Because when they're *not* over at your house they're too busy playing singleplayer or internet multiplayer, neither segments are really covered by the Wii. The "friend code" thing (as opposed to, say, a memorable user name) has completely destroyed any chance for the Wii to ever become a popular internet multiplayer machine.
See... on the PS360 you got vast, epic RPGs, crazy single-player shoot-em-ups, and lots of awesome multiplayer action games (COD4, Halo 3, etc etc.), on the Wii you've got party games... Each console has its niche, but I do have to say that the signal-to-noise ratio on the Wii is pretty pathetic. For every Mario Kart you have a million other hastily-produced Wii games that aren't worth the discs they're pressed upon.
Canada's governmental system has one advantage over the US: we don't radicalize quickly. Because a government falls if defeated on a major bill, the laws that get tabled generally are much tamer than their American counterparts. This law, sadly, is the exception to the rule.
Canada is pretty great. I'm currently working in Seattle, but grew up in Vancouver, and despite the similar climate, the culture is worlds apart. People in Canada are just... *nicer*, I have to say. They're more polite, they actually say thank you sometimes... I can't count the number of times the employee across the counter here in Seattle seemed surprised when I thanked them. What's wrong with you people? Seriously, I can't count the number of times people at Starbucks just grab their brew and go, without so much as acknowledging the guy who just made it for you.
Yes, call/mail your MP. No, do not send this letter. As soon as politicians see form letters come in they stop reading them, and the issue stops mattering. Take some time to write your MP a note (or a full letter, whichever) about what you think about this bill. It's important not to dilute the cause by resorting to copy and pasting.
Except if you're Canada, where the Senate (our parliamentary equivalent to the House of Lords) is consisted of members appointed by the PM, and therefore highly susceptible to voting with the party. They are also known for rubber-stamping legislation through, and spend a ludicrously small amount of time in session each year.
I think it's because people have this misguided notion that gay people marrying will somehow devalue their straight marriage. People also have this notion that marriage is a Christian idea (right, try just about every other culture on Earth), and that since homosexuality is (ostensibly) un-Christian, it should not be allowed. Either way, in my not-so-humble opinion, anyone who opposes gay marriage on these grounds is a flaming idiot.
Often times integrity and political smarts are mutually exclusive, at least in the way we've defined political smarts. People don't like hearing about how hard the road ahead will become, they want to be fed lies about how everything smells like roses - a President with integrity will by definition not be able to lie through his teeth to the people. Unfortunately, I just don't see a good way for the fringe candidates to gain legitimacy without compromising their character.
I myself have not followed Dennis Kucinich, but I have just gained a lot of respect for this man. This impeachment is never going to go anywhere, but the road to a better future is not paved by people shutting up because it's too hard. He stood up for what was right and said it, regardless of how unpopular it was, and how unlikely it is to succeed, and for that he has my deepest profound respect.
The world needs men of integrity. I don't care if you disagree with me, as long as this world is run by men of character and integrity we'll all be ok.
Re:Uncle Sam is too fat. You need to trim it.
on
The SUV Is Dethroned
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· Score: 1
By your analogy... the solution to software bugs is to not write software.
Word on the street is that the iPhone Dev Team already have a working 2.0 unlock (based on the beta) - and are holding on to it until the product ships, to avoid having the bug patched pre-ship.
That being said, word on the street also says neither AT&T nor Apple will let you out the store until your contract is signed. This means effectively no unlocking is possible (or at least, meaningful).
I got it on 360, loved every moment of it, will probably replay it for achievements soon:) IMHO the 360 version is better, since all the commands are tied well into the various controller buttons, whereas the PC is entirely mouse-driven. Combat is a bit easier on 360 because of this.
If they need to park a van in front of your house with two agents inside to spy on you, then there's a logistical limit to how many people they can watch. We will never be able to stop governmental abuse of power, but what we can fight is the ability to pervasively do it without so much as lifting a finger. If spying required a signed warrant for every single line monitored, it would already discourage a lot of otherwise unjustified spying.
For the record, I'm an Obama-ite, but I wish the guy would come up with more concrete plans. I mean, I'm with him for the sake of not staying in this boondoggle of a war in Iraq, and that he promises to be "different", and we have nowhere to go but up in terms of policy-making. Nonetheless, I wish he would give us some real meat regarding his plans as President.
I agree, I have great love for VLC, it *just works* against all the file formats I've thrown against it.
But... IMHO MPlayer and VLC are not ready for primetime. They are functionally amazing, but have usability that rivals GIMP in its shoddiness.
Go ahead, I dare you. Crack open VLC and try to play a DVD. Okay, File->Open Disc, make sense right? Take a look at the dialog that comes up. See if your mother or your non-techie uncle can make heads or tails of it.
I don't play with MPlayer that much, but VLC is downright pathetic in usability. Too much functionality that non-power-users don't need, exposed in every damn corner of the app. How's about having a simplified UI for normal users, and a hidden corner for us techies? Seriously, I should not need to know that my DVD drive is at/dev/wtf to play a DVD!
Yeah, I don't know why any of these games were worth a front-page story... Let's see:
Ninja Gaiden II - Mediocre reviews, sequel to a franchise that wasn't even much on the radar the first time around... Probably worth a rent, but nothing so ridiculously anticipated that it's worth front-page...
Grid - same. Codemasters makes good racing sims, but this game doesn't look like it offers anything exciting.
Bourne Conspiracy - mediocre reviews, the game is one big cinematic sequels with quick-time "MASH THAT BUTTON IN 0.5 seconds or you DIE!" events. Joy.
Lego Indian Jones - the only game in the list worth a front-page mention.
Kung Fu Panda - eww? There's no evidence that this game will be any different than any of the other movie cash-ins.
The Incredible Hulk - this one is looking a bit better than the average movie tie-in, but seriously, it's nothing to get excited about.
Better Headline: June Gaming Sees Host of Mediocre Summer Releases, Keep Wallet in Pants
and niceties such as being able to replay any cut-scene you've already seen in the game
Most Japanese games have this, particularly RPGs. For them gaming is a means to a story, whereas storylines in Western games tend to be there for the sake of gameplay.
I'm sorry, I know the overwhelming Slashdot groupthink is to support Obama, but it without reading TFA and just going by your summary, it seems like Obama is being vague, while McCain is being specific, albeit somewhat misguided.
"Re-define 'broadband', what? Where's the second part of that sentence - what are we redefining it into?
Full immigration overhaul? What does that involve? How do we make workers less dependent on employers?
Increase cooperation on international IP standards? What does that mean exactly?
I mean... McCain's stance seems to be more or less "yeah we're not going to touch that", which I suppose is valid (however dumb) policy... But Obama's plan is no better, and seems to revolve around a lot of vague words with not a lot of details.
if the government really had that much of an interest in me or that much intent against me there pretty much ain't but jack and shit I can do about it
True, but the government does not yet have the ability to do it on a massive scale without significant investment. Which is to say we should try to raise the bar as high as possible for governmental spying - so high that it will only be used for legitimate, isolated cases, as opposed to the broad, scary data-mining applications we see today.
Well, I suppose that someone could consider that statement not palpably idiotic, for some value of "any other" that excludes the country of Iran,
Right, because the the 80s and early 90s justify an invasion *right now*. Whatever justification that was used to attack Iraq in the Gulf War does not apply to the war going on here and now. Whatever moral high ground we stood upon to defend Kuwait from an unprovoked aggressor is now gone. We are the unprovoked aggressors, against a country that did not pose any immediate threat to us (whether "immediate threat" is justification for war is another story), nor attack any of our allies in recent memory.
and assorted offenses against Turkmens, Shi'a, and every other non-Sunni-Arab religion/ethnicity in the region.
Right, because the USA is *seriously* committed to righting the injustices of the world. So much so that we've invested our military might in cleaning up the Darfur crisis! Oh wait. No we haven't. This whole "bringing freedom" and "righting the wrongs of the world" thing is BS, and just a convenient excuse to justify an otherwise illegal and morally reprehensible war.
The genocidal offenses documented above are much more than anything Hitler was known to have done at the time the U.S. declared war on Germany despite never being attacked by Germany, only by a *very* loosely allied country on the completely opposite side of the globe.
More emotional hogwash with no basis in history. We declared war on Germany because they were the war-time ally of Japan, which attacked the USA directly without provocation. Humanitarian concerns have nothing to do with any of this, and in fact the current war was started for reasons of "immediate threat", which turned out to be a lie. The humanitarian angle was only concocted once it was clear there were no WMDs, nor any *real* reason to have gone to war.
From any humanist -- OR pragmatic -- perspective, war to remove Saddam Hussein was unquestionably far more justified than declaring war on Germany was.
Humanist maybe. Pragmatic no. Are you saying that we should've taken Pearl Harbour lying down, and not declared war in return? Japan and Germany were acting as allies in their war of agression, there was no choice for America, once attacked, to declare war on all of the Axis powers.
Let's not color this in the humanist perspective, really, because the war was never started under the pretense of humanitarian aid, whatever justification there may have been for it. Let's also not pretend that we are the shining beacon of humanist behavior - because if we were we wouldn't be engaged in this silly war for oil, and be committing our considerable military might to *much worse* humanitarian disaster zones around the world.
the Democrats have a strong history of war making and a lot to apologize for:
Did you seriously just consider WW2 with the Iraq Wars? My God man, take some history. Yes, there is a certain amount of propaganda associated with World War II, but it is nonetheless *widely agreed* that it was a necessary war, and that America's role in it was inevitable (we *were* attacked by Japan, y'know, as opposed to *not* being attacked by Iraq).
So... On the one hand we have... A war fighting two aggressive world powers, who have taken over many countries not their own, one of whom has attacked American territory directly, unprovoked.
On the other hand we have... A war fighting a country that has not attacked us, nor attacked any other country... Nor is it connected to any attacks against the US.
I think early gripes were due to the fact that practically nobody was using JavaScript in a productive way. No, we don't want bouncing images, no, we don't want insane drop-down menus that don't behave right, and no, we don't want the web page to break back/forward buttons by doing some underhanded sly scripting work. Or worse! We don't want no stupid popups that ask me for my name.
I think JavaScript has proven now that it has *some* redeeming qualities and legitimate uses:)
Slashdot Mirror
Because when they're *not* over at your house they're too busy playing singleplayer or internet multiplayer, neither segments are really covered by the Wii. The "friend code" thing (as opposed to, say, a memorable user name) has completely destroyed any chance for the Wii to ever become a popular internet multiplayer machine.
See... on the PS360 you got vast, epic RPGs, crazy single-player shoot-em-ups, and lots of awesome multiplayer action games (COD4, Halo 3, etc etc.), on the Wii you've got party games... Each console has its niche, but I do have to say that the signal-to-noise ratio on the Wii is pretty pathetic. For every Mario Kart you have a million other hastily-produced Wii games that aren't worth the discs they're pressed upon.
True, though this effect can be lessened by increasing the penalty for killing your virtual self.
Canada's governmental system has one advantage over the US: we don't radicalize quickly. Because a government falls if defeated on a major bill, the laws that get tabled generally are much tamer than their American counterparts. This law, sadly, is the exception to the rule.
Canada is pretty great. I'm currently working in Seattle, but grew up in Vancouver, and despite the similar climate, the culture is worlds apart. People in Canada are just... *nicer*, I have to say. They're more polite, they actually say thank you sometimes... I can't count the number of times the employee across the counter here in Seattle seemed surprised when I thanked them. What's wrong with you people? Seriously, I can't count the number of times people at Starbucks just grab their brew and go, without so much as acknowledging the guy who just made it for you.
Yes, call/mail your MP. No, do not send this letter. As soon as politicians see form letters come in they stop reading them, and the issue stops mattering. Take some time to write your MP a note (or a full letter, whichever) about what you think about this bill. It's important not to dilute the cause by resorting to copy and pasting.
Except if you're Canada, where the Senate (our parliamentary equivalent to the House of Lords) is consisted of members appointed by the PM, and therefore highly susceptible to voting with the party. They are also known for rubber-stamping legislation through, and spend a ludicrously small amount of time in session each year.
I think it's because people have this misguided notion that gay people marrying will somehow devalue their straight marriage. People also have this notion that marriage is a Christian idea (right, try just about every other culture on Earth), and that since homosexuality is (ostensibly) un-Christian, it should not be allowed. Either way, in my not-so-humble opinion, anyone who opposes gay marriage on these grounds is a flaming idiot.
Often times integrity and political smarts are mutually exclusive, at least in the way we've defined political smarts. People don't like hearing about how hard the road ahead will become, they want to be fed lies about how everything smells like roses - a President with integrity will by definition not be able to lie through his teeth to the people. Unfortunately, I just don't see a good way for the fringe candidates to gain legitimacy without compromising their character.
I myself have not followed Dennis Kucinich, but I have just gained a lot of respect for this man. This impeachment is never going to go anywhere, but the road to a better future is not paved by people shutting up because it's too hard. He stood up for what was right and said it, regardless of how unpopular it was, and how unlikely it is to succeed, and for that he has my deepest profound respect.
The world needs men of integrity. I don't care if you disagree with me, as long as this world is run by men of character and integrity we'll all be ok.
By your analogy... the solution to software bugs is to not write software.
Yes, in fact I believe AT&T themselves give you a grace period to terminate a contract... But that would also involve *giving the phone back* :)
Yes, because if the screen is not glass, you just destroyed your LCD, or worse, the things underneath it. That's *totally* less than $200 to repair...
Actually they do :P AT&T, Virgin, T-Mobile, amongst others, sell pre-paid phones in convenience stores, including 7/11 :P
Word on the street is that the iPhone Dev Team already have a working 2.0 unlock (based on the beta) - and are holding on to it until the product ships, to avoid having the bug patched pre-ship.
That being said, word on the street also says neither AT&T nor Apple will let you out the store until your contract is signed. This means effectively no unlocking is possible (or at least, meaningful).
Good to know you *used to* work there, 'cos I'm pretty sure you just violated your NDA.
I got it on 360, loved every moment of it, will probably replay it for achievements soon :) IMHO the 360 version is better, since all the commands are tied well into the various controller buttons, whereas the PC is entirely mouse-driven. Combat is a bit easier on 360 because of this.
If they need to park a van in front of your house with two agents inside to spy on you, then there's a logistical limit to how many people they can watch. We will never be able to stop governmental abuse of power, but what we can fight is the ability to pervasively do it without so much as lifting a finger. If spying required a signed warrant for every single line monitored, it would already discourage a lot of otherwise unjustified spying.
For the record, I'm an Obama-ite, but I wish the guy would come up with more concrete plans. I mean, I'm with him for the sake of not staying in this boondoggle of a war in Iraq, and that he promises to be "different", and we have nowhere to go but up in terms of policy-making. Nonetheless, I wish he would give us some real meat regarding his plans as President.
I agree, I have great love for VLC, it *just works* against all the file formats I've thrown against it.
But... IMHO MPlayer and VLC are not ready for primetime. They are functionally amazing, but have usability that rivals GIMP in its shoddiness.
Go ahead, I dare you. Crack open VLC and try to play a DVD. Okay, File->Open Disc, make sense right? Take a look at the dialog that comes up. See if your mother or your non-techie uncle can make heads or tails of it.
I don't play with MPlayer that much, but VLC is downright pathetic in usability. Too much functionality that non-power-users don't need, exposed in every damn corner of the app. How's about having a simplified UI for normal users, and a hidden corner for us techies? Seriously, I should not need to know that my DVD drive is at /dev/wtf to play a DVD!
Yeah, I don't know why any of these games were worth a front-page story... Let's see:
Ninja Gaiden II - Mediocre reviews, sequel to a franchise that wasn't even much on the radar the first time around... Probably worth a rent, but nothing so ridiculously anticipated that it's worth front-page...
Grid - same. Codemasters makes good racing sims, but this game doesn't look like it offers anything exciting.
Bourne Conspiracy - mediocre reviews, the game is one big cinematic sequels with quick-time "MASH THAT BUTTON IN 0.5 seconds or you DIE!" events. Joy.
Lego Indian Jones - the only game in the list worth a front-page mention.
Kung Fu Panda - eww? There's no evidence that this game will be any different than any of the other movie cash-ins.
The Incredible Hulk - this one is looking a bit better than the average movie tie-in, but seriously, it's nothing to get excited about.
Better Headline: June Gaming Sees Host of Mediocre Summer Releases, Keep Wallet in Pants
Most Japanese games have this, particularly RPGs. For them gaming is a means to a story, whereas storylines in Western games tend to be there for the sake of gameplay.
I'm sorry, I know the overwhelming Slashdot groupthink is to support Obama, but it without reading TFA and just going by your summary, it seems like Obama is being vague, while McCain is being specific, albeit somewhat misguided.
"Re-define 'broadband', what? Where's the second part of that sentence - what are we redefining it into?
Full immigration overhaul? What does that involve? How do we make workers less dependent on employers?
Increase cooperation on international IP standards? What does that mean exactly?
I mean... McCain's stance seems to be more or less "yeah we're not going to touch that", which I suppose is valid (however dumb) policy... But Obama's plan is no better, and seems to revolve around a lot of vague words with not a lot of details.
True, but the government does not yet have the ability to do it on a massive scale without significant investment. Which is to say we should try to raise the bar as high as possible for governmental spying - so high that it will only be used for legitimate, isolated cases, as opposed to the broad, scary data-mining applications we see today.
Right, because the the 80s and early 90s justify an invasion *right now*. Whatever justification that was used to attack Iraq in the Gulf War does not apply to the war going on here and now. Whatever moral high ground we stood upon to defend Kuwait from an unprovoked aggressor is now gone. We are the unprovoked aggressors, against a country that did not pose any immediate threat to us (whether "immediate threat" is justification for war is another story), nor attack any of our allies in recent memory.
and assorted offenses against Turkmens, Shi'a, and every other non-Sunni-Arab religion/ethnicity in the region.Right, because the USA is *seriously* committed to righting the injustices of the world. So much so that we've invested our military might in cleaning up the Darfur crisis! Oh wait. No we haven't. This whole "bringing freedom" and "righting the wrongs of the world" thing is BS, and just a convenient excuse to justify an otherwise illegal and morally reprehensible war.
The genocidal offenses documented above are much more than anything Hitler was known to have done at the time the U.S. declared war on Germany despite never being attacked by Germany, only by a *very* loosely allied country on the completely opposite side of the globe.More emotional hogwash with no basis in history. We declared war on Germany because they were the war-time ally of Japan, which attacked the USA directly without provocation. Humanitarian concerns have nothing to do with any of this, and in fact the current war was started for reasons of "immediate threat", which turned out to be a lie. The humanitarian angle was only concocted once it was clear there were no WMDs, nor any *real* reason to have gone to war.
From any humanist -- OR pragmatic -- perspective, war to remove Saddam Hussein was unquestionably far more justified than declaring war on Germany was.Humanist maybe. Pragmatic no. Are you saying that we should've taken Pearl Harbour lying down, and not declared war in return? Japan and Germany were acting as allies in their war of agression, there was no choice for America, once attacked, to declare war on all of the Axis powers.
Let's not color this in the humanist perspective, really, because the war was never started under the pretense of humanitarian aid, whatever justification there may have been for it. Let's also not pretend that we are the shining beacon of humanist behavior - because if we were we wouldn't be engaged in this silly war for oil, and be committing our considerable military might to *much worse* humanitarian disaster zones around the world.
Did you seriously just consider WW2 with the Iraq Wars? My God man, take some history. Yes, there is a certain amount of propaganda associated with World War II, but it is nonetheless *widely agreed* that it was a necessary war, and that America's role in it was inevitable (we *were* attacked by Japan, y'know, as opposed to *not* being attacked by Iraq).
So... On the one hand we have... A war fighting two aggressive world powers, who have taken over many countries not their own, one of whom has attacked American territory directly, unprovoked.
On the other hand we have... A war fighting a country that has not attacked us, nor attacked any other country... Nor is it connected to any attacks against the US.
How are they comparable?
I think early gripes were due to the fact that practically nobody was using JavaScript in a productive way. No, we don't want bouncing images, no, we don't want insane drop-down menus that don't behave right, and no, we don't want the web page to break back/forward buttons by doing some underhanded sly scripting work. Or worse! We don't want no stupid popups that ask me for my name.
I think JavaScript has proven now that it has *some* redeeming qualities and legitimate uses :)