Look... when I buy a product, I expect it to come in its original packaging straight from the factory. When its out of its packaging, I have no idea where the product has been. Sure, it could have been safely stowed in drawer, but seeing the assholes who work at my local gamestop, I can only assume the game has been used as a coaster for a cigarette stuffed bottle of stale miller light. How am I to know otherwise?
Because, if it's not sealed in its original case, you can look at it, you know, with your eyes, and then choose not to buy it if it's scratched or if there are tracces of cigarette ash or beer stains on it. Or you can tell the manager that you want one that wasn't a "display copy" and if they only have "display copies", then you can either buy it, or not buy it, or try to Intimidate the manager, or just wander around and level up for a while and collect more gil, or whatever. It's really up to you. But let's dispense with the drama. It's not like the store is replacing the sticker on the top of the case (that's such a pain to remove) and then re-plastic wrapping it and pretending that it's never been opened. Sheesh.
Just in case anyone is wondering, I finally broke down and bought one of those CD/DVD buffing/repair kits (with the hand crank, haven't tried the automatic things) and it works great. I got a lot of games and DVD's that my kids had scratched working again with it.
Take this with a grain of salt (possibly lithium salt), but I have found the following technique to work for returning the occasional horrible game (Spore? anyone?):
Go to the store and tell them that you had "problems with the game" and would like to exchange it for an new copy. In most cases, they will give you an unopened copy which you can then return for a credit. If you buy from a chain that there are multiple of in your area this works a little bit better. (Get the new copy at Target A, return it at Target B)
As I understand it, the system is set up so that stores can return what they call "defective copies" for almost nothing. This allows the store to not lose money and for you to return the game.
I really wish this comment could be at the top of every political discussion to come up on Slashdot. Losing the representation of state's as entities cost this nation a great deal.
Suppose someone creates a very minimalist linux distro which includes a very good package management system. Suppose this package management system includes nearly all popular linux software packages.
Now suppose it were rather easy for anyone to install any number of those packages, bundle them together into one meta-package keyword, and call that a distro.
Then Linux would be as simple as installing the minimalist distro, then doing "apt-get install smartphone-system" for a distro customized for smartphones, or "media-system" for a distro customized for mediacenter PCs, etc.
I think this would be a superior option to having many completely independent distributions, and it would allow for faster innovation and easier support.
Then Linux would be as simple as installing the minimalist distro, then doing "apt-get install smartphone-system" for a distro customized for smartphones, or "media-system" for a distro customized for mediacenter PCs, etc.
I think this would be a superior option to having many completely independent distributions, and it would allow for faster innovation and easier support.
Every time I read one of these posts I'm reminded of this scene in the movie "Enemy of the State":
Miltary muscle: Can we get a feature scan of the guy with him? Tech: No, he's smart, he never looks up. Miltary muscle: So? Tech: The satellite is 155 miles above the Earth. It can only look straight down. Miltary muscle: That's a bit limited, isn't it? Tech: [Sarcastically] Well, maybe you should design a better one. Miltary muscle: Maybe I will.
The problem with your proposal is that it's not that simple. Smartphone system A may rely on kernel features that are incompatible with smartphone system B or maybe only on architecture C or when used with optional sub-package D of version E.
The people who design the kernel and the distributions aren't lacking in intelligence or ambition and please understand, I'm not saying that can't have some great insight that will work for a large number of people, but I am saying that the thing you've described doesn't sound new or innovative, it sounds naive.
On a side and only barely related note, Ender's Game may be my favorite novel of all time.
I'm assuming that their argument(not that I agree with it) would be that it is international waters, not interpersonal. If you are operating under the authority of a recognized nation, they won't mess with you, otherwise you are a pirate. I believe it's always been legal to pursue pirates (with said pirates (I assume) being identified by some means other than parrots, peg legs, and Jolly Rogers)
the odds that the normal looking white guy on your other side is going to mug you are probably significantly higher
I'm sorry, but you just derailed your entire argument. In an effort to prove that the average person lacks sufficient knowledge to truly be prudent, you created a "probable" statistic based on what - the desire that reality be the opposite of what someone "less intelligent/knowledgeable" than you would reason it to be?
If the a lack of a Creative Commons license for linux.com content doesn't lead you to avoid the website, their efforts to indoctrinate you certainly will...
In other news, Count Aral and his Betan wife, Countess Cordelia Vorkosigan, announced today that they are expecting their first child, a baby boy. Rather than using a uterine replicator, the young heir, who will be third in line to the Barrayan throne, is being gestated naturally, as is the custom on his father's homeworld of Barrayar. Everyone here at WRMHL, "the heart of Escobar" wishes them the best, and a safe and healthy pregnancy. Now, onto sports, where the Komarran Raiders played the Jackson Whole Splicers in a deadly game of...
There's another aspect to the "untrained" programmer/sysadmin/technical guy that I think needs to be addressed and you've just touched on it.
People who do well at "IT Stuff" without formal training are often people who like to dig into the details of how things work. They are always asking questions like: "Where does the data for that come from?", "How is that implemented, and that, and the thing underneath that?" A lot of them have written some assembler, if for no other reason than to figure out how a computer really works. They've installed Linux from scratch and maybe they've modified the kernel to add a system call, again, just because. They've played around with bootloaders, they've screwed around with device drivers, basically, if it has components, they've probably taken it apart and replaced some of them with their own.
And because of this, these people understand that there is no such thing as magic in the IT industry. If something is reading a data file, then somewhere there is something that lays out the data format. If two processes are communicating, then there are only so many ways they might be doing so, and depending on the platform and the context, they can usually narrow it down to one or two. And for some of these guys, the most fun they ever have, is when they are placed in front of a new environment/technology and they are able to intuit its details based on their understanding of a computer's primitives.
What is interesting, is that a lot of people who do have CS degrees have no interest in learning this way. Some of it is due to the formalized nature of their educational patterns, some of it is just pragmatism. And it's not really a bad thing, because if it wasn't so, there wouldn't be a lot of room or need for the informally trained professional. (Plus, there are things that the informally trained professional just isn't typically as good at)
I don't know how much I'll like the awesomebar. For the past few years, I've been using a combination of the keyconfig extension and Firefox quick searches to give me quick acess to all the sites I use. (In case anyone's curious, I use keyconfig to map Ctrl-space to select the address bar and then I've modified a lot of the quick searches and added some of my own so that I type "d word" to search dictionary.com, "w topic" to search Wikipedia, "y search term" for youtube, etc...) It works great for me and it's gotten to the point that my wife has started to use it as well.
I think it's always been technically true that a company can sue you for violating a license agreement. The issue is that penalty for infringement is always based on damages, and in most cases, the amount of financial damage done is insufficient to warrant a lawsuit (or for a court to award anything). In this case though, the bot maker is violating Blizzard's license in order to make money for himself. He is also encouraging others to violate their license. Blizzard may not win, but they have a better case than if they sued someone who just wrote a bot for their own amusement.
But you have to ask how he developed the bot without using a client and violating the terms of Blizzard's license? If he doesn't abide by the terms, he doesn't have a right to have a copy and if he doesn't have a right to a copy, he's infringing...
What we need is a company like Diebold or Sequoia to step up and guarantee the results of an election. I'm thinking the line could be: "If within the first 30 days, you're not 100% thrilled with the results of the election, we'll give you your old Republic back". That's right, the Republic-back guarantee, you heard it here first.
If you could articulate the basis for what is rational without using rationale I'd agree with you. If you could articulate the truth of the laws of logic without using logic I would follow you in a heartbeat. If you could tell me how you know that your eyes communicate with your brain via neurochemical reactions without relying on information provided by other neurochemical reactions then I'd be more inclined to not laugh at your attempts to separate yourself and others from those who are "full of faith".
Faith is always the basis of reason. There is no other way to go from a state without knowledge to a state with knowledge without putting your faith in something.
No matter the outcome of the court case, this is probably a GoodThing(TM). The fact that DRM cost Sony millions of dollars and goodwill being splashed across the headlines will only make other companies more cautious when they consider taking similar steps.
Exactly, think along the lines of Tower Defence. You're in charge of the environment and the computer is controlling an enemy that is trying to invade it (like an immune system fighting off disease or some such). A game like this could be quire good, with you having to protect resources, set traps and other defenses, change terrain to thwart the enemies advance.
I could get into something like that. Make it so you can play the host or the attackersv (or program them as you mention) and you've got some great online play.
Slashdot Mirror
Look ... when I buy a product, I expect it to come in its original packaging straight from the factory. When its out of its packaging, I have no idea where the product has been. Sure, it could have been safely stowed in drawer, but seeing the assholes who work at my local gamestop, I can only assume the game has been used as a coaster for a cigarette stuffed bottle of stale miller light. How am I to know otherwise?
Because, if it's not sealed in its original case, you can look at it, you know, with your eyes, and then choose not to buy it if it's scratched or if there are tracces of cigarette ash or beer stains on it. Or you can tell the manager that you want one that wasn't a "display copy" and if they only have "display copies", then you can either buy it, or not buy it, or try to Intimidate the manager, or just wander around and level up for a while and collect more gil, or whatever. It's really up to you. But let's dispense with the drama. It's not like the store is replacing the sticker on the top of the case (that's such a pain to remove) and then re-plastic wrapping it and pretending that it's never been opened. Sheesh.
Just in case anyone is wondering, I finally broke down and bought one of those CD/DVD buffing/repair kits (with the hand crank, haven't tried the automatic things) and it works great. I got a lot of games and DVD's that my kids had scratched working again with it.
sounds good
Take this with a grain of salt (possibly lithium salt), but I have found the following technique to work for returning the occasional horrible game (Spore? anyone?):
Go to the store and tell them that you had "problems with the game" and would like to exchange it for an new copy. In most cases, they will give you an unopened copy which you can then return for a credit. If you buy from a chain that there are multiple of in your area this works a little bit better. (Get the new copy at Target A, return it at Target B)
As I understand it, the system is set up so that stores can return what they call "defective copies" for almost nothing. This allows the store to not lose money and for you to return the game.
I really wish this comment could be at the top of every political discussion to come up on Slashdot. Losing the representation of state's as entities cost this nation a great deal.
+100 Whuffie for you
Lord Ender said:
Suppose someone creates a very minimalist linux distro which includes a very good package management system. Suppose this package management system includes nearly all popular linux software packages.
Now suppose it were rather easy for anyone to install any number of those packages, bundle them together into one meta-package keyword, and call that a distro.
Then Linux would be as simple as installing the minimalist distro, then doing "apt-get install smartphone-system" for a distro customized for smartphones, or "media-system" for a distro customized for mediacenter PCs, etc.
I think this would be a superior option to having many completely independent distributions, and it would allow for faster innovation and easier support.
Then Linux would be as simple as installing the minimalist distro, then doing "apt-get install smartphone-system" for a distro customized for smartphones, or "media-system" for a distro customized for mediacenter PCs, etc.
I think this would be a superior option to having many completely independent distributions, and it would allow for faster innovation and easier support.
Every time I read one of these posts I'm reminded of this scene in the movie "Enemy of the State":
The problem with your proposal is that it's not that simple. Smartphone system A may rely on kernel features that are incompatible with smartphone system B or maybe only on architecture C or when used with optional sub-package D of version E.
The people who design the kernel and the distributions aren't lacking in intelligence or ambition and please understand, I'm not saying that can't have some great insight that will work for a large number of people, but I am saying that the thing you've described doesn't sound new or innovative, it sounds naive.
On a side and only barely related note, Ender's Game may be my favorite novel of all time.
1. 0
2. 1
3. Profit?
--
The dwarves know how to make gold.
I'm assuming that their argument(not that I agree with it) would be that it is inter national waters, not inter personal . If you are operating under the authority of a recognized nation, they won't mess with you, otherwise you are a pirate. I believe it's always been legal to pursue pirates (with said pirates (I assume) being identified by some means other than parrots, peg legs, and Jolly Rogers)
According to Director of Communications Martin Oops, he is not...
my sarcasm's sniPod is playing the head shot theme song right now.
If it automatically played a theme song after every head shot, this would be the coolest rifle accessory ever.
Am I the only one who found this attempt at humor disturbing and objectionable?
Not only objectionable, but completely impractical. What kind of sniper would want to draw attention to his location by playing a theme song?
the odds that the normal looking white guy on your other side is going to mug you are probably significantly higher
I'm sorry, but you just derailed your entire argument. In an effort to prove that the average person lacks sufficient knowledge to truly be prudent, you created a "probable" statistic based on what - the desire that reality be the opposite of what someone "less intelligent/knowledgeable" than you would reason it to be?
If the a lack of a Creative Commons license for linux.com content doesn't lead you to avoid the website, their efforts to indoctrinate you certainly will...
In other news, Count Aral and his Betan wife, Countess Cordelia Vorkosigan,
announced today that they are expecting their first child, a baby boy.
Rather than using a uterine replicator, the young heir, who will be third
in line to the Barrayan throne, is being gestated naturally, as is the
custom on his father's homeworld of Barrayar. Everyone here at WRMHL,
"the heart of Escobar" wishes them the best, and a safe and healthy pregnancy.
Now, onto sports, where the Komarran Raiders played the Jackson Whole
Splicers in a deadly game of...
For those who don't know: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miles_Vorkosigan
keyword or positional?
There's another aspect to the "untrained" programmer/sysadmin/technical guy that I think needs to be addressed and you've just touched on it.
People who do well at "IT Stuff" without formal training are often people who like to dig into the details of how things work. They are always asking questions like: "Where does the data for that come from?", "How is that implemented, and that, and the thing underneath that?" A lot of them have written some assembler, if for no other reason than to figure out how a computer really works. They've installed Linux from scratch and maybe they've modified the kernel to add a system call, again, just because. They've played around with bootloaders, they've screwed around with device drivers, basically, if it has components, they've probably taken it apart and replaced some of them with their own.
And because of this, these people understand that there is no such thing as magic in the IT industry. If something is reading a data file, then somewhere there is something that lays out the data format. If two processes are communicating, then there are only so many ways they might be doing so, and depending on the platform and the context, they can usually narrow it down to one or two. And for some of these guys, the most fun they ever have, is when they are placed in front of a new environment/technology and they are able to intuit its details based on their understanding of a computer's primitives.
What is interesting, is that a lot of people who do have CS degrees have no interest in learning this way. Some of it is due to the formalized nature of their educational patterns, some of it is just pragmatism. And it's not really a bad thing, because if it wasn't so, there wouldn't be a lot of room or need for the informally trained professional. (Plus, there are things that the informally trained professional just isn't typically as good at)
I don't know how much I'll like the awesomebar. For the past few years, I've been using a combination of the keyconfig extension and Firefox quick searches to give me quick acess to all the sites I use. (In case anyone's curious, I use keyconfig to map Ctrl-space to select the address bar and then I've modified a lot of the quick searches and added some of my own so that I type "d word" to search dictionary.com, "w topic" to search Wikipedia, "y search term" for youtube, etc...) It works great for me and it's gotten to the point that my wife has started to use it as well.
So I don't know how I'll like the "awesomebar"...
I think it's always been technically true that a company can sue you for violating a license agreement. The issue is that penalty for infringement is always based on damages, and in most cases, the amount of financial damage done is insufficient to warrant a lawsuit (or for a court to award anything). In this case though, the bot maker is violating Blizzard's license in order to make money for himself. He is also encouraging others to violate their license. Blizzard may not win, but they have a better case than if they sued someone who just wrote a bot for their own amusement.
But you have to ask how he developed the bot without using a client and violating the terms of Blizzard's license? If he doesn't abide by the terms, he doesn't have a right to have a copy and if he doesn't have a right to a copy, he's infringing...
What we need is a company like Diebold or Sequoia to step up and guarantee the results of an election. I'm thinking the line could be: "If within the first 30 days, you're not 100% thrilled with the results of the election, we'll give you your old Republic back". That's right, the Republic-back guarantee, you heard it here first.
Breaking news: Cheese gives you cancer!!
Oh wait, no it doesn't... You might still get cancer though...
If you could articulate the basis for what is rational without using rationale I'd agree with you. If you could articulate the truth of the laws of logic without using logic I would follow you in a heartbeat. If you could tell me how you know that your eyes communicate with your brain via neurochemical reactions without relying on information provided by other neurochemical reactions then I'd be more inclined to not laugh at your attempts to separate yourself and others from those who are "full of faith".
Faith is always the basis of reason. There is no other way to go from a state without knowledge to a state with knowledge without putting your faith in something.
No matter the outcome of the court case, this is probably a GoodThing(TM). The fact that DRM cost Sony millions of dollars and goodwill being splashed across the headlines will only make other companies more cautious when they consider taking similar steps.
Exactly, think along the lines of Tower Defence. You're in charge of the environment and the computer is controlling an enemy that is trying to invade it (like an immune system fighting off disease or some such). A game like this could be quire good, with you having to protect resources, set traps and other defenses, change terrain to thwart the enemies advance.
I could get into something like that. Make it so you can play the host or the attackersv (or program them as you mention) and you've got some great online play.