It's probably not PC to say, but your experience is not typical. Particularly the housing problems that led to the current financial crisis. The vast majority of those folks simply didn't do their homework and bought more house than they could afford.
As to your remark about "some very very lucky religious fanatics", that's sort of the point. They aren't that lucky. It took more than one try to bring down the World Trade Center. It took more than one try to successfully bomb a US warship. It's precisely this level of persistence and determination to murder that's a major factor in what makes the radical Islamists dangerous.
They were very lucky, that is not mutually exclusive with "organized" or "well funded". It required the simultaneous failure of many organizations and individuals for 9/11 to occur. They hijacked planes with utility knives, that's how lucky they were. They were not masterminds.
Bombing of the Cole was much easier, since they were in foreign waters.
The worst is that you probably believe that "the world is changed" after 9/11. The only people who changed the world after 9/11 is the US, rampaging through the middle east in a haphazard manner.
But, it's a whole lot easier to manipulate a populace if they're afraid. I'll give the Bush Administration credit there, they know how to sell fear to get their desires fulfilled.
I'd like it if Asus and Gigabyte could maybe come up with a 'Get off my lawn!' series for us folks who like stock voltages, and wear onions on our belts
Well, that was the fashion in those days.
As an answer to your question, though, I've taken to spending a little more money to get actual Intel boards for their CPUs and then buy RAM as inexpensively as possible along with a dead-midrange graphics card. The retail Intel desktop boards have very little in terms of whizbang features, but manage to be very solid performers.
Quest-wise though, WAR does have a lot, although I think they're rather bland.
So far I've had two problems with WAR quests. 1) Some of them have clearly wrong directions to find the object of your questing, and 2) The lore is sometimes very dense, and I get tired of reading it XD
As a 31 year old casual player, how would I have known that?
I'm a 32 year old casual player, I figured it out the first time I sat down.
There's a manual for a reason, but even beyond that, how about spending a little time learning about the game interface before complaining that since you couldn't personally figure it out, it was poorly designed.
I think this is a result of the trend (in console games mostly, but also in some PC games) where the manual is basically redundant and players are spoon fed a (sometimes tedious) tutorial at the beginning of the game (which are sometimes even more aggravating because skipping them avoids storyline info). If it isn't in a nice, colorful pop-up onscreen, they're lost as to find it.
Speaking for myself, but I get the impression I'm not alone, the reason I left WoW was the horrible PvP implementation. WotLK does really nothing to make that aspect of the game more fun.
Yes, this is colloquially referred to as the "B-b-but Clinton!" Effect. Basically, when someone points out that the political group you prefer did something wrong, point out that someone from the other major party also did something wrong, and imply that (therefore) it is all a wash, regardless of whether or not the original revelation of wrongdoing was done in order to draw a comparison between the two parties (that is, even if the original statement that "party A did [wrong thing]" and ended at that, make your response be a partisan response).
GOP supporters have been getting 10 years of mileage out of Clinton in particular, but it applies to things like this as well.
Sometimes this is deliberate, though I think some people are in such a partisan mindset when elections come around (or, all the time, I guess) that its impossible for them to just say, "Yes, my party did this, and it was wrong."
Damn it, try using "Democratic" instead of "Democrat". The pejorative never drives home a point, it just makes you sound ignorant.
It's a good indicator of the viewpoint of the poster/speaker, though. The use of "Democrat Party" instead of "Democratic Party" started somewhere around 2003 when someone in the GOP figured out that "running against the Democratic Party" was a potential liability in talking points.
Basically it shows that the speaker/poster is already heavily biased towards the Republican party, and so anything they put forth must be considered in that light.
I understand what you're saying, however the majority of senior politicians are still of the Cold War vintage, and as such, political paradigms are still frequently framed (and marketed) with a "we don't want to be socialist" approach.
Most people don't spend very much time worrying about the national debt. They do, however, seem to respond negatively to anything that even hints at a reduction in what they perceive as the the absolute level of personal freedom Americans have (regardless of whether or not that perception is accurate). As a result, any movement towards universal healthcare just needs to be relabeled as "socialized" (aka "socialist") healthcare, and you get propoganda implying that basically people are going to get the medical care equivalent of soviet bread lines, and they balk at programs that would IN FACT HELP THEM LIVE BETTER LIVES.
I was under the impression that there was always a significant distrust of banks in the US, until recently that is. I am astonished that a country which refuses to pay for a national 'free at point of provision' health service, supported by taxes, yet they happily hand over the entire country's income tax to the banking system, and now 700 billion because they stayed greedy for a bit too long.
This is highly related to Cold War politics, namely a deep fear of anything that isn't straight-up laissez faire capitalism (even though we don't even have that). Conservative politicians routinely deem anything that isn't private industry-based to be "socialism", which to many Americans (who are, let's be honest, stupid, stupid people) is the same as Soviet-style communism and a harbinger of not only the fall of American democracy but most likely the End Times(tm)
It doesn't help that many devotees of the two major political parties will stick to their party no matter what. This is most apparent in the Republican party, where "smaller government, lower taxes, stronger America" has been the refrain for 3 decades, while the politicians elected in said party have routinely governed towards larger government, same or higher taxes, and a dubiously stronger US (by virtue of overextended military capacity and very high national debt). Alas.
No, that isn't true, unless you're talking pure one-on-one battles. Chances are you will get squashed in one-on-one until you are using all T2/named etc etc.
In group battles you can function perfectly well as part of a team in under a month.
By default "most" of the content for any game is for the lead up to the endgame. However, most *new* content is generated for endgame players, because those are the most likely to leave (and as a result, stop paying their subscriptions, of course).
Whether or not any given company does this well is another discussion (but from my experience no one does it well -- at least WAR will have the endgame RvR to play).
Well, I'm sure that $.99 cents looks better in ads/prices, etc. I just don't think that most iTunes users even notice anymore. Other than that we seem to be in agreement that "it doesn't really matter" in the case we're discussing.
I'm speaking from my knowledge of that way that TuneCore works, and it seems to come all at once (the payments are periodic, so the deferment takes place "behind the scenes"... there's a related bit of weirdness if someone on the Japanese iTunes buys a song, Japan's mechanical royalties are removed from the sale price even though you yourself may be the royalty receiver. i actually have a question posted to a tunecore forum asking how exactly that works in practical matters).
In any event, this is just Apple playing up FUD as a negotiating tactic. Getting rid of iTunes would be a hugely boneheaded maneuver.
That review was the worst, seeing as he only played 20% of the game by avoiding the corporation and PvP aspect.
Though its mitigated by the fact that his reviews really aren't reviews at all, they're "I don't really like videogames, so here's my low-budget flash animation with voice over that tells you, again, why I don't like videogames."
Slashdot Mirror
You just disable it in the BIOS and run off the expansion card, yes?
It's probably not PC to say, but your experience is not typical. Particularly the housing problems that led to the current financial crisis. The vast majority of those folks simply didn't do their homework and bought more house than they could afford.
As to your remark about "some very very lucky religious fanatics", that's sort of the point. They aren't that lucky. It took more than one try to bring down the World Trade Center. It took more than one try to successfully bomb a US warship. It's precisely this level of persistence and determination to murder that's a major factor in what makes the radical Islamists dangerous.
They were very lucky, that is not mutually exclusive with "organized" or "well funded". It required the simultaneous failure of many organizations and individuals for 9/11 to occur. They hijacked planes with utility knives, that's how lucky they were. They were not masterminds.
Bombing of the Cole was much easier, since they were in foreign waters.
The worst is that you probably believe that "the world is changed" after 9/11. The only people who changed the world after 9/11 is the US, rampaging through the middle east in a haphazard manner.
But, it's a whole lot easier to manipulate a populace if they're afraid. I'll give the Bush Administration credit there, they know how to sell fear to get their desires fulfilled.
It's not intuitive because its not like other interfaces you've used before?
Sounds very familiar to the Window Manager "intuitive" arguments. Everything requires learning, deal with it.
I'd like it if Asus and Gigabyte could maybe come up with a 'Get off my lawn!' series for us folks who like stock voltages, and wear onions on our belts
Well, that was the fashion in those days.
As an answer to your question, though, I've taken to spending a little more money to get actual Intel boards for their CPUs and then buy RAM as inexpensively as possible along with a dead-midrange graphics card. The retail Intel desktop boards have very little in terms of whizbang features, but manage to be very solid performers.
The Muslims have already been here for decades.
It's sad that our entire foreign policy and domestic paranoia level has been upended by some very, very lucky religious fanatics.
I realize that you're a troll, as well, but its the sort of thinking that you've typed up that is ruining this country.
If you like grinding for gear, it doesn't get better than WoW currently.
However, if you like non-carebear play done well, WoW is horrible.
Can't say I've noticed the queue problems, though. And I'm on a server that was highly populated since before the release.
WAR (like DaoC) is a shining beacon of how fun PvP can be if it is done *correctly*. For some reason MMO creators rarely get it right, though.
Quest-wise though, WAR does have a lot, although I think they're rather bland.
So far I've had two problems with WAR quests. 1) Some of them have clearly wrong directions to find the object of your questing, and 2) The lore is sometimes very dense, and I get tired of reading it XD
As a 31 year old casual player, how would I have known that?
I'm a 32 year old casual player, I figured it out the first time I sat down.
There's a manual for a reason, but even beyond that, how about spending a little time learning about the game interface before complaining that since you couldn't personally figure it out, it was poorly designed.
I think this is a result of the trend (in console games mostly, but also in some PC games) where the manual is basically redundant and players are spoon fed a (sometimes tedious) tutorial at the beginning of the game (which are sometimes even more aggravating because skipping them avoids storyline info). If it isn't in a nice, colorful pop-up onscreen, they're lost as to find it.
Speaking for myself, but I get the impression I'm not alone, the reason I left WoW was the horrible PvP implementation. WotLK does really nothing to make that aspect of the game more fun.
It really does sadden me that FOX gets to call itself "news".
Yes, this is colloquially referred to as the "B-b-but Clinton!" Effect. Basically, when someone points out that the political group you prefer did something wrong, point out that someone from the other major party also did something wrong, and imply that (therefore) it is all a wash, regardless of whether or not the original revelation of wrongdoing was done in order to draw a comparison between the two parties (that is, even if the original statement that "party A did [wrong thing]" and ended at that, make your response be a partisan response).
GOP supporters have been getting 10 years of mileage out of Clinton in particular, but it applies to things like this as well.
Sometimes this is deliberate, though I think some people are in such a partisan mindset when elections come around (or, all the time, I guess) that its impossible for them to just say, "Yes, my party did this, and it was wrong."
Damn it, try using "Democratic" instead of "Democrat". The pejorative never drives home a point, it just makes you sound ignorant.
It's a good indicator of the viewpoint of the poster/speaker, though. The use of "Democrat Party" instead of "Democratic Party" started somewhere around 2003 when someone in the GOP figured out that "running against the Democratic Party" was a potential liability in talking points.
Basically it shows that the speaker/poster is already heavily biased towards the Republican party, and so anything they put forth must be considered in that light.
Because it applies to that specific group? Why would I bring a group of other people into the conversation who are not involved with said topic?
I understand what you're saying, however the majority of senior politicians are still of the Cold War vintage, and as such, political paradigms are still frequently framed (and marketed) with a "we don't want to be socialist" approach.
Most people don't spend very much time worrying about the national debt. They do, however, seem to respond negatively to anything that even hints at a reduction in what they perceive as the the absolute level of personal freedom Americans have (regardless of whether or not that perception is accurate). As a result, any movement towards universal healthcare just needs to be relabeled as "socialized" (aka "socialist") healthcare, and you get propoganda implying that basically people are going to get the medical care equivalent of soviet bread lines, and they balk at programs that would IN FACT HELP THEM LIVE BETTER LIVES.
You're absolutely correct, however, we weren't talking about "other people in the world".
I was under the impression that there was always a significant distrust of banks in the US, until recently that is. I am astonished that a country which refuses to pay for a national 'free at point of provision' health service, supported by taxes, yet they happily hand over the entire country's income tax to the banking system, and now 700 billion because they stayed greedy for a bit too long.
This is highly related to Cold War politics, namely a deep fear of anything that isn't straight-up laissez faire capitalism (even though we don't even have that). Conservative politicians routinely deem anything that isn't private industry-based to be "socialism", which to many Americans (who are, let's be honest, stupid, stupid people) is the same as Soviet-style communism and a harbinger of not only the fall of American democracy but most likely the End Times(tm)
It doesn't help that many devotees of the two major political parties will stick to their party no matter what. This is most apparent in the Republican party, where "smaller government, lower taxes, stronger America" has been the refrain for 3 decades, while the politicians elected in said party have routinely governed towards larger government, same or higher taxes, and a dubiously stronger US (by virtue of overextended military capacity and very high national debt). Alas.
The catch-22 is distribution, however. It's not more profitable if no one ever knows who you are. That's where the labels tend to be beneficial.
Now if they were also not thoroughly corrupt, that'd be nice.
No, that isn't true, unless you're talking pure one-on-one battles. Chances are you will get squashed in one-on-one until you are using all T2/named etc etc.
In group battles you can function perfectly well as part of a team in under a month.
By default "most" of the content for any game is for the lead up to the endgame. However, most *new* content is generated for endgame players, because those are the most likely to leave (and as a result, stop paying their subscriptions, of course).
Whether or not any given company does this well is another discussion (but from my experience no one does it well -- at least WAR will have the endgame RvR to play).
Seems to be a moot point anyway:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20081002-royalty-rate-stays-same-for-itunes-other-download-services.html
Well, I'm sure that $.99 cents looks better in ads/prices, etc. I just don't think that most iTunes users even notice anymore. Other than that we seem to be in agreement that "it doesn't really matter" in the case we're discussing.
I'm speaking from my knowledge of that way that TuneCore works, and it seems to come all at once (the payments are periodic, so the deferment takes place "behind the scenes"... there's a related bit of weirdness if someone on the Japanese iTunes buys a song, Japan's mechanical royalties are removed from the sale price even though you yourself may be the royalty receiver. i actually have a question posted to a tunecore forum asking how exactly that works in practical matters).
In any event, this is just Apple playing up FUD as a negotiating tactic. Getting rid of iTunes would be a hugely boneheaded maneuver.
That review was the worst, seeing as he only played 20% of the game by avoiding the corporation and PvP aspect.
Though its mitigated by the fact that his reviews really aren't reviews at all, they're "I don't really like videogames, so here's my low-budget flash animation with voice over that tells you, again, why I don't like videogames."