There is a difference - trolling requires at least a modicum of thought and creativity, whereas the UCTAM idiots, MOO FUCKAZ and so on is just spam calling itself a troll. And yeah, I'm sure doing something like that here on/. would mean they'd just do it twice as much once you came back online - and it's not like they'd care if/. shut down for a day or whatever is it?
Hmm, a tricky question, but I'll give it my expert IANAL opinion:) MIDI files are simply a method of encoding instructions for playing a piece of music - they are a digital equivalent of a musical score. Since a musical score is protected as free speech, so really should a MIDI file - it allows the musician to "express" the ideas they have about music.
But an MP3 cannot be used to exchange information or express anything about music in that way - its only use is for playing back a *finished* piece of music. This is the key difference between the two formats - one can communicate the idea behind the music, one can only play a finished product. So MIDI files would count as free speech, and MP3s wouldn't.
It's a great program - a logical combination of trackers and modular synths. There are some superb generators and effects out there, and it's remarkably easy to pick up the basics of creating a song compared to using a full-blown sequencer. The latest version has got some MIDI support in it as well IIRC.
until he has a solid sequencer and soundforge type app he can't consider it (unless vmware).
Yeah, but a sequencer doing a full hard-disk recording of both MIDI and audio tracks with effects/plugins is one of the most processor and IO intensive things you can do on your PC. I wouldn't dare to do this using a virtual OS running under VMWare, and I doubt he would.
And it's not really suprising that BeOS will get more support as an audio platform, especially now it's freely available. It was designed with multimedia as one of its primary goals, and succeeds brilliantly, whereas Linux and Windows include audio as an afterthought. Given the performance requirements of serious audio tools, making the move to BeOS rather than Linux is the obvious move for Steinberg et al. It's not about Linux at all, it's about BeOS's audio performace.
The loss of DirectX plugins may be a downer on the Linux front, however.
Yeah, especially since Jazz++ doesn't seem to support VST plugins, which are pretty much the de facto standard, especially since Steinberg opened up the specifications last year(see here for some VST stuff). If they were supported then the lack of DirectX plugins wouldn't be so bad, but as it is it puts a serious downer on the audio side of Jazz++.
Well I'm not so sure about open source, but there are plenty of freeware/shareware tools at MAZ Sound Tools which might be of use. You can get Cool Edit from there, which has a noise reduction option IIRC, and support for very large files.
As for writing your own, you'd better get a book out on statistical sampling and analysis and prepare for a long reading session...:)
However, from what I have read about the case this hinges around the fact that Outcast have printed as facts things which aren't true about the Pink Papers editor. If these are harmful then this would account for the threat under the libel law.
Errm, read the article - you've got it all wrong. Outcast never published anything about the Pink Paper - they were sent a letter from Pink Paper's lawyers saying they'd be sued if they ever printing anything defamatory about them. In response to this NetBenefit pulled the Outcast site and won't let them have it back, even though nothing at all has been done by Outcast.
This isn't anything to do with a libel case, more to do with an ISP forcing pre-emptive censorship on one of their clients. And the Demon case doesn't apply - it was settled out of court and therefore sets no precedence.
then there will be no overseas locations available
I'd contest this statement - until the advent of a truly "global" government there will always be countries where these laws won't apply. Consider copyright laws - both Malta and Taiwan don't have them, even though there is enormous pressure from the rest of the world that does for them to adopt copyright. Until copyright is universal there will always be somewhere you can go to get around it.
Similarly, there will always be at least one country without these censorship laws - consider the Cayman Islands or Antigua, where practically all online gambling sites are hosted due to the lax laws there. Its a matter of supply and demand - if the demand for hosting without the restrictions of censorship laws exists, then there will be somewhere which will supply that service, and make a lot of money out of it.
And then there's offshore hosting at sea, which could become a viable option given the increasingly restrictive nature of laws in most countries.
God, I'm sick and tired of hearing Americans going on about "Constitutional rights" and how it makes them superior to the people of every other country in the world. Every country has rights for its citizens, but no-one bleats on about it like Americans:)
I am a geek. A flaming geek. The kind of geek that inspired both fear from the mentally deficient and awe from the intelligent.
Okay, two points. I truly hope that paragraph was meant to convey irony, because otherwise it comes across as a) the worst kind of arrogance and b) a refernce to the term "flaming queen" - I think you can guess where this comes from:)
'I must have been ill.' Bull. You stick yourself in a room full of mental vegetables and see how long it takes you to become depressed and angry. Try to sit through two years of high school after graduating college. Same feeling.
I am well-adjusted, moral, and probably finished ahead of 90% of you 'WAVE-approved' sheep.
Again, arrogance. I'm sorry, I can appreciate feeling frustrated at being ahead of most of your classmates, but this kind of attitude is, in its own way, just as bad as the attitude that anything different is bad. Just because people aren't as bright/computer literate as you doesn't mean they're "mental vegetables" as you call them. And yes, kids will treat you bad for being different, but in many ways this is part of human instinct and fear rather than in some vast conspiracy to make you feel bad.
And yeah, according to a lot of psych profiles I'd have been a "danger", but I'm not as bitter about it as you. I was bullied, but I managed to a) stop it, and b) get over it. Since then I've managed to get a very active social live which has nothing to do with computers, and I can look back on my school days with a laugh. I've got a job programming, lots of friends and a distinct lack of bitterness. I'm friends with a lot of people who you would label "mental vegetables" - they can't work a computer and they might not be the brightest sparks in the world, but they're nice, good people whose company I enjoy.
Don't let your experiances in the past taint your future.
I was wondering what kind of checks and balances you would be applying to this system? Surely you must have considered the issues behind this beforehand and must have some kind of idea about how to separate the potentially dangerous from the depressed or prank victim. Given that the point of this is that fellow students are in a better position to notice behavioural problems, how do you as outsiders determine the validity of an anonymous call?
Given that Americans pride themselves on the various checks and balances inherent in the Constitution, I am curious to know how this system will be balanced. I believe that the underlying idea has some merit - after all fellow students are the most likely to notice problems at an age where parents generally aren't confided in - but in its current incarnation it seems it will simply lead to a deluge of pranks, hoaxes and wrong diagnoses. The flood of names supplied to WAVE may seem to validate its purpose, but in reality what is the use of this system in every teenager in America is on their lists?
Well actually, I do troll fairly often, but that was just something that popped into my head. The word "Slapmeat" kind of appealed to my sense of humour, but I didn't really think it would anyone elses. Ah well, shows how wrong you can be:)
Dunno, but he had tha observatory which you could only get to via a secret passage. If I had a house like that, I'd want to keep it. Or sell it without revealing any of the secret passages...
The Ultima series was absolutely wonderful, especially in its early days when its attention to plot (which was pretty much a dirty word in the computer RPG genre back then) and detailed background. It set the tone for later CRPGs, and I'm sure that it inspired the recent revival started by games like Diablo.
Assuming Richard Garriot isn't just going to spend his time lounging around in his big house throwing Halloween parties, I'm looking foward to what he does next. Without the pressure to do yet another Ultima game, he can turn his creative talents to producing a new game with a new setting, hopefully one even better than Britannia. Given the increased power of computers nowadays, he could really produce a detailed setting and a great game based in it.
When Origin started out there was no Linux, so it's not suprising that he wasn't writing games for Linux. And it's only recently that Linux has become a viable platform for games (what with reasonable hardware support), and so it's not suprising there aren't any Ultima games.
Just because the hasn't written anything for Linux is no reason to dismiss him./. isn't actually "News for Linux zealots", despite what you might think sometimes. The Ultima series contributed a lot to the computer RPG genre, and the platform they ran on shouldn't be an issue at all.
Yeah, I know Linux will run on it, but with no CD-ROM, no mouse, no modem it's going to be a pain to get it on there and next to impossible to use X stuff, since IIRC there aren't all that many keybaord shortcuts. One thing (well, pretty much the only thing) I'll say about Windows is you don't need a mouse to run 99% percent of non-game apps.
Anyway, when I can finally afford it, I'll get a new PC and install Linux on it. Until then I can't be bothered...
It's not that I don't want to it's more that I can't:( My only PC at home at the moment is a crappy old P133 with the majority of its components broken and no net connection. It's practically impossible to use at all, which is why I haven't bothered. In fact, it's still sitting at my new flat in pieces, because it's not worth reassembling it... Thank God for my net connection here at work, even if it is slow as hell.
Re:So where's the box...
on
Quickielanche
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· Score: 1
Only some of them, my last troll was modded up to (4, Insightful). *Hee hee*.
Wow... I like the fact that I can call someone a wanker at any point in time I feel like it. I guess maybe I should take that for granted. Though we all know England really can't do much of anything right. I mean they even mess up the english language. Let's face it. English people like tea and whining. And I guess whining gets you a half a million dollars because someone typed something that hurt your feelings.
Wow, you're not too much of a bigot are you? I mean this bloke is already known on USENET as being very quick with the threat of legal action, and yet you seem to think that he obviously represents all of English people. And as for winning money for this, the US is by far the worse for frivolous lawsuits. I mean lets face it, a country with 50% of the world's lawyers can't really talk about people suing for quick money.
But flaming someone... come on... you've obviously never driven in a big city in America if you really think something someone types will upset you. I mean you get a bit to close to someone and BOOM you just became lower than dirt. Also there's that whole fact that americans like to put down and flame peole. It's the american way.
Oh, so having a go at someone is obviously an American invention? Have you been watching Mary Poppins too much and started believing it is a genuine depiction of the UK? From the sounds of it you've never been to England and don't have much of a clue about how people *actually* live. And you sound proud about a country where people think it's a high point to go on TV and insult other people. Very clever.
Yeah, I'd like a sneaky peek if you'd post it. It's kind of hard to get decent info on these things in the press over here, and if it's going to become a part of my life I'd like to know what's going on:)
As well as Berick Upon Tweed, there's the Channel Islands, and the Isle of Man IIRC. I'm not sure how much of English law covers these places. Does anyone know exactly?
Yeah, I agree. And let's face it - the kids who get picked on are the ones who are different from the herd, whether it is by dress, interests, colour or whatever. This is just another way for them to get picked on, but a far more dangerous method than most.
... for pissed-off students to take revenge on other students that have annoyed them. All they have to do is make a single, anonymous phone call and their victim will become marked and monitored, possibly for ever, with no knowledge of the situation or chance of repreive. And I think we'd all agree that at that age, kids can be incredibly vindictive, and I don't doubt that this would become yet another way to pick on enemies and people not conforming to the "typical student" mold.
Any good this service could do (which I personally doubt anyway) will be completely undone by hoax calls in search of revenge. Given a moment's consideration, you would have thought that the people behind W.A.V.E. would have realised this - or maybe they have and it's just a pure publicity stunt with nothing behind it at all.
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There is a difference - trolling requires at least a modicum of thought and creativity, whereas the UCTAM idiots, MOO FUCKAZ and so on is just spam calling itself a troll. And yeah, I'm sure doing something like that here on /. would mean they'd just do it twice as much once you came back online - and it's not like they'd care if /. shut down for a day or whatever is it?
Hmm, a tricky question, but I'll give it my expert IANAL opinion :) MIDI files are simply a method of encoding instructions for playing a piece of music - they are a digital equivalent of a musical score. Since a musical score is protected as free speech, so really should a MIDI file - it allows the musician to "express" the ideas they have about music.
But an MP3 cannot be used to exchange information or express anything about music in that way - its only use is for playing back a *finished* piece of music. This is the key difference between the two formats - one can communicate the idea behind the music, one can only play a finished product. So MIDI files would count as free speech, and MP3s wouldn't.
It's a great program - a logical combination of trackers and modular synths. There are some superb generators and effects out there, and it's remarkably easy to pick up the basics of creating a song compared to using a full-blown sequencer. The latest version has got some MIDI support in it as well IIRC.
until he has a solid sequencer and soundforge type app he can't consider it (unless vmware).
Yeah, but a sequencer doing a full hard-disk recording of both MIDI and audio tracks with effects/plugins is one of the most processor and IO intensive things you can do on your PC. I wouldn't dare to do this using a virtual OS running under VMWare, and I doubt he would.
And it's not really suprising that BeOS will get more support as an audio platform, especially now it's freely available. It was designed with multimedia as one of its primary goals, and succeeds brilliantly, whereas Linux and Windows include audio as an afterthought. Given the performance requirements of serious audio tools, making the move to BeOS rather than Linux is the obvious move for Steinberg et al. It's not about Linux at all, it's about BeOS's audio performace.
The loss of DirectX plugins may be a downer on the Linux front, however.
Yeah, especially since Jazz++ doesn't seem to support VST plugins, which are pretty much the de facto standard, especially since Steinberg opened up the specifications last year(see here for some VST stuff). If they were supported then the lack of DirectX plugins wouldn't be so bad, but as it is it puts a serious downer on the audio side of Jazz++.
Well I'm not so sure about open source, but there are plenty of freeware/shareware tools at MAZ Sound Tools which might be of use. You can get Cool Edit from there, which has a noise reduction option IIRC, and support for very large files.
As for writing your own, you'd better get a book out on statistical sampling and analysis and prepare for a long reading session... :)
However, from what I have read about the case this hinges around the fact that Outcast have printed as facts things which aren't true about the Pink Papers editor. If these are harmful then this would account for the threat under the libel law.
Errm, read the article - you've got it all wrong. Outcast never published anything about the Pink Paper - they were sent a letter from Pink Paper's lawyers saying they'd be sued if they ever printing anything defamatory about them. In response to this NetBenefit pulled the Outcast site and won't let them have it back, even though nothing at all has been done by Outcast.
This isn't anything to do with a libel case, more to do with an ISP forcing pre-emptive censorship on one of their clients. And the Demon case doesn't apply - it was settled out of court and therefore sets no precedence.
then there will be no overseas locations available
I'd contest this statement - until the advent of a truly "global" government there will always be countries where these laws won't apply. Consider copyright laws - both Malta and Taiwan don't have them, even though there is enormous pressure from the rest of the world that does for them to adopt copyright. Until copyright is universal there will always be somewhere you can go to get around it.
Similarly, there will always be at least one country without these censorship laws - consider the Cayman Islands or Antigua, where practically all online gambling sites are hosted due to the lax laws there. Its a matter of supply and demand - if the demand for hosting without the restrictions of censorship laws exists, then there will be somewhere which will supply that service, and make a lot of money out of it.
And then there's offshore hosting at sea, which could become a viable option given the increasingly restrictive nature of laws in most countries.
God, I'm sick and tired of hearing Americans going on about "Constitutional rights" and how it makes them superior to the people of every other country in the world. Every country has rights for its citizens, but no-one bleats on about it like Americans :)
I am a geek. A flaming geek. The kind of geek that inspired both fear from the mentally deficient and awe from the intelligent.
Okay, two points. I truly hope that paragraph was meant to convey irony, because otherwise it comes across as a) the worst kind of arrogance and b) a refernce to the term "flaming queen" - I think you can guess where this comes from :)
'I must have been ill.' Bull. You stick yourself in a room full of mental vegetables and see how long it takes you to become depressed and angry. Try to sit through two years of high school after graduating college. Same feeling.
I am well-adjusted, moral, and probably finished ahead of 90% of you 'WAVE-approved' sheep.
Again, arrogance. I'm sorry, I can appreciate feeling frustrated at being ahead of most of your classmates, but this kind of attitude is, in its own way, just as bad as the attitude that anything different is bad. Just because people aren't as bright/computer literate as you doesn't mean they're "mental vegetables" as you call them. And yes, kids will treat you bad for being different, but in many ways this is part of human instinct and fear rather than in some vast conspiracy to make you feel bad.
And yeah, according to a lot of psych profiles I'd have been a "danger", but I'm not as bitter about it as you. I was bullied, but I managed to a) stop it, and b) get over it. Since then I've managed to get a very active social live which has nothing to do with computers, and I can look back on my school days with a laugh. I've got a job programming, lots of friends and a distinct lack of bitterness. I'm friends with a lot of people who you would label "mental vegetables" - they can't work a computer and they might not be the brightest sparks in the world, but they're nice, good people whose company I enjoy.
Don't let your experiances in the past taint your future.
I was wondering what kind of checks and balances you would be applying to this system? Surely you must have considered the issues behind this beforehand and must have some kind of idea about how to separate the potentially dangerous from the depressed or prank victim. Given that the point of this is that fellow students are in a better position to notice behavioural problems, how do you as outsiders determine the validity of an anonymous call?
Given that Americans pride themselves on the various checks and balances inherent in the Constitution, I am curious to know how this system will be balanced. I believe that the underlying idea has some merit - after all fellow students are the most likely to notice problems at an age where parents generally aren't confided in - but in its current incarnation it seems it will simply lead to a deluge of pranks, hoaxes and wrong diagnoses. The flood of names supplied to WAVE may seem to validate its purpose, but in reality what is the use of this system in every teenager in America is on their lists?
Well actually, I do troll fairly often, but that was just something that popped into my head. The word "Slapmeat" kind of appealed to my sense of humour, but I didn't really think it would anyone elses. Ah well, shows how wrong you can be :)
Dunno, but he had tha observatory which you could only get to via a secret passage. If I had a house like that, I'd want to keep it. Or sell it without revealing any of the secret passages...
The Ultima series was absolutely wonderful, especially in its early days when its attention to plot (which was pretty much a dirty word in the computer RPG genre back then) and detailed background. It set the tone for later CRPGs, and I'm sure that it inspired the recent revival started by games like Diablo.
Assuming Richard Garriot isn't just going to spend his time lounging around in his big house throwing Halloween parties, I'm looking foward to what he does next. Without the pressure to do yet another Ultima game, he can turn his creative talents to producing a new game with a new setting, hopefully one even better than Britannia. Given the increased power of computers nowadays, he could really produce a detailed setting and a great game based in it.
When Origin started out there was no Linux, so it's not suprising that he wasn't writing games for Linux. And it's only recently that Linux has become a viable platform for games (what with reasonable hardware support), and so it's not suprising there aren't any Ultima games.
Just because the hasn't written anything for Linux is no reason to dismiss him. /. isn't actually "News for Linux zealots", despite what you might think sometimes. The Ultima series contributed a lot to the computer RPG genre, and the platform they ran on shouldn't be an issue at all.
Really! Thank you for that expert knowledge! Sorry about the sarcasm, but I had realised that on my own a while back...
Yeah, I know Linux will run on it, but with no CD-ROM, no mouse, no modem it's going to be a pain to get it on there and next to impossible to use X stuff, since IIRC there aren't all that many keybaord shortcuts. One thing (well, pretty much the only thing) I'll say about Windows is you don't need a mouse to run 99% percent of non-game apps.
Anyway, when I can finally afford it, I'll get a new PC and install Linux on it. Until then I can't be bothered...
It's not that I don't want to it's more that I can't :( My only PC at home at the moment is a crappy old P133 with the majority of its components broken and no net connection. It's practically impossible to use at all, which is why I haven't bothered. In fact, it's still sitting at my new flat in pieces, because it's not worth reassembling it... Thank God for my net connection here at work, even if it is slow as hell.
Only some of them, my last troll was modded up to (4, Insightful). *Hee hee*.
Anything but cricket...
Wow ... I like the fact that I can call someone a wanker at any point in time I feel like it. I guess maybe I should take that for granted. Though we all know England really can't do much of anything right. I mean they even mess up the english language. Let's face it. English people like tea and whining. And I guess whining gets you a half a million dollars because someone typed something that hurt your feelings.
Wow, you're not too much of a bigot are you? I mean this bloke is already known on USENET as being very quick with the threat of legal action, and yet you seem to think that he obviously represents all of English people. And as for winning money for this, the US is by far the worse for frivolous lawsuits. I mean lets face it, a country with 50% of the world's lawyers can't really talk about people suing for quick money.
But flaming someone ... come on ... you've obviously never driven in a big city in America if you really think something someone types will upset you. I mean you get a bit to close to someone and BOOM you just became lower than dirt. Also there's that whole fact that americans like to put down and flame peole. It's the american way.
Oh, so having a go at someone is obviously an American invention? Have you been watching Mary Poppins too much and started believing it is a genuine depiction of the UK? From the sounds of it you've never been to England and don't have much of a clue about how people *actually* live. And you sound proud about a country where people think it's a high point to go on TV and insult other people. Very clever.
Yeah, I'd like a sneaky peek if you'd post it. It's kind of hard to get decent info on these things in the press over here, and if it's going to become a part of my life I'd like to know what's going on :)
Thanks.
As well as Berick Upon Tweed, there's the Channel Islands, and the Isle of Man IIRC. I'm not sure how much of English law covers these places. Does anyone know exactly?
Yeah, I agree. And let's face it - the kids who get picked on are the ones who are different from the herd, whether it is by dress, interests, colour or whatever. This is just another way for them to get picked on, but a far more dangerous method than most.
... for pissed-off students to take revenge on other students that have annoyed them. All they have to do is make a single, anonymous phone call and their victim will become marked and monitored, possibly for ever, with no knowledge of the situation or chance of repreive. And I think we'd all agree that at that age, kids can be incredibly vindictive, and I don't doubt that this would become yet another way to pick on enemies and people not conforming to the "typical student" mold.
Any good this service could do (which I personally doubt anyway) will be completely undone by hoax calls in search of revenge. Given a moment's consideration, you would have thought that the people behind W.A.V.E. would have realised this - or maybe they have and it's just a pure publicity stunt with nothing behind it at all.