Found a link to the opening video for MechWarrior 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-X3GD0UnBCk that I mentioned in the previous post.

GREAT POST.

The MW2 of which you speak is one of my favorites of all time.

I loved the opening video for that one with the Timberwolves on patrol on an airless moon.

"He's got a lock on me! He's got a lock on me!"

The two games I miss most from DOS are MW2 and X-Wing. Yes I could probably get them working, but I don't want to spoil my memories...

If I want to jump out of a second story window and break my leg, I can do that in the real world.

I don't want a perfect simulation of the real world. I want a simulation of the FUN world.

This is where games like Team Fortress and Left4Dead excel. They KNOW they are games and try to be fun games. If you simulate the real world too accurately, then I don't have any zombies to fight. And I have a broken leg anyway.

You could make the same argument for books or movies. You don't expect a novel to be 100% true and accurate. You expect it to be a work of fiction. There is a place for realism. There is a place for fantasy.

I would say that C# and Java are more alike that either is like Javascript.

I think the "inflict damage" comment meant if a MAJORITY of news sources pulled out of Google, not just News Corp.

I didn't wriite it, I'm just trying to interpret...

The point of the article is that unless virtually ALL of the news sources leave at once, the result will really just be that those who are left will profit by the others voluntarily removing themselves from the competition.

Personally I think it is a gutsy but stupid move...

Grandparents I agree with, 3rd World education I disagree with.

ChromeOS is ONLY useful with a fast, reliable internet connection. 3rd World means those can be hard to come by.

Heck, those can be hard to come by ANYwhere. Unless you are talking cell connection or wimax, this would be worthless in a car or anywhere else you can't get a wi-fi signal.

To me the benefit is the grandparents (or anyone else who has limited needs, but good net connection). Specifically anyone who is likely to call me about their virus infected, trojan-laden, "oh no we didn't click anything" system on which they have NO CLUE where they have saved documents. For them, I give ChromeOS a big thumbs-up.

The huge downside is the "might as well give Google a copy of my brain" problem. Even if you trust Google 100%, do you trust the government 100%? How about the government 20 years from now? How about governments of other large countries with whom Google wants to do business?

I HOPE that my paranoia is just that. I TOTALLY want a Droid phone from Verizon, but does anyone remember the furor over the Bush administration wanting to see which books you've checked out of the library? How about everything you've read, written, played, listened to, or VISITED (thanks to the Droid and/or ChromeOS sending GPS coords back to the servers...). Google is amazing at collating and aggregating ENORMOUS amounts of data and letting you "Google" it to find what you want. That could be true for dissadents in a specific area too.

Like everyone else I use the net without thinking much about it (well some). This very post will be available via Google search shortly. We will all have to live with the aggregation of information about us, I just hope we don't come to regret it.

Xenophon? Sounds like a foreigner...

Although you have been modded "Insightful," I truly hope you meant to be funny (which seems likely due to the wording of the post).

FOSS is about community as much as it is about code.

Although you can't tell someone's gender by the code they write, you sure can tell in a real community with potential "meat-space" interactions (conferences, etc.).

Saying that women won't be picked on in community interactions if they pretend to be male is ludicrous. There is absolutely no reason they should have to pretend anything to be treated with respect.

I'm afraid these kinds of attitudes will forever marginalize FOSS in the wider world if not addressed. It does not matter in the minds of the public at large if 90% of the FOSS developers are good people if 10% are so loud and so obnoxious that theirs are the only voices heard.

OK, now HERE's something fun. Watch that video again and pretend that instead of a Windows 7 launch party, they are talking about a wild and crazy sex party.

Also watch out for the side trip into racism at about 5:43 - 5:50...

NOW THAT's entertainment!

It really struck me like a bunch of the "I'm a PC" guys throwing a party.

That TOTALLY depends on who you are talking to and what you want to show them...

That's what SHE said!

No way will they give up ad money. Newspapers started depending on advertising in the late 1700s. They have traditionally made virtually all their profits from ads.

The problem with micropayments is not a technical one. The problem is that users hate them and the websites that implement them (really any form of payment-for-content). I work for a newspaper (in the IT dept) and we had to drop the requirement for free registration because people would rather go elsewhere than even register for free. Ask them to pay and I think you are setting up your own demise.

Absolutely will people pay for access to the Wall Street Journal. Because they have news? Heck no. Because they contain information useful to running a business and investing.

I have to be optimistic about the future of newspapers (job requirement number 7), but I do not think it will involve micropayments in any large scale way.

Well truth be told the idea from Google's perspective is to say to the newspaper industry, "See? We're your friend! You wouldn't sue a friend, would you??"

That's a plus 5 funny right there with no saving throw.