Pretbek - Slashdot User

Comment It's the infrastructure, baby (Score 1) 1205

by Pretbek on Thursday March 01, 2012 @10:12AM (#39207763) Attached to: The Specter of Gasoline At $5 a Gallon

A gas price hike alone will probably not change the behavior of Americans significantly, other than driving more slowly, driving less, or driving the smaller vehicle in the household.

To make people bike to school or to work, you need to be able to get there safely. With the current road system you risk your life, at least in the suburban areas that I live and move around in.
I really miss biking everywhere in the Netherlands, where bicyclists often have their own separate bike lane, and the car drivers are used to bicyclists (who by the way obey traffic rules) in traffic with them.

Public transportation is also sorely lacking here in the US, it is not a viable alternative in its current state. Perhaps higher taxes on gasoline could pay for public transportation improvements? ... HAAAAHAHA! There is a great solution, but a political non-starter for ya.

Comment Screen is a rather crucial part (Score 1) 401

by Pretbek on Friday February 12, 2010 @05:02PM (#31118960) Attached to: IdeaPad U1, What We Wanted the iPad To Be

FTFA:
"Unfortunately, the screen itself was pretty abysmal".

I dunno, but that would ruin the entire device for me, no matter what clever functionality or packaging it harbors. The screen is such an important part, because it is in your face all the time.

EA Flip-Flops On Battlefield: Heroes Pricing, Fans Angry 221

Posted by Soulskill on Wednesday December 02, 2009 @07:50AM from the put-your-money-where-your-gun-is dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Ben Kuchera from Ars Technica is reporting that EA/DICE has substantially changed the game model of Battlefield: Heroes, increasing the cost of weapons in Valor Points (the in-game currency that you earn by playing) to levels that even hardcore players cannot afford, and making them available in BattleFunds (the in-game currency that you buy with real money). Other consumables in the game, such as bandages to heal the players, suffered the same fate, turning the game into a subscription or pay-to-play model if players want to remain competitive. This goes against the creators' earlier stated objectives of not providing combat advantage to paying customers. Ben Cousins, from EA/DICE, argued, 'We also frankly wanted to make buying Battlefunds more appealing. We have wages to pay here in the Heroes team and in order to keep a team large enough to make new free content like maps and other game features we need to increase the amount of BF that people buy. Battlefield Heroes is a business at the end of the day and for a company like EA who recently laid off 16% of their workforce, we need to keep an eye on the accounts and make sure we are doing our bit for the company.' The official forums discussion thread is full of angry responses from upset users, who feel this change is a betrayal of the original stated objectives of the game."

Comment Opt-out? (Score 1) 583

by Pretbek on Thursday October 29, 2009 @02:18PM (#29913753) Attached to: Who Installs the Most Crapware?

It would be great to be able to opt-out of the crapware. I understand, the trial-ware and that kind of third party stuff generates income for the PC company, but I can imagine they lose some PC sales entirely, by bogging the PC down so much right from the start. Even the proprietary software that is well-meant and supposed to be helpful tips the scales to the side of inconvenience, when you take into account the long startup time and resources taken because of it. I realise this post is aimed at those who are bothered by the crapware and know the PC could do much better without, but are unwilling/unable to quickly and easily change that themselves.

Slashdot Top Deals