The math isn't the same as a movie. I can buy a newly released $50 single player game (the equivalent of seeing a movie in the theater) and expect to get 30-60 hours out of it, so I would need to get at least 10-20 hours a month to make it cost effective. MMORPGs are usually considered continual development, so that $15/month is really for additional content and tuning of the game itself.
If you don't feel you are getting $15/month in content or enhanced experience + additional enjoyment, it isn't worth the fee.
The content enhancement argument is really BS (yes, they might add some, but why then charge a fee for expansions like The Burning Crusade? - that should be part of your service fee), the real reason most MMORPGs charge a monthly fee is for one reason and one reason only - profit - services are the most profitable market in software, and you are basically agreeing to a service contract for a product. Do you really think Blizzard added $150 million in new content when they hit 10 million active subscribers? My guess is they spent at most 10 million (including network and hardware costs) and pocketed 140 million in that month. The movie industry model is similar yet different - they release several versions of hit movies over time, usually with unreleased content, new endings, interviews with cast, etc, hoping collectors will buy every one.
"Microsoft needs to come clean and tell its customers what deals it has made." Isn't it obvious? To quote the Devil and Daniel Mouse (a cartoon based on Faust), "We always use blood - it's more permanent."
B. L. Zebubb
yeah - I'd like to know how computers are useful to my blind 92 year old grandmother, or my 91 year old grandfather, who is suffering from dementia.
Or a high school buddy of mine moved to Hawaii and did competitive surfing for many years before I lost touch with him. He didn't even own a phone and at times lived on the beach, so getting in touch with him was a pain (leave a message with his parents and ask him to call from a pay phone).
Two girls I knew in high school packed up a VW bus and followed the Grateful Dead around after graduation. I'm sure they lived out of their van with no communication with the outside world. I got pretty close to one of them before graduating (we talked 2-3 times a week in the evenings - it's a shame I never asked her out), but she must have met someone or decided to start anew because I never heard from her again (I would have heard about any tragedies - my parents and the other girl's mom and stepdad went to the same church).
So there's a few examples I can think of. I knew another guy that was a bike shop worker and bike messenger and didn't have Internet or even a phone for a while (the messengers used walki-talkies to communicate, not cell phones), but he eventually got a phone in his studio and has since gone into custom silver-smithing and added a web presence and e-mail (not to mention got married and had a kid - he even drives a car, which probably shocked me the most when I ran into him for the first time in 4 years [last fall]).
#1: Fix filenames and filesystem so they match Unix. This means you use the forward slash. Refuse to "microsoft certify" any software that will not accept a pasted or typed filename with a forward slash in it, and change all the OS api that returns filenames to return forward slashes (probably with a registry setting) and again refuse to "microsoft certify" software that fails when this setting is on. And get rid of the damn drive letters (just make "/A:/" be the same as "A:/") and support UTF-8 encoding of the filenames at all times (probably by changing the "a" version of the win32 api to be hard-coded to UTF-8). C code interprets '/' as '\', so you can type C:/mydirectory/myfile as a string type and it works fine (using \ is actually bad - you need \\). Supporting Drive letters doesn't really add that much extra work, and switching this now would probably be more of a problem for users, especially those that are moderate users and know enough to get into the DOS prompt. Really, what the OS should do is support either - a space is always required before a switch anyway, so I don't see any loss in adding support for, say, D:/mydir/myfile/? vs D:\mydir\myfile/? (or even \?).
#2: Support OpenGL, meaning that by default you get at least what Mesa provides. Supporting OpenGL 1.4 only is not acceptable. This is really a non-issue these days - the software driver is too slow for modern hardware functions and the hardware manufacturers supply the hardware driver.
#3: Support C99 standard functions and don't make your compiler spew a lot of bogus "warnings" that you put in there to try to encourage people to change to your windows-specific functions. Remove the underscores you stuck on lots of the functions so that portable useful code cannot be written. MS gives an excuse that C99 string functions are not protected from buffer attacks (which is true) and their version is (which I know nothing about). I heard there is an easy workaround (aside from rewriting all functions like wsprintf to _wsprintf, but I don't remember what it is.
Personally, I'd like to see C finally standardize some sizes - wchar_t being of ambiguous size drives me nuts. Porting Linux to BSD almost always gives wchar_t errors because Linux people tend to assume it's 16 bit and some BSD people 32 bit (like MacOS X and FreeBSD), others 16 (and I've heard proposals of 128).
He was still on the board of directors after selling his stake to GM. I checked today and it doesn't appear he is on the current board of directors, though (he is Chairman Emeritus of Perot Systems).
But EDS lost some huge contracts like the GM OnStar (to Convergys back in 2004), one of several huge losses for them. I'm not sure if Convergys still runs the contract or not, but I do know it's not run by EDS.
Nope, the label owns only the musicians contract and terms and the recording itself (NOT the music) - they license the lyrics from a publisher. See ASCAP below.
You own the CD and can listen to it in private. If you broadcast or perform it publicly it in ANY way, you owe the lyricist money as per the licensing rules. This battle has been fought and lost multiple times in court (e.g. webcasting). Note that only the lyric writer is owed money - the musicians don't get a dime (that includes me for my recordings, thus my bitterness). Read up on the Harry Fox agency: http://www.harryfox.com/index.jsp
The musicians contract with the record company for their services on the recording - that is independent of the lyrics. See the links below.
Artists with songs that are deemed too similar can attempt to sue the infringing artist, but this is difficult to prove. There are some high profile wins, like Huey Lewis vs Ghostbusters and Vanilla Ice vs David Bowie/Queen (settled out of court), but it's very difficult to copyright a riff because of the limited "vocabulary" in music - How many variations of 12 notes and 4 beats per bar are there (the most common structure)? Even combined into chords you get a lot of repeats due to the structure of western music (based on thirds). Think of a note like a letter and the song as words (and rhythm the cadence of the speaker) - at some point you can claim yours is original enough to be (say) poetry, but a short phrase (riff) that would be analogous to 2-3 words is VERY hard to prove. Only very memorable lines even stand a chance of winning (e.g. the 7 bar bass line to Pink Floyd's Money might qualify, for instance, or the multi-line guitar riff from Metallica's One, but Bob Dylan's Knockin' on Heaven's Door? Never gonna happen).
Graphics intensive games would call OpenGL, which is already cross-platform and supported in almost all hardware. Objective-C is a programming language, so if the programming language is written for the platform, it should compile. This should be fairly straightforward and little porting involved. You always have a few issues, mainly where BSD differs from Linux library-wise and sometimes endian issues (Objective-C or at least Cocoa includes endian libraries, but you aren't forced to use them).
What may be an issue: New features in Cocoa - Objective-C 2.0 added some new functions and compiler options and I doubt they're in GNUStep or OpenStep (at least yet).
Pippin was supposed to be a computer-console bridge, but it was too expensive for the console market (~$600) and too slow for either the computer or console market (and I believe had almost no storage which hurt its appeal on the computer side, as well). Apple didn't even build it - the hardware form was licensed (Bandai was one manufacturer, Kai or something was the other) and Apple just provided software (this was in the Michael Spindler-Gil Amelio days, when Apple was dedicated to licensing and running the company into the ground). I never saw Pippin hardware or a unit of software for sale in the United States as a result of this and I frequented tech stores a lot more than I do now.
That said, I seriously doubt Apple would push into the console market at this time, as there is no market niche for them - the high end is MS and Sony, the low end (and currently hip market) is Nintendo and all are low margin and make it up in long term licensing. On the other hand, jumping into the handheld market would be perfect - I'm sure they have hardware comparable or better than the current systems out there (the PSP is 4 years old already and the DS was old when the PSP came out) and they have the dominant alternative distribution model - iTunes (Steam is the current big player for games). It seems a perfect time to put out a flashy alternative handheld.
OK I attempted to simplify things and that didn't come out right (in fact, it's technically incorrect) - you don't need a contract (in this case a EULA) because the record company does not own the song, the publisher does, and they sign a legal contract with the record company licensing them to add music and sell it. A record company is like a packager/distributer and the lyrics to a song is the actually product. The music itself (including vocals) is part of the packaging - only the song (lyrics) is product (so the way the industry is now, you get really fancy packaging). In effect, the contract is still there, its just between different parties.
In the computer industry model, at one level you are essentially the record company and the EULA your contract and on another level you are the consumer using the product. It's maybe easier to picture if you think of large licenses like 1000 seats and each installation is a consumer (so most software is sold as a single license to the installer for a single consumer installation).
I doubt Blizzard can win this - EULAs assume the installer and user are the same, which is not necessarily the case (I extend this to iTunes). By the parent's argument, I signed no agreement ( and I'd like you to prove otherwise)! A click is not a signature so I doubt the "contract" of a EULA is legally binding, however, since software is licensed to you, you could view it more as a FAQ explaining license terms so you are aware of any reason the license may be revoked - basically some excuse for the company to say "I warned the user of my terms." Consumers could even change during use of the program.
Essentially my assertion from yesterday was partially incorrect - by Blizzard's argument, radio could still cut the music short (change the packaging), but bleeping out lyrics would not be legal. Remixes would be legal if the lyrics are not changed in any way.
The quoted poster (grandparent) is wrong - Blizzard doesn't really sell you the software - they sell you a license to use the software, just as recording companies actually sell you licenses to listen to the songs on a CD. In effect, buying software or a CD is more akin to loaning you a copy with no return terms - a EULA is a way for the lender to rescind your rights to that copy under certain terms, which they may not even have the right to do (you could argue they are the loaner, so they can take it back, or you could argue they lent it to you indefinitely and they can have it back when you give it back).
The point in contention is akin to "if I buy a CD and thus get a license to the music, can I remix it any way I please, or can it not be modified at all?" As far as I know this has never been contended in court, but this would destroy the music industry. DJ dance party remixes? Nope, illegal. Radio that overlaps or cuts songs short? I cry felony! Censoring offensive lyrics? Definitely not - gotta keep 'em all - it's the law !
I completely agree with you on lawmakers - the Mickey Mouse law (technically the Copyright Term Extension Act) alone was enough for me to think Congress favors business over the people, and that was a decade ago.
Re:History of Gaming?
on
Second Person
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· Score: 2, Informative
Outside of poetry, songs and short stories it's almost unheard of - it's especially uncommon in literary fiction (books considered to have "literary merit," which itself is an ambiguous term - essentially a work of art, which means different things to different people). The only instance of second person I remember directly is the short story "The Haunted Mind" in Nathaniel Hawthorne's Twice Told Tales.
Interactive fiction is probably the most common way to see second person (e.g. Choose Your Own Adventure books), but those would lack literary merit in the opinion of most critics.
Feminism or not, she is and always has been grammatically correct, even for the gender neutral case, even though he has traditionally been used for it (it does feel weird reading she as gender neutral when not used to it, however). 'It' works in English for people provided they are deformed enough to be gender indistinguishable, hermaphroditic, monsters in some way (Frankenstein or zombies for instance) or (sometimes) transsexuals. He/she or she/he or [s]he is grammatically correct and can be used if you want to avoid bias, but are not often used to avoid verbosity and/or confusion.
The last thing we need is this nut to be a martyr.
The irony with Jack is that not a single gamer has gone out and shot the guy yet. I mean, really, if gaming is training us to be murderers and aggressively attack things we dislike, why hasn't this guy gone down in a hail of gunfire (about 11 times by now)?
The bit of irony about this letter in particular is his quotes from a violent, hate filled book - the Bible. I know that is not the purpose of the Bible (in fact, I'd say the opposite is true), but my point is narrow minded people see things in a narrow minded way. If I focus entirely on who smote who and the violent battles and God turning sinners to salt and flooding the world killing everyone and everything (keeping two of everything is killing a lot of innocent animals), I miss the message of the book as a whole. I've heard many Christians describe the Koran (a book I doubt many of them have read) in exactly the same way, and again, it is a very violent book with a good message.
Since Jack is quoting Bible verses and I've read the GTA4 is about revenge, how about one of our own? Does the Bible not teach (in Exodus) life for life (eye for eye, tooth for tooth, etc)? I'll ignore the fact that Jesus contradicts that in the sermon on the mount (somewhere in Matthew) because it doesn't suit my cause.
I think Comcast's deployment in Minnesota is only available at the highest price tier ($120) at the moment, but they plan to scale it later, or at least that's what I remember from the article.
Don't let an apartment hold you up - in the US by a 1996 law (with a 1998 update that allows for you to put it in any exclusive use area, such as a balcony or patio) apartment owners can't stop you from installing Dishes less than 1 meter in diameter.
The main problem with satellite internet is there is usually significant lag. If you just browse the web or stream video that shouldn't be a problem, but if you want it for games you'll probably have problems (I've read they have done some improvements, possibly through some land line connection, but I don't really keep up with the tech).
yeah - one thing that irks me is monopolies like Comcast should not be able to bundle Cable and Phone service at a discounted rate. If they offered services they did not own (like Echostar and DirectTV do with some phone companies) or even a short term discount on a package I could understand it, but the FCC is just letting them abuse the consumer.
The DSL market doesn't have the same benefit. While I don't believe I can get a cheaper rate through Qwest without something like a triple play, I do know I can get a cheaper rate than their standard service through their competitors. Try looking at sites like BroadbandReports to see if there is an alternate ISP with DSL service in your area. Unfortunately, if you want Cable TV and DSL you still pay the premium for Cable.
we're also talking about our infrastructure as a whole, and in reality it varies in both price and performance. For instance, in areas where Verizon is the main provider, you can get relatively cheap, fast, fiber service. Qwest, however has no such service, so in their areas you are usually throttled to 6-7Mbps DSL (unless you're in the Minneapolis region, where Comcast offers faster service).
The day Qwest offers a higher speed service before competition is the day I crap my pants in disbelief. Qwest is a follower that responds only when competitively challenged as they did for years by bumping up DSL rates only in response to faster (and cheaper) cable speeds. I suspect they'll be forced to bring FiOS to Minnesota in a couple of years before they lose their customer base, or else they'll deeply discount their DSL to undercut Comcast. I'm sure some of the other baby bells are similar, but I don't track them.
Linux is POSIX compliant, which only means it hasn't been certified. Many free BSDs are POSIX compliant but not certified, as well.
Saying Linux isn't POSIX is like saying Mesa isn't OpenGL - it is a functional work-alike that runs the same code using the same API. It is written from scratch to not require paying for the certification license or per-unit fees (I recall SGI required OpenGL vendors pay a small per-unit fee in the 1990s - I'm not sure if that is how it is licensed today).
This is the whole guns don't kill people, people do argument.
Put it this way - do you really think banning guns will end murder?
Same thing with prohibition or even banning cars (you'll drunken fly then, or whatever, unless driverless transport or enough public transport is available).
Personally, I think make it zero tolerance like in Germany (though their limits are a bit low - 1 beer is enough to put many people over - OTOH, their public transportation is quite good in most cities).
This: Drunk driving is not a game, and it is not a joke. Drunk driving is a choice, a violent crime and it is also 100 percent preventable. that's ok. I agree with that. Hell, I agree with Jack Thompson when he says stuff like "Hay guys, maybe 8 year olds shouldn't play GTA4". (Sprinkle with batshit and curse words to taste.)
On one hand, I can understand their perspective - if you made a game called Holocaust and the idea of the game was to torture and kill Jews, Jewish people would be quite irate/hostile with you. OTOH, if that wasn't really the point of the game, but you could still torture them (for instance, maybe you play a spy and get in a situation where it's that or blow your cover), does the game deserve condemnation? It's a hard call - the material is obviously offensive to some people, but it isn't what the game is about.
I have not played the game, so I'm no authority, but AFAIK, there is nothing forcing you to drive drunk in the game, just like there was nothing forcing you to have your way with a hooker and kill her in the last game. And seriously, why not go after WoW for drinking and flying? MADD doesn't really care - they see something that is potentially a hot button issue, twist it around to make it look like that is what the game is about and kick in the self promotion machine, which is no different than how Jack Thompson operates.
Thompson I take with a grain of salt - I could create a game called "Bloodbath in Iran, the Christian Game" where after the US defeats Iran, they hire you as a crack commando to go house to house and kill the defenseless women and children unless they converted to Christianity, and he'd praise it as the greatest game ever.
Apple also has stricter quality control than the average PC maker. Dell was willing to use cheap ECS motherboards back when they had a hideous failure rate but were the cheapest part available. Apple would not put up with that in a vendor.
Not that any one vendor is perfect - I heard great things about IBM Deskstar drives before the catastrophic failure rate gave them the nickname Deathstar. In fact, I got mine replaced 3 times under warranty (and backed it up religiously, something I'm not generally good at). Finally after Hitachi took over the business I got a reliable drive that has not failed (in almost 5 years - the purchase was in 2002, the last failure in June 2003, or at least that's when I formatted it).
Most interesting to me is the processor - it's not AMD or Intel - it's a Via C7M. Via owns Centaur technology, the Texas based owner of the Cyrix IP, which they acquired from National Semiconductor. They still release chips 2-3 generations behind the leaders at larger form factors, but apparently quality control is much better than Cyrix (at least I haven't read of anything horrible about them).
I didn't even know that chip supported SSE2 or better, but that was ignorance (see wiki)
DX9 is actually a bit easier to use than OpenGL, has better tools available, is slightly faster (at least in my project - others may argue this), and standard file formats, which I think helped it a lot.
The verdict is still out for DX10 - it is a complete rewrite of the API and I personally haven't used it yet. In fact, I'm currently steeped in OpenGL 2.0 shaders at the moment because most of my dev work is on an XP box and I've been writing Geometry Shaders (DX10/Vista only). I've restricted my dev work in this area only to shaders, however, because Khronos intends to release a new version of OpenGL (any day now... already 8 months late due to design flaws) with an entirely different model (object model instead of state model) and I intend to change the driver ASAP, provided the promised speed improvements happen.
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The math isn't the same as a movie. I can buy a newly released $50 single player game (the equivalent of seeing a movie in the theater) and expect to get 30-60 hours out of it, so I would need to get at least 10-20 hours a month to make it cost effective. MMORPGs are usually considered continual development, so that $15/month is really for additional content and tuning of the game itself.
If you don't feel you are getting $15/month in content or enhanced experience + additional enjoyment, it isn't worth the fee.
The content enhancement argument is really BS (yes, they might add some, but why then charge a fee for expansions like The Burning Crusade? - that should be part of your service fee), the real reason most MMORPGs charge a monthly fee is for one reason and one reason only - profit - services are the most profitable market in software, and you are basically agreeing to a service contract for a product. Do you really think Blizzard added $150 million in new content when they hit 10 million active subscribers? My guess is they spent at most 10 million (including network and hardware costs) and pocketed 140 million in that month. The movie industry model is similar yet different - they release several versions of hit movies over time, usually with unreleased content, new endings, interviews with cast, etc, hoping collectors will buy every one.
"We always use blood - it's more permanent."
B. L. Zebubb
yeah - I'd like to know how computers are useful to my blind 92 year old grandmother, or my 91 year old grandfather, who is suffering from dementia.
Or a high school buddy of mine moved to Hawaii and did competitive surfing for many years before I lost touch with him. He didn't even own a phone and at times lived on the beach, so getting in touch with him was a pain (leave a message with his parents and ask him to call from a pay phone).
Two girls I knew in high school packed up a VW bus and followed the Grateful Dead around after graduation. I'm sure they lived out of their van with no communication with the outside world. I got pretty close to one of them before graduating (we talked 2-3 times a week in the evenings - it's a shame I never asked her out), but she must have met someone or decided to start anew because I never heard from her again (I would have heard about any tragedies - my parents and the other girl's mom and stepdad went to the same church).
So there's a few examples I can think of. I knew another guy that was a bike shop worker and bike messenger and didn't have Internet or even a phone for a while (the messengers used walki-talkies to communicate, not cell phones), but he eventually got a phone in his studio and has since gone into custom silver-smithing and added a web presence and e-mail (not to mention got married and had a kid - he even drives a car, which probably shocked me the most when I ran into him for the first time in 4 years [last fall]).
Personally, I'd like to see C finally standardize some sizes - wchar_t being of ambiguous size drives me nuts. Porting Linux to BSD almost always gives wchar_t errors because Linux people tend to assume it's 16 bit and some BSD people 32 bit (like MacOS X and FreeBSD), others 16 (and I've heard proposals of 128).
He was still on the board of directors after selling his stake to GM. I checked today and it doesn't appear he is on the current board of directors, though (he is Chairman Emeritus of Perot Systems).
But EDS lost some huge contracts like the GM OnStar (to Convergys back in 2004), one of several huge losses for them. I'm not sure if Convergys still runs the contract or not, but I do know it's not run by EDS.
I worked in the very fscked up industry?
Nope, the label owns only the musicians contract and terms and the recording itself (NOT the music) - they license the lyrics from a publisher. See ASCAP below.
You own the CD and can listen to it in private. If you broadcast or perform it publicly it in ANY way, you owe the lyricist money as per the licensing rules. This battle has been fought and lost multiple times in court (e.g. webcasting). Note that only the lyric writer is owed money - the musicians don't get a dime (that includes me for my recordings, thus my bitterness). Read up on the Harry Fox agency:
http://www.harryfox.com/index.jsp
The musicians contract with the record company for their services on the recording - that is independent of the lyrics. See the links below.
see Record Label here:
http://www.ascap.com/licensing/termsdefined.html
the MPA covers sheet music and compositions (NOT live performances)
http://mpa.org/copyright_resource_center/copying
Artists with songs that are deemed too similar can attempt to sue the infringing artist, but this is difficult to prove. There are some high profile wins, like Huey Lewis vs Ghostbusters and Vanilla Ice vs David Bowie/Queen (settled out of court), but it's very difficult to copyright a riff because of the limited "vocabulary" in music - How many variations of 12 notes and 4 beats per bar are there (the most common structure)? Even combined into chords you get a lot of repeats due to the structure of western music (based on thirds). Think of a note like a letter and the song as words (and rhythm the cadence of the speaker) - at some point you can claim yours is original enough to be (say) poetry, but a short phrase (riff) that would be analogous to 2-3 words is VERY hard to prove. Only very memorable lines even stand a chance of winning (e.g. the 7 bar bass line to Pink Floyd's Money might qualify, for instance, or the multi-line guitar riff from Metallica's One, but Bob Dylan's Knockin' on Heaven's Door? Never gonna happen).
Graphics intensive games would call OpenGL, which is already cross-platform and supported in almost all hardware. Objective-C is a programming language, so if the programming language is written for the platform, it should compile. This should be fairly straightforward and little porting involved. You always have a few issues, mainly where BSD differs from Linux library-wise and sometimes endian issues (Objective-C or at least Cocoa includes endian libraries, but you aren't forced to use them).
What may be an issue:
New features in Cocoa - Objective-C 2.0 added some new functions and compiler options and I doubt they're in GNUStep or OpenStep (at least yet).
Pippin was supposed to be a computer-console bridge, but it was too expensive for the console market (~$600) and too slow for either the computer or console market (and I believe had almost no storage which hurt its appeal on the computer side, as well). Apple didn't even build it - the hardware form was licensed (Bandai was one manufacturer, Kai or something was the other) and Apple just provided software (this was in the Michael Spindler-Gil Amelio days, when Apple was dedicated to licensing and running the company into the ground). I never saw Pippin hardware or a unit of software for sale in the United States as a result of this and I frequented tech stores a lot more than I do now.
That said, I seriously doubt Apple would push into the console market at this time, as there is no market niche for them - the high end is MS and Sony, the low end (and currently hip market) is Nintendo and all are low margin and make it up in long term licensing. On the other hand, jumping into the handheld market would be perfect - I'm sure they have hardware comparable or better than the current systems out there (the PSP is 4 years old already and the DS was old when the PSP came out) and they have the dominant alternative distribution model - iTunes (Steam is the current big player for games). It seems a perfect time to put out a flashy alternative handheld.
OK I attempted to simplify things and that didn't come out right (in fact, it's technically incorrect) - you don't need a contract (in this case a EULA) because the record company does not own the song, the publisher does, and they sign a legal contract with the record company licensing them to add music and sell it. A record company is like a packager/distributer and the lyrics to a song is the actually product. The music itself (including vocals) is part of the packaging - only the song (lyrics) is product (so the way the industry is now, you get really fancy packaging). In effect, the contract is still there, its just between different parties.
In the computer industry model, at one level you are essentially the record company and the EULA your contract and on another level you are the consumer using the product. It's maybe easier to picture if you think of large licenses like 1000 seats and each installation is a consumer (so most software is sold as a single license to the installer for a single consumer installation).
I doubt Blizzard can win this - EULAs assume the installer and user are the same, which is not necessarily the case (I extend this to iTunes). By the parent's argument, I signed no agreement ( and I'd like you to prove otherwise)! A click is not a signature so I doubt the "contract" of a EULA is legally binding, however, since software is licensed to you, you could view it more as a FAQ explaining license terms so you are aware of any reason the license may be revoked - basically some excuse for the company to say "I warned the user of my terms." Consumers could even change during use of the program.
Essentially my assertion from yesterday was partially incorrect - by Blizzard's argument, radio could still cut the music short (change the packaging), but bleeping out lyrics would not be legal. Remixes would be legal if the lyrics are not changed in any way.
The quoted poster (grandparent) is wrong - Blizzard doesn't really sell you the software - they sell you a license to use the software, just as recording companies actually sell you licenses to listen to the songs on a CD. In effect, buying software or a CD is more akin to loaning you a copy with no return terms - a EULA is a way for the lender to rescind your rights to that copy under certain terms, which they may not even have the right to do (you could argue they are the loaner, so they can take it back, or you could argue they lent it to you indefinitely and they can have it back when you give it back).
The point in contention is akin to "if I buy a CD and thus get a license to the music, can I remix it any way I please, or can it not be modified at all?" As far as I know this has never been contended in court, but this would destroy the music industry. DJ dance party remixes? Nope, illegal. Radio that overlaps or cuts songs short? I cry felony! Censoring offensive lyrics? Definitely not - gotta keep 'em all - it's the law !
I completely agree with you on lawmakers - the Mickey Mouse law (technically the Copyright Term Extension Act) alone was enough for me to think Congress favors business over the people, and that was a decade ago.
Outside of poetry, songs and short stories it's almost unheard of - it's especially uncommon in literary fiction (books considered to have "literary merit," which itself is an ambiguous term - essentially a work of art, which means different things to different people). The only instance of second person I remember directly is the short story "The Haunted Mind" in Nathaniel Hawthorne's Twice Told Tales.
Interactive fiction is probably the most common way to see second person (e.g. Choose Your Own Adventure books), but those would lack literary merit in the opinion of most critics.
Feminism or not, she is and always has been grammatically correct, even for the gender neutral case, even though he has traditionally been used for it (it does feel weird reading she as gender neutral when not used to it, however). 'It' works in English for people provided they are deformed enough to be gender indistinguishable, hermaphroditic, monsters in some way (Frankenstein or zombies for instance) or (sometimes) transsexuals. He/she or she/he or [s]he is grammatically correct and can be used if you want to avoid bias, but are not often used to avoid verbosity and/or confusion.
The last thing we need is this nut to be a martyr.
The irony with Jack is that not a single gamer has gone out and shot the guy yet. I mean, really, if gaming is training us to be murderers and aggressively attack things we dislike, why hasn't this guy gone down in a hail of gunfire (about 11 times by now)?
The bit of irony about this letter in particular is his quotes from a violent, hate filled book - the Bible. I know that is not the purpose of the Bible (in fact, I'd say the opposite is true), but my point is narrow minded people see things in a narrow minded way. If I focus entirely on who smote who and the violent battles and God turning sinners to salt and flooding the world killing everyone and everything (keeping two of everything is killing a lot of innocent animals), I miss the message of the book as a whole. I've heard many Christians describe the Koran (a book I doubt many of them have read) in exactly the same way, and again, it is a very violent book with a good message.
Since Jack is quoting Bible verses and I've read the GTA4 is about revenge, how about one of our own? Does the Bible not teach (in Exodus) life for life (eye for eye, tooth for tooth, etc)? I'll ignore the fact that Jesus contradicts that in the sermon on the mount (somewhere in Matthew) because it doesn't suit my cause.
The fastest 30Mbps service is that price - 15/2 and 15/15 service is in the $50-65 range. I pay $90 for 6Mbps/1.5 ($20 for increased upload speed and $10 for 2 static IPs) in my area, but that includes taxes and fees.
See:
http://www22.verizon.com/content/consumerfios/packages+and+prices/packages+and+prices.htm
I think Comcast's deployment in Minnesota is only available at the highest price tier ($120) at the moment, but they plan to scale it later, or at least that's what I remember from the article.
Don't let an apartment hold you up - in the US by a 1996 law (with a 1998 update that allows for you to put it in any exclusive use area, such as a balcony or patio) apartment owners can't stop you from installing Dishes less than 1 meter in diameter.
The main problem with satellite internet is there is usually significant lag. If you just browse the web or stream video that shouldn't be a problem, but if you want it for games you'll probably have problems (I've read they have done some improvements, possibly through some land line connection, but I don't really keep up with the tech).
yeah - one thing that irks me is monopolies like Comcast should not be able to bundle Cable and Phone service at a discounted rate. If they offered services they did not own (like Echostar and DirectTV do with some phone companies) or even a short term discount on a package I could understand it, but the FCC is just letting them abuse the consumer.
The DSL market doesn't have the same benefit. While I don't believe I can get a cheaper rate through Qwest without something like a triple play, I do know I can get a cheaper rate than their standard service through their competitors. Try looking at sites like BroadbandReports to see if there is an alternate ISP with DSL service in your area. Unfortunately, if you want Cable TV and DSL you still pay the premium for Cable.
we're also talking about our infrastructure as a whole, and in reality it varies in both price and performance. For instance, in areas where Verizon is the main provider, you can get relatively cheap, fast, fiber service. Qwest, however has no such service, so in their areas you are usually throttled to 6-7Mbps DSL (unless you're in the Minneapolis region, where Comcast offers faster service).
The day Qwest offers a higher speed service before competition is the day I crap my pants in disbelief. Qwest is a follower that responds only when competitively challenged as they did for years by bumping up DSL rates only in response to faster (and cheaper) cable speeds. I suspect they'll be forced to bring FiOS to Minnesota in a couple of years before they lose their customer base, or else they'll deeply discount their DSL to undercut Comcast. I'm sure some of the other baby bells are similar, but I don't track them.
Linux is POSIX compliant, which only means it hasn't been certified. Many free BSDs are POSIX compliant but not certified, as well.
Saying Linux isn't POSIX is like saying Mesa isn't OpenGL - it is a functional work-alike that runs the same code using the same API. It is written from scratch to not require paying for the certification license or per-unit fees (I recall SGI required OpenGL vendors pay a small per-unit fee in the 1990s - I'm not sure if that is how it is licensed today).
This is the whole guns don't kill people, people do argument.
Put it this way - do you really think banning guns will end murder?
Same thing with prohibition or even banning cars (you'll drunken fly then, or whatever, unless driverless transport or enough public transport is available).
Personally, I think make it zero tolerance like in Germany (though their limits are a bit low - 1 beer is enough to put many people over - OTOH, their public transportation is quite good in most cities).
On one hand, I can understand their perspective - if you made a game called Holocaust and the idea of the game was to torture and kill Jews, Jewish people would be quite irate/hostile with you. OTOH, if that wasn't really the point of the game, but you could still torture them (for instance, maybe you play a spy and get in a situation where it's that or blow your cover), does the game deserve condemnation? It's a hard call - the material is obviously offensive to some people, but it isn't what the game is about.
I have not played the game, so I'm no authority, but AFAIK, there is nothing forcing you to drive drunk in the game, just like there was nothing forcing you to have your way with a hooker and kill her in the last game. And seriously, why not go after WoW for drinking and flying? MADD doesn't really care - they see something that is potentially a hot button issue, twist it around to make it look like that is what the game is about and kick in the self promotion machine, which is no different than how Jack Thompson operates.
Thompson I take with a grain of salt - I could create a game called "Bloodbath in Iran, the Christian Game" where after the US defeats Iran, they hire you as a crack commando to go house to house and kill the defenseless women and children unless they converted to Christianity, and he'd praise it as the greatest game ever.
Apple also has stricter quality control than the average PC maker. Dell was willing to use cheap ECS motherboards back when they had a hideous failure rate but were the cheapest part available. Apple would not put up with that in a vendor.
Not that any one vendor is perfect - I heard great things about IBM Deskstar drives before the catastrophic failure rate gave them the nickname Deathstar. In fact, I got mine replaced 3 times under warranty (and backed it up religiously, something I'm not generally good at). Finally after Hitachi took over the business I got a reliable drive that has not failed (in almost 5 years - the purchase was in 2002, the last failure in June 2003, or at least that's when I formatted it).
Most interesting to me is the processor - it's not AMD or Intel - it's a Via C7M. Via owns Centaur technology, the Texas based owner of the Cyrix IP, which they acquired from National Semiconductor. They still release chips 2-3 generations behind the leaders at larger form factors, but apparently quality control is much better than Cyrix (at least I haven't read of anything horrible about them).
I didn't even know that chip supported SSE2 or better, but that was ignorance (see wiki)
wrong - the cases are unique to Apple.
;)
oh - you meant the guts
DX9 is actually a bit easier to use than OpenGL, has better tools available, is slightly faster (at least in my project - others may argue this), and standard file formats, which I think helped it a lot.
The verdict is still out for DX10 - it is a complete rewrite of the API and I personally haven't used it yet. In fact, I'm currently steeped in OpenGL 2.0 shaders at the moment because most of my dev work is on an XP box and I've been writing Geometry Shaders (DX10/Vista only). I've restricted my dev work in this area only to shaders, however, because Khronos intends to release a new version of OpenGL (any day now... already 8 months late due to design flaws) with an entirely different model (object model instead of state model) and I intend to change the driver ASAP, provided the promised speed improvements happen.