Robert Jordan broke away from the standard cookie cutter fantasy epic outline
I haven't read any of his books, but everything I've heard of their plot was so very cookie cutter fantasy that I've never had the slightest wish to open one.
I'd say the above mentioned leaders (not one of mines, fortunately) weren't, or aren't, blinded by anything. They've simply been motivated by greed all along.
I'm only using them as evidence to the fact religions are used to support any and all claims toward somekind of personnal advantage - in the case of mormons we have (had?) polygamy which had been forbidden for centuries by all other kinds of christianism.
Actually, considering the way traditional religions have been used to get, keep and justify power (and quite a few other things, think mormons), I disagree.
As for taking you to court or not, considering the way the catholic church forbid anybody who wasn't a priest or training to be one to even read the bible in the first millenium or so...
It's not that they don't have this kind of thing in them, it's only because they learned they can't get away with it, and got subtler about it.
The only real difference between scientology and classic religion is that scientologist are just a bunch of rank amateurs.
I've no idea in the US, but in most EU countries, you can't be bound by the terms of a contract you haven't signed yourself.
That said, considering that even in the US you have to click 'yes' to license agreement to be bound by it (never mind the abusiveness of said license), I'd tend to think the rules are similar.
Question is, how much does the touchscreen cost. It is the one thing that makes the iphone interesting once you get through the hype (the same way it is with the ipod's wheel).
As far as I know, Apple had to buy a company to get the technology (I've no idea what the cost was), pay for R&D to complete/adapt it to their need, and then there's factoring cost (which isn't cheap at all, epecially since Apple has no factory of its own).
I don't know how much all this adds up to, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn they still have a way to go to see some return on investment.
It's (probably) true with the latest blockbuster, but not so much with somewhat older movies.
I can't count the number of times I've looked everywhere (legitor not) for some movie I wanted to see and had to settle for a very low bandwith download through bittorrent. At such times I ended up having to wait at least a week for it to complete. Of course most often than not the quality was pretty low and a bunch of times I never could complete the download.
I'd have gladly paid $1-$2 to have access to an official torrent-like repository of quality copies. Once people get used to pay for such movies they'll keep doing it even for the latest releases they could have for free elsewhere.
Again, the companies are too greedy and prefer having ten customers paying $20-40 than a hundred paying $1-$2 (notwithstanding the fact that among the later at least five will also buy the high quality $50 edition).
That is why the process by which SP got rejected in Europe is very interesting.
On the outside, you could say that it's only the 'anti' lobby who got its way. But when you look at it a bit more closely, you see that although it was 'led' by the people you could say were the lobby, among other things they worked through involving a not insignificant of 'common citizen' (though those who have an interest in such things.
I firmly believe that's the way democracy should work. Nobody can take an interest in every decisions and policies made by a their own government - hell, even professionnal politicians can't keep track of everything in any meaningful way (that's actually one of the main weapons of lobbies). But if a big enough number of common people were to take an interest in the couple of things they feel are important, if the politician were really accountable - and swiftly - for what they do; if the system wasn't rigged so the professionals can go about their affairs without interference from us peons, I firmly believe we wouldn't be heading for the corporate owned world we seem to be so gleefully headed for.
What's not to like is when at the heart of it you only find "special interests".
You could, in a way, make a point in favor of software patents in the US because of who holds them there (though ultimately they are counter-productive. But that's another debate).
As a citizen of the EU, I know that SP are not only a basically bad idea, they'd also gut European IT in favor of the US's.
Also, from a broader point of view, though they do exist here as well, lobby groups have yet to be accepted as a normal way to do politics in most of Europe. Which they're not: they ARE a perversion of politics.
What's really interesting are the places where such hardware lock-in aren't authorized by law, or only for a short time.
For exemple in France you can ask to have your phone unlocked after 6 months of contracts. They can't refuse, and neither can they stall: if you took the time to get the IMEI number (#06#), it takes 5 minutes, top.
The reasoning is that if the phone needs a longer time to get paid, it was sold for too low a price which is akin to hidden costs.
I'm pretty sure there are similar rules in most EU countries.
Here in France mobiles can only be simlocked when they're subsidised with a contract, and the carrier has to unlock them if the owner asks it after six month.
And just to be clear about that, we're not talking about lots of red tapes with triplicates and so on.
You only have to get your phone id (dial #06#) and call your provider (free call if your contract is still valid) to have it unlocked within the next 5 minutes.
If you really wanted to run a campaign set in the Star Wars universe, you should do a bit of work hunting the original West End Games books. At least for playing Star Wars the rules are superior to everything else - they flow.
Furthermore the sourcebooks are of exceptionnal quality, and you can find them dirt cheap on ebay.
D&D 3/3.5 is all about planning your character progression 10 levels in advance (Feat tree, prestige class and so on...). If you don't, you just end up being poor at what you do. And that's if you even can.
That makes the essence of the rules themselves based on min/maxing.
I won't comment on the rest of the post, but this...
Eh, like the XBox? An "I'm feeling lucky" searching for "XBOX sales wii" returns this website - and even if the sales figures are a few months old, they're nothing to shake a stick at.
Considering that the xbox got out about a year before its competitors, if you compare xbox and wii sales, I'd say it's very telling. It'd much more interesting to have charts of sales numbers since launch though.
1- I care, I don't like what it does to my already not so great sex-appeal
2- I don't care, it's not that important for the above mentionned
I find myself that I do care. It's got to the point where there really isn't much left in front, and I've never been a hat/cap wearing person. As a result I keep getting sunburns there and that really is a pain (both litteraly and figuratively).
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I haven't read any of his books, but everything I've heard of their plot was so very cookie cutter fantasy that I've never had the slightest wish to open one.
Just my two cents...
I'd say the above mentioned leaders (not one of mines, fortunately) weren't, or aren't, blinded by anything. They've simply been motivated by greed all along.
I'm only using them as evidence to the fact religions are used to support any and all claims toward somekind of personnal advantage - in the case of mormons we have (had?) polygamy which had been forbidden for centuries by all other kinds of christianism.
As for taking you to court or not, considering the way the catholic church forbid anybody who wasn't a priest or training to be one to even read the bible in the first millenium or so...
It's not that they don't have this kind of thing in them, it's only because they learned they can't get away with it, and got subtler about it.
The only real difference between scientology and classic religion is that scientologist are just a bunch of rank amateurs.
That said, considering that even in the US you have to click 'yes' to license agreement to be bound by it (never mind the abusiveness of said license), I'd tend to think the rules are similar.
As far as I know, Apple had to buy a company to get the technology (I've no idea what the cost was), pay for R&D to complete/adapt it to their need, and then there's factoring cost (which isn't cheap at all, epecially since Apple has no factory of its own).
I don't know how much all this adds up to, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn they still have a way to go to see some return on investment.
I can't count the number of times I've looked everywhere (legitor not) for some movie I wanted to see and had to settle for a very low bandwith download through bittorrent. At such times I ended up having to wait at least a week for it to complete. Of course most often than not the quality was pretty low and a bunch of times I never could complete the download.
I'd have gladly paid $1-$2 to have access to an official torrent-like repository of quality copies. Once people get used to pay for such movies they'll keep doing it even for the latest releases they could have for free elsewhere.
Again, the companies are too greedy and prefer having ten customers paying $20-40 than a hundred paying $1-$2 (notwithstanding the fact that among the later at least five will also buy the high quality $50 edition).
That's what I mean. The second you let your guard slip, they jump to fuck you in the rear.
I'm getting tired of such shit, and I'm far from being old.
My point si that it isn't over, only postponed.
On the outside, you could say that it's only the 'anti' lobby who got its way. But when you look at it a bit more closely, you see that although it was 'led' by the people you could say were the lobby, among other things they worked through involving a not insignificant of 'common citizen' (though those who have an interest in such things.
I firmly believe that's the way democracy should work. Nobody can take an interest in every decisions and policies made by a their own government - hell, even professionnal politicians can't keep track of everything in any meaningful way (that's actually one of the main weapons of lobbies). But if a big enough number of common people were to take an interest in the couple of things they feel are important, if the politician were really accountable - and swiftly - for what they do; if the system wasn't rigged so the professionals can go about their affairs without interference from us peons, I firmly believe we wouldn't be heading for the corporate owned world we seem to be so gleefully headed for.
Color idealistic if you want.
You could, in a way, make a point in favor of software patents in the US because of who holds them there (though ultimately they are counter-productive. But that's another debate).
As a citizen of the EU, I know that SP are not only a basically bad idea, they'd also gut European IT in favor of the US's.
Also, from a broader point of view, though they do exist here as well, lobby groups have yet to be accepted as a normal way to do politics in most of Europe. Which they're not: they ARE a perversion of politics.
The current European Parliament members have learned what soft patents mean, and know their consequences.
Hence these guys are going to crawl back under their rock and try to make themselves forgotten until after the next elections.
I'm saying Apple makes it a point for itunes not to sync with any other device than an ipod.
That said, you shouldn't use the terms "iPhone-ish interface", as its interface design was public way before the iphone's got to be back in January.
For exemple in France you can ask to have your phone unlocked after 6 months of contracts. They can't refuse, and neither can they stall: if you took the time to get the IMEI number (#06#), it takes 5 minutes, top.
The reasoning is that if the phone needs a longer time to get paid, it was sold for too low a price which is akin to hidden costs.
I'm pretty sure there are similar rules in most EU countries.
And here I was, looking forward to post pictures of me raping a dead puppy...
Damn...
And just to be clear about that, we're not talking about lots of red tapes with triplicates and so on.
You only have to get your phone id (dial #06#) and call your provider (free call if your contract is still valid) to have it unlocked within the next 5 minutes.
Furthermore the sourcebooks are of exceptionnal quality, and you can find them dirt cheap on ebay.
D&D 3/3.5 is all about planning your character progression 10 levels in advance (Feat tree, prestige class and so on...). If you don't, you just end up being poor at what you do. And that's if you even can.
That makes the essence of the rules themselves based on min/maxing.
A shame really. The WEG's game rules are so much better than the crap Wizard made using D20.
Reading that review I can see that even now, they don't get that a class/level system just isn't appropriate for a Star Wars game.
Of course, I guess it all went pretty well together we the other brown stuff under the same licence that a fella' released in theaters...
Considering that the xbox got out about a year before its competitors, if you compare xbox and wii sales, I'd say it's very telling. It'd much more interesting to have charts of sales numbers since launch though.
Not to say that he won't be debunked, but none of rules you cited apply.
Doesn't that means they definitly are NOT our ancestors? (well, I don't know about you... :P)
You should microwave the baby to eat it AFTER sodomizing it to death...
1- I care, I don't like what it does to my already not so great sex-appeal
2- I don't care, it's not that important for the above mentionned
I find myself that I do care. It's got to the point where there really isn't much left in front, and I've never been a hat/cap wearing person. As a result I keep getting sunburns there and that really is a pain (both litteraly and figuratively).