I think the plan is that if we get all 6 billion monkeys slapping their balls against a keyboard, hopefully we will get Shakespeare before we go extinct.

And Unicorn Meat is real! You just have to embark over a "good" forest or shrubland biome. http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/40d:Unicorn - Look for serene, mirthful, or joyous wilds. You too can enjoy Unicorn Tallow Biscuits, Unicorn Meat Stew, Unicorn Chopped Liver Roast...

Speaking as a Cox subscriber, I can say that Cox is a poor-quality ISP overall, and this move, while disappointing, does not surprise me.

Nope! Now, hand me that pickaxe, I need to dig myself a memory upgrade.

http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/Computing

The first ad with sound that I encountered on the internet was an ad for some soda. (Coke or pepsi, don't know, don't care)

You get 1 guess what the sound effect was. :)

Yep, that's right. "KA-CHUNK. SLLLLLLLLLLLLUUUUUUUUUUUURRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPPPPPPPPPPPPPP! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"
(wow even slashdot's posting filter thinks my TEXT rendition is annoying :)

You get 1 guess where I was when I encountered that ad. :)

Yep, that's right, at work. I had the sound turned up because I was listening to music that was quiet, too.

I installed Proxomitron that same day. I even wrote some custom filters for it. When that project died I switched to the hosts file everyone knows about. ( http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm - #3 on Google for "hosts")

To all sites: serious about getting viewers to see your ads?

First, don't make them so damn annoying. Don't allow crappy ads on your site, period.
Second, use your own ad server. If it's not in the hosts file, I don't block it unless it becomes an annoyance.

I had AVG give me a false positive on a .cs (text) file once, because it contained the word "poison".

I don't hate Microsoft just for the sake of hating them. I hate them because they are shitfuckers. :)

You know how Windows file copy will choke on one file out of a bunch, shit all over itself, and abort halfway through, and you have to go download a file-copying utility because their operating system apparently can't copy files? It's because they are ass-cock fuckshits.

You know how stuff on XBOX costs more or less, rather than the exact amount of points you can buy, so that every time you get something you end up giving Microsoft an interest-free loan? That's because they are Dickbreath McCockSlurpers.

You know how they bought Bungee, a...well, THE Mac game developer, and then Halo never came out for Mac? Well, Microsoft has an excuse for that one, it's because they are fuckers who can't do anything right except act like assholes.

You know how they have the inverse Midas touch, where anything gold they touch turns into shit? It's because they're a little distracted, what with all the time they spend giving hand-jobs in dirty restrooms for crack.

So, remember, don't hate Microsoft just for the sake of hating them. Hate them for the right reasons, like the fact that they could fuck up a wet dream.

] If you like a game, buy it, and we will promise to constantly work to make the player experience better at every corner we can.

Oh, goodie. Okay, I'll bite, Blizzard. I just pre-ordered StarCraft 2. Now, as a paying customer, you should know that the one thing you can do that will make my player experience better is to add LAN support. :) Thank you for your time, and I look forward to seeing LAN support in the game at release. ^.^

The problem with pretend gold or pieces of paper that say you have some gold, somewhere, but no you can't have it, is that you don't actually have the gold.

Gold isn't as special as people think it is, but it is more special than might be apparent just from intellectual consideration. In other words, a smart person will realize gold is only really useful in industrial uses and electronic components due to it's properties. A smarter person will realize that, even if civilization collapses, certain people will still trade food, water, and sex for shiny objects.

Same thing with diamonds, they're nearly worthless rocks, useful to industry and science. But, oh wow, they're sooo shiny... :P :D And you know what they say. "Diamonds. She'll pretty much have to."

Cheat menu: ultima7.exe abcd(alt-255)

Or, in Exult, just enable cheats in the menu. :)

And the building in question is the Blacksmith's building in Trinsic. The teleporter is behind the chimney, and can easily be accessed without cheating.

Ultima 7 Part 2, Serpent Isle, had a few secret areas too, accessed by a teleporter on a tree stump that could be reached with a crate, then walking along an invisible path through the otherwise impassible water. SI's cheat code was "serpent.exe manimal". (Or, again, via the menu in Exult)

Fake "codecs" are one of the main ways windows PCs currently get infected with spyware/viruses. This comes from all the people who install Limewire with no AV and then download the first thousand results for "porn".

VLC - has all codecs built-in. Use it. :)

Legalize it, tax it at $1 a gram, and we'd have 7.5 billion dollars a year in tax income from it. (Based on US Government estimates of marijuana usage, verify the figures yourself, they're on some .gov site.)

If they don't know what it's properly called, charge them double.

Yes, tax the stupid!

I work with Joe Sixpacks all day. Maybe I can clear up some misconceptions.

wv] Joe Sixpack should not need to know how the internals of his computer work, just the basics.

I'm about to break your heart...

wv] I do expect Joe Sixpack to know about Windows and preferably the existence of alternatives

What alternatives? Joe only knows Windows. He might have HEARD of Macs, but he has never before seen these mythical machines.

wv] about a hard disk and what it does and how big he should want it

Joe has no idea what a hard drive is, let alone how big he should want it.

wv] what a processor speed roughly means

Such topics are beyond the ken of Joe.

wv] and whether he would need 1GB or 2GB or 4GB of memory for his needs.

Joe doesn't know the difference between hard drives and memory, never mind how much memory he might want to have

More importantly, for all these gaps in his knowledge, Joe doesn't care. He doesn't WANT to learn. He may pretend to listen if you try and explain, but if you quiz him on it you will find he hasn't really been paying attention, no matter how simply or how many times you explain it.

You know what Joe does know? He knows the Power button, and he knows what to double click for teh pron. That's all Joe knows, and that's all Joe wants to know.

See? Even the geekiest of Star Trek games made by the geekiest of geeks, was all about space combat.