Agreed. Here's a quote from a Humble Bundle rep from an article on Rock, Paper, Shotgun:
When THQ expressed interest in our pay what you want plus charity model and willingness to let us bundle so many top tier titles, we couldn’t believe it at first,” the rep explained to RPS. “But trying to turn up our noses at this epic chance to make gamers happy and help worthy causes like Child’s Play and the American Red Cross could only have been defined as arrogance. We had to try and we were extremely curious to see what would happen.
I agree with the "arrogance" observation. Childs Play & the American Red Cross are real, tangible causes, and as others mentioned, you can cause your entire donation to go to them and none of it to THQ or even HumbeBundle, if you like. The nerd rage against this bundle is completely inappropriate.
I don't even need to dip in to "nerd rage". The fact that Humble Bundle would even consider allowing anyone to give any amount of money to the disgustingly homophobic Red Cross is disappointing at best.
And notice the EFF isn't on the charity list this time. Given the long standing with Humble Bundle, I'm sure they were engaged to determine involvement with this deal. I'm glad the EFF took the high road and stuck to their principles and outspokenness over DRM instead of pretending the propagation of locked down software is ok in the name of getting cash.
I'm just completely bemused by the seeming response.
THQ did a good thing. Somebody within the company went to bat for this, made it happen, and people respond like this?
FFS.
Someone went to bat and probably some beancounter said "whoa, can't strip that DRM, without it the chairs under our giant behinds would literally disappear" and promptly replaced the bat with a dead salmon.
And people point to worker conditions in China about slave wages, long hours, and suicidal tenancies. Compared to Amazon warehouses, though, these Chinese workers get lots more money working at some horrible factory in Guandong than their peers, while in the US, the pay still can't sustain a living.
As usual, the global population spans the entire spectrum from massive government censorship and oppression and from relatively free communication. Tor enables those in free countries to operate exit nodes for the benefit of those in oppressed areas. Those operators are basically modern-day information Robin Hoods.
That your government is willing to raid you is a sign that you live in one of those oppressed areas and should not be running an exit node. So, you should prepare to face the consequences if the reach of The Man can grab you.
I had an aftermarket GPS/iPod/Video system from 2007 that worked great with my iPod nano from 2005. No video from the iPod (obviously) but it was great. Then I decided to get a 6th gen iPod classic for the massive library and video.
Every few weeks the iPod would crash, whether I used it or not. I usually left it plugged in to its cable, and I wouldn't even know what happened until it "auto connected". One time I caught it in the act and I realized it wasn't the stereo failing, it was the iPod. Frozen, screen lit up to max brightness, completely unresponsive to controls. I had to wait for the battery to run out, then recharge it enough to turn on. That's why the auto connect has happening, it was literally coming back to life, realizing there's a cable attached, and trying to renegotiate. Then there was video functionality. Some times it would just switch off, and the only way to bring it back was to unplug the iPod, manually reset, and plug it back in. Oh, and, it would then forget it's place in the video.
Also, the head unit was pretty sweet and would display album art. Basically, if I put high res art on my nano, it would display high res on the display. With the 6th gen, it's like Apple intentionally downgraded the functionality and the same songs with the same high res album art were restricted to some ridiculous resolution, like 96x96. Looked god awful on the 720x480 display.
So before you blast the 3rd party system, it's pretty clear to me anyway that Apple doesn't like regression testing only as far as it can be made to look like someone else's fault.
Back in the olden days, people looked at a map, planned out a route, and tried to follow it. If they lost track of their position, they'd stop the car (heresy in the modern age, I know) get out the map and sort out a new route to their destination.
Then there was the skill that few mere mortals possessed: folding that map back to it's original shape correctly, so that all the crease directions were the same way as when new.
Folding incorrectly made the map bulge and, over time, would pretty much become a race to tear it faster than the other misfolded creases.
Can't speak for the polarized display, but most video systems detect the car in motion by tapping into the parking brake wire. It can be cut from the wiring harness of the radio with no ill effects. If you look at the installation guide, it will describe the pinout for the connections and you can make the modification even if you had it installed elsewhere.
While silly, that line of CD-Rs still uses the blue azo pigments in cyanine dyes instead of the newer phthalocyanine that every other disc produced today, including all of Verbatim's other discs. I have found the longevity and readability of these discs to be quite excellent, especially on older drives.
Back then that chemistry was also available on DataLifePlus brand discs. Every single one I used to burn stuff on is still readable today (last checked this summer) while the Ritek discs I also burned at the time with the newer light green dyes are running about 2 good discs out of every 3 I pull. I believe older TDK discs also used the same Mitsubishi chemistry, but it's been a long time since such things mattered to me, since sneakernet with USB drives is more efficient.
I wasn't aware they did that! After struggling and ultimately failing to get Thief installed on my current machine, the $10 it will cost to buy it again is cheap compared to the cost of reacquiring the parts to build a functional Windows 95 machine again.
And the perfect example of what happens when you open source your code. Doom gets opened source, enthusiasts modify it for things they want out of it: higher resolution, hardware rendering, better input controls, native ports, etc.
New people are attracted to these new features who never played the original and, would you look at that? They're buying a decades old game for the asset files to run against new code. Long-tail sales at $20 a pop at the id Store. Minus merchant fees and some minor distribution costs, the rest is pure profit by now.
This is similar to Sony's product line up. They continued to sell PS2's pretty solidly until just the last year or so (at least in the US.) If you look at the sales numbers (I haven't recently) they were moving something like 40k units a week. Not too many manufactures would discontinue a product selling that well. Add in the savings with the cost reduce and I'm sure this will continue as a cash cow for Nintendo for quite some time.
With the exception of losing the HDD expansion bay, the PS2 slim wasn't nearly as gimped compared to the original PS2 as the Wii Mini is to the original Wii.
What gets me is, how much did they save by removing WiFi from a system that already communicates wirelessly to it's controllers? It couldn't have been very much. Microsoft's cheaper 360 design went the other direction and bundled it in! Makes Microsoft look like Santa IMO.
At least with internet connectivity the console could buy games off the shop at whatever price Nintendo wants to ask. With how mature the Wii game market is, I don't see anyone pinching pennies by buying this system over a Wii classic as buying anything other than cheap used games at no profit to Nintendo. Why wouldn't they want to leave this revenue stream open? Even if they did
It's not the first time Nintendo re-released a system and fucked it up. The NES 2 dropped the composite connections, SNES 2 dropped S-Video and RGB output (even though the port and cable supported them). Since then further gimping revisions haven't been so obvious. There was a Gamecube revision that dropped the digital video out, removing 480p possibilities, and modern Wiis don't have Gamecube compatibility.
It's not like the original Wii was enormous...it may have been the smallest major gaming console ever sold. And since the price is not significantly less and the functionality is significantly less (no internet) I'm left wondering one thing:
Why would Nintendo waste their money developing and selling this?
To confuse grandparents.
"My little Pumpkin wants a Wii U. Is that a U? Golly, I can hardly read this. That doesn't make sense. It's probably a Wii 2. Yup, they'll be so happy. Also, let me put a few butterscotch candies in the box."
I hate this idea. If I need help with some random bit of software and have to dig through email or hunt for some no-longer existing sticky note with a support contract code on it I'm going to get pissed and most likely give up.
Why aren't you documenting that sort of thing in a company repository? I don't see how bad organization on the customer's part is the company's fault.
Also, they discontinued that product. To complete the cycle for you.
Are you including that in your definition of good software?
Just curious, what is your definition of good software? Can you provide an example? Everyone is going to have a different opinion on what is "good".
Some of their best software, in my opinion, is the stuff you don't necessarily know is there. The NTFS code base is pretty impressive, and interestingly enough, almost always under-utilized by Windows by having the feature set ahead of the curve (features like alternative data streams, sparse files, and HSM are some of my favorites).
If I were one of Onity's competitors, I would be fast-tracking a replacement system that uses the existing housings at least. Their lunch is right there, on the table, practically begging to get eaten.
The point being that not everyone is going to be an expert in real estate and mortgages and all that stuff. That industry is an army of employees, all trained, doing this every fucking day, and they're going to understand it all way better than a person who might go through it once or twice in their entire lifetime.
The system is just plain stacked against the average person.
Not blind, necessarily. Enterprise software is almost certainly designed to be "consultant ware."
Oh, having trouble getting it installed? Yep, our software is very powerful therefore very complex. We can help you with that, let's talk about a retainer.
A function isn't working? It must be your sprawling IT infrastructure. We can help track it down for you with an engineer dispatched to your data center, what's your closest hotel?
You can argue whether or not it's a righteous opinion for someone to have, but it's still just a philosophical opinion. Some fascist parallel universe storytelling is just a carrier with which to discuss it.
In moving with charitable giving, I'd propose that donating money is providing use of force (purchasing power) to an organization they agree with, and trust to use that money, along with pooled money from others, to do things that forward their cause. After all, that's what money does, right? Makes people do things? For example, someone may like the ACLU's mission, and would donate to them so that they could continue to pay for defense lawyers for those upon whom might have their rights trampled.
Slashdot Mirror
Agreed. Here's a quote from a Humble Bundle rep from an article on Rock, Paper, Shotgun:
I agree with the "arrogance" observation. Childs Play & the American Red Cross are real, tangible causes, and as others mentioned, you can cause your entire donation to go to them and none of it to THQ or even HumbeBundle, if you like. The nerd rage against this bundle is completely inappropriate.
I don't even need to dip in to "nerd rage". The fact that Humble Bundle would even consider allowing anyone to give any amount of money to the disgustingly homophobic Red Cross is disappointing at best.
And notice the EFF isn't on the charity list this time. Given the long standing with Humble Bundle, I'm sure they were engaged to determine involvement with this deal. I'm glad the EFF took the high road and stuck to their principles and outspokenness over DRM instead of pretending the propagation of locked down software is ok in the name of getting cash.
I'm just completely bemused by the seeming response.
THQ did a good thing. Somebody within the company went to bat for this, made it happen, and people respond like this?
FFS.
Someone went to bat and probably some beancounter said "whoa, can't strip that DRM, without it the chairs under our giant behinds would literally disappear" and promptly replaced the bat with a dead salmon.
And people point to worker conditions in China about slave wages, long hours, and suicidal tenancies. Compared to Amazon warehouses, though, these Chinese workers get lots more money working at some horrible factory in Guandong than their peers, while in the US, the pay still can't sustain a living.
Yet hedge fund managers...
As usual, the global population spans the entire spectrum from massive government censorship and oppression and from relatively free communication. Tor enables those in free countries to operate exit nodes for the benefit of those in oppressed areas. Those operators are basically modern-day information Robin Hoods.
That your government is willing to raid you is a sign that you live in one of those oppressed areas and should not be running an exit node. So, you should prepare to face the consequences if the reach of The Man can grab you.
Joe Shmoe doesn't even know what a regular boot is, let alone secure boot.
<quote>
<quote><p>???</p></quote>
<p>Please, expand on your question.</p></quote>
???
? ? ?
? ? ?
? ? ?
? ? ?
There you go. Hope that helped.
I had an aftermarket GPS/iPod/Video system from 2007 that worked great with my iPod nano from 2005. No video from the iPod (obviously) but it was great. Then I decided to get a 6th gen iPod classic for the massive library and video.
Every few weeks the iPod would crash, whether I used it or not. I usually left it plugged in to its cable, and I wouldn't even know what happened until it "auto connected". One time I caught it in the act and I realized it wasn't the stereo failing, it was the iPod. Frozen, screen lit up to max brightness, completely unresponsive to controls. I had to wait for the battery to run out, then recharge it enough to turn on. That's why the auto connect has happening, it was literally coming back to life, realizing there's a cable attached, and trying to renegotiate. Then there was video functionality. Some times it would just switch off, and the only way to bring it back was to unplug the iPod, manually reset, and plug it back in. Oh, and, it would then forget it's place in the video.
Also, the head unit was pretty sweet and would display album art. Basically, if I put high res art on my nano, it would display high res on the display. With the 6th gen, it's like Apple intentionally downgraded the functionality and the same songs with the same high res album art were restricted to some ridiculous resolution, like 96x96. Looked god awful on the 720x480 display.
So before you blast the 3rd party system, it's pretty clear to me anyway that Apple doesn't like regression testing only as far as it can be made to look like someone else's fault.
but how do you navigate if not with GPS?
Back in the olden days, people looked at a map, planned out a route, and tried to follow it. If they lost track of their position, they'd stop the car (heresy in the modern age, I know) get out the map and sort out a new route to their destination.
Then there was the skill that few mere mortals possessed: folding that map back to it's original shape correctly, so that all the crease directions were the same way as when new.
Folding incorrectly made the map bulge and, over time, would pretty much become a race to tear it faster than the other misfolded creases.
For kicks, check out this early Honda navigation system... from 1981
Electro Gyrocator
Can't speak for the polarized display, but most video systems detect the car in motion by tapping into the parking brake wire. It can be cut from the wiring harness of the radio with no ill effects. If you look at the installation guide, it will describe the pinout for the connections and you can make the modification even if you had it installed elsewhere.
If I dock my smart phone into my car, I'm going to take it with me when I get out. Just like I do already with my keys.
While silly, that line of CD-Rs still uses the blue azo pigments in cyanine dyes instead of the newer phthalocyanine that every other disc produced today, including all of Verbatim's other discs. I have found the longevity and readability of these discs to be quite excellent, especially on older drives.
Back then that chemistry was also available on DataLifePlus brand discs. Every single one I used to burn stuff on is still readable today (last checked this summer) while the Ritek discs I also burned at the time with the newer light green dyes are running about 2 good discs out of every 3 I pull. I believe older TDK discs also used the same Mitsubishi chemistry, but it's been a long time since such things mattered to me, since sneakernet with USB drives is more efficient.
Anecdotal? Sure, but that's my tale.
Clearly they should have started a campaign on Kickstarter
I wasn't aware they did that! After struggling and ultimately failing to get Thief installed on my current machine, the $10 it will cost to buy it again is cheap compared to the cost of reacquiring the parts to build a functional Windows 95 machine again.
I know what I'm doing this weekend. :D
And the perfect example of what happens when you open source your code. Doom gets opened source, enthusiasts modify it for things they want out of it: higher resolution, hardware rendering, better input controls, native ports, etc.
New people are attracted to these new features who never played the original and, would you look at that? They're buying a decades old game for the asset files to run against new code. Long-tail sales at $20 a pop at the id Store. Minus merchant fees and some minor distribution costs, the rest is pure profit by now.
This is similar to Sony's product line up. They continued to sell PS2's pretty solidly until just the last year or so (at least in the US.) If you look at the sales numbers (I haven't recently) they were moving something like 40k units a week. Not too many manufactures would discontinue a product selling that well. Add in the savings with the cost reduce and I'm sure this will continue as a cash cow for Nintendo for quite some time.
With the exception of losing the HDD expansion bay, the PS2 slim wasn't nearly as gimped compared to the original PS2 as the Wii Mini is to the original Wii.
The next Game Boy Advance Micro.
What gets me is, how much did they save by removing WiFi from a system that already communicates wirelessly to it's controllers? It couldn't have been very much. Microsoft's cheaper 360 design went the other direction and bundled it in! Makes Microsoft look like Santa IMO.
At least with internet connectivity the console could buy games off the shop at whatever price Nintendo wants to ask. With how mature the Wii game market is, I don't see anyone pinching pennies by buying this system over a Wii classic as buying anything other than cheap used games at no profit to Nintendo. Why wouldn't they want to leave this revenue stream open? Even if they did
It's not the first time Nintendo re-released a system and fucked it up. The NES 2 dropped the composite connections, SNES 2 dropped S-Video and RGB output (even though the port and cable supported them). Since then further gimping revisions haven't been so obvious. There was a Gamecube revision that dropped the digital video out, removing 480p possibilities, and modern Wiis don't have Gamecube compatibility.
It's not like the original Wii was enormous...it may have been the smallest major gaming console ever sold. And since the price is not significantly less and the functionality is significantly less (no internet) I'm left wondering one thing:
Why would Nintendo waste their money developing and selling this?
To confuse grandparents.
"My little Pumpkin wants a Wii U. Is that a U? Golly, I can hardly read this. That doesn't make sense. It's probably a Wii 2. Yup, they'll be so happy. Also, let me put a few butterscotch candies in the box."
I hate this idea. If I need help with some random bit of software and have to dig through email or hunt for some no-longer existing sticky note with a support contract code on it I'm going to get pissed and most likely give up.
Why aren't you documenting that sort of thing in a company repository? I don't see how bad organization on the customer's part is the company's fault.
Also, they discontinued that product. To complete the cycle for you.
Are you including that in your definition of good software?
Just curious, what is your definition of good software? Can you provide an example? Everyone is going to have a different opinion on what is "good".
Some of their best software, in my opinion, is the stuff you don't necessarily know is there. The NTFS code base is pretty impressive, and interestingly enough, almost always under-utilized by Windows by having the feature set ahead of the curve (features like alternative data streams, sparse files, and HSM are some of my favorites).
Only if you can get a copy of a maintenance or master key.
If I were one of Onity's competitors, I would be fast-tracking a replacement system that uses the existing housings at least. Their lunch is right there, on the table, practically begging to get eaten.
The point being that not everyone is going to be an expert in real estate and mortgages and all that stuff. That industry is an army of employees, all trained, doing this every fucking day, and they're going to understand it all way better than a person who might go through it once or twice in their entire lifetime.
The system is just plain stacked against the average person.
Not blind, necessarily. Enterprise software is almost certainly designed to be "consultant ware."
Oh, having trouble getting it installed? Yep, our software is very powerful therefore very complex. We can help you with that, let's talk about a retainer.
A function isn't working? It must be your sprawling IT infrastructure. We can help track it down for you with an engineer dispatched to your data center, what's your closest hotel?
You can argue whether or not it's a righteous opinion for someone to have, but it's still just a philosophical opinion. Some fascist parallel universe storytelling is just a carrier with which to discuss it.
In moving with charitable giving, I'd propose that donating money is providing use of force (purchasing power) to an organization they agree with, and trust to use that money, along with pooled money from others, to do things that forward their cause. After all, that's what money does, right? Makes people do things? For example, someone may like the ACLU's mission, and would donate to them so that they could continue to pay for defense lawyers for those upon whom might have their rights trampled.