well...call of Cthulhu, alone in the dark, eternal darkness, and quite a few others are at least loosely based, Cthulhu mythos is actually quite common in video games.
Back to the article though, I have to wholeheartedly agree with his views, I've noticed the same for a while. Maybe he should look to a smaller, independent developer to work with? I can think of quite a few talented groups that would jump at the chance... If you want creativity you can't really go to the big guys anymore.
I thought this was a story on Cal city as well...land-wise the city is actually pretty big (absolutely huge actually...just miles in between some houses) and a lot of people in so-cal are aware of it...mostly for the fact that they cut a shitload of roads for new development and never did anything with it.
In response to the article though...sounds like it's about time to take a trip down to Corona with a truck and a sawzall
It's awful but there's no DSL or Cable here yet, for larger files i use the SAT connection (I peak around 90kB/sec, but can only get that in bursts, and only around 200 megs a day until it's capped to sub dial-up speeds) for real-time stuff I use a dial-up line. I don't think my ping on the satellite has ever dropped below 2200ms, my average ping is around 3000.
As an ex-UO player (thank you EA for trying to make UO exactly like WoW, if I liked WoW i would have just switched to that when it came out thank you! Nice job alienating all your existing player base with new expansions in an attempt to appeal to the new market)I have to say this is NOTHING new for EA to do, I cant read the article from here but to me it doesn't sound like they're talking about buying "ammo" or something like that, it sounds like the "game code" store for ultima where you can buy special items, slot upgrades, etc... it was somewhat mentioned up earlier also, the site EA sells these from is http://www.uogamecodes.com/ . what they sell changes from time to time, they even (cant see site from here, they may not have it anymore) sell "advanced character" tokens, where you buy a premade character template with ~80 skill in different areas depending on character. (for those not familiar with ultima, it doesn't use levels, you level different skills individually, your class name is dynamicly generated based on what your highest skill is, and you can change skills at any time) For $20 you could buy one of those and for some of the templates (for example, animal tamer) it would easily replace a few month's worth of skill leveling. They also sell items like anniversary gifts, evil house decor set, etc.. All in all completely unbalanced the game.
I was an Adelphia Customer as they made the transition over to Time Warner, and had one of Adelphia's DVR recievers (this was back when I still watched tv). About a month before my service was set to end, I received a green "collections agency" slip in the mail for ~$2000 stating that I had failed to turn in the receiver and modem I was leasing from them. First two problems that popped up in my mind. 1. My service wasn't set to end for another month and 2. I didn't have internet service with them, and didn't have one of their modems, which they claimed to be worth ~$1000 on the collections slip. Luckily I lived at that time only about 2-3 blocks from the local Adelphia/Time Warner building. I showed up, cable box in hand, set it on the desk and handed them the collections slip and my bill, stating that I wasn't even supposed to turn it in for another month, and that I didn't have a modem. After finally getting someone there to research my problem a bit for me, it turned out that the DVR box also "counted" as a modem, so they had counted it twice (incorrectly, of course), and that the transition had caused them to lose records when switching to the new systems, so they really had no reliable record of which customers had which receivers.
They finally managed to clear it up for me, but it was pretty disturbing to know a major company like that "lost" all these records.
Personally, the BBC one was narrated a bit better anyways, nothing against Sigourney Weaver just having seen them both that's how i feel, her voice just didn't "fit" to me, was a little distracting from the footage. Other than the narration it's the same video clips.
I don't think that the problem is that cars are becoming too safe, I think that the problem is the DMV no longer seems to care and hands out licenses to anyone who can do a right turn.
My first DMV test was to pull out of the DMV onto a dead street, go around the block staying to the right so I'd never have to merge, and pull straight back into the DMV. What exactly did that test?
The post above about cars becoming entertainment centers also hits it dead on too, driving a small car I find myself using the horn and swerving to avoid people who are more often than not distracted, or just plain don't check their mirrors/sides before merging or turning. Here in Southern California the day just isn't complete unless one person nearly crashes into me.
Another huge problem I see often is people trying to drive SUVs as if they are small cars, doing 85MPH on side streets, cutting in front of traffic even though they can't accelerate to keep up. I'd say at least 90% of the "dangerous" drivers I see on the road are in SUVs. Personally I believe SUVs and larger trucks should require a different class license and different testing much like a motorcycle does.
The final problem I believe adds to dangerous driving is automatic transmissions, they seem to enable you to be further distracted while driving as you no longer have to operate the clutch and shift gears. Even I have to admit when I'm driving an automatic I feel far more "detached" from the road and the car, I don't know how to describe it but I'm sure anyone else here who has a standard transmission will know what I'm talking about.
Just wanted to point out from the post above, this is average salary, and costs of living vary drastically between states. 53k pre-tax working here in California is maybe enough to live off ramen noodles in 1 room sector8 apartments. This is far outside the city too, around the actual cities where the jobs are it's far worse. (which is why in California most people commute, in this area at least, an average of 75 miles each way)
go slightly east to Arizona (just outside phoenix) though, and it's enough to have a small house and nice car.
Not really aimed at the parent post so much as just being more specific in what he said. Though it may be what ATT is trying to say, it should be noted that file sharing is NOT illegal, and though it is heavily used for illegal purposes it is also heavily used for legal purposes.
Off the top of my head a few legal uses that, on the ISP side, would be indistinguishable from illegal uses.
1. Downloads for open source projects such as OpenOffice, Mandriva, ubuntu, and NetBSD are offered over P2P, and is the recommended download method (saves the distributors in bandwidth, kinda important in gratis software)
2. World of Warcraft's auto-update tool (P2P using
BitTorrent protocol)
They might just as well go farther and ban IP, because ALL the protocols on top of it contribute to illegal actions.
"Does anybody really need 1 terabyte hard drives ? I think NOT"
really? nobody really needs any more than 128k of memory then either then huh? Every one of my machines has at LEAST 1 tb in it. I must pirate TONS of stuff then, right?
WRONG
Ever heard of mythtv? pop in your dvd, rip it, put your master copy away and enjoy being able to select your movies and play on demand. Source code, linux ISO images, raw 3d models/level files, tons of material I have takes up massive amounts of space.
As for the story at hand, this is not the ISP's job. Should people infringe copyright by downloading movies? No. Should it be the ISP's job to spy on everything we do just IN CASE we do do something illegal? HELL NO. They're the internet service provider, not the internet service nanny. Next step after this i guess is make it the isp's job to filter porn so our virgin american eyes can't see it....then after that maybe start filtering "political dissent", to keep the hate down you know?
I wonder... Could this be considered copyright infringement since the private, internal emails are being duplicated without the owner's consent and sold to the MPAA. It's somewhat like the MPAA is buying bootleg emails.
Not that i know if that would hold up or not, it would just be sweet, sweet justice for someone to sue the MPAA for copyright infringement and win.
Found the hours, (http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/epg/theGuide.jsp) looks like they're getting away with starting it all in prime time. Starting 7pm pacific this Friday they're playing the 6 most "offensive" south park episodes uncensored followed directly by the uncensored "Team America: World Police" at 10
if this really is a poke at the FCC, i think it's hilarious. Of course, back on topic, how can they even have a say in cabletv? I mean, I could have sworn the FCC is only in charge of regulating public airwaves.
First off, i don't really watch tv, but my roommates ordered directv so from time to time ill tune in to catch a new south-park or watch a futurama re-run which I'm working on my computer, tv's off about 6 days 23 hours a week though, just nothing on that's worth wasting my time. I did see, however, comedy central is going to run "Team America: World Police" and South Park un-censored, I think just for one night, but you gotta wonder if they got wind of this and were taking a poke at the FCC. (not at all unlike comedy central, or trey+matt). I don't know the day or time they'll be showing it though, and I already have a copy of the movie, but for those that haven't seen it the theme song... well, lets just say if profanity offends you, you wont like it at all :P
Just gotta wonder if it's related.
Oh well, though I think this is wrong for the FCC to do, maybe it will have the nice side effect of my roommates canceling the service and spending the extra $50 a month on something more entertaining, like beer.
Funny story and all, but I think everyone's missing an important lil question here. Now i dont know if Japan is different than the US in this way but generally you must secure classified information in a vault or secure system after using it, you can't make copies to an insecure system, you normally have to go to a "secure" computer center and work off it's system, or have a special "secure" computer that's not connected to the normal network to access information. This soldier was most likely breaking the rules just by having a copy on that computer at all.
I'm a verizon/vzw customer. (only DSL provider here is verizon, only cell with decent coverage is VZW, cingular normally ok but there's a ton of cingular dead zones, but back on topic..)
If all you want from verizon is the dsl, not the phone service, ask them and they'll do it, you just have to pay some stupid line fee (but it's much smaller than a phone bill, like $6 a month IIRC)
I have small buisness but at my old apartment i had it for VZ residential too.
Im curious, how do they plan on making this work? Are blizzard and the other MMO makers supposed to modify their games and produce a "China" version? It specifies in the article it's a external piece of software that does that, but how would this work in a MMO where points are calculated server side, not client, where the program is not at.
Granted it's a stupid idea either way, and censorship is just plain wrong. Nothing we can do about it though, hopefully it at least has the good side effect of re-balancing the in-game worlds by reducing the number of gold/item farmers.
Finally, i can learn more new songs... when the tab sites went down i was so ticked off, most of what i like to learn to play is impossible/very hard to find. I browse bookstores for tab/sheet music (tab wasnt all that was taken down) from time to time, generally cant find anything current, or anything im intersted in learning. Luckily i had archived good portions of the categories i liked on Olga before it went down, so i did have a little.
the music industry needs to play a little catch-up with technology, it's the 21st century, their outdated tactics may keep the stranglehold on people who dont know better, but it WILL catch up with them.
Also, someone above said dont use tab, learn on your own. While that's great and most guitar players can do that given time, that's about akin to rewriting openal for your game, the tab may not be 100% correct but it can help you figure it out far faster than if you started completely from scratch. Personally ill make modifications to the tab i download as i play it more, and im sure im not alone with that.
Re:
About $500 if memory serves...
Re: Re: New Blood is Welcome
well...call of Cthulhu, alone in the dark, eternal darkness, and quite a few others are at least loosely based, Cthulhu mythos is actually quite common in video games.
Back to the article though, I have to wholeheartedly agree with his views, I've noticed the same for a while. Maybe he should look to a smaller, independent developer to work with? I can think of quite a few talented groups that would jump at the chance... If you want creativity you can't really go to the big guys anymore.
Confused me too...
I thought this was a story on Cal city as well...land-wise the city is actually pretty big (absolutely huge actually...just miles in between some houses) and a lot of people in so-cal are aware of it...mostly for the fact that they cut a shitload of roads for new development and never did anything with it.
In response to the article though...sounds like it's about time to take a trip down to Corona with a truck and a sawzall
I use a satellite connection...
It's awful but there's no DSL or Cable here yet, for larger files i use the SAT connection (I peak around 90kB/sec, but can only get that in bursts, and only around 200 megs a day until it's capped to sub dial-up speeds) for real-time stuff I use a dial-up line. I don't think my ping on the satellite has ever dropped below 2200ms, my average ping is around 3000.
Google cache?
anyone know the forum address? maybe the posts are cached. (I'd look myself but I cant get out to the site from here)
sounds like what ea did to ultima...
As an ex-UO player (thank you EA for trying to make UO exactly like WoW, if I liked WoW i would have just switched to that when it came out thank you! Nice job alienating all your existing player base with new expansions in an attempt to appeal to the new market)I have to say this is NOTHING new for EA to do, I cant read the article from here but to me it doesn't sound like they're talking about buying "ammo" or something like that, it sounds like the "game code" store for ultima where you can buy special items, slot upgrades, etc... it was somewhat mentioned up earlier also, the site EA sells these from is http://www.uogamecodes.com/ . what they sell changes from time to time, they even (cant see site from here, they may not have it anymore) sell "advanced character" tokens, where you buy a premade character template with ~80 skill in different areas depending on character. (for those not familiar with ultima, it doesn't use levels, you level different skills individually, your class name is dynamicly generated based on what your highest skill is, and you can change skills at any time) For $20 you could buy one of those and for some of the templates (for example, animal tamer) it would easily replace a few month's worth of skill leveling. They also sell items like anniversary gifts, evil house decor set, etc.. All in all completely unbalanced the game.
Time Warner has done similar...
I was an Adelphia Customer as they made the transition over to Time Warner, and had one of Adelphia's DVR recievers (this was back when I still watched tv). About a month before my service was set to end, I received a green "collections agency" slip in the mail for ~$2000 stating that I had failed to turn in the receiver and modem I was leasing from them. First two problems that popped up in my mind. 1. My service wasn't set to end for another month and 2. I didn't have internet service with them, and didn't have one of their modems, which they claimed to be worth ~$1000 on the collections slip. Luckily I lived at that time only about 2-3 blocks from the local Adelphia/Time Warner building. I showed up, cable box in hand, set it on the desk and handed them the collections slip and my bill, stating that I wasn't even supposed to turn it in for another month, and that I didn't have a modem. After finally getting someone there to research my problem a bit for me, it turned out that the DVR box also "counted" as a modem, so they had counted it twice (incorrectly, of course), and that the transition had caused them to lose records when switching to the new systems, so they really had no reliable record of which customers had which receivers.
They finally managed to clear it up for me, but it was pretty disturbing to know a major company like that "lost" all these records.
What's the big deal?
Personally, the BBC one was narrated a bit better anyways, nothing against Sigourney Weaver just having seen them both that's how i feel, her voice just didn't "fit" to me, was a little distracting from the footage. Other than the narration it's the same video clips.
The real problem...
I don't think that the problem is that cars are becoming too safe, I think that the problem is the DMV no longer seems to care and hands out licenses to anyone who can do a right turn.
My first DMV test was to pull out of the DMV onto a dead street, go around the block staying to the right so I'd never have to merge, and pull straight back into the DMV. What exactly did that test?
The post above about cars becoming entertainment centers also hits it dead on too, driving a small car I find myself using the horn and swerving to avoid people who are more often than not distracted, or just plain don't check their mirrors/sides before merging or turning. Here in Southern California the day just isn't complete unless one person nearly crashes into me.
Another huge problem I see often is people trying to drive SUVs as if they are small cars, doing 85MPH on side streets, cutting in front of traffic even though they can't accelerate to keep up. I'd say at least 90% of the "dangerous" drivers I see on the road are in SUVs. Personally I believe SUVs and larger trucks should require a different class license and different testing much like a motorcycle does.
The final problem I believe adds to dangerous driving is automatic transmissions, they seem to enable you to be further distracted while driving as you no longer have to operate the clutch and shift gears. Even I have to admit when I'm driving an automatic I feel far more "detached" from the road and the car, I don't know how to describe it but I'm sure anyone else here who has a standard transmission will know what I'm talking about.
Re: I agree...
Just wanted to point out from the post above, this is average salary, and costs of living vary drastically between states. 53k pre-tax working here in California is maybe enough to live off ramen noodles in 1 room sector8 apartments. This is far outside the city too, around the actual cities where the jobs are it's far worse. (which is why in California most people commute, in this area at least, an average of 75 miles each way)
go slightly east to Arizona (just outside phoenix) though, and it's enough to have a small house and nice car.
Re: ???
Not really aimed at the parent post so much as just being more specific in what he said. Though it may be what ATT is trying to say, it should be noted that file sharing is NOT illegal, and though it is heavily used for illegal purposes it is also heavily used for legal purposes.
Off the top of my head a few legal uses that, on the ISP side, would be indistinguishable from illegal uses.
1. Downloads for open source projects such as OpenOffice, Mandriva, ubuntu, and NetBSD are offered over P2P, and is the recommended download method (saves the distributors in bandwidth, kinda important in gratis software)
2. World of Warcraft's auto-update tool (P2P using
BitTorrent protocol)
They might just as well go farther and ban IP, because ALL the protocols on top of it contribute to illegal actions.
Re: File Sharing
"Does anybody really need 1 terabyte hard drives ? I think NOT"
really? nobody really needs any more than 128k of memory then either then huh? Every one of my machines has at LEAST 1 tb in it. I must pirate TONS of stuff then, right?
WRONG
Ever heard of mythtv? pop in your dvd, rip it, put your master copy away and enjoy being able to select your movies and play on demand. Source code, linux ISO images, raw 3d models/level files, tons of material I have takes up massive amounts of space.
As for the story at hand, this is not the ISP's job. Should people infringe copyright by downloading movies? No. Should it be the ISP's job to spy on everything we do just IN CASE we do do something illegal? HELL NO. They're the internet service provider, not the internet service nanny. Next step after this i guess is make it the isp's job to filter porn so our virgin american eyes can't see it....then after that maybe start filtering "political dissent", to keep the hate down you know?
hmmm
I wonder... Could this be considered copyright infringement since the private, internal emails are being duplicated without the owner's consent and sold to the MPAA. It's somewhat like the MPAA is buying bootleg emails.
Not that i know if that would hold up or not, it would just be sweet, sweet justice for someone to sue the MPAA for copyright infringement and win.
right....
I have no words for this, but this picture pretty much sums up what i feel....
http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts/science/6df7/
Re: Re: Hmm...I wonder
Found the hours, (http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/epg/theGuide.jsp) looks like they're getting away with starting it all in prime time. Starting 7pm pacific this Friday they're playing the 6 most "offensive" south park episodes uncensored followed directly by the uncensored "Team America: World Police" at 10
if this really is a poke at the FCC, i think it's hilarious. Of course, back on topic, how can they even have a say in cabletv? I mean, I could have sworn the FCC is only in charge of regulating public airwaves.
Hmm...I wonder
First off, i don't really watch tv, but my roommates ordered directv so from time to time ill tune in to catch a new south-park or watch a futurama re-run which I'm working on my computer, tv's off about 6 days 23 hours a week though, just nothing on that's worth wasting my time. I did see, however, comedy central is going to run "Team America: World Police" and South Park un-censored, I think just for one night, but you gotta wonder if they got wind of this and were taking a poke at the FCC. (not at all unlike comedy central, or trey+matt). I don't know the day or time they'll be showing it though, and I already have a copy of the movie, but for those that haven't seen it the theme song... well, lets just say if profanity offends you, you wont like it at all :P
Just gotta wonder if it's related.
Oh well, though I think this is wrong for the FCC to do, maybe it will have the nice side effect of my roommates canceling the service and spending the extra $50 a month on something more entertaining, like beer.
Why was it even on the computer?
Funny story and all, but I think everyone's missing an important lil question here. Now i dont know if Japan is different than the US in this way but generally you must secure classified information in a vault or secure system after using it, you can't make copies to an insecure system, you normally have to go to a "secure" computer center and work off it's system, or have a special "secure" computer that's not connected to the normal network to access information. This soldier was most likely breaking the rules just by having a copy on that computer at all.
how to make verizon dsl a little bit cheaper
I'm a verizon/vzw customer. (only DSL provider here is verizon, only cell with decent coverage is VZW, cingular normally ok but there's a ton of cingular dead zones, but back on topic..)
If all you want from verizon is the dsl, not the phone service, ask them and they'll do it, you just have to pay some stupid line fee (but it's much smaller than a phone bill, like $6 a month IIRC)
I have small buisness but at my old apartment i had it for VZ residential too.
How exactly would this work?
Im curious, how do they plan on making this work? Are blizzard and the other MMO makers supposed to modify their games and produce a "China" version? It specifies in the article it's a external piece of software that does that, but how would this work in a MMO where points are calculated server side, not client, where the program is not at.
Granted it's a stupid idea either way, and censorship is just plain wrong. Nothing we can do about it though, hopefully it at least has the good side effect of re-balancing the in-game worlds by reducing the number of gold/item farmers.
SWEET!
Finally, i can learn more new songs... when the tab sites went down i was so ticked off, most of what i like to learn to play is impossible/very hard to find. I browse bookstores for tab/sheet music (tab wasnt all that was taken down) from time to time, generally cant find anything current, or anything im intersted in learning. Luckily i had archived good portions of the categories i liked on Olga before it went down, so i did have a little.
the music industry needs to play a little catch-up with technology, it's the 21st century, their outdated tactics may keep the stranglehold on people who dont know better, but it WILL catch up with them.
Also, someone above said dont use tab, learn on your own. While that's great and most guitar players can do that given time, that's about akin to rewriting openal for your game, the tab may not be 100% correct but it can help you figure it out far faster than if you started completely from scratch. Personally ill make modifications to the tab i download as i play it more, and im sure im not alone with that.