google is saying that they know what's best for the chinese people
Seems to me that by complying with the Chinese government, they're saying that the local government knows what's best for it's people. If Google was going in and saying "Nah, you don't need to see that or that" based up on their own whims, then sure, they'd be saying "Google knows best". But they're not, they're abiding by ideals, regardless of how horrific most find them to be, sanctioned by the Chinese government.
Honestly I don't see why people are throwing such a fuss over this just because Google got involved. It's already a known fact that Yahoo! and MSN have long since agreed to this type of filtering. What they're doing is no more unethical than our own turning of a blind eye by continuing to support the Chinese government by purchasing their imported products because it saves a few buck at the check-out counter.
The problem with google's line of ethical reasoning has to do with their predictive capabilities. How in hell do you evaluate which is better?
The same thing can be said about our own personal buying habits. When was the last time you thought to yourself "Oh, this is one is nice. Oh, but it's made in China and they have a very oppresive government which commits crimes against humanity. I think I'll spend the extra $5 on the 'Made in the USA' one so as to not continue feeding that immoral regime". Their decision was made in the exact same way "Hmm, enter a competitive market which Yahoo! and MSN already are active in or take the 'Moral highground' and take a stance against the Chinese government'. Cold as the truth is, it's all about money, wether it's a large tech company or Joe Schmoe picking up a product at the local WalMart. We can't hold any company to any higher moral grounds than we allow ourselves to be a part of.
Evil begets evil.. at least until Ballmer "fucking kills" (TM) them.
Re:If they have a software workaround
on
Hopes Rise for RIM
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Either that or they don't truly know how it'll work in the real world with hundreds of thousands of users. Sure, working in a controlled environment is fine and dandy to test things, but surely they can't be positive it'll work across the board.
His book, Massively Multiplayer Games for Dummies, is a straightforward text on what to and what not to do in any Massive game you're likely to play.
Word has it that there is to be a hit follow-up to this titled "Cybering in MMO's: Everything you wanted to know but were afraid to type". Back on topic, it's good to see he covers needed wisdom such as the breakdown of common slang terms like LFG, WTB, WTS, etc. Heaven knows any time I ever talk somebody at work into starting up, that's the first thing they ask me about is all the acronyms.
Shareholder's wealth is more important than human rights? I hope the author feels the same way when China is rounding up "bad thinkers" who search for the wrong things from within China.
If you feel so strongly about it, perhaps you should think twice before going shopping at WalMart or any other retail store for that matter. Have you seen the number of "Made in China" stickers on most of today's goods? You can't realistically blame businesses for valuing shareholder wealth over human rights unless you're doing something to buck the trend yourself. By continuing to buy their products, you're basically telling them that you're ok with it so long as you can continue to save a couple bucks at the checkout.
I'm sure we all wish Microsoft had their priorities in that order but recent news
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/19/204 5204 seems to indicate otherwise. Alas, they care more about their next money making scam, err "product cycle" (i.e. Vista) than fixing their current offerings. I can understand their wanting to move into this market, after all, they feel as if they need to be everything to everybody.
Sometimes the world forgets the technology we had yesteryear.
I'm not sure it's so much forgetting as it is many folks never even knowing that it existed. I can remember one of the local Babbage's used to have one on display showing off The Killing Game Show. It was jaw-dropping gorgeous compared to anything you could find on the PC at the time. Unfortunately, Amiga was kind of a niche product that never had anywhere near the market share that your standard, run of the mill, IBM XT had.
Besides the pure and utter idiocy of a tax system such as this, one main concern I'd have is who decides if a game is or isn't violent? Sure, titles such as GTA, Half Life 2, or DOOM 3 would easily be targets due to the amount of blood shown, but somebody in the wrong frame of mind could extend it to include racing games or worse. After all, in most the racing games, Burn Out 3 comes to mind, you actually get points for ramming into other racers and causing massive pile-ups. I'm sure that principle could potentially be seen by some folks as violent and as such they'd slap it with a tax.
The least they could do is support 2GB modules to max the card out at 8GB. I don't think I could even copy over my entire World of Warcraft folder to that thing.
It's not like it's that big of a loss, you can still find women who are just as scantily clad, if not more-so, in the games that the booth babes were often there to promote in the first place. On the plus side, instead of a deluge of sites offering their daily booth babe shots, maybe we can actually get a picture or two of some actual products.
I can already hear the cost of Big Macs going up because all the McDonald's employees have now come the realization that they're better than these other professional gaming chumps and are going to dedicate their lives to it. Sure, it might be a "valid" career path, but for how many people exactly? We're not talking about something like the fast food industry where there's always an open job for a warm body. You're talking about quite a niche market. While there may be tens of thousands of gamers out there, how many of them actually have the disposable income to support the companies who're using this to advertise to what they believe is worthwhile demographic? Look at Abit. Heaven knows how much they've sunk into the "Fatal1ty" brand and it doesn't appear to have helped with news of them potentially being bought out because of how poorly they're doing. Sure, it's a pipe dream to be a professional gamer, but as is often said "Don't quit your day job!"
Yet many of the users of these cameras lack the time or patience to tackle the steep learning curve of the Photoshop family and are left asking "How do I do... ?
Considering the widescale use of digital cameras today, I can't help but think a lot of the lack of use of this software stems not from "How do I do...?" but rather the "I didn't know you could do that!" catergory. Besides a batch or two of red eye, how often does the average consumer actually even care about the end product? Judging by my Inbox, apparently not much as most don't even take the time to figure out how to resize or compress a picture before sending it to the masses. Besides, who needs to spend $ on a book when they can just call the tech/geek in the family.
his staff found the makeshift audio-video studio amid his widening probe into spending and other abuses at the state General Services Division.
Look on the bright side, maybe the person(s) behind the purchases were filming some amateur porn and the state can sue their earnings to recoup some extra cash.
Sounds like a line of new cologne from Ralph Loren aimed at today's IT workers.
Re:This being Slashdot
on
RFID Cookware
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· Score: 1
I can see Reynold's introducing RFID into their foil line. Then not only could big brother know when and what you're cooking, when made into a hat they can also listen in on your thoughts.
Future of our civilization?
on
Return to the Moon
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· Score: 0, Flamebait
When the subject is one as potentially important to the future of our civilization as the energy resources geologist Harrison ("Jack") Schmitt sees buried in the lunar surface, along with our future in space, it becomes all the more daunting to take issue with it.
Ok, so we're already screwing up the ecological system of one planet, so all the more reason to start mining the moon too! What a wonderful present to give to future generations. "Sorry about that ozone thing son, we didn't think it would turn out this bad. Oh, sure, the moon is 1/5th it's original size now in due to all the mining, but you can still find it with a telescope in the night sky."
I'm sorry, but isn't it this "let's just mine the blasted thing!" line of thinking that's stifled the advancement of newer energy resources for so long?
Maybe one possible scenario is that a digital tax will be added to all machines that can play digitized music/games/etc. in order to make up for the lost revenue.
The problem with that though is exactly what the author is talking about. Just because a machine has the potential to make copies of digital media doesn't mean it will ever be used in that fashion due to the environment it's used in. Most of the PCs I see around here in the office are equipped with either CD or DVD based drives. The only time most of them are used is when the machine needs to be re-imaged. Sure, if somebody had enough local access rights to the machine they could install their favorite ripping software and make copies from work. That doesn't mean that it would ever happen and that we should be the one's responsible to cover the losses of some other compnay just because the potential is there.
He raises several questions that the developers of DRM technologies ought to answer - because not all computers are merely personal entertainment systems for 'content' consumers."
And how likely is it that they'll ever be forced to answer these questions? Considering the deep pockets of both the music and video industries and how much pull they have via their lobbyists, it's likely they'll never be pressed to answer these types of important questions. Without some more high profile issues like those witnessed with the Sony fiasco, the average consumer will probably never be the wiser as to the depths of contempt these companies have for their customers. To them, every single person is a potential thief.
If anything, they'll do like Virigin Mobile and team up with another provider (ala Sprint) who'll handle the entire network side of things. All that Apple would have to do is continue to charge exubert amounts of money for their shiney merchandise for all to "Oooo" and "Ahhhh" over. Honestly I can see this happening, it does seem like a logical step for Apple's product revolution.
Slashdot Mirror
google is saying that they know what's best for the chinese people
Seems to me that by complying with the Chinese government, they're saying that the local government knows what's best for it's people. If Google was going in and saying "Nah, you don't need to see that or that" based up on their own whims, then sure, they'd be saying "Google knows best". But they're not, they're abiding by ideals, regardless of how horrific most find them to be, sanctioned by the Chinese government.
Honestly I don't see why people are throwing such a fuss over this just because Google got involved. It's already a known fact that Yahoo! and MSN have long since agreed to this type of filtering. What they're doing is no more unethical than our own turning of a blind eye by continuing to support the Chinese government by purchasing their imported products because it saves a few buck at the check-out counter.
The problem with google's line of ethical reasoning has to do with their predictive capabilities. How in hell do you evaluate which is better?
The same thing can be said about our own personal buying habits. When was the last time you thought to yourself "Oh, this is one is nice. Oh, but it's made in China and they have a very oppresive government which commits crimes against humanity. I think I'll spend the extra $5 on the 'Made in the USA' one so as to not continue feeding that immoral regime". Their decision was made in the exact same way "Hmm, enter a competitive market which Yahoo! and MSN already are active in or take the 'Moral highground' and take a stance against the Chinese government'. Cold as the truth is, it's all about money, wether it's a large tech company or Joe Schmoe picking up a product at the local WalMart. We can't hold any company to any higher moral grounds than we allow ourselves to be a part of.
Evil begets evil .. at least until Ballmer "fucking kills" (TM) them.
Either that or they don't truly know how it'll work in the real world with hundreds of thousands of users. Sure, working in a controlled environment is fine and dandy to test things, but surely they can't be positive it'll work across the board.
His book, Massively Multiplayer Games for Dummies, is a straightforward text on what to and what not to do in any Massive game you're likely to play.
Word has it that there is to be a hit follow-up to this titled "Cybering in MMO's: Everything you wanted to know but were afraid to type". Back on topic, it's good to see he covers needed wisdom such as the breakdown of common slang terms like LFG, WTB, WTS, etc. Heaven knows any time I ever talk somebody at work into starting up, that's the first thing they ask me about is all the acronyms.
I'll tell you the best power of portable gaming, no more pausing for bathroom breaks.
Shareholder's wealth is more important than human rights? I hope the author feels the same way when China is rounding up "bad thinkers" who search for the wrong things from within China.
If you feel so strongly about it, perhaps you should think twice before going shopping at WalMart or any other retail store for that matter. Have you seen the number of "Made in China" stickers on most of today's goods? You can't realistically blame businesses for valuing shareholder wealth over human rights unless you're doing something to buck the trend yourself. By continuing to buy their products, you're basically telling them that you're ok with it so long as you can continue to save a couple bucks at the checkout.
I thought Web 2.0 was the future?
Ow wait.. that's right.. that was LAST week's "future". So, shall we take bets on next week's "future"?
I'll put $20 on "Web 3.0, now with secret Ingredient X."
1) Windows XP SP3
4 5204 seems to indicate otherwise. Alas, they care more about their next money making scam, err "product cycle" (i.e. Vista) than fixing their current offerings. I can understand their wanting to move into this market, after all, they feel as if they need to be everything to everybody.
2) Windows Vista
I'm sure we all wish Microsoft had their priorities in that order but recent news http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/19/20
You know the old saying, "If you have to ask ..."
Forget the potatoes, the sushi chefs are going to need much smaller knives if they wanna carve up one of those things.
Sometimes the world forgets the technology we had yesteryear.
I'm not sure it's so much forgetting as it is many folks never even knowing that it existed. I can remember one of the local Babbage's used to have one on display showing off The Killing Game Show. It was jaw-dropping gorgeous compared to anything you could find on the PC at the time. Unfortunately, Amiga was kind of a niche product that never had anywhere near the market share that your standard, run of the mill, IBM XT had.
Besides the pure and utter idiocy of a tax system such as this, one main concern I'd have is who decides if a game is or isn't violent? Sure, titles such as GTA, Half Life 2, or DOOM 3 would easily be targets due to the amount of blood shown, but somebody in the wrong frame of mind could extend it to include racing games or worse. After all, in most the racing games, Burn Out 3 comes to mind, you actually get points for ramming into other racers and causing massive pile-ups. I'm sure that principle could potentially be seen by some folks as violent and as such they'd slap it with a tax.
The least they could do is support 2GB modules to max the card out at 8GB. I don't think I could even copy over my entire World of Warcraft folder to that thing.
It's not like it's that big of a loss, you can still find women who are just as scantily clad, if not more-so, in the games that the booth babes were often there to promote in the first place. On the plus side, instead of a deluge of sites offering their daily booth babe shots, maybe we can actually get a picture or two of some actual products.
Professional Gamer is now a valid career path.
I can already hear the cost of Big Macs going up because all the McDonald's employees have now come the realization that they're better than these other professional gaming chumps and are going to dedicate their lives to it. Sure, it might be a "valid" career path, but for how many people exactly? We're not talking about something like the fast food industry where there's always an open job for a warm body. You're talking about quite a niche market. While there may be tens of thousands of gamers out there, how many of them actually have the disposable income to support the companies who're using this to advertise to what they believe is worthwhile demographic? Look at Abit. Heaven knows how much they've sunk into the "Fatal1ty" brand and it doesn't appear to have helped with news of them potentially being bought out because of how poorly they're doing. Sure, it's a pipe dream to be a professional gamer, but as is often said "Don't quit your day job!"
20 MB audio file limit per song
So I'm guessing that means I won't be able to take some extended Iron Butterfly tracks with me then?
Yet many of the users of these cameras lack the time or patience to tackle the steep learning curve of the Photoshop family and are left asking "How do I do ... ?
...?" but rather the "I didn't know you could do that!" catergory. Besides a batch or two of red eye, how often does the average consumer actually even care about the end product? Judging by my Inbox, apparently not much as most don't even take the time to figure out how to resize or compress a picture before sending it to the masses. Besides, who needs to spend $ on a book when they can just call the tech/geek in the family.
Considering the widescale use of digital cameras today, I can't help but think a lot of the lack of use of this software stems not from "How do I do
his staff found the makeshift audio-video studio amid his widening probe into spending and other abuses at the state General Services Division.
Look on the bright side, maybe the person(s) behind the purchases were filming some amateur porn and the state can sue their earnings to recoup some extra cash.
Its all just pictures of ugly babies and nerds talking about wires and crap.
Don't forget the porn! Granted, it's level of "value" ranges from user to user.
Sounds like a line of new cologne from Ralph Loren aimed at today's IT workers.
I can see Reynold's introducing RFID into their foil line. Then not only could big brother know when and what you're cooking, when made into a hat they can also listen in on your thoughts.
When the subject is one as potentially important to the future of our civilization as the energy resources geologist Harrison ("Jack") Schmitt sees buried in the lunar surface, along with our future in space, it becomes all the more daunting to take issue with it.
Ok, so we're already screwing up the ecological system of one planet, so all the more reason to start mining the moon too! What a wonderful present to give to future generations. "Sorry about that ozone thing son, we didn't think it would turn out this bad. Oh, sure, the moon is 1/5th it's original size now in due to all the mining, but you can still find it with a telescope in the night sky."
I'm sorry, but isn't it this "let's just mine the blasted thing!" line of thinking that's stifled the advancement of newer energy resources for so long?
Maybe one possible scenario is that a digital tax will be added to all machines that can play digitized music/games/etc. in order to make up for the lost revenue.
The problem with that though is exactly what the author is talking about. Just because a machine has the potential to make copies of digital media doesn't mean it will ever be used in that fashion due to the environment it's used in. Most of the PCs I see around here in the office are equipped with either CD or DVD based drives. The only time most of them are used is when the machine needs to be re-imaged. Sure, if somebody had enough local access rights to the machine they could install their favorite ripping software and make copies from work. That doesn't mean that it would ever happen and that we should be the one's responsible to cover the losses of some other compnay just because the potential is there.
He raises several questions that the developers of DRM technologies ought to answer - because not all computers are merely personal entertainment systems for 'content' consumers."
And how likely is it that they'll ever be forced to answer these questions? Considering the deep pockets of both the music and video industries and how much pull they have via their lobbyists, it's likely they'll never be pressed to answer these types of important questions. Without some more high profile issues like those witnessed with the Sony fiasco, the average consumer will probably never be the wiser as to the depths of contempt these companies have for their customers. To them, every single person is a potential thief.
If anything, they'll do like Virigin Mobile and team up with another provider (ala Sprint) who'll handle the entire network side of things. All that Apple would have to do is continue to charge exubert amounts of money for their shiney merchandise for all to "Oooo" and "Ahhhh" over. Honestly I can see this happening, it does seem like a logical step for Apple's product revolution.