I'm certain that the PSN had to be audited as part of PCI-DSS compliance to process credit cards in the volume they had to. I'm sort of shocked that they didn't implement some sort of tokenization to process credit card data, but if they were storing complete card data... weren't they encrypted? If they did encrypt the data, did the hacker steal the keys too? Just how badly was Sony owned, anyway? And if they were just storing this plain text, then they and their auditor is going to have some serious 'splaining to do to the payment card peeps.

They're going to have a long, difficult process ahead of them, with lawsuits, fines, loss of business, customer trust, penalties, processing fee hikes, etc. Might be while they're still down, that they literally CAN'T go back on line until they satisfy an outside QSA that they have their i's dotted and t's crossed. Don't get me wrong, they deserve what they're getting, but if CC info is involved, this becomes the new landmark PCI case. Should be interesting to watch for years.

While the fetus is inside her body, yeah, that's pretty much how it goes. If the father doesn't like that, then he should glove up or snip his shit or keep his cock out of the baby chamber. And I think you'll find that who ever makes less and has the kid for most of the time gets the money. Sometimes it's the man, sometimes it's the woman. How would you prefer this division of rights and responsibilities to work?

I could understand if you're railing against punitive alimony or spousal support. Or if you're point was somehow that fathers tend to get screwed on parenting time. But child support? If you don't like it, how else should it be done?

Did you just cite a sitcom (WKRP in Cincinnati) as evidence in a debate? I can't tell if this is a tongue in cheek piss taking or if you honestly believe a comedy bit happened in real life.

I'm just speaking from personal experience. Well seeded, reliable, hi-def shows seem to take about 24 hours to appear on the torrent sites I frequent. YMMV, and there may be outliers.

I think he's right to look at piracy as competition. But his cures are worse than the disease. I mean, give away your shows, simultaneous to air time, in hi def, with no interstitial ads. Just because any other way would not be competitive with piracy. Balloney.

First, if you want a high def copy of the show, you're going to wait an average of 24 hours. If the big networks streamed high def copies of the show in real-time, that is already a huge competitive advantage! You could air it with full commercials for the first 24 hours easily without turning away the audience. Maybe 24-48 hours after the show has aired, you can turn off interstitials and just go with an opening 30 second ad. This would also recognize that one of the chief annoyances to anyone discovering a show and catching up to it would be sitting through the same stale interstitial ads over and over again as they plow through a show.

You don't have to beat a competitor at every level to be competitive. The content producers have the following competitive advantages.

* They own copyrights and they are legal.
* They can release their material at the same time as the show airs, or even BEFORE if they choose.
* They can release pristine copies in high def.
* They can properly support subtitles easily.
* They are easy to find, and their websites SHOULD be free of malware.
* They can hold archives of past shows in an obvious, easy to understand, search, and index way.
* They can monitize some of these perks (early showings, subtitles, etc) with a subscription model if they choose to.

I'd almost prefer a model where I don't subscribe to channels per se, I subscribe to shows. I buy "season passes" to my favorites for $15/season. I'm sure they'll figure it out, but them "figuring it out" will not be them giving away their product, for free, in high def, with no restrictions whatsoever. If this character was NBC's CEO, they'd go bankrupt.

That's crazy, and it's not about the ruralness of your company. There is lots of metro IT shops that are run that way. That's about the lack of sensitivity to people's lives from the people on top. Not all places are like that. Brush up your resume and leave it for the next guy who is willing to be underpaid and used up. Don't be that guy!

http://theoatmeal.com/blog/apps

This is even worse when you think about the naked money grab nature of it. He's releasing the blurays of the movies, then he's releasing these, then he'll release the blurays. Again. The man is just printing his own money at this point.

I've bought the THX remastered VHS tapes of the classic trilogy, the "special" editions of same, the DVD releases of the prequels, and the DVD release of original trilogy. I'm done. No more. Not one more red cent. Buying the prequels was already a bridge to far if I'm being honest with myself. The ONLY way I will EVER buy another version of Star Wars is if they make Bluray copies of the ORIGINAL series, no special editions. Or even better, make branching copies so I can select which I want to watch or in my dream scenario, blend in the stuff I like about the special editions (the improved models in the Battle of Yavin, improved matting on the Battle of Hoth) and keep the rest as is.

I've got high quality versions of the original trilogy ripped from laser disc. They do just fine, thanks George. Let me know when I can pay you for the old, non fucked up editions, and you can have some (more) of my money then.

Hey, I live in the boonies. Still have a quality library, that networks with other libraries, has online reserve and renewal, and all the other modern features that larger, metropolitan areas have. Just because one lives in the "sticks" doesn't mean one has to accept sub-standard services.

Good point. I actually had a counter argument in the back of my mind RE: Left 4 Dead, which uses a director system to ramp up the difficulty of the game, by playing with the size of and timing of the zombie hordes, and supply of health and ammo. A person that sucks at FPSs and a veteran can play the same game with wildly different difficulties, with the same end result: having to fight through a massive amount of zombies and just barely surviving to the safehouse.

I can imagine the same could be said for Dwarf Fortress. From what I know, the core experience of the game is going to be similar, with similar situations and encounters, even if the difficulty varies.

So you might be right. I still think the less strategic and more "arcadey" a game is, the less this will hold true. But it's just a feeling, and probably fueled not a little bit by some grognard standards I have for gaming difficulty now versus the "good old days". :)

Totally agree. As we talked about on my podcast, I want to know people were in the deep shit with me. When I talk about NES-era Ninja Gaiden with a fellow aging geek, and I see the look of pain flash on his face? I know. I know he knows. And I know he knows that I know. You know? That experience has currency.

If it had some kind of sliding difficulty scale, and he says "what do you mean? I thought the game was easy." What does that mean? Is he a god of gaming? Does he suck and the game took mercy on him? There is a shadow* of the same feeling war veterans get talking with fellow soldiers who spent time in the same conflict together. Well designed but brutally difficult games can spark that kind of "Band of Brothers" conversation in groups of gamers.

* A small shadow. A shade. Like, on an overcast day.

The single "best" story of zombifying parasites have to be the Sacculina barnacles. Read this to lose some sleep: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacculina

The basics: Barnacle attaches itself to crab. Weaves tendrils throughout crabs central nervous system to take control of the crab and also leach neutrients from it. The crab stops growing and molting at that part. It will not engage in normal behavior like regrowing lost limbs. Anything behavior that does not serve the parasite is suppressed If the crab is a female, the barnacles sprouts an internal egg sac at the exact place a crabs would be and causes the crab to care for the eggs as if it is its own.

If the crab is a male? IT REWIRES THE CRABS INTERNAL PLUMBING AND *MAKES* IT A FEMALE!!

Truly insane stuff. I remember first reading about them in the book Parasite Rex (highly recommended, btw), and one biologist recounts the crabs behavior when it feels the parasite latch on to a joint in its armor. At first, the crab is panicked, flailing around, trying to scrape the damn thing off. Then, as the hours go by, and the parasite takes over its system, it slowly stops its resistance, until it becomes a zombie crab. It will then be used up and discarded.

Pretty horrifying, if you ask me. No crab deserves to go out like that. :)