Humodour

Np. It's a relatively minor point in both articles, though. Because those articles only talk about Valve and Blizzard, you conclude Valve and Blizzard are the only two companies making money off PC gaming? Come on...

I think the key here is actually something different. Technology improvements haven't really slowed down at all, and materials science promises some sweet new things for the future (photonic circuits, graphene transistors, memristors, etc). What HAS slowed down is the human capacity to fully utilise technological improvements. Technology sort of improves exponentially, while the human capacity to utilise it improves logistically, as it were. We've seen it before: a new technology is created and all sorts of mad geniuses utilise it to make cool things, but then the number of innovations starts to slow down significantly and there's a shift to collaborative research drawn out over many years. The same is true for PC gaming, or specifically physics engines, graphics engines, audio/voice engines, etc. In light of this, I predict (and hope for) a shift back to focusing on game content instead of graphics, since they are basically now static. To those mentioning multiple cores and processors: parallelisation is definitely an important technological step, but it does not give linear speed boosts and recent studies suggest it actually tapers off at n cores (with n being below 100, possibly significantly below) with potential performance decreases for large numbers of cores. It's not something you can rely on to continue the exponential growth trend.

Not really. Did you happen to read that article by Valve's main guy where he explains that it's a myth? Gabe Newell explains why PC gaming is the future: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/valve-wh...-future-article Doug Lombardi further discredits "the PC is dead" claims: http://www.shacknews.com/featuredarticle.x?id=873

Pro-tip: everybody already has a PC these days, so the cost of a PC, however high you may think it is ($3000 would get you a PC far superior to any current console) is not terribly relevant. I know a lot of people who like PC gaming just fine. If you can't get GTA IV working properly on your computer, that's unfortunate. I'm pretty sure this isn't a referendum on digital downloads, since physical stores will exists regardless of whether or not consoles do. Again, what's the got to do with it? Consoles use the Internet these days, too. The Internet will exist, and people will use it, with or without consoles. Actually, governments typically spend money on infrastructure (which includes communications) during big recessions because it creates job and loosens credit.

Well I live in the country so there's not as much choice as some place like Sydney, but download capping is so common I bet the unlimited services would cost twice as much. At the Australian National University when I lived on campus we each had 100 Mbps connections to our rooms. But we were charged at 7 cents per meg. Just as I left they upgraded it to 10 Gbps and lowered the cost to 2 cents per meg. So that was amazingly refreshing compared to a normal ISP, but at $70 (and then $20) per gigabyte it was still fairly restrictive. Data on the uni network (which included the research schools and residential halls) was unmetered thank god. Edit: P.S. 10 Gbps ethernet will blow your mind. It's literally 10,000 times faster than a 1Mbps connection.

Pretty much, and it doesn't really surprise me, either. I expected it ever since the Xbox came out. Although I highly doubt consoles will disappear completely. You've got things like the PSP and Gameboy which filled a niche that PCs simply can't fill (or can they...? maybe we'll see fancy shaped netbooks) Consoles thrived because they were cheap, PC's were expensive, they were common, PC's were rare, they were stable and constant, PC hardware was always improving exponentially. None of those are true anymore. The only thing consoles still have going for them really is the social factor. But that alone won't really keep them alive since it's easy enough to port to PCs. It'll be interesting to see if we experience a resurgence of gamepads and such for PCs. The Wii is an interesting one. Something like that could well stick around despite the PC simply because of the unique input device which the devs can guarantee every Wii user has - that's hard on a PC.

In case anybody is wondering, I stumbled upon some awesome open source programmes and plugins for creating at least two important art assets: Trees/grass/shrubs: http://arbaro.sourceforge.net/ then exporting the model to a 3d software (Blender) and rendering it or http://dryad.stanford.edu/index.php (Windows only) And seamlessly tileable floor tiles (e.g. desert dirt, room walls, carpet): http://gimp-texturize.sourceforge.net/ or http://www.logarithmic.net/pfh/resynthesizer

Australia's broadband and mobile penetration rates are perfectly fine. Above the OECD average. And we also have the technology to support blistering speeds (e.g. NextG is the fastest commercial mobile network in the world at 42Mbps in 2009). The problem is what the average customer actually gets. I suspect speed caps stifle innovation (read: speed increases) because it's basically a form of price fixing. Speeds do go up over time, though, so as long as that happens, whatever. Our ISPs certainly aren't about to change their business model. What irks me far more about Australian broadband is the download caps. They're usually something pathetic like 1gb or 10gb, and change the cost of the plan by horrendous amounts. E.g. mobile broadband on Telstra's NextG network costs $130 AUD per month for 10 gigs and $60 for 1 gigs (at about 0.5 to 6 Mbps on average because of the scarcity of NextG infrastructure). That's 65 and 30 Euros respectively. I already pay $40 (20 euro) a month to get 10 gigs at 512kbps, so no way am I gonna pay $130 just because it's wireless.

How's that supposed to work? Files are scattered throughout the harddisk, so an Ubuntu installed like this will be terribly fragmented, wouldn't it? I was confusing Wubi and the partition resize option. Basically Wubi is where you run Ubuntu on NTFS as stated above, whilst resizing the partition involves keeping your Windows boot but squeezing it down to free space for an Ubuntu partition. To use this option you need to defragment in Windows (for obvious reasons) and then when installing Ubuntu, select how much space you want to assign Windows vs Ubuntu (making sure you give both enough space to run, including the swap file - usually not a problem on large harddrives). Apart from that though, it is as I said: you create a Windows/Ubuntu dual boot by turning one partition into two, without any need to format. So if you want to dual-boot into Windows and Ubuntu but only have one partition (which is typical), you've got three options: Wubi, partition (and format) your HD then install Windows on partition 1 and then install Ubuntu on partition 2, or partition your HD without formatting by defragmenting in Windows and then selecting the resize option when installing Ubuntu. So method 1 requires little fiddling but cops a performance decrease, method 2 is clean but requires a format which wipes your data, and method 3 is the best of both worlds.

Starbuck was good this episode. She went around killing people. I never liked Gaeta. He's always been the worst character of the show, IMHO. Hope he dies soon.

The guy in Gorgon's avatar doesn't have an anachronism attacking his head.

Cantousent? Does he still post?

He was allowed. He just chose not to. He chose to boycott his own trial and go on talk shows instead and try to convince people he was a lovable rascal.

The latest Ubuntu Live CD's default option (since like 8.04 or so) doesn't carry partitioning risk anyway (unless you specifically want to partition). It just squeezes the Windows partition and installs Ubuntu in the spare space for you automatically. No formatting, no hassle, no risk.

Bestest EVAR! SECRET AGENT SAM!

Standards certainly isn't evil. You don't need to have a monopoly to have standards, though. Poor comparison. You should be thinking of hardware. There has definitely not been any hardware monopoly for PCs. Perhaps instead they should make a console with a single console OS and allow competing hardware vendors to utilise that OS? Oh wait. Seriously, the only thing consoles still have going for them is their controllers. For example, they've all been hacked to run Linux, etc. They're just glorified PCs, and their ability to continue to hide that fact is disintegrating.

What do you do? Analyst of some sort?

You seem to get by ok, so I don't think it poses a problem.

I just switched to methylphenidate (a cocaine analogue, marketed as 'Ritalin') from amphetamine (commonly sold as Adderall), and it's like 2 or 3 times better at improving my concentration and focus. Which is probably bad on an internet forum since it results in posts which exceed the character limit.

But all the Cylons that lived on Earth were different 'models', too (and as far as we know, the same as the final five, just not reborn), so how many human/cylon wars are we talking about? I think there's actually been three. Remember the 12 tribes made the 13th tribe leave (and then most likely bombed their new colony, Earth), so that was probably the first war.

Cont. It's called a free market. Only the fittest survive. It's not unique to open source. You see more open source projects die because they don't have to secure funding first (which acts like a vetting process). So what? Does it effect you if an open source project doesn't survive the first month? Any ideas that are half decent typically get picked up again later by people who have the drive to see them through. Plenty of people are willing to code for free. For many it's a creative pleasure. Don't even bother trying to use "no monetary incentive" as a justification against open source. And again you rely on a search result to 'prove' your point. No. Then be specific. Don't claim all strawberries taste bad because you ate a rotten one. Generally only the software which has an equivalent or superior open source alternative. If some random starts ranting about how all proprietary software is inhumane, just smile and pay attention to something else. Building a reliable reputation is a trait of companies and has nothing to do with open source software. The open source business model is to create the software for free and then provide sell support for it. This business model flies squarely in the face of the claims that "open source is not reliable". Again you show your ignorance. Most open source programmers are highly educated and often have technical jobs (the most common of which is obviously programming). I think you meant VB there. But to the point: All you did was provide a search result as 'proof' of your claim. Which is absolutely ludicrous even if your claim had of been true.

I gather you don't mind us discussing this in the thread, then. Yes. See the posts above. Ignorant means lack of knowledge in an area. It's not an insult unless you or others view such a lack of knowledge as a woeful deficit. I do not, but I will admit me it annoys me when ignorant opinion is touted as fact (which is not terribly fair on my part as I should correct you not condescend you). I don't care. You're still ignorant on open source software, just as I am ignorant on electronics and hardware these days. But you implied it. How else did you expect people to interpret the statement "open source is overrated"? Ubuntu started (and obviously remains) free and was then is funded by a multimillionaire, Firefox started free and then built a non-profit company around itself to develop it when it started converting people away from IE. Open source management is fine. Take a look at your typical successful open source project and you'll find that people contribute managerial skills like they do code. Those with poor management die. You haven't looked at the guts of many (any?) successful open source projects, then. You won't find any of those in the major Linux distributions for example, or Firefox, or many other things. Of course, those which do fail on these things often die. So? Blame that on poor management. It's certainly not unique to open source.

Maybe the final five aren't Cylons at all, but genetically enhanced humans who could accept a downloaded consciousness? I mean, they age, they were created before humanoid Cylons, they can reproduce like normal humans, and they aren't susceptible to radiation or that Cylon disease. Perhaps the people (Cylon or otherwise) who built those funky temples and wrote those prophecies were actually acting deliberately with knowledge of the five and their creation (and they obviously added extra programming to them, e.g. activate, home in on Kara's ship's beacon - which means THEY resurrected Kara and she's a Cylon, which fits because she's a sixth but was made AFTER the final five prophecies were told). Maybe they built them to stop any future war between Cylons and humans (and failed because of the sketchy nature of the whole thing - or perhaps they were only meant to stop total annihilation). As for the mysticism - it's not hard at all for humans to make mundane anecdotes or technical specifications mythical. Look at the Church of Scientology or the Viking Sagas. The Cylon dog raiders obviously knew they weren't humans but didn't automatically detect them as Cylon, either. Edit: There's plenty of gaps to fill here, but it's actually fairly self-consistent IMHO. Time travel would help, but I'm kind of hoping they avoid that.

1949? There was no EU back then, let alone a Coal-steel union that was formed in 1953. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_Europe Nothing. Most projections show the US dollar won't collapse, and those that do show other countries' currencies collapsing more, meaning the USD is still the dominant currency. The Euro isn't a bad one, though. It's like 20% of world reserves (the USD is like 70%). Not really, they are just calling early elections. This might sound odd to Americans, but it happens in other countries when there's things like a loss of confidence, or supply (budget) is blocked, or the executive (President, Prime Minister, etc) calls for it. I found the total collapse of Iceland's economy to be far more interesting - due to their small size, most of their investment is foreign, which obviously killed them when America and Britain caught a severe case of the economic 'flu. Through it all they're still probably one of the richest countries in the world per capita, with one of the highest standards of life. The thing about PPP is it's for internal comparison. It says little to nothing about international strength or competitiveness. Of course, GDP growth is calculated based on internal growth for obvious reasons (i.e. to eliminate fluctuations based on currency shift). But yes, China's doubles with PPP to about $8 trillion. When I first learnt about the EU I was puzzled as to why Britain was a member "They're about as European as your average Australian!". It pissed Australians and New Zealanders off a lot when you guys entered the EU. So we set up a bunch of FTAs with eachother and South-East Asia instead. In hindsight, our economy got stronger because of it, so thanks. :D

I agree wholeheartedly. I disagree for a simple reason: it won't happen. Regional trade actually isn't easier or more profitable. It certainly hasn't been the significant force shaping economies in the past. Globalisation only hinders it further. This disagreement obviously frames the rest of this post. Far too simplistic for the reasons above. I believe each of those countries will have their power spread through the entire world, which is pretty much already the case. Australia relies on China, America, AND Japan for trade (among many other smaller partners). Which is why we typically don't suffer from recessions in any one country, only global ones (like when the USSR collapsed). Because China is in (or near) a recession now (by economist standards, not newspaper ones - 6% drop in GDP growth is enormous), Australia will enter one, too. Yep. Australia's even gearing up for war because our leaders expect a resource race (which I don't think will happen). It doesn't pay to be an unguarded diamond in a den of thieves. Then they're not exactly blocs, are they? Sort of. I mean they argue endlessly over the details but you can't deny they've concrete overarching ideology with the will and means to back it up (NATO). Expect hell if any country tries to go to war again. This makes a lot of sense. However I disagree with your use of the term 'bloc' because it has distinctly militaristic/political connotations. I think one thing it's safe to predict is that Africa will take China and India's place as an economic powerhouse in the next 50 years, though, because economic growth is logistic, and once China and India develop sufficiently, the capitalists will realise it's cheaper to offshore to Africa. It'll be weird to hear Indians complaining about their job being outsourced to Africa.