Repetitive skill-less tasks that take forever and are required to get to the promised exciting parts of the game.

It's not like that. I will admit to repetitive, but skill helps tremendously. The ban was applied to accounts using a bot that automated PvP...that means one human against another. Or, rather, twenty humans against twenty others. Since humans are so ingenious, it can be quite challenging, particularly against people who are experienced. However, since it was twenty against twenty a bot could be "carried" by nineteen humans and gain honor, which is coin with which to buy armour and weapons. The armour and weapons didn't allow you to get to an exciting part of the game, it made it more difficult for other human-operated characters to kill you. The bot allowed the owner to start it and leave, coming back hours later to spend the coins that it had received.

~Loyal

Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded. Yogi Berra

What's the best example you know of for open-source documentation?

It's not open-source documentation, but the same general principles ought to apply. Years ago I bought an Epson dot matrix printer. The first chapter was called "Quick Start." Quick Start told you how to get up and running with the minimum of fuss. For example, it said, "connect all the cables" instead of saying, "connect plug a (pictured) of cable monster (pictured) to jack b (pictured) of printer 345DEF (pictured), along with all the warnings about what damages and injuries might be caused by improper connections of cables. The manual's author assumed the buyer was fairly knowledgeable and simply wanted to print his first file as quickly as possible. So, with a task at hand, and a knowledgeable user, the chapter because a quick, two page, guide that served as either an introduction or a reminder of how things work.

Chapter 2 did the same as chapter 1, but this time with all of the details. People used it to set their printer up using chapter 1, then, if they had trouble, would go to the corresponding portion of chapter 2.

Chapter 3 introduced seldom-used features by describing a task that required that feature and then describing all of the steps necessary to use that feature. It was only with chapter 4 or subsequent chapters that every detail of every possibility was described.

In short, the manual was task-oriented, tasks being the things the user wanted to accomplish, rather then being function-oriented, functions being the things that various parts of the printer were capable of. Engineers and programmers tend to be function-oriented because they design the various functions. Users tend to be task-oriented because things are tools used to get other things done.

I wrote a manual based on the organization of the Epson manual years later. I heard one story of an operator holding up my manual, and telling the speakers, "that's the way to write a manual." It's one of my proudest accomplishments.

~Loyal

This is very important, because religious wackos tend to be the ones against modern science and technology.

True. But then, irreligious wackos tend to be as well.

~Loyal

Not sure what your idea of recent is, but I have some pretty old books on mathematical astronomy dating back to the 70's that all refer to the Earth as an oblate spheroid.

Usually, you divide the "recent" time by the lifetime of the object in question. So, if we're talking about Mayflies then recent is anytime within the last 18 minutes. Since we're talking about the Earth, then you divide the time since the very early 70s (45 years) by the age of the earth (6000 years) to get 0.7%, so, yeah. That's recent.

~Loyal
 

It's pretty obvious to all but the hopelessly deluded that this event had absolutely nothing to do with free speech. Not even those offering that justification actually believe it.

Group A believes something. Group B believes the contrary. Group A threatens to kill group B if they say the contrary. Group B says the contrary. It smells like free speech to me.

~Loyal

I warn you - A government big enough to protect you is strong enough to destroy you.

A government small enough to be unable to destroy you is small enough to be destroyed by the government next door.

~Loyal

That's the level of deliberate stirring we're seeing and it is designed to get a response - bbq in synagogue level squared. If I was in law enforcement in that place I'd make them have their international trollfest way out in the desert so bystanders don't get killed if someone takes the bait.

Really? Do you feel the same way when the shoe's on the other foot? Like when people who subscribe to macro-evolutionary theory take the Ichthys symbol that Christians have used for about twenty centuries, put little footies on it and replace the "Ichthys" with "DARWIN"? Should the guys with that symbol on their cars be forced to drive them out in the desert?

~Loyal

The whole purpose of this contest was to attract a Jihadi to shoot.

Yeah, 'cause there's no way this could have been about free speech! If those Texans would just shut up about their opinion of Muhammad, and keep it to themselves, then they could practice all the free speech they wanted.

Why else the extra extra guards?

So that's why Obama has all of those Secret Service guys!

~Loyal

I'm tempted to defend Obama here by saying that if Bush were still in office, he'd probably have a televised national speech explaining why the NSA needs these powers to prevent a WMD attack or something. And by contrast, Obama has not publicly come out in favor supporting renewal. However, Obama is clearly working behind the scenes to push renewal.

So...you're advocating against transparency?

~Loyal

This is another power grab by the religious right.

You remind me of Bluto Blutarsky when he was ranting about it not being over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor, in the movie Animal House. Of course, the Germans didn't bomb Pearl Harbor, and neither is this a power grab by the religious right for the simple reason that it isn't a power grab. A power grab is when one uses political power to force someone else to do something they don't want to do, or force them not to do something that they want to do.

Instead, this is a reaction to a previous power grab by the homosexuals wherein they forced bakers to provide cakes for the marriage of homosexuals. Do you see who is doing the forcing? It's the homosexuals. Do you see who doesn't want to do something? It's the religious right. Do you see what they are being forced to do that they don't want? It's provide cakes for homosexual marriages. So, who has made a power grab? It's the homosexuals.

It is connected to their efforts to restrict sex (through access to contraception, sex education, abortion, etc) and control the lives of Americans in the bedroom.

If, in fact, there is such a connection it's a remote one. The more direct connection is not in the bedroom, but rather in the store front, or the service location. The religious right wants to provide certain products or services and not provide others. Homosexuals have used political power to force a choice on them. Either the religious right can provide cakes to whom they don't want to provide cakes to, or they can quit providing cakes altogether. Neither choice would be what they would prefer to choose if they were free to do so.

But you know what? Every article, every boycott and every protest is pushing them back. Similar bills are stalling or failing. The outrage at actions like these are causing more and more Americans to leave their religion in disgust. The more we drag this bullshit into the light, the more the theocrats feel the heat.

You sound like those salesmen selling multi-level marketing. "Don't you want to get into this opportunity early? Everyone is buying in! Don't be the last one to have a piece of this action!"

~Loyal

"Never mind; he's on a roll."

A free market solution never worked in the Jim Crow south and it wont work now.

A free market solution never worked in the Jim Crow south because a free market solution was never tried in the Jim Crow south. Jim Crow laws refer to a set of laws that governments created and that determined what businesses could and could not do. A free market solution is free because it's free from government intervention. The Jim Crow south was not free from government intervention because government intervened in what businesses could and could not do.

~Loyal

When people are proponents of laws like these I just hope they simply haven't thought about their opinion thoroughly enough. But here is someone who fully knows the ramifications of this opinion and is actually proud of it. I don't meet people like this often, and it is very chilling.

I agree with everything DarkOx said.

I simply couldn't imagine someone walking into a store with a "Whites Only" sign on the door and hear him say "Good for them for sticking up for their convictions." But it is clear that DarkOx is such a person.

I wouldn't say that. Rather--I'm glad that neither the government nor anyone else can force them to take the sign down. It's kind of like saying, "I may not agree with what you say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."

~Loyal

Nazi Germany was not opposed to religion -- they were very specifically Christian.

Hitler and Nazi Germany were opposed to religion. Hitler's problem was that Germany was, as you so clearly stated, 94% Christian, so they couldn't be seen as being opposed to Christianity. Thus, the quote you found.

~Loyal

Do you believe that business owner should have the legal ability to refuse service to a black/hispanic/asian person, or a woman?...If so, why are you an bigot?

Do you believe that a white person should have the legal ability to refuse to marry (as in, become the spouse of) a black person? If so, why are you a bigot?

~Loyal