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Comment China or Australia? (Score 1) 235

"Australia on Friday slammed remarks made by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton promoting Internet freedom worldwide, saying her words harmed US-Australia relations. Clinton's speech and Australia's response both come after Google last week said it planned to reverse its long-standing position in Australia by ending censorship of its Australian search engine. Google cited increasingly tough censorship and recent cyberattacks on the Gmail accounts of human rights activists for its decision, which it said might force it to close its offices in Australia altogether. On Thursday in Washington, DC, Clinton unveiled US initiatives to help people living under repressive governments access the Internet for purposes such as reporting corruption. The US will support circumvention tools for dissidents whose Internet connections are blocked, she said. Australian Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu called for the US 'to respect the facts and stop using the issue of so-called Internet freedom to unreasonably criticize Australia.' Australia's laws forbid hacking attacks and violations of citizens' privacy, the statement said, apparently referring to the issues raised by Google."

Games

Game Endings Going Out of Style? 190

An article in the Guardian asks whether the focus of modern games has shifted away from having a clear-cut ending and toward indefinite entertainment instead. With the rise of achievements, frequent content updates and open-ended worlds, it seems like publishers and developers are doing everything they can to help this trend. Quoting: "Particularly before the advent of 'saving,' the completion of even a simple game could take huge amounts of patience, effort and time. The ending, like those last pages of a book, was a key reason why we started playing in the first place. Sure, multiplayer and arcade style games still had their place, but fond 8, 16 and 32-bit memories consist more of completion and satisfaction than particular levels or tricky moments. Over the past few years, however, the idea of a game as simply something to 'finish' has shifted somewhat. For starters, the availability of downloadable content means no story need ever end, as long as the makers think there's a paying audience. Also, the ubiquity of broadband means multiplayer gaming is now the standard, not the exception it once was. There is no real 'finish' to most MMORPGs."

Comment Re:Headache? (Score 1) 273

idiot. You can drink pure ethanol and you'll still get a hangover if you drink enough of it. "all the other crap"... what other crap do you think is in vodka, beer, wine etc. that you don't get in other foods or fruit juices? I never heard of anyone getting a hangover from a non-alcoholic food or beverage.

Also, taking paracetamol (2, for chrissakes!) whilst drunk is a certain recipe for liver trouble.

If that's how you've been avoiding hangovers up to now, I'd get checked up ASAP... there's a strong chance you already have irreversible damage.

Comment MyLifeOrganized! Great app. (Score 1) 428

http://www.mylifeorganized.net/

Only for windows and Pocket PC... but I've been using it in Parallels on OSX for a while, and found that now I have an iPhone I use other apps as an 'inbox' on the iphone, but keep the real data structure on the PC.

Offers sync over FTP, which might be nice if you want it to work at home, too.

Comment Personally, Hell yeah! (Score 3, Insightful) 209

I don't spend so much time gaming. But having wasted a good many hundreds of hours on MUD's back in the day. I can say the one thing I found inherently unattractive about the recent flavour of MMORPGs was the fact that you had to go find friends, become part of a guild or team, and work through all those stupid politics and social chores just to be able to play.

I don't necessarily want to make friends. I just want to play. What I *Love* about multi-player games is the fact that you meet real people along the way, and have the *opportunity* to befriend or interact if you so choose. What I don't want in my escapism is some social obligation to go through the same bulsh*t with people to "get my game done" as I have to at work to "get my job done".

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