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Comment Re:A Few Notes (Score 2) 206

Third, all of this is only somewhat relevant to actual chess playing, and only at the very highest levels of play; the average FIDE Master (i.e. a well above average tournament player, though nowhere near being among the 1,000 best players in the world) need not remove the King's Gambit from his repertoire because it has been "solved". This has, historically, been one of the most dynamic openings in chess, with tons of opportunities for tactical tomfoolery and psychological pressure. When we talk about "perfect play", or "near perfect play", we're already reaching beyond the level of world champions.

If chess is so hard that WORLD CHAMPIONS frequently and regularly make dumb moves -- yes, that's what not playing perfectly is defined as -- then why should it attract any interest as a discipline at all? It's like wheelchair ballet.

As a GAME -- an opportunity for excitement, aggression, a way to humiliate your opponent -- sure, it makes sense to play chess. But so does poker. As a mathematical discipline -- we're outclassed as a species. We have no business studying chess anymore.

Comment Re:"First sale" doesn't really apply. (Score 1) 111

There absolutely is a way to enforce it for a physical good. However, a DVD is not a physical good. Its value is not the few ounces of plastic, but the bytes stored on them. And since bytes stored and readable can be re-stored, etc., etc. and now it's your argument, and I agree with you.

My point was just that your initial statement is false. Your conclusion is true nonetheless.

Comment Re:Issues such as fair use & first sale (Score 1) 111

I had a large collection of physical CDs stolen. Can I listen to my backups? Can I sell the backups when I'm done with the music? (or will the record companies help me get my collection back?)

More interesting than the possibility of theft, is the fact that physical CDs have a finite lifespan. But backups are immortal, as long you copy them to fresh digital storage periodically.

Comment Re:Magic (Score 1, Flamebait) 396

I think some of the Apple hatred stems from the fact that many techies absorb themselves in computers because it gives them a feeling of control that they lack in their daily lives. Mastering a system is gratifying on many levels. When a company offers a platform that doesn't allow or require that kind of micro-management and control, it's really like an attack on the person directly, especially when the product is popular among non-techies--many of the same people who alienated that person in the first place. And so there's resentment.

You absolutely loved the "I'm a Mac / I'm a PC" commercials, didn't you?

Comment Re:Well... (Score 1) 1059

We are the ones who checked boxes in a ballot (or pushed buttons on an electronic voting machine with no audit trail). Those boxes or buttons were next to names helpfully provided by civil servants, according to what the government told them to put there.

If that's "election" then a pimple qualifies as cancer.

Comment Re:yawn (Score 1) 80

Enjoying yourself, I hope. Like the asshole doctor who told me I needed to lose weight, as if I didn't already know that since before he was born, your comments have exactly zero impact on my future behavior. And I'm smiling ear to ear at the pleasant thought of your violent death next week.

Comment Re:yawn (Score 0, Offtopic) 80

Anonymous cowards post too much. Stop arguing about this. If you are too cowardly to use your name and you post 5 times a day you are posting too much. It's that simple. Time to cut your throat, asshole.

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