Is it sad that I used to love my calculator watch? It probably is. But I can't even imagine wearing any watch anymore, much less something like the calculator watches I used to love...

Perhaps smart watches actually will do well because things are cyclical, and the time for super-bulky tech watches has come again. But since I already rode that wave, I'm sitting this one out.

If you are a sysadmin, and you have a Facebook page, LinkedIn account, social-media-whatever thingmagajig or Slashdot account, the NSA may well come after you.

Remember: this is written in plain sight and the NSA created fake Slashdot account to get into Belgacom.

I am a sysadmin. I have a Slashdot account. Maybe it is time for me to say so long, and thanks for all the fish. What Beta was not able to do, the NSA did.

... if there was even the *slightest* risk of killing 7 billion people *why would you even contemplate it*?

Go ahead. Fry your brain. It's not like you're using it or anything. :(

Chuckle. Anyone who has been playing PC games ( and console games for that matter ) knows that within a month of launch, you can expect one or more patches to fix the product they rushed out the door to meet some deadline. Guaranteed.

I'm pretty much done with jumping through all the hoops for this. If you want to make it a pain in the ass just to play it, then I just won't play it. Pretty simple really.

Not that they care as they have legions of folks who are willing to put up with the BS to play at any cost, but in time they too will become jaded with the system and become ex-gamers as well.

Steam seems to have finally got it right in my opinion. I have zero issues with that platform now and the majority of my games come from there.

Pirate groups do a lot of necessary cleanup already. For example, they made it possible to play the latest Sim City at release day, something that was not possible when you bought the game instead of copying it.

>>(35GB of uncompressed audio)
> It was so that lower spec PCs can run it.
OMG have you thought your answer through? that would be effective only for a PC which is powerful enough to manage the graphics and engine and does not spare the cycles for audio.

Given that a 166mhz pc from twenty years ago effortlessly decoded mp3s in realtime, that in the meantime people have improved decoders, encoders, formats that audio playing is parallelizable, that uncompressed audio requires uncompressed IO, I think "aliens wanted that" is a better explanation. The best of course being that a 45gb game is less piratable than a 10gb one.

I wish I had mod points, I'd moderate you "Underrated". Your comment has a je ne sais quoi.

There's one issue with Linux game sales that I hope these publishers keep in mind. There are a lot of games that they're porting to Linux, where I already bought a copy of the game for Windows. If there had been a Linux version at the time, I would have bought that instead.

So I hope they don't get the wrong idea when I don't buy certain games. If in the future I know a game I want will be released on Linux within a reasonable time, I'll hold out.

So, what do I need a 300GB, when I can go to Fry's and get 4TB drive and just plug it in?

It's not the government. These people have access to all the modern conveniences via their jobs. They have chosen not to learn anything about them which would be O.K. if it wasn't critical to their job performance.

That's not true at all.
The dollar has value. It has government backing, it has protection for consumers, it is globally recognized, and pretty stable.
That is more valuable then gold.

Some people like to contribute something to a site they visit frequently. For some, it is giving ad views. I had AdBlock disabled for this site for quite a while, however, I turned it back on when I first saw the beta.

I find it hard to believe that someone else mined a million coins (6% of the total), lost their private key, and never mentioned it on the internet after they became worth a billion dollars.

about my death?

As long as I can remember (that includes Captain Kangaroo and the Watergate Hearings), I've known I'm going to die, and it's never worried me that much.

No, I don't want to die, but it's gonna happen whether I want it to or not, so no use getting my tits in a twist about something I can't prevent.