I can see it now... you get the free computer, and it's burdened with EULAs that say hackers can't repurpose the device (remember CueCAT barcode readers), followed by software that monitors what you do, floods you with ads, and collects marketing information about you.
No thanks.
When I slap down money for a hardware and software, I want to be beholden to no one. Ever.
Usually my first exposure is to the radio, which often has different version than what it available on CD. However, while I'm wanting to see the artist perform the song, sometimes I'm not exactly enjoying the improv version. Glad they can do it? Sure. And, some are much better than others. I suppose it's a matter of preference, that's all.
This is going to raise an interesting question -- which is more sought after, the artistic content or the performer.
When you go to see someone play, are you going to see _them_ play (even if there are inaccuracies) or is it to experience the real music.
Sometimes I'm disappointed when a concert rendition doesn't hold "true" to the recording studio's copy, and othertimes I'm more entertained when it's the performance. (e.g. Would Blue Man Group be as interesting without the showmanship?)
Then again, as a geek, I'd pay to see a guitar playing robot.
Alright, so here we have an author who's done a great job and we're all downloading his book. The publishers have decided to cut themselves out of the loop.
Does anyone know how to easily make a donation to the author, one saying thanks for releasing this cause we value your work, and two rub it into publishers that a technical book does have value?
The illusion that all good things come from closed source solutions and that open source is merely a reverse engineering hackery is pretty easy to shatter.
The reason one knows about such amazing new innovative products in the first place is due to marketing. Corporations use campaigns to get the word out -- look at how much Microsoft does a razzle dazzle when a product isn't anywhere in sight.
The Open Source community tends to rely more on word of mouth -- the product quality speaks for itself. And, sometimes, a really project that scratches a large enough itch gets a lot of public attention in the media.
But pick your favorite commercial application and you'll discover if you look hard enough there was something else it was based on. From word processor, to web browser, to chat client, to drawing package.
Closed source companies do something right that open source communities don't -- they see a need and focus on a set of target users. Look at yourself on the bell curve of comparison: you're not 'average', more than likely you're somewhere over on the far right. And that means that there are more people out there with LESS knowledge than you. Closed source companies want that market -- because those people are willing to put DOLLARS down where you're willing to put in TIME. As such, they cater to the lower common denominators.
What's great is that once the closed source community determines the threshold of what the minimal user is able to grasp, the open source community can usually produce a better implementation.
Of course closed source people are upset; they've made an investment in parting people from the contents of their wallets, and you're raising the standards that must be met while teaching them to fish for themselves.
Dumb question here... but didn't Wine pre-date the DMCA anyhow? Is there some grandfathering?
Suppose you wanted to call any reverse engineering illegal (shudder!) -- if that happened before the DMCA and now the project is just in maintence mode, can the DMCA still apply? I'd hope not.
What prevents someone from getting a month worth of service and then downloading everything in sight, then canceling the service? You could listen to a lot before making a return trip.
> That's the thing with Linux though. Take a > hard drive out of one machine, put in in > another machine, and it boots and runs. Try > doing that with Windoze and it's fscked up > registry bollocks.
I completely agree Linux is better than Windows.
But neither grandma, my wife, nor the majority of computer owners are going to take a screw driver to their computer. They wouldn't even understand why you'd WANT to do this.
Remember the motto Microsoft has taught: "If it doesn't work, reboot. If it doesn't boot, rebuild."
Attitudes like that make us hang our heads in shame at the guilibility of regular users.
With the cost of upgrades, the continued security holes, the perceived instability, the required activation, and the neutering of XP Home... I really don't see myself or others upgrading from Win98 or Win2K without being forced to.
How's that going to happen? Microsoft is going to have to discontinue support for those operating systems.
And, I suspect that's their longer term plan. By cutting support, when the next window of bit-rot or software bloat forces a user to consider their options, I think Microsoft is banking on intimidating them into a newer version of the OS, no matter the cost.
It was precisely the anticipation of this world wide event that made me switch to using Apple's OS X (based on FreeBSD!) and start finding non-Microsoft solutions via Linux.
I've found a new mouth piece as well. When I went to evangelize alternate solutions to friends and family, I got the standard "but you're a geek" roll of the eyes. I was, however, able to convert my wife of alternatives to Microsoft with the use of applications such as Mozilla's Firefox as a browser replacement to get rid of pop-ups/adware and Thunderbird to stop her from getting infected with viruses.
Upon learning that there are alternative solutions with better features that let her not have to deal with everyday annoyances, she was an easy sell on Linux, and now uses Putty and SSHing -- something I never thought I'd see!
She's the one who gets creditability marks with her friends. They know she's an artist and not a computer geek. If she's raving about it, they want to try it, because obviously it's not above their level.
Linux, however, is going to have to compete hard with Microsoft. It isn't Linux's free price tag or outstanding stabilily that's holding it back. It's complexity.
The learning curve is too great for the non-technical user to setup and immediately start using it. Microsoft scores big when it comes to easy install for a basic system, and they actually do automatic updates quite well from a simplicity standpoint.
What many geeks don't get is simple computer users are willing to give up power and features for ease of use. If someone put out a basic distribution that auto-detected hardware, did an easy install, and set up the basic environment with nothing but the standard Office tools -- much like a dumbed down version of Mandrake or BeOS or the free OpenBeOS version.
Microsoft sees that "we don't get it" and aren't catering a special distribution to "grandma", and with that fact they leverage Windows into homes, knowing that once someone invests in learning something, they usually don't switch without good cause (frustration, cost, or inapplicability to task).
The problem with Linux is neither cost nor quality that prevents grandma from switching, it's complexity.
There is just to darn much of a learning curve, and Linux developers haven't understood that they need to shelter that from the basic user --yes, at the expense of features-- in order to get adoption.
Follow this. A basic user buys Windows, puts the CD in, and clicks Next a zillion times. An hour later they have a system that they can then install Office on; more clicks and done. The OS isn't tweaked for the best performance or graphics -- and the user doesn't care. What they care about is word processing and printing. That's it. They don't know how their computer works. Furthermore, they don't care.
Sad, but true, as a long time Linux advocate, I find myself in the same boat when looking at FreeBSD.
When I log into FreeBSD, my favorite commands are missing, I can't figure out what slices are, everything in the/dev directory looks foreign, and I'm unhappy. So, I switch back to familiar Linux -- why? To get the job done.
Then along comes OS X, and they put a sweet interface over FreeBSD, and I'm willing to pay for that. Happily. Why? It makes me functional without reading a lot of manuals.
Sure, I could spend a few hours and read the FreeBSD pages, ask around and get helpful people. But this is time dealing with infrastructre and not problem solving. Point being: I'm not dumb, I'm lazy.
Basic end users are really, really, really lazy, and disinsterested to boot. How many Linux people tear their cars apart and change their own oil or transmission fluid? (pause) Exactly. You do computers, not cars. These end users do accounting, realestate, and a host of other "boring" things -- their computers are a means to an end, and they don't care how inefficient, slow, or broken they are, as long as they can get there.
I do have to say, with OS X, my understanding of FreeBSD was able to sky rocket, and all those issues I professed to have are laughable looking back. OS X increased my comfort level by removing the frustration.
Linux needs the same thing: a newbie-novice mode that shelters users from everything the community loves. When the user gains enough knowledge, familiarity, and experience, they'll crave more. And Linux will be there.
You're dead on target. I can always repair my box, but if I have to renew a lifetime subscription, which do I want to pay: $0, $50, $450, or $500.
In the case of TiVo, the Lifetime subscription is tied to the box. I have mixed feelings about that.
1) As an early adopter, I feel I got a little shafted when my friend bought his TiVo and got a discounted promo on his lifetime subscription two years after I had mine.
2) As an early adopter, the lower lifetime rate I did pay makes it a harder sell to get my friends to buy into TiVo. It also makes it harder for me to justify a second TiVo.
3) If my box dies, I'm hozed. (Actually, I think it's tied to a serial number in the IDE drive, it's the drive not the box. I may be wrong.) That said, I have computers 15 years old that still work -- given my TiVo just sits there, I figure it has a good lifespan.
4) Before upgrading to a Series 2 box, I wrote TiVo and said it would be nice if I could keep my lifetime subscription and sell off my old box. A month later, they ran that promo -- and I bought, just like I said I would. I do have to hand it to TiVo, they do listen to their customers. Guess that is what builds loyality.
There's a big problem with software-services, and that is that the consumer doesn't feel like they're getting the same "value" (whatever that is) that they get when they have something they can hold in their hands. With hardware, you can usually repurpose it, but with software, you feel like you're held hostage and we know that companies sometimes stop support (DOS, QuickBASIC, J#) if not disappear altogether. Even though alternate guide services exist, I like TiVo's, but feel secure by TiVo's policies toward [friendly] hackers.
Witness TiVo, by far the best piece of consumer electronic to come along in a long while. To get the full value, you need to buy a TiVo box -and- get a lifetime subscription. Now, pretend you're standing in BestBuy in the TiVo section and you're looking at price tags.
Alternate Universe #1: Buy a TiVo box for $50 and purchase the lifetime service for $450. How do you feel? (Personally, I wonder why the box is so cheap and how long they'll stay in business.)
Alternate Universe #2: Buy a TiVo box for $450 and purchase a lifetime service for $50. How do you feel? (Now, I feel like getting several boxes.)...what changed? The fact that I'm walking out of the store holding something I *perceive* to put value in. I can see the TiVo box. I can't see the service.
Incidently, this is why a $250 box with $250 service causes so many consumers to sit there and ponder about making the plunge. (You should. -ed.)
The point being that free hardware is perceived as cheap hardware, even if it isn't. We also know, free hardware gets repurposed. (Witness the Cue:CAT barcode readers.)
No, if I'm going to have to pay for software, I want it to be like Apple's model for OS X -- everytime an update comes out, I *want* to shell out cash to get the new, _stable_, features that breath new life into my system.
There was a television special recently about this. What I found even more interesting was a different security compromise.
A private investigator was hired to watch the airport in Las Vegas and he observed which cars came and went on a frequent basis. He was eventually able to deduce which cars' owner were spending the day at Area 51.
At that point, it became a simple matter of just following the cars to a plush neighborhood. When he went to knock on the door and asked about Area 51, they said "no comment" and shut the door in his face. One would think that just mentioning Area 51 would be enough to inspire curosity from the non-involved.
An once-insider agreed to secretly meet with them doing the whole inside-a-hotel with blured-face and altered-voice routine. He examined maps and photos and said they were accurate. He also said that there were no UFOs at Area 51, and that the big secret was the abusive politics and unsafe worker conditions.
Guess Area 51 scooby gang missed the television special on S4, where the anti-gravity from borrowed UFOs go on.
I stumbled on to this by accident a while back. You're obviously familiar with those stereogram images (look at infinity and a 3D surface emerges from a bunch of "random" dots). The trick is to give each eye different information.
I wondered, instead of doing this spacially, could one do it temporially? The answer is _YES_.
Open two copies of QuickTime and load the same movie in each. Put the two windows side-by-side. Now, advance the right one just a few frames (the arrow keys can do it). Then start BOTH running at the same time. (It usually takes a mouse click in one window and a keyboard focus on the other window to get this to happen.)
Now you have the same movie running side-by-side, although one is just a little off from the other.
No cross your eyes and produce an overlay of the two images. Obviously, smaller frames are easier on the eyes. Eventually your eyes will focus on the overlap, just as it does with the posters, and you can easily hold focus.
Surprise -- the movie has DEPTH. It's in 3D.
The only thing I can figure is that each eye gets a little different signal, and your brain has to piece the information together; when it does, you get 3D.
Normally you can use the red-blue glasses, sterograms, or hidden patterns in dots to do this. You can also get a similar effect by watching television with one eye closed (you're taking cues based on shadows and such), or, by having one eye look through a darkened filter. Not sure why that happens, but I suspect the difference between the left and right eye kick in the extra steps that trick the brain.
When I upgrade Microsoft, I feel like I'm simply getting patches and ugly window dressing. When I upgrade Apple, I feel like I'm getting tons of new features and capabilities. Bottom line, Apple is providing significant value -- I'm willing to put hard money behind that kind of corporate behavior. The complaint I have toward Microsoft is that I don't get $200 worth of value, productivity, interest, or entertainment for the price tag. In fact, the XP "experience, the licensing, and lack of new features has turned me off from using Microsoft until I absolutely have to. Apple, who seems to trust their users not to pirate, gladly gets my repeat business. And will continue to do so.
Part of scripting holds the player in check, letting them know when they are just going down the wrong path. Some players are harmful to themselves; others are out to do the most damage.
It's useful to know where the action is. For example, what if I left the well house and didn't follow the spring but was permitted to wander far from the mouth of the Colossal Cave? Even with clues, I spent far more time in Flood Control Dam #3 than I intended. And Dork Towers has a wonderful cartoon of a Hobbit adventure going wrong, as the first words out of the players' mouths are "Kill Gandalf!"
I contend that part of an adventure is the story line, and that games aren't all SimKILL. While engines can deal with contingencies, I doubt they will ever be able to weave an interesting tale after too much deviation.
Naturally, the solution is to prevent the character from accomplishing that which they desire... but that's putting some constraints on what I'd call infinite.
Reminds me of the Hoover Dam, where they had a heat problem when the concrete dried. The solution was to run small pipes through the wet concrete and let the natural cool water flow through the pipes. This cooled the concrete as it set. Later, the pipes themselves could be filled in with concrete themselves.
It's a democratic, non-national set of dns servers that sit above the regular root server and offering additional top-level domain spaces such as:
.glue for mutual peer root servers .indy organiztions and individuals of
the independent media and arts .geek Duh! .null non-commercial and natural persons .oss Open Source Software projects .parody non-commercial parody work .bbs (bulletin boards, pending...)
By altering where you point your DNS, you get everything you always had, plus the above, plus more redundancy.
Slashdot Mirror
Does anyone remember playing the game "The PITS" on CompuServe? Or, even better, know if thesource survived?
http://games.wwco.com/pits/
I can see it now... you get the free computer, and it's burdened with EULAs that say hackers can't repurpose the device (remember CueCAT barcode readers), followed by software that monitors what you do, floods you with ads, and collects marketing information about you.
No thanks.
When I slap down money for a hardware and software, I want to be beholden to no one. Ever.
Usually my first exposure is to the radio, which often has different version than what it available on CD. However, while I'm wanting to see the artist perform the song, sometimes I'm not exactly enjoying the improv version. Glad they can do it? Sure. And, some are much better than others. I suppose it's a matter of preference, that's all.
This is going to raise an interesting question -- which is more sought after, the artistic content or the performer.
When you go to see someone play, are you going to see _them_ play (even if there are inaccuracies) or is it to experience the real music.
Sometimes I'm disappointed when a concert rendition doesn't hold "true" to the recording studio's copy, and othertimes I'm more entertained when it's the performance. (e.g. Would Blue Man Group be as interesting without the showmanship?)
Then again, as a geek, I'd pay to see a guitar playing robot.
Alright, so here we have an author who's done a great job and we're all downloading his book. The publishers have decided to cut themselves out of the loop.
Does anyone know how to easily make a donation to the author, one saying thanks for releasing this cause we value your work, and two rub it into publishers that a technical book does have value?
The illusion that all good things come from closed source solutions and that open source is merely a reverse engineering hackery is pretty easy to shatter.
The reason one knows about such amazing new innovative products in the first place is due to marketing. Corporations use campaigns to get the word out -- look at how much Microsoft does a razzle dazzle when a product isn't anywhere in sight.
The Open Source community tends to rely more on word of mouth -- the product quality speaks for itself. And, sometimes, a really project that scratches a large enough itch gets a lot of public attention in the media.
But pick your favorite commercial application and you'll discover if you look hard enough there was something else it was based on. From word processor, to web browser, to chat client, to drawing package.
Closed source companies do something right that open source communities don't -- they see a need and focus on a set of target users. Look at yourself on the bell curve of comparison: you're not 'average', more than likely you're somewhere over on the far right. And that means that there are more people out there with LESS knowledge than you. Closed source companies want that market -- because those people are willing to put DOLLARS down where you're willing to put in TIME. As such, they cater to the lower common denominators.
What's great is that once the closed source community determines the threshold of what the minimal user is able to grasp, the open source community can usually produce a better implementation.
Of course closed source people are upset; they've made an investment in parting people from the contents of their wallets, and you're raising the standards that must be met while teaching them to fish for themselves.
Next up, TigerDirect sues Microsoft for using the word Direct in DirectX.
Dumb question here... but didn't Wine pre-date the DMCA anyhow? Is there some grandfathering?
Suppose you wanted to call any reverse engineering illegal (shudder!) -- if that happened before the DMCA and now the project is just in maintence mode, can the DMCA still apply? I'd hope not.
That's horrible. I retract the question!
What prevents someone from getting a month worth of service and then downloading everything in sight, then canceling the service? You could listen to a lot before making a return trip.
And it would be helpful to have a precedence case.
> That's the thing with Linux though. Take a
> hard drive out of one machine, put in in
> another machine, and it boots and runs. Try
> doing that with Windoze and it's fscked up
> registry bollocks.
I completely agree Linux is better than Windows.
But neither grandma, my wife, nor the majority of computer owners are going to take a screw driver to their computer. They wouldn't even understand why you'd WANT to do this.
Remember the motto Microsoft has taught: "If it doesn't work, reboot. If it doesn't boot, rebuild."
Attitudes like that make us hang our heads in shame at the guilibility of regular users.
With the cost of upgrades, the continued security holes, the perceived instability, the required activation, and the neutering of XP Home... I really don't see myself or others upgrading from Win98 or Win2K without being forced to.
How's that going to happen? Microsoft is going to have to discontinue support for those operating systems.
And, I suspect that's their longer term plan. By cutting support, when the next window of bit-rot or software bloat forces a user to consider their options, I think Microsoft is banking on intimidating them into a newer version of the OS, no matter the cost.
It was precisely the anticipation of this world wide event that made me switch to using Apple's OS X (based on FreeBSD!) and start finding non-Microsoft solutions via Linux.
I've found a new mouth piece as well. When I went to evangelize alternate solutions to friends and family, I got the standard "but you're a geek" roll of the eyes. I was, however, able to convert my wife of alternatives to Microsoft with the use of applications such as Mozilla's Firefox as a browser replacement to get rid of pop-ups/adware and Thunderbird to stop her from getting infected with viruses.
Upon learning that there are alternative solutions with better features that let her not have to deal with everyday annoyances, she was an easy sell on Linux, and now uses Putty and SSHing -- something I never thought I'd see!
She's the one who gets creditability marks with her friends. They know she's an artist and not a computer geek. If she's raving about it, they want to try it, because obviously it's not above their level.
Linux, however, is going to have to compete hard with Microsoft. It isn't Linux's free price tag or outstanding stabilily that's holding it back. It's complexity.
The learning curve is too great for the non-technical user to setup and immediately start using it. Microsoft scores big when it comes to easy install for a basic system, and they actually do automatic updates quite well from a simplicity standpoint.
What many geeks don't get is simple computer users are willing to give up power and features for ease of use. If someone put out a basic distribution that auto-detected hardware, did an easy install, and set up the basic environment with nothing but the standard Office tools -- much like a dumbed down version of Mandrake or BeOS or the free OpenBeOS version.
Microsoft sees that "we don't get it" and aren't catering a special distribution to "grandma", and with that fact they leverage Windows into homes, knowing that once someone invests in learning something, they usually don't switch without good cause (frustration, cost, or inapplicability to task).
The problem with Linux is neither cost nor quality that prevents grandma from switching, it's complexity.
/dev directory looks foreign, and I'm unhappy. So, I switch back to familiar Linux -- why? To get the job done.
There is just to darn much of a learning curve, and Linux developers haven't understood that they need to shelter that from the basic user --yes, at the expense of features-- in order to get adoption.
Follow this. A basic user buys Windows, puts the CD in, and clicks Next a zillion times. An hour later they have a system that they can then install Office on; more clicks and done. The OS isn't tweaked for the best performance or graphics -- and the user doesn't care. What they care about is word processing and printing. That's it. They don't know how their computer works. Furthermore, they don't care.
Sad, but true, as a long time Linux advocate, I find myself in the same boat when looking at FreeBSD.
When I log into FreeBSD, my favorite commands are missing, I can't figure out what slices are, everything in the
Then along comes OS X, and they put a sweet interface over FreeBSD, and I'm willing to pay for that. Happily. Why? It makes me functional without reading a lot of manuals.
Sure, I could spend a few hours and read the FreeBSD pages, ask around and get helpful people. But this is time dealing with infrastructre and not problem solving. Point being: I'm not dumb, I'm lazy.
Basic end users are really, really, really lazy, and disinsterested to boot. How many Linux people tear their cars apart and change their own oil or transmission fluid? (pause) Exactly. You do computers, not cars. These end users do accounting, realestate, and a host of other "boring" things -- their computers are a means to an end, and they don't care how inefficient, slow, or broken they are, as long as they can get there.
I do have to say, with OS X, my understanding of FreeBSD was able to sky rocket, and all those issues I professed to have are laughable looking back. OS X increased my comfort level by removing the frustration.
Linux needs the same thing: a newbie-novice mode that shelters users from everything the community loves. When the user gains enough knowledge, familiarity, and experience, they'll crave more. And Linux will be there.
You're dead on target. I can always repair my box, but if I have to renew a lifetime subscription, which do I want to pay: $0, $50, $450, or $500.
In the case of TiVo, the Lifetime subscription is tied to the box. I have mixed feelings about that.
1) As an early adopter, I feel I got a little shafted when my friend bought his TiVo and got a discounted promo on his lifetime subscription two years after I had mine.
2) As an early adopter, the lower lifetime rate I did pay makes it a harder sell to get my friends to buy into TiVo. It also makes it harder for me to justify a second TiVo.
3) If my box dies, I'm hozed. (Actually, I think it's tied to a serial number in the IDE drive, it's the drive not the box. I may be wrong.) That said, I have computers 15 years old that still work -- given my TiVo just sits there, I figure it has a good lifespan.
4) Before upgrading to a Series 2 box, I wrote TiVo and said it would be nice if I could keep my lifetime subscription and sell off my old box. A month later, they ran that promo -- and I bought, just like I said I would. I do have to hand it to TiVo, they do listen to their customers. Guess that is what builds loyality.
There's a big problem with software-services, and that is that the consumer doesn't feel like they're getting the same "value" (whatever that is) that they get when they have something they can hold in their hands. With hardware, you can usually repurpose it, but with software, you feel like you're held hostage and we know that companies sometimes stop support (DOS, QuickBASIC, J#) if not disappear altogether. Even though alternate guide services exist, I like TiVo's, but feel secure by TiVo's policies toward [friendly] hackers.
...what changed? The fact that I'm walking out of the store holding something I *perceive* to put value in. I can see the TiVo box. I can't see the service.
Witness TiVo, by far the best piece of consumer electronic to come along in a long while. To get the full value, you need to buy a TiVo box -and- get a lifetime subscription. Now, pretend you're standing in BestBuy in the TiVo section and you're looking at price tags.
Alternate Universe #1: Buy a TiVo box for $50 and purchase the lifetime service for $450. How do you feel? (Personally, I wonder why the box is so cheap and how long they'll stay in business.)
Alternate Universe #2: Buy a TiVo box for $450 and purchase a lifetime service for $50. How do you feel? (Now, I feel like getting several boxes.)
Incidently, this is why a $250 box with $250 service causes so many consumers to sit there and ponder about making the plunge. (You should. -ed.)
The point being that free hardware is perceived as cheap hardware, even if it isn't. We also know, free hardware gets repurposed. (Witness the Cue:CAT barcode readers.)
No, if I'm going to have to pay for software, I want it to be like Apple's model for OS X -- everytime an update comes out, I *want* to shell out cash to get the new, _stable_, features that breath new life into my system.
I do NOT want to have to deal with the hassle of license codes.
As for me, sell me the hardware -- give me the software.
Guess he got tired of moving vats of blinker-light fluid when his buddy got run over by a UFO.
There was a television special recently about this. What I found even more interesting was a different security compromise.
A private investigator was hired to watch the airport in Las Vegas and he observed which cars came and went on a frequent basis. He was eventually able to deduce which cars' owner were spending the day at Area 51.
At that point, it became a simple matter of just following the cars to a plush neighborhood. When he went to knock on the door and asked about Area 51, they said "no comment" and shut the door in his face. One would think that just mentioning Area 51 would be enough to inspire curosity from the non-involved.
An once-insider agreed to secretly meet with them doing the whole inside-a-hotel with blured-face and altered-voice routine. He examined maps and photos and said they were accurate. He also said that there were no UFOs at Area 51, and that the big secret was the abusive politics and unsafe worker conditions.
Guess Area 51 scooby gang missed the television special on S4, where the anti-gravity from borrowed UFOs go on.
I stumbled on to this by accident a while back. You're obviously familiar with those stereogram images (look at infinity and a 3D surface emerges from a bunch of "random" dots). The trick is to give each eye different information.
I wondered, instead of doing this spacially, could one do it temporially? The answer is _YES_.
Open two copies of QuickTime and load the same movie in each. Put the two windows side-by-side. Now, advance the right one just a few frames (the arrow keys can do it). Then start BOTH running at the same time. (It usually takes a mouse click in one window and a keyboard focus on the other window to get this to happen.)
Now you have the same movie running side-by-side, although one is just a little off from the other.
No cross your eyes and produce an overlay of the two images. Obviously, smaller frames are easier on the eyes. Eventually your eyes will focus on the overlap, just as it does with the posters, and you can easily hold focus.
Surprise -- the movie has DEPTH. It's in 3D.
The only thing I can figure is that each eye gets a little different signal, and your brain has to piece the information together; when it does, you get 3D.
Normally you can use the red-blue glasses, sterograms, or hidden patterns in dots to do this. You can also get a similar effect by watching television with one eye closed (you're taking cues based on shadows and such), or, by having one eye look through a darkened filter. Not sure why that happens, but I suspect the difference between the left and right eye kick in the extra steps that trick the brain.
When I upgrade Microsoft, I feel like I'm simply getting patches and ugly window dressing. When I upgrade Apple, I feel like I'm getting tons of new features and capabilities. Bottom line, Apple is providing significant value -- I'm willing to put hard money behind that kind of corporate behavior. The complaint I have toward Microsoft is that I don't get $200 worth of value, productivity, interest, or entertainment for the price tag. In fact, the XP "experience, the licensing, and lack of new features has turned me off from using Microsoft until I absolutely have to. Apple, who seems to trust their users not to pirate, gladly gets my repeat business. And will continue to do so.
Old and cheap usually beats new and expensive.
For the average user, what do they really gain to moving to XP? A lot of fluff.
What does the techy user gain from staying with 98? A closet full of games that still work.
Part of scripting holds the player in check, letting them know when they are just going down the wrong path. Some players are harmful to themselves; others are out to do the most damage.
It's useful to know where the action is. For example, what if I left the well house and didn't follow the spring but was permitted to wander far from the mouth of the Colossal Cave? Even with clues, I spent far more time in Flood Control Dam #3 than I intended. And Dork Towers has a wonderful cartoon of a Hobbit adventure going wrong, as the first words out of the players' mouths are "Kill Gandalf!"
I contend that part of an adventure is the story line, and that games aren't all SimKILL. While engines can deal with contingencies, I doubt they will ever be able to weave an interesting tale after too much deviation.
Naturally, the solution is to prevent the character from accomplishing that which they desire... but that's putting some constraints on what I'd call infinite.
Wouldn't several loops of this be better?
# dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/hda
Reminds me of the Hoover Dam, where they had a heat problem when the concrete dried. The solution was to run small pipes through the wet concrete and let the natural cool water flow through the pipes. This cooled the concrete as it set. Later, the pipes themselves could be filled in with concrete themselves.
http://www.opennic.unrated.net/
It's a democratic, non-national set of dns servers that sit above the regular root server and offering additional top-level domain spaces such as:
By altering where you point your DNS, you get everything you always had, plus the above, plus more redundancy.