Uh. I am at a real loss on how to explain this.

-Joke Explainer

and hitmen!

I don't think you grasped the theme here.

A neutron walks into a bar and asks the bartender, "How much for a drink?"

"For you, no charge."

Wake me up when Microsoft comes up with a tool that allows non-coder graphic designers or animators to create entire apps in Silverlight with the same ease that you can with Flash.

That's the assumption sideline-commenting non-designer coders who aren't in the web or multimedia industry make, like a lot of guys here in Slashdot who do mostly non-frontend stuff. Until then, don't expect Flash to vanish anytime soon.

Same case goes for HTML5. Without proper authoring tools for the non-programmer layman, don't expect any other tech to knock off Flash from its perch. Nothing comes close to the Flash Professional authoring tool's ability for creating vector animations and integrating motion, sound and interactivity with ease today.

Even then, Adobe CTO Kevin Lynch announced that Adobe would be the 1st one to build the same kind of tools for HTML5. In fact, they've already built HTML5 + CSS3 support for Dreamweaver.

As for video, there's a good reason Flash exploded on the net long before it had the capability to play videos, so don't expect alternative video players to end it either.

Heck, I heard even Blizzard used Flash for certain parts of Starcraft 2's UI. [citation needed]

while on the subject of rare Star Wars footage, check out Return of the Ewok, a mockumentary shot by the original cast and crew during the filming of Return of the Jedi.

It's got a lot of funny interesting tidbits pretty rare to find, even on the net (and much much harder to find than the Star Wars Christmas special), so check it out.

Warwick Davis as Wicket is the protagonist and it's pretty interesting how he was just a kid when they shot ROTJ. The name of the film was actually even Revenge of the Jedi during filming of Return of the Ewok.

Seeds don't need light when they're just sprouting. That's why you can plant them buried under soil, then they start to sprout.

Think of it as them subsisting on their "egg yolk" (the twin "bean" parts) while they're still in the process of sprouting. As the plant use them up in sprouting and forming leaves, the "bean" parts shrivel up and then the plant starts to rely on its roots and leaves for food and water.

What the article describes most likely looks more like a bean sprout than a full-blown pea plant.

It's a top down racer and a completely different animal, like the Micromachines games on NES. As such, it's a completely different animal and I don't enjoy it much because of the limited size of the map you see.

Death Track was awesome. Resurrection was an absolute abomination that tarnished the name.

Members of Future Crew turned into Remedy Entertainment later on. The Demoscene is awesome.

A number of people who work in the industry today came from the demoscene.

It didn't perform good enough under DOSBox.

Yup! If Torchlight only had multiplayer, it wouldn't have needed much of a story at all. Fun-ness of the gameplay would have been enough.

Proof of this is the ridiculous slew and success of MMORPGs coming from Asia that have zero story and are all about level grinding and looting: I'm looking at you MU Online and Perfect World! (the parent company of which bought Runic and will be funding the Torchlight MMO).

In fact, it's such a good Diablo clone that all that latent muscle memory you stored from playing Diablo II all those years ago would kick in without a hitch and make you feel right at home. Great job by Runic! :)

Excellent point. If Diablo III will continue to be internet-only with zero LAN support, that could be how Torchlight can grab a respectable enough chunk of the Diablo market segment. That'd be a sale from me as well :)

Runic really *really* needs to be able to release this way before Diablo III comes out.

Torchlight 1 was excellent for scratching the Diablo itch except that it painfully lacked multiplayer/coop -> that was what made the Diablo series really really fun and was very sorely missed. All in all that was my only Torchlight gripe, and was why I stopped playing it after a while. Collecting randomized bling ain't as fun if you can't show 'em off and trade 'em with others.

If this comes out at roughly the same time as Diablo III, it'll not only be a problem of gaining wallets+mindshare, but also the big one of timeshare.

People playing other games means less time playing your game, and with multi-player games, critical mass of players is very very important. It's really frustrating at how there aren't enough players to play with who have decent pings if you're in Asia, like with Streetfighter IV on PC and Borderlands.

If there aren't enough players online to play with, it'll make the game a little less attractive.

Anyway, Runic did a good job with Torchlight. The modest system requirements were a big plus too as it allowed you to run it on netbooks with less horsepower. Hope they're able to push the sequel out the window in time to avoid being slaughtered by Diablo III.

Speaking of ammonia, the crew on the ISS are in a pretty interesting relationship dynamic.

I mean everyone up there's drinking the recycled pee of their crewmates.

Shhh! Don't tell kids who're aspiring Astronauts!