storyline last about 5 seconds and the rest of the gameplay time is filled with boring side quests that are as repetitive as the crap in MMOs. Ironically I got bored of MMOs because the content in single player or coop games was much more rich and interesting, but that doesn't seem to be the case anymore. Frankly I'd quite happily say goodbye to the side quests altogether and have them work on the main storyline more for these sorts of games. Games like Deadspace show how awesome games can be if you just focus on the storyline.
It could be worse, money could be pumped into studies to see why the large cornflakes don't fall to the bottom of the packet when they're heavier because some idiot doesn't get it that the small parts fall through the gaps whereas the large parts can't.
Oh wait, no, that was has been funded and done.
Apparently we sometimes have to pay for studies to confirm what common sense and logic already told us. Just don't ask me why, I think it's just the way of the world.
I used to need glasses as a kid, now, 15 years of online gaming later I've had 20/20 vision for over 8 years.
Of course, that doesn't prove anything, my eyes could've just naturally corrected themselves. Either way though one thing is for sure, staring at a monitor or TV didn't make my eyesite worse like my grandparents always told me it would ;)
Honestly though I wonder if my eyes ever were bad. When I was a kid and told I needed glasses my eye checks were always at commercial opticians. Eye tests over the last few years were always done by impartial eye doctors as part of my job giving me free eye checkups because I work with computers. I wonder if the original diagnosis of me requiring glasses was simply a good old case of conflict of interest in that of course commcercial opticians are going to tell me I need glasses, because then they get to sell me some! The impartial eye doctors however had nothing to gain either way because he wasn't also selling me glasses so just gave me the truth.
You sound like you're basically just trolling, because clearly you don't actually know what the feeling in Britain is about all that's been going on. Particularly with this comment:
"The backlash is gaining; in the UK, it never started."
Sorry, but that's complete and utter bullshit. Recently there has been a lot of coverage about government plans, particularly with regard to their various databases to try and make the government back down on them. In the local council elections last year as well, Labour lost a massive amount of it's territory because people were sick of what Labour has been doing to this country. In the general election next year, it seems fairly clear cut that Labour is going to lose by quite a decent amount. We also had people like David Davis give up and re-win his position in parliament as a referendum and protest against anti-terror laws. It also seems like an absolute certainty that whichever party gets in next (almost certainly the Conservatives) will repeal many of the laws Labour has created that trample rights and allowed for the creation of the database state.
Furthermore and much more interestingly in recent weeks, Jacqui Smith, the home secretary who most people see as one of the main instigators for the trampling of rights, the illegal databases and so on has been under a sustained attack. Someone - be it someone in opposition, a leak in the home office, or possibly even members of the security services are gaining access to information that is being used to engineer her downfall. With the relevation yesterday that her husband had been using her MP expenses (for which she is already under fire over) to pay for porn films it seems she is very close to being finished.
Not only has the UK backlash started, it's in full swing. Real action such as repealing of laws can't happen until the next election next year because Labour have a majority that lets them vote in whatever law changes they want unchallenged but that doesn't mean the opposition and citizens haven't already made their mind up, similarly even the EU parliament and European courts have slammed Labour on many issues. Even Labour itself looks set to back down on some things now because it realises that no one is on it's side any longer.
"the decision to split from England ~230 years ago appears to have been an excellent one nonetheless."
Yes it does, because otherwise if they'd given you the vote then we might have ended up with George Bush overseeing us as well as you for the last 8 years.
Seriously, I understand if all you ever read is Slashdot that you might get the impression that nothing positive is happening on the UK front against Labour's attempts at oppression, but if you'd actually been following what's really going on in the UK from other news sources who cover stuff other than just the negative, alarmist stuff that Slashdot mostly seems to (not that that's totally a bad thing - it's great we're made aware of the issues) then you wouldn't come up with such clueless statements as "The backlash is gaining; in the UK, it never started.".