taks

ron's really the closest thing to a "third party" candidate with any real presence in recent times... granted, he's running on a republican ticket, but he ain't a republican. he's got no real hope at winning the republican nomination, either, but his numbers are high enough to at least get the publicity libertarians need for future efforts (assuming he lives long enough he could attempt a run in the next election... he's 73 now). taks

my guess, btw, would be related to the whole "right brain," "left brain," idea, for whatever that's worth. i.e. some people are really good at resolving the highly analytical tasks related to solving algorithmic problems (i.e. math), while others are good at tasks related to organizational and human behavior problems (management is both). personally, not that it matters, i'm terrible at the latter so i have no idea what that should involve. taks

don't get me wrong, i'm not trying to imply that they can't be good at both, just that being good at one is no measure of an ability in the other. what always irks me in the engineering world is that often the managers are promoted out the rank and file engineering staff. on the surface, this seems like a good idea, but rarely does it work out in practice. in fact, often the managers weren't very good engineers, either, which is why they went in to management in the first place. then you end up with someone running the show that's both a bad engineer and a bad manager. ugh. you can even see the same problem in sports. the best coaches weren't necessarily the best players (or players at all). talents seem to be confined to very specific skill sets and management doesn't overlap with implementation very well in many cases. taks

100% correct and a large portion of why i always felt troika failed. if he is such a good coder, that's what he should have had a larger role with. #1 rule of business: stick to the knitting (i.e. do what you're good at). good programmer != good developer. heck, even having good ideas about games, apparently fallout being one of them, is not sufficient for good game development. taks

that's why there are contracts, which would also fall on the developer to stick to... taks

exactly my point... there is an even more restricted audience than crpg developers face simply because of what is already taken up. it's not like the whole of the audience in favor of MMOs is available. only a subset of those already dedicated to one or another will be willing to switch, and an even smaller subset that are willing to play more than one (or are capable of such a feat). the competition is decidedly different in this case. newer MMOs then have to rely on those that have not already gotten into MMOs, which is not a big chunk of the overall gaming market. as an aside, or in addition to, how has tabula rasa faired? i haven't heard anything. taks

there's a difference between profitable and "successful." in the context i was using, "successful" would imply WOW enough to conclude that there is a big enough market to support more than the three biggies (i'm thinking WoW, Everquest and isn't there a japanese one that's huge?). the percentage of dead MMO attempts vs. big ones is not the same as, for example, the percentage of dead FPS attempts vs. big ones. i just don't think the market is as big as these guys think it is... which is why we end up with so many failures. for that matter fallout was considered "successful" as it did make a modest profit, fallout 2 as well from what i remember, but it wasn't successful in the same sense as "there's definitely a huge market here we can exploit." hence it is 8 years later and still no follow-on nor an abundance of post-apoc crpgs. taks

there's like what, 3 successful MMOs in history, and someone is unveiling yet another studio dedicated to MMOs? seems a bit naive, IMO. taks

nope. with the exception of little town-hall type votes, just about all elections require registration. not everyone in the US is allowed to vote, even if they are of age (felons, for example, are often denied voting privileges). having an SSN is not even required, though many other things are difficult to do without one. just about anyone can get an SSN or a driver's license, even if they are not citizens, so that can't be the deciding factor. even if it were, those take a while to expire even after someone's death (which is one way to cheat, btw, register dead people). of course, i was still on the voting list in florida (of all places) two years after moving to colorado... hehe. they were still demanding that i perform my civic duty in the form of jury duty, too (florida, at least melbourne, uses voting lists). dang bureaucracies. taks

agreed, newc. though hope for an earlier date, e.g. before xmas 2008, is not out of the question, nor is hope that it will be something good. taks

Fiscal Year 2009 Q1 actually starts in April 2008, not 2009. They have a weird way of naming their fiscal years.. that's what newc meant, i.e. it will be out no later than april 2009 since it is "during FY 2009" which ends april 2009. not really a weird way of naming fiscal years, quite common actually. most companies i've worked for start sometime right after tax time. the government (US) starts in october for that matter. nobody wants to start the fiscal year during tax time... it would be an accounting nightmare. taks

that's actually probably the best way to cheat any election... put more voters on the ballot than there actually are (registered). there's usually a lot of headroom since not everyone registers. of course, knowing what the problems with electronic voting are is the first step towards corrective action (one of the notes in the wiki seems to indicate some locations have already taken corrective action). it's got a way to go before being viable as a "standard" of operation for every election. taks

i had to take my test on a stick, too. in fact, i was on my way to get my learner's permit driving the stick, and did not expect to take the full test (learner's permit is written test only, license includes driving portion) BECAUSE i wasn't used to the stick. my buddy came along for the ride (back seat, momma was in the passenger seat) and noted that i was driving the stick fine, and should go ahead and get the full license. i did, and passed easily, though i was so nervous i had a hard time holding the clutch in. anyway, four-wheeling with a stick is a blast. driving up a rock hill while mucking around with the gear shift and clutch is definitely a challenge, though there are many advantages over an auto (control when you need it). taks

EU and japanese populations are also much more co-located than in the US. as a result, it is much easier to implement mass transit (that actually works). living in a city is not always possible in the US. most japanese, OTOH, live in or very near very large metropolitan areas. it is very easy to justify small cars in such places since they don't need them for much as we in the US do. weather in the US varies wildly as well, ranging from desert, to beach to mountain terrain also with significant snowfall in areas not otherwise in the mountains. these terrain differences are separated by hundreds if not thousands of miles to boot. in COS, it is insane to NOT have an SUV. it has snowed nearly non-stop that past 2 months. going anywhere other than denver or pueblo from here requires mountain travel, and depending upon your hobby of choice, significant off-road travel as well. i'd like to see any of you so-called environmentalists get up timber hill in a 40 mpg car. you're naively comparing apples to oranges. taks

no, it's an IP thing. of course, there may be some IP-based signature in some cookie. happened again the other day. i turned on the work system and noticed i had to log in. before checking the system my buddy was tunneling in to, i called and said "check the IP"... sure enough, it changed. taks

went to see national treasure right before xmas. good, at least entertaining, but not as much so as the first. watched the newest harry potter movie the other night. i'm kicking myself for not waiting for the HD version since i don't have any HD player yet (dish is alternating several movies in and out of HD). outstanding either way, IMO. we watched the transformers before we had HD and it was pretty cool, too. i'm thinking blu-ray is going to win, so i'm probably going to get a blu-ray player soon... taks

norton is really a hog only because it defaults to real-time virus checking. i.e. every time you touch a file it, to read, write or execute it, norton checks it for virii. if you're playing a game, this is going to result in very poor performance since it is constantly loading and unloading any of a number of different files. simply turning off the real-time checking removes most of the issues with norton's virus software. we had to do this at my previous company, but since we didn't have permission to turn it off, we had to "trick" it by telling it to only check certain file types, and we gave those types file extensions that did not otherwise exist (like "check all files named *.OMG"). the file sharing problems pointed out by kaftan are probably due to norton's network security, which by default locks out access to the local domain as i recall (while allowing web access). i typically have had to go in and manually adjust everything, including the windows firewall (which is an XP addition as i recall), in order to do any printing or file sharing when norton is installed. i had this problem with my laptop, which is running vista, as well. my guess is that the install automatically disables things, including the windows firewall, which i don't think is right (at least the current settings should be left alone). don't hold me to any of this, however, since i have not used norton in a while. my laptop's copy is all but disabled at the moment. the benefit of norton is that it is extremely comprehensive, particularly if you have a professional version, but the drawback is that it is very difficult to configure (at least, labor intensive) if you want maximum protection but minimum performance degradation. you have to tinker with it to get things right... taks

if i had to choose i'd say either norton or mcafee, though i fully acknowledge what tigranes mentions. personally, i find norton to be an extreme resource hog, though it is configurable to the point at which it is not a bother - it simply works well. mcafee is less so annoying, and likewise configurable to the point at which is not as annoying, and it's cheaper to boot. i do own a copy of mcafee, btw, though it is not currently installed at home (brand new build and no recent DLs so there's no hurry on that front). i'm running something here, but i'm too lazy to figure out what. taks

it doesn't even show up in your installed programs list (add/remove programs option in control panel)? i've found drivers installed in there sometimes, but not always. taks

well, i while back i asked if the board "dumped" my login over time... the answer was no, at least, there's nothing that should specifically remove my default login or any cookies to that affect. today i think i found out the answer WHY i have to reenter my login information every so often. it must be IP based and today, my host server changed the address and sure enough, i had to log in again. this happens very rarely at home with my cable service (comcast). we're running through qwest here, which supposedly does not auto-reset your IP unless your lease expires, so i wonder if my company is only getting 10-day IP leases? anyway, this is the first time i noticed because one of the software contractors is tunneling into our linux box (project he's working on with me) and i had to give him the new IP address this morning so he could turn his session back on (ssh tunnel). what's interesting, btw, is that comcast will tell you that yes, they will issue a new IP address on occasion (at least, they don't guarantee they won't reset it), and qwest says no. such an occurrence happens maybe once every 6 months or so with comcast, yet something like once every 10-14 days with qwest. hmmm... taks

i should add, my uncle doesn't type the "right" way, either. he is self-taught... taks

one note: it may be that you cannot uninstall your device because you do not have administrator privileges. if that is the case, then you won't be able to edit your registry, either. at least, if you manually delete the keys, they may return when you log off and back on... that said, i'm assuming when you said "option is grayed out in hardware profile" you mean the profile you get when you go through the device manager? if so, do a quick check on your account status to see if this is the case. if you have XP, user accounts is an option in the control panel. you can change account type in there as well, though only if you are logged onto an administrator account. taks

i took typing in high school. 2 semesters, actually. looking at the keyboard actually slows me down, now. of course, i discovered the other day that i can no longer write legibly... it's actually becoming difficult to write since i do so much typing. my uncle can type 120 wpm or so on a manual typewriter from what i have heard. i've watched him before, and he really flies, though i've apparently never seen him truly in stride. my dad once told me the typewriter would bounce when my uncle was typing at full speed. i can't use a manual at all... taks

helium, generally, since air requires a constant heat source to get to that altitude. motorcycles: pintos of the new milllenium. taks

hehe... no. think balloon. taks