Go Out with a Bang
on
WB Cancels Angel
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· Score: 4, Interesting
Despite saying that the show is a "cornerstone" of their network, not to mention the glowing ratings for the show in the last season...I have to wonder if they're doing for artistic reasons or ignorant marketing. I tend to lean towards the latter. Here's a link from a friend of mine who is also a big Angle/Buffy fan that might shed some light on the subject: Breaking News: Angel to End After 5 Seasons. Needless to say, Joss Whedon is not amused.
Good guess, except that, since the files are stored in an encrypted format, you can't export anything to Quake or Half-Life. As a professional who has used Softimage and LightWave for years now, I found the implementation of Maya PLE pathetic. Marketing paranoia ruined what would have otherwise been a great idea.
If your file format is encrypted and you have a big, fat watermark on everything else, why on earth do you have to shove it in your (potential) customer's face that they have not, in fact, plunked down the money yet? It's not only visually distracting, it's insulting.
Screw that. I lived in Germany for two years and loved it (once in 1991, and once again in 1997.) Former DDR, too, so you think you slobs over in North Rhine Westfalia have it bad...at least you weren't getting paid 60% of the going rate to do the same job for the past ten years. Not to mention that unemployment in Zeitz, where my host-uncle lives, hit 50% in some areas.
Now I'm in my second year of living in Japan, and although it's not the fun and games that most people expect, it's good (if you're weird like me, anyway.) I still think life in Germany is better, though, just don't tell my friends here. Und im Sachsen, die schoene Frauen wachsen wie auf den Baeume.
But it's a closed system. You're talking about moving mass from one object to another. While one object's mass decreases, the other one increases, thus balancing the effect.
As for fusion reactions putting more energy out than they take in, yes. That's the general idea. The idea is that it's a chain reaction; once you get it going, you don't have to do much to keep it going, much like starting a bonfire with a match (you keep having to add fuel to a fire, but you don't have to keep adding heat. Or matches, if you're doing it right.)
Don't confuse Physics 101 with economic feasibility; the problem with fusion reactors to date is that they aren't efficient, or just don't work. However, if you want a working proof of concept, try staring into the sun for a while.
Not to mention the simple logic of it all. Do you think people would be amused if they were hit in the head with it, frozen or not? What do you think environmental groups would have to say about it?
No, my license hasn't expired yet. I wisely had it renewed just before I moved here. That, actually, proved to be the major hitch - the license showed only the renewal date, and that was only two weeks before departure. Japan requires that you have been driving at least 3 months in your own country before your license is valid in Japan.
After much delay in getting the paperwork, I will be taking proof of my original date of issue (11 years ago) to show that I am indeed a veteran driver) down to the local Japanese Auto Federation for translation and verification tomorrow. Then I can get down to business.
I'm going to transfer my license from US to Japanese, and I have to go through a separate theoretical and practical. Not only that, I have to wait a month after applying before I can take the test. I'm told this is for study purposes.
Japan also has a one-year "novice" sticker. They also have senior citizen stickers, too, for good measure. They are appropriately designed to look like spring and autumn leaves, respectively.
Then I get to go to motorcycle school (which will cost a pretty penny), and things get REALLY tough. One of the requirements is that I traverse a 10-meter-long raised surface, barely wider than the motorcycle tire, in no less than 10 seconds. You think this sounds easy? They also forbid you from touching your feet to the ground at any point along the way.
This is to demonstrate that you can control the bike in a confined area. You're also required to test on a 400-horsepower motorcycle.
Exactly right. It actually doesn't bar the person, it just makes it that much more difficult. It doesn't stop them from re-inventing the same case with a different slant and re-arranged details. For example, instead of A saying B owes him money, A can say that B took advantage of A by breaking some form of agreement (acting in good faith, etc.), and, by the way, still owes him the damn money.
A ridiculously high number, from what I've seen, and that's in the city. And FYI, public transportation is only "a lot better" if you're living in a big city, just like in the United States. Most people outside of Japan have a Tokyo-centric view of life here, so a lot of fallacious stereotypes have built up.
Kind of how many foreigners assume life in America is either like New York or Los Angeles.:)
I second that. I live in Osaka, and I see the same thing. Japan has around half the population of the US, and if you buy a car with a stereo system in Japan, you'll get CD, DVD and MD support (as well as DVD-based GPS navigation that also doubles as a television, for that matter.) So, yeah, I think 127 million people is a pretty significant figure.
So the bit where Mars appears red to the naked eye (not to mention, through binoculars and home optical telescopes) is a NASA conspiracy, too? Am I suppose to understand, based on the logic I've read so far, that Mars is actually blue?
And the purpose for changing the colors to red would be? To prevent everybody from realizing Mars for the tropical paradise that it really is, building rockets in our back yards and leaving the Earth en masse?
That, or they're just out to spite me, because they know blue is my favorite color. Bastards.
NASA does deserve a little mocking, though, because the linked page is obviously designed for high school students following the project, and NASA completely fails to mention that the image is not a true-color image. Anybody who has spent any time working in photo processing can see at a glance that the image color is not the original; cyan highlights on rocks, and whites that bleed into pure magentas and yellows are a dead give-away.
The trick with the "simple mental process" is that it requires your concentration. That, and your eyes. What is simple one second turns into a six-year-old chasing a ball into the street the next, and then let's see how talented you are while you're fiddling with your laptop and not paying attention.
It seems stupid to ban this from the passenger seat, though, since the passenger isn't driving. The car navigation thing is going to be a big issue, too, as built-in car navigation screens become more popular.
Spoken like somebody who has never taken a foreign language class. Which is more likely to pronounce any given word or phrase correctly every single time without forgetting how it's done, a computer or a human?
It can't tank in a country it hasn't been released for yet. I'm sure it will do well in Japan, though. Coincidentally, that's where they've released it.
Revenge? you want revenge? Just sit back and watch as the security for that company gets pummeled.
Because sitting back and watching puts oh-so-much food on the table.
If there was justice in the world, the guy wouldn't have gotten fired in the first place. Don't count on karma to say, "Whoops, missed you getting screwed the first time, but don't worry, I'm on the job now!"
No, I think he's got a more-than-legitimate case against these people. I can't believe something like this would even happen in real life; this guy wasn't even given a chance to defend himself? Good grief.
Weird. When Windows boots here, it's always with the standard Microsoft Windows boot-up screen. Same for my Mac running OSX. Sony, Panasonic, etc. all refer to themselves by their "English" names. Every Japanese appliance I own has a Latin alphabet name on it.
As mentioned before, broadband providers in Japan have already made this a reality.
I have Yahoo! BB service, and their setup is really sweet. It automatically detects if I'm calling another Yahoo customer, and the call is free. Calls back to the states are only 2 cents a minute just by dialing a three-number prefix before I dial the normal country code and number.
I read your post. You referred to Latin alphabets as "foreign" in regards to Korean, Chinese and Japanese.
You made absolutely no reference in your post to trademarking a word in Japan. Your point, insofar as you made one, was that it was unfair for countries using non-Latin alphabets to have to enter URLs that included them. I've been living in Osaka for over a year and a half now, and studying Japanese for two; as far as I can tell, the Japanese consider the Latin alphabet part of their modern culture; they don't have issues with it. You might want to check your post again.
And just FYI: there is no specific statement made in the Japanese trademark laws, under "Unregistrable Trademarks," which states that you cannot use Romaji. There is specific mention later that you can protest a registration if it happens to sound like a trademark written in any of the alphabets, including the Latin alphabet. Check here for the latest revision.
Nur zum Hinweis, Herr Foesch. Das naechstem Mal sollen Sie besser auf Ihrem eigenen Zeug aufpassen, wie?
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Despite saying that the show is a "cornerstone" of their network, not to mention the glowing ratings for the show in the last season...I have to wonder if they're doing for artistic reasons or ignorant marketing. I tend to lean towards the latter. Here's a link from a friend of mine who is also a big Angle/Buffy fan that might shed some light on the subject: Breaking News: Angel to End After 5 Seasons. Needless to say, Joss Whedon is not amused.
Good guess, except that, since the files are stored in an encrypted format, you can't export anything to Quake or Half-Life. As a professional who has used Softimage and LightWave for years now, I found the implementation of Maya PLE pathetic. Marketing paranoia ruined what would have otherwise been a great idea.
If your file format is encrypted and you have a big, fat watermark on everything else, why on earth do you have to shove it in your (potential) customer's face that they have not, in fact, plunked down the money yet? It's not only visually distracting, it's insulting.
Screw that. I lived in Germany for two years and loved it (once in 1991, and once again in 1997.) Former DDR, too, so you think you slobs over in North Rhine Westfalia have it bad...at least you weren't getting paid 60% of the going rate to do the same job for the past ten years. Not to mention that unemployment in Zeitz, where my host-uncle lives, hit 50% in some areas.
Now I'm in my second year of living in Japan, and although it's not the fun and games that most people expect, it's good (if you're weird like me, anyway.) I still think life in Germany is better, though, just don't tell my friends here. Und im Sachsen, die schoene Frauen wachsen wie auf den Baeume.
It *can* also beg the question. Expand your idiomatic usage.
But it's a closed system. You're talking about moving mass from one object to another. While one object's mass decreases, the other one increases, thus balancing the effect.
As for fusion reactions putting more energy out than they take in, yes. That's the general idea. The idea is that it's a chain reaction; once you get it going, you don't have to do much to keep it going, much like starting a bonfire with a match (you keep having to add fuel to a fire, but you don't have to keep adding heat. Or matches, if you're doing it right.)
Don't confuse Physics 101 with economic feasibility; the problem with fusion reactors to date is that they aren't efficient, or just don't work. However, if you want a working proof of concept, try staring into the sun for a while.
No time like the present! First time I got my license at home, I failed the first two times, too. :)
Not to mention the simple logic of it all. Do you think people would be amused if they were hit in the head with it, frozen or not? What do you think environmental groups would have to say about it?
No, my license hasn't expired yet. I wisely had it renewed just before I moved here. That, actually, proved to be the major hitch - the license showed only the renewal date, and that was only two weeks before departure. Japan requires that you have been driving at least 3 months in your own country before your license is valid in Japan.
After much delay in getting the paperwork, I will be taking proof of my original date of issue (11 years ago) to show that I am indeed a veteran driver) down to the local Japanese Auto Federation for translation and verification tomorrow. Then I can get down to business.
I'm going to transfer my license from US to Japanese, and I have to go through a separate theoretical and practical. Not only that, I have to wait a month after applying before I can take the test. I'm told this is for study purposes.
Japan also has a one-year "novice" sticker. They also have senior citizen stickers, too, for good measure. They are appropriately designed to look like spring and autumn leaves, respectively.
Then I get to go to motorcycle school (which will cost a pretty penny), and things get REALLY tough. One of the requirements is that I traverse a 10-meter-long raised surface, barely wider than the motorcycle tire, in no less than 10 seconds. You think this sounds easy? They also forbid you from touching your feet to the ground at any point along the way.
This is to demonstrate that you can control the bike in a confined area. You're also required to test on a 400-horsepower motorcycle.
Now the real question is, how long has it been sine Japan used notes for 1 yen instead of coins? No notes until you hit 1000 yen.
Exactly right. It actually doesn't bar the person, it just makes it that much more difficult. It doesn't stop them from re-inventing the same case with a different slant and re-arranged details. For example, instead of A saying B owes him money, A can say that B took advantage of A by breaking some form of agreement (acting in good faith, etc.), and, by the way, still owes him the damn money.
A ridiculously high number, from what I've seen, and that's in the city. And FYI, public transportation is only "a lot better" if you're living in a big city, just like in the United States. Most people outside of Japan have a Tokyo-centric view of life here, so a lot of fallacious stereotypes have built up.
:)
Kind of how many foreigners assume life in America is either like New York or Los Angeles.
I second that. I live in Osaka, and I see the same thing. Japan has around half the population of the US, and if you buy a car with a stereo system in Japan, you'll get CD, DVD and MD support (as well as DVD-based GPS navigation that also doubles as a television, for that matter.) So, yeah, I think 127 million people is a pretty significant figure.
Depends on your definition of the term. This from the American Heritage Dictionary:
"A human who has certain physiological processes aided or controlled by mechanical or electronic devices."
Requiring that the electronics be implanted doesn't seem to be a requirement.
So the bit where Mars appears red to the naked eye (not to mention, through binoculars and home optical telescopes) is a NASA conspiracy, too? Am I suppose to understand, based on the logic I've read so far, that Mars is actually blue?
And the purpose for changing the colors to red would be? To prevent everybody from realizing Mars for the tropical paradise that it really is, building rockets in our back yards and leaving the Earth en masse?
That, or they're just out to spite me, because they know blue is my favorite color. Bastards.
NASA does deserve a little mocking, though, because the linked page is obviously designed for high school students following the project, and NASA completely fails to mention that the image is not a true-color image. Anybody who has spent any time working in photo processing can see at a glance that the image color is not the original; cyan highlights on rocks, and whites that bleed into pure magentas and yellows are a dead give-away.
The trick with the "simple mental process" is that it requires your concentration. That, and your eyes. What is simple one second turns into a six-year-old chasing a ball into the street the next, and then let's see how talented you are while you're fiddling with your laptop and not paying attention.
It seems stupid to ban this from the passenger seat, though, since the passenger isn't driving. The car navigation thing is going to be a big issue, too, as built-in car navigation screens become more popular.
Spoken like somebody who has never taken a foreign language class. Which is more likely to pronounce any given word or phrase correctly every single time without forgetting how it's done, a computer or a human?
It can't tank in a country it hasn't been released for yet. I'm sure it will do well in Japan, though. Coincidentally, that's where they've released it.
Because sitting back and watching puts oh-so-much food on the table.
If there was justice in the world, the guy wouldn't have gotten fired in the first place. Don't count on karma to say, "Whoops, missed you getting screwed the first time, but don't worry, I'm on the job now!"
No, I think he's got a more-than-legitimate case against these people. I can't believe something like this would even happen in real life; this guy wasn't even given a chance to defend himself? Good grief.
Had the economy. The tense is important. The early 90's were the height of the bubble economy over here.
Weird. When Windows boots here, it's always with the standard Microsoft Windows boot-up screen. Same for my Mac running OSX. Sony, Panasonic, etc. all refer to themselves by their "English" names. Every Japanese appliance I own has a Latin alphabet name on it.
As mentioned before, broadband providers in Japan have already made this a reality.
I have Yahoo! BB service, and their setup is really sweet. It automatically detects if I'm calling another Yahoo customer, and the call is free. Calls back to the states are only 2 cents a minute just by dialing a three-number prefix before I dial the normal country code and number.
You made absolutely no reference in your post to trademarking a word in Japan. Your point, insofar as you made one, was that it was unfair for countries using non-Latin alphabets to have to enter URLs that included them. I've been living in Osaka for over a year and a half now, and studying Japanese for two; as far as I can tell, the Japanese consider the Latin alphabet part of their modern culture; they don't have issues with it. You might want to check your post again.
And just FYI: there is no specific statement made in the Japanese trademark laws, under "Unregistrable Trademarks," which states that you cannot use Romaji. There is specific mention later that you can protest a registration if it happens to sound like a trademark written in any of the alphabets, including the Latin alphabet. Check here for the latest revision.
Nur zum Hinweis, Herr Foesch. Das naechstem Mal sollen Sie besser auf Ihrem eigenen Zeug aufpassen, wie?
I second that. Seems that Wired got their own wires crossed.
Just remember, in the Far East, *everything* is opposite, even if the reason seems to be "just because we can."
Doesn't that also assume that he's flying at an altitude of zero?