Reality shows would have to stick in advertising land, because no-one would pay for that crap.
Ok, you might feel the ratings systems in TV are outdated, and you'd be right. But they're not misreading by orders of magnitude, and you're going to have to face the fact that reality shows are, and have consistently been, very popular. Why else do you think they'd still be on after so many years?
It makes me question your entire post when you know so little about the television industry.
I think you kind of miss the point of the article. It's not "game franchises that aren't made anymore", it's "game franchises that were run into the ground."
Mechwarrior IV was great. It's not a franchise that was "run into the ground" as much as one that... just isn't getting any new games. (Unless you count MechAssault on Xbox.) The Sierra games were good until the very end, also. They just stopped making new ones.
Tribes 2, while passable, didn't capture the magic of the original, and was released in such a buggy and unplayable state that it instantly alienated many fans. (I guess the developers were too busy adding in pointless "community" features, like forums, to actually make the game playable.) After a year of patches, it shaped up to be a pretty good product, but by that time it'd lost everyone to other games.
Tribes 3 and 4 were just messes. The multiplayer fun was entirely gone.
The true tragedy is that this series should have been easy to continue. Heck, they could have done nothing but upgrade the graphics engine and release the Shifter v1 mod as Tribes II, and it would have been ont of the best multiplayer games ever made.
If you're a Liberal hammer, you see everything as a... uh factual nail.
The reason you think facts have a liberal bias is because, as a liberal, it's impossible for you to consider anything that truly challenges your beliefs as factual.
For instance, try reading Black Liberals and White Rednecks by Thomas Sowell. Given your belief system, you're required to ignore the reams of evidence presented in that book that the Civil Rights Movement did nothing to increase the standard of living of blacks in America and, in fact, might have actually harmed it greatly. You'd instantly dismiss the book as crap, and therefore it wouldn't be considered "factual" to you regardless of how much research Sowell had done, because the liberal movement in America requires that Civil Rights works, that forced busing of minorities works, and any evidence to the contrary could disrupt your entire belief system.
This is the administration that forbade the tour guides at the Grand Canyon from mentioning how old is is, lest they offend creationists.
How about a citation there? That sounds like unvarnished bullshit to me.
Do tour guides at the Grand Canyon take orders directly from the Federal Government, much less the Presidential Administration? That just strikes me as complete crap.
A post by an anonymous coward entitled "your country is fucked" is +5 insightful. Meanwhile, my response to that post, with my name attached, no pointless swear words, and at least a semi-thought out response is Flamebait.
Pretty insightful to insult the US for no reason. Because it's unthinkable that any European nation has any obsolete "Blue Laws" which can be used to prosecute people like in this case.
Uh, yeah. Lotus Notes sucks. The more your business relies on it, the more your competitors using Outlook/Sharepoint will kick your ass. That's all I have to say.
Ok, he's videotaped himself, IN THE SUIT, being hit by a truck, wailed on by baseball bats, etc. And you're arguing that the suit must not exist because he also believes in some other nutcase idea?
Look, the suit exists. There's documentary evidence. (Literally; a documentary was made about his efforts to use the suit to observe hibernating bears, which is what it was originally designed for.) Regardless of what else he believes, this is definitely a product that can be useful to the military.
Actually, they're pretty popular inside the server room as well. Netware used a text-based GUI in version 5. Windows NT servers have always used GUI tools to manage things. The first thing you do when installing SQL Server is boot up Enterprise Manager or Query Analyzer, both GUIs, to configure your databases. I'm also curious to hear his reasoning why GUIs are "detestable".
GUIs are detestable for many reasons I will not elaborate here
Detestable? Detestable? You honestly believe that GUIs are (and I quote from Dictionary.com) "deserving to be detested; abominable; hateful"?
In God's name why!? What the hell are your reasons?
The only even half-sensible reason I can come up with for your belief is that GUIs are detestable because they allow those human vermin known as "normal people" use computers as well as any of us Unix nerds, and we simply can't have them mucking around in our world because they are so inferior to us!
No kidding. People are getting so bent out of shape about Apple's response... have they never tried to contact a cell phone company or cable company? Or, for that matter, get warranty repairs from a computer maker like Sony or Toshiba? Apple's support is solid gold compared to most companies around.
Ok, I'm not uber-nerd, but I don't even know what 3G (or 2.5G for that matter) even *is*. Therefore, not supporting it won't affect my purchase decision.
Video calling? You have to be joking. Every video phone ever made, back to ATT's first prototype in the 70s, has been a huge market failure. What makes you think that would change now? Why would Apple waste resources developing a feature that's been firmly rejected by customers dozens of times before?
I'm pretty sure there will be third party software, it'll just have to be approved by Apple first. This isn't that much of a stretch... all video game consoles work under this arrangement, for instance.
What good is GPS in a phone? I don't get it. Sounds like more expense for something you'd never use. (I guess maybe to track your kids, but I wouldn't give my kids a phone that expensive.)
The entire POINT of the iPod is to replace radio. Criminy. I really hate this argument... maybe you live in a place where the local radio stations don't completely suck, but you're an exception to the rule. If you want a radio, buy one. They're a hell of a lot cheaper than an iPod or iPhone.
I agree about you with a couple points: Not being able to use iTunes music as ring tones (if true) sucks. Non-replacable battery sucks for any device with less than about 20 hours runtime. Fixed capacity also kind of stinks.
... for a scientist, or someone else who lives in a metric world. Yes, we all know you're a smarty pants and everyone has to be like you because you're so smart you use metric every day.
But for the average American, it would be a lot more practical to be taught the units I use every damned day. For cooking meals, if nothing else.
Which brings up an interesting point... what do metric recipes look like? "Add 100ml of milk." Crazy.
Do you even live in the US? Every single point you brought up has been happening at least 20 years, and probably much longer. All my schooling was in metric. Kids have been growing up knowing only metric terms for decades, and there's no interest in adopting metric for everything. In fact, I always got kind of pissed that although I knew how many centimeters were in a meter, my entire school career NEVER taught me how many feet were in a mile, or pints in a gallon. Not very practical.
This means that the billboards will display their messages whenever the MAIL DELIVERY TRUCK drives by.
Ok, but it's still advertising by Mini regardless of what vehicle is near it. What difference does it make which vehicle triggers it?
And I'm betting a number of tags will mysteriously get lost in the mail and end up on eBay.
What makes you say that? I've never had anything stolen from my mail, which I actually find kind of remarkable considering how many people have access to it. In either case, the post office has pretty good security... why would you expect this to be stolen more than any other package?
If it's a keyfob, then it will also trigger the signs when someone is driving their OTHER non-Mini vehicle. Many families have two cars, and people drive other cars.
Ok. And?
It's still kind of cool, and it's still eye-catching advertising for Mini (regardless of which specific make and model of car is driving by) so I don't see why this would even be an issue.
The article says "When the boards detect that you are about the drive by, they deliver a personal message based on the information you originally gave." In other words, when you're driving 70mph down the road, make sure you look up for your important message from your car manufacturer -- and then miss your turn.
If you frequently miss turns because of billboards, even animated ones, you're probably not fit to drive in the first place. Again, I don't see why this would be an issue.
Opposite extreme: you're stuck in traffic for 50 minutes underneath the sign.
That would be the exact same as if you didn't have the keyfob, except perhaps mildly less boring. Once more, I don't see how it's an issue.
You're not very good at this whole "let's make up some issues so I sound smarter than the entire ad agency" post thing.
1) I'd wager it was done that way CPU-saving or code-saving measure because it's easier to write a case-sensitive sort function than a case-insensitive one.
2) I'd wager that the reason "the type of people who use Unix" prefer it that way is only because they are used to it from using Unix.
3) I'd wager that if you polled just "the type of people who use Unix" that they would prefer an actual alphabetical sort. Since that's what, for instance, the index of every book they read, the card catalog at their brain institutes's library, etc all use.
Slashdot Mirror
This from the woman who wants to federal government to regular the sale of videogames?
There's more than one issue at stake, you know.
What the hell does presence of DRM have to do with the quality of content? By almost it's very definition, DRM isn't content but meta-content.
Reality shows would have to stick in advertising land, because no-one would pay for that crap.
Ok, you might feel the ratings systems in TV are outdated, and you'd be right. But they're not misreading by orders of magnitude, and you're going to have to face the fact that reality shows are, and have consistently been, very popular. Why else do you think they'd still be on after so many years?
It makes me question your entire post when you know so little about the television industry.
All solutions I've ever seen for running a full party of adventurers in 3D is a joke.
Wizardry 8 does a pretty damned good job of it. Give it a try.
You still see from just one viewpoint, but it gives lots of options for how to arrange the party in combat.
I think you kind of miss the point of the article. It's not "game franchises that aren't made anymore", it's "game franchises that were run into the ground."
... just isn't getting any new games. (Unless you count MechAssault on Xbox.) The Sierra games were good until the very end, also. They just stopped making new ones.
Mechwarrior IV was great. It's not a franchise that was "run into the ground" as much as one that
Starsiege Tribes!
Tribes 2, while passable, didn't capture the magic of the original, and was released in such a buggy and unplayable state that it instantly alienated many fans. (I guess the developers were too busy adding in pointless "community" features, like forums, to actually make the game playable.) After a year of patches, it shaped up to be a pretty good product, but by that time it'd lost everyone to other games.
Tribes 3 and 4 were just messes. The multiplayer fun was entirely gone.
The true tragedy is that this series should have been easy to continue. Heck, they could have done nothing but upgrade the graphics engine and release the Shifter v1 mod as Tribes II, and it would have been ont of the best multiplayer games ever made.
Alas, it was great while it lasted.
... same as serial numbers and bar codes.
I don't see why people get their panties in a bunch over RFID when it doesn't offer anything that we don't already have with bar codes.
If you're a Liberal hammer, you see everything as a ... uh factual nail.
The reason you think facts have a liberal bias is because, as a liberal, it's impossible for you to consider anything that truly challenges your beliefs as factual.
For instance, try reading Black Liberals and White Rednecks by Thomas Sowell. Given your belief system, you're required to ignore the reams of evidence presented in that book that the Civil Rights Movement did nothing to increase the standard of living of blacks in America and, in fact, might have actually harmed it greatly. You'd instantly dismiss the book as crap, and therefore it wouldn't be considered "factual" to you regardless of how much research Sowell had done, because the liberal movement in America requires that Civil Rights works, that forced busing of minorities works, and any evidence to the contrary could disrupt your entire belief system.
This is the administration that forbade the tour guides at the Grand Canyon from mentioning how old is is, lest they offend creationists.
How about a citation there? That sounds like unvarnished bullshit to me.
Do tour guides at the Grand Canyon take orders directly from the Federal Government, much less the Presidential Administration? That just strikes me as complete crap.
Ah, I see how Slashdot works.
A post by an anonymous coward entitled "your country is fucked" is +5 insightful. Meanwhile, my response to that post, with my name attached, no pointless swear words, and at least a semi-thought out response is Flamebait.
Brilliant.
Like every IBM webpage, that's a lot of words that say very little.
For instance, it doesn't actually explain WHAT WEBSPHERE IS! God I hate IBM.
Pretty insightful to insult the US for no reason. Because it's unthinkable that any European nation has any obsolete "Blue Laws" which can be used to prosecute people like in this case.
Uh, yeah. Lotus Notes sucks. The more your business relies on it, the more your competitors using Outlook/Sharepoint will kick your ass. That's all I have to say.
Ok, he's videotaped himself, IN THE SUIT, being hit by a truck, wailed on by baseball bats, etc. And you're arguing that the suit must not exist because he also believes in some other nutcase idea?
Look, the suit exists. There's documentary evidence. (Literally; a documentary was made about his efforts to use the suit to observe hibernating bears, which is what it was originally designed for.) Regardless of what else he believes, this is definitely a product that can be useful to the military.
Then you'll be happy to know that that was the first thing Microsoft turned off when they started revamping the interface for Office 2007.
Actually, they're pretty popular inside the server room as well. Netware used a text-based GUI in version 5. Windows NT servers have always used GUI tools to manage things. The first thing you do when installing SQL Server is boot up Enterprise Manager or Query Analyzer, both GUIs, to configure your databases. I'm also curious to hear his reasoning why GUIs are "detestable".
GUIs are detestable for many reasons I will not elaborate here
Detestable? Detestable? You honestly believe that GUIs are (and I quote from Dictionary.com) "deserving to be detested; abominable; hateful"?
In God's name why!? What the hell are your reasons?
The only even half-sensible reason I can come up with for your belief is that GUIs are detestable because they allow those human vermin known as "normal people" use computers as well as any of us Unix nerds, and we simply can't have them mucking around in our world because they are so inferior to us!
No kidding. People are getting so bent out of shape about Apple's response... have they never tried to contact a cell phone company or cable company? Or, for that matter, get warranty repairs from a computer maker like Sony or Toshiba? Apple's support is solid gold compared to most companies around.
Ok, I'm not uber-nerd, but I don't even know what 3G (or 2.5G for that matter) even *is*. Therefore, not supporting it won't affect my purchase decision.
Video calling? You have to be joking. Every video phone ever made, back to ATT's first prototype in the 70s, has been a huge market failure. What makes you think that would change now? Why would Apple waste resources developing a feature that's been firmly rejected by customers dozens of times before?
I'm pretty sure there will be third party software, it'll just have to be approved by Apple first. This isn't that much of a stretch... all video game consoles work under this arrangement, for instance.
What good is GPS in a phone? I don't get it. Sounds like more expense for something you'd never use. (I guess maybe to track your kids, but I wouldn't give my kids a phone that expensive.)
The entire POINT of the iPod is to replace radio. Criminy. I really hate this argument... maybe you live in a place where the local radio stations don't completely suck, but you're an exception to the rule. If you want a radio, buy one. They're a hell of a lot cheaper than an iPod or iPhone.
I agree about you with a couple points: Not being able to use iTunes music as ring tones (if true) sucks. Non-replacable battery sucks for any device with less than about 20 hours runtime. Fixed capacity also kind of stinks.
But radio? Come on!
... for a scientist, or someone else who lives in a metric world. Yes, we all know you're a smarty pants and everyone has to be like you because you're so smart you use metric every day.
But for the average American, it would be a lot more practical to be taught the units I use every damned day. For cooking meals, if nothing else.
Which brings up an interesting point... what do metric recipes look like? "Add 100ml of milk." Crazy.
No, it's supposed to remind you of an Airstream trailer. Thus the name "Airstream." Duh.
Is it me, or are the comments here getting dumber over time?
Do you even live in the US? Every single point you brought up has been happening at least 20 years, and probably much longer. All my schooling was in metric. Kids have been growing up knowing only metric terms for decades, and there's no interest in adopting metric for everything. In fact, I always got kind of pissed that although I knew how many centimeters were in a meter, my entire school career NEVER taught me how many feet were in a mile, or pints in a gallon. Not very practical.
Branson could pull it off, natch, but again he wouldn't do it even if asked.
This means that the billboards will display their messages whenever the MAIL DELIVERY TRUCK drives by.
Ok, but it's still advertising by Mini regardless of what vehicle is near it. What difference does it make which vehicle triggers it?
And I'm betting a number of tags will mysteriously get lost in the mail and end up on eBay.
What makes you say that? I've never had anything stolen from my mail, which I actually find kind of remarkable considering how many people have access to it. In either case, the post office has pretty good security... why would you expect this to be stolen more than any other package?
If it's a keyfob, then it will also trigger the signs when someone is driving their OTHER non-Mini vehicle. Many families have two cars, and people drive other cars.
Ok. And?
It's still kind of cool, and it's still eye-catching advertising for Mini (regardless of which specific make and model of car is driving by) so I don't see why this would even be an issue.
The article says "When the boards detect that you are about the drive by, they deliver a personal message based on the information you originally gave." In other words, when you're driving 70mph down the road, make sure you look up for your important message from your car manufacturer -- and then miss your turn.
If you frequently miss turns because of billboards, even animated ones, you're probably not fit to drive in the first place. Again, I don't see why this would be an issue.
Opposite extreme: you're stuck in traffic for 50 minutes underneath the sign.
That would be the exact same as if you didn't have the keyfob, except perhaps mildly less boring. Once more, I don't see how it's an issue.
You're not very good at this whole "let's make up some issues so I sound smarter than the entire ad agency" post thing.
Few thoughts:
1) I'd wager it was done that way CPU-saving or code-saving measure because it's easier to write a case-sensitive sort function than a case-insensitive one.
2) I'd wager that the reason "the type of people who use Unix" prefer it that way is only because they are used to it from using Unix.
3) I'd wager that if you polled just "the type of people who use Unix" that they would prefer an actual alphabetical sort. Since that's what, for instance, the index of every book they read, the card catalog at their brain institutes's library, etc all use.