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PC Games (Games)

Submission + - Why do games still have levels? (blogspot.com) 1

Submitted by a.d.venturer
a.d.venturer writes: Elite, the Metroid series, Dungeon Siege, God of War I and II, Half-Life (but not Half-Life 2), Shadow of the Colossus, the Grand Theft Auto series; some of the best games ever (and Dungeon Siege) have done away with the level mechanic and created uninterrupted game spaces devoid of loading screens and artificial breaks between periods of play. Much like cut scenes, level loads are anathema to enjoyment of game play, and a throwback to the era of the Vic-20 and Commodore 64 when games were stored on cassette tapes, and memory was measured in kilobytes. So in this era of multi-megabyte and gigabyte memory and fast access storage devices why do we continue to have games that are dominated by the level structure, be they commercial (Portal, Team Fortress 2), independent (Darwinia) and amateur (Nethack, Angband)? Why do games still have levels?
Operating Systems

Submission + - Rev. Al Sharpton to Campaign for Linux (sillylug.com)

Submitted by
Snarky Comment Withheld
Snarky Comment Withheld writes: "Rev. Al Sharpton has said that he will now campaign in favor of Linux, because he views it as a way to help end the "digital divide." In his own words, "Corporate America has to learn that it needs to support everyone in America, and not just those who can afford to spend $400 on Microsoft Office. By supporting free software, we can keep hope alive in America.""
Announcements

Submission + - Text Compressor 1% Away From AI Threshold (google.com)

Submitted by
Baldrson
Baldrson writes: "Alexander Ratushnyak compressed the first 100,000,000 bytes of Wikipedia to a record-small 16,481,655 bytes (including decompression program) thereby, not only winning the second payout of The Hutter Prize for Compression of Human Knowledge but, bringing text compression within 1% of the threshold for artificial intelligence. Achieving 1.319 bits per character, this makes the next winner of the Hutter Prize likely to reach the threshold of human performance (between 0.6 and 1.3 bits per character) estimated by the founder of information theory, Claude Shannon and confirmed by Cover and King in 1978 using text prediction gambling. When the Hutter Prize started, less than a year ago, the best performance was 1.466 bits per character. Alexander Ratushnyak's open-sourced GPL program is called paq8hp12."

Feed Techdirt: Will 'Women Involved In Farm Economics' Tip The Balance In XM/Sirius Debate? (techdirt.com)

From feed by techdirtfeed
Reasonable people could disagree about when it's best to disallow a given merger on antitrust grounds, but our current system seems both arbitrary and open to manipulation by interested parties. Standing athwart XM and Sirius' attempt to merge is the National Association of Broadcasters, which has tried to make the claim that the merger would eliminate any competition for the companies, a point which is undermined by the NAB's own interest in the outcome. It's obvious why the NAB is interested: It's not that it has some lofty ideals about competition, but rather it fears for the future of its own members, should the companies be allowed to merge. In addition to making its arguments directly, the NAB has also turned to the practice of astoturfing, the establishment of phony grassroots organizations that are in fact nothing more than shill groups. Blatantly self-interested lobbying isn't just limited to the NAB, however. Lobbyists representing the satellite radio firms have cobbled together an odd coalition of supporters, including Southern Baptists, businesswomen, rural voters and Hispanic chambers of commerce. A representative of one group, Women Involved in Farm Economics (WIFE), tells The Wall Street Journal that her group supports the merger because it could allow for expanded radio coverage in rural areas. She also makes the good point that the government seems to have multiple standards depending on the industry, noting that little has been done to prevent consolidation in the meatpacking market (which directly affects WIFE's constituents). Her points are valid, but it's still disturbing that these issues are decided, in large part, by which side can marshal the necessary lobbying firepower, rather than some standard for what's a legitimate level of consolidation within an industry.
Biotech

Submission + - Nicotine is the new wonder drug. (wired.com)

Submitted by Fantastic Lad
Fantastic Lad writes: Smoking may be bad for you, but Researchers and biotech companies are quietly developing pharmaceuticals that are decidedly good for brains, bowels, blood vessels and even immune systems — and they're inspired by tobacco's active ingredient: nicotine. Nicotine acts on the acetylcholine receptors in the brain, stimulating and regulating the release of a slew of brain chemicals, including seratonin, dopamine and norepinephrine. Now drugs derived from nicotine and the research on nicotine receptors are in clinical trials for everything from helping to heal wounds, to depression, schizophrenia, Alzheimer's, Tourette Syndrome, ADHD, anger management and anxiety. Smoking will kill you, but also keep you in good health? Another story about nicotine warding off Parkison's disease here seems to agree. -Who knew?
Announcements

Submission + - Warcraft designs quest for 10-year-old with cancer

Submitted by
destinyland
destinyland writes: "Blizzard Entertainment is creating a new quest in World of Warcraft for a 10-year-old boy who's fighting brain cancer. The boy's father said the 7-hour visit was the first time he'd seen "contentment and peace" on his son's face — and the second time was when he read warm emails he'd received from Warcraft players online. The Make-a-Wish Foundation arranged the 7-hour meeting with the game's lead designer, who will implement the boy's quest in four weeks. (Players search for a dog modelled after the boy's own pet.) And an online fund was just established if you also want to make a contribution to the boy's medical quest."
Security

Submission + - The difference between script kiddies and hackers?

Submitted by
Anonymous Coward
Anonymous Coward writes: "I know Wikipedia has definitions for both terms, but I want the Slashdot community's opinion: What is the difference between a so-called "script kiddie" and a bona fide "hacker?" It seems that if you crack wifi using readily available tools, you're a script kiddie. If you use the Metasploit framework, you're a script kiddie. At what skill level or accomplishment can one truly be called a hacker?"
It's funny. Laugh.

Submission + - Jack-in-the-Box Sued Over An(g)us Beef Ads

Submitted by
theodp
theodp writes: "CKE Restaurants has filed a lawsuit to stop Jack-in-the-Box from running TV ads that suggest Carl's Jr. and Hardee's use cow anus to make Angus beef hamburgers. In one ad, executives laugh hysterically at the word Angus. In another, the Jack-in-the-Box mascot is asked to point to a diagram of a cow and show where Angus meat comes from. 'We talked about but stopped short of doing a spot on [McDonald's] Angus Pounder,' said the ads' director."
Microsoft

Submission + - Ballmer: Google and Yahoo aren't Netscape

Submitted by thefickler
thefickler writes: During a recent whirlwind visit to Australia, Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer defended Microsoft's online strategy, saying that while there is some possibility that the Internet market could overheat, the current situation is very different to the dot.com bubble of the 1990s.

"I say that for a lot of reasons this is different to competing against Netscape ... the simplest one is that Google and Yahoo have real revenues. Netscape never did," he said.

With insight like that no wonder Ballmer's in the top job!
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft's ODF Add-in Found Lacking

Submitted by
Send Bug Reports Here
Send Bug Reports Here writes: "In all the fuss over open standards, with Microsoft touting its OOXML in favor of the ISO standard ODF, Microsoft eventually changed its tune to say that there's room in the market for both formats and created an add-in to import ODF files into Word. But just how "committed to interoperability" were they? Of the 12 major features that comprise what most people think of as standard Windows and Office integration, Microsoft's extension supports zero of them. You can't double click ODFs to open them, you can't select ODF via the "save as" dialog, and you have to save new documents as something else before you can convert them to an ODF. In fact, when you open an ODF, it automatically converts it to an OOXML DOCX file, and you have to use the ODF menu (not any of the save menus) to convert it back when you're done. Apparently, some see compatibility as a one-way street."

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