Vista Sucks, and how to make Windows 7 not

Common complaints against windows vista, and how to fix them in Windows 7:

New Hardware Requirements:
. Keep the visual style in tune with windows XP, allow an aero type interface on capable machines
. Use the WinMin core, compartmentalize what is needed.
. Use XP capable machines as the developmental benchmark.

Slow file operations:
. MinWin core allowing for low OS overhead

Licensing and cost:
. Limit the amount versions: One for mobile devices , one home version (i.e. 7 home ultimate),
one business version (i.e. 7 business ultimate), one ultimate version, and one for ultra-low end computers (i.e. 7 basic)
. MS needs to lower the costs of licenses, as lower costs leads to increased adoption.

Digital rights management and open standards:
. Windows needs to have support for all the various form of DRM out there, but not force DRM onto its users.

User Account Control:
. Banish it entirely, and make up for it by overhauling the event logs. This makes end users happy, and lets admins do their thing.

Software Protection Platform:
. Microsoft needs to realize that piracy will happen, regardless of whether anti-piracy software is used. Further more, Microsoft
needs to let pirated copies receive updates (perhaps limit pirates to service packs only). Also, MS needs to enable the changing
of a pirated key to a legit one easy, requiring no more then a restart (repair installs are a bear).

Legacy Support:
. Full virtualization for prior versions of windows, allowing everything from programs to drivers from prior versions to run in windows 7.
MS needs to pull their weight, and create a method for allowing drivers from prior versions of windows to work with 7. Forcing
hardware manufacturers to make new drivers makes the manufacturers and users unhappy.

Vulnerabilities:
. MS has always been the one to keep outsiders in the dark about their source code. By opening up parts of their source code, they can shorten the
time from discovery of a vulnerability to patch much shorter. Also, a team of thousands of programmers working on 7 will shorten the development time.


Too bad MS doesn't appear to care about their market share :)

Sources:
Wikipedia
Myself

The WoW Effect

With so many things going on in the gaming world, its hard to keep track of them all. Between the PS3, Jack Thompson's latest escapades, or the latest fad video, there is just so much to keep track of. However, there is one disturbing trend that has been taking the gaming world by storm that we need to take note of and put to an end. This trend is what I like to call the 'WoW Effect'. Now you're probably asking "Well, what the heck is the WoW Effect Newman?" Good question, so let me break it down for you.

With so many subscribers (somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 million) no one can deny that Blizzard has a hit on their hands. World of Warcraft is inescapable. Its in the news, its on the toy store shelves, it's even at your comic stores. There are roughly 2.5 million subscribers in North America, so there a good chance that you have several friends in your circle that are Wowheads.
Good for them, it's a fun game, and it offers a good chance for you and your buds to get together and grind mobs for exp using teamspeak (kudos to you who gets the reference).

I do play, and its a great time waster. However, that is the problem. World of Warcraft is designed to be a time waster. WoW is built from the ground up to entice players to spend hours and hours of their free time grinding for levels, getting new gear, etc. This cycle alone can take anywhere from 3 weeks to 6 months, and can be repeated as many times on as many characters as the player wishes. Don't get me started on dailys and instances either, whoo boy.

'So what?' you may say 'It's not like it's that big a deal' Ah, but that's where you'd be wrong. For those who don't know Xfire is an instant messaging client for PC gamers that tracks the number of hours spent playing PC games. According to the xfire website: Gamers who use xfire have totaled a whopping 300,423 hours logged playing Wow. This equates to over 12,517 days spent in game per day. That alone gives me the shakes.

"Okay, so a bunch of people play WoW for hours at a time daily. So what?"

I'm glad you asked. Please, follow me with this hypothetical situation. So 'Frank' decides to get a bunch of his friends over to play Halo3/Rock Band/CoD 4, which he knows his friends will like. 'Frank' tells all his buddies, and can't wait. However, it gets to be 9, and no one's there. Why? BECAUSE THEY'RE ALL PLAYING WOW!!! Frank fires up xfire, to meet something like this:

This is precisely the problem. There is naught a person out there to play games with. No body to co-op Army of Two with. No buddies to matchmake with in Halo 3. You start getting a little lonely. And not only that, but all your buddies are constantly chiding you to join them. "Dude, when you getting back into WoW?" It never ends.

I don't care if you play it. I don't care that you have 5 lvl 70's with epic everything. That's not the probem. It's when you spend every free bit of time doing that. For those out there who can relate to me, I feel your pain. For those who can relate to my example, please just log out of the world of Azeroth, and pick up a controller. Master Chief and all your buds are waiting.

Not your dady's antivirus.

Let's face it. Anti virus is done for, or at least the days of buying an anti virus program. Time for big guys like Symantec to close up their antivirus divisions, and do something different. There are many reasons for the big, brand name's demise in the computing computer world..

One big reason is the lack of new features. Go to Staples and pick up the latest versions of Norton Anti virus, for example. Chances are you won't see much of a difference. Therein lies the problem. Anti virus hasn't changed much. Every anti virus program, free and otherwise, does the same thing. It scans your hard drive, comparing each and every file against a list of known viruses. They may vary in speed and dependability. A simple google search reveals a cornucopia of free anti virus, avast, AVG, etc. Why pay, when you can get comparable service for free?

Another big reason that anti virus is on the decline is the lack of viruses being created and released. A quick check of the Symantec anti virus website shows that most threats are at a low risk. These days, chances are slim that you'll catch a virus through IM, email, or file sharing. The only threat to your computer isn't even a risk of being infected with viruses! The "medium risk" these days is a vulnerability in Internet Explorer.

And not just big, brand name anti virus is on the decline. Anti virus in general is heading down the tube. Take my friend "Paul" for example. Always the risk taker, Paul disabled all anti virus software on his computer, and lived on a steady diet of firewall for a few weeks. A simple virus scan a few weeks later revealed a whopping 0 viruses.

People, thankfully, aren't stupid. Most of us have the sense not to go to random web sights with Japanese and English in the url. Everyone and their grandma knows not to click on those crazy links forwarded by Nigerian Royalty.

And it's not like anti virus is hard to find these days. Take a look under the hood of some of your most used programs. I guarantee that many of them have their own, usually crude, yet somewhat effective, implementation of virus scanner. So, the end user is bound to have their incoming data scanned multiple times before it reaches home.

Most nare-do-gooders these days don't even bother with viruses. It takes too much time and a little bit of luck to ensure a good infection. Spy ware is the new kid on the malware block, potentially sending your personal info (and passwords!) to some 16 year old kid in Sweden. Spy ware comes in all shapes and sizes these days, but viruses spend their days in the corner, obsessing about how noone likes them while listening to their new Taking Back Sunday album.

So yes, it's not a bad thing to keep the ol' antivirus program around, feeding it a few updates now and then, but it may soon become obsolete. Like Paul, it may not be long before we need not worry about those silly viruses, and those antivirus programs growing lonelier and lonelier...

PETA and you

Wanna know one group of people that pisses me off? Probably not, but that ain't stopping me. I hate vegetarians. Sure, I bet they are nice people, but they have some of the dumbest ideas.

It's meat for cripes sake! Humans have been eating it for thousands of years now. But apparently, it's wrong to kill a lesser being on the planet to provide sustanace for you and your family. No, but if they had their way, we'd all be eating soy burgers and wheatgerm shakes,

And it's not all vegetarians either. My uncle doesn't eat meat because of his health (diabetes and the like). One of my teachers doesn't eat meat because of religious (not to hate, but what good religion doesn't allow the eating of any meat?). It's the ones out there that don't eat meat because of the animals themselves.

Yeah, animals are people too, we've head the rhetoric before. Personally, I don't see the comparison. I don't see chickens driving to work everyday, or pigs that go shopping for bargain prices at Wal-mart. Most of them don't even walk on two legs! How can any sane person make such a stupid statement?

And it's these types that run PETA. People Eat Tasty Animals they aint. These are a bunch of morons grouped together to allow the "ethical" treatment of animals. Unless I live on Mars or something, last time I checked "ethical" didn't mean "same rights as people". See, it's not cool to kill an animal. No, we must free them, allow them to move in, rent out rooms. You know, all those "ethical" ideas.

How immature and juvenile do they have to be. Instead of boycotting companies who make fur coats, they throw paint on the fur coats of others. They walk around in the nude to protest the killing of animals. I may not be on the board or something, but I fail to see how running around naked=rights for animals...

And they're allowed to do this! They have rallies every year, run their mornonic campaignes, throw paint on fur coats and not pay restitution. It's the crazies like these we should be booting out of the country, not the Mexicans.

And the cult is tax-exempt! No taxes for the paint throwing, animal killing, crazies. Tell me, do you equate killing chickens to killing jewish humans? Is eating at KFC the same as eating the cooked remains of Holocaust victims? Please say no, or I'd have to add you to the list of people to kick out when I become president. And training elephants in the circus is slavery? Please tell me they aren't serious...

Not that I'm advocating the cruel treatment of animals either. No puppy kicking or performing open-heart surgery on your still awake goldfish. Try to strike a good balance between "making fido eat dirt" and "feeding fido filet-mingion every night".

So kids, if a PETA crazy comes up to you on the street corner, what should you do? A) Spit in their eyes and kick dust on their fake fur jackets? B) Shove three cheeseburges down their throat. Or C) Wack them in the face with a stuffed beaver? That's right class, you get a cookie if you picked all of the above.

So, In closing, if they want to save the chickens,

PETA, GTFO!

Graphicsgasim X 2

Yep, that's another big buzzword in the world of videogames. Talk to any gamer about graphics, and watch the results. Some will launch into a tizzy about the technology behind it. Others will talk about frames per second. And the less knowledgeable will tell you next gen = better graphics. And for the most part, they're right.

Graphics have marched forward with each new console generation. Bring a PS2 back in time to a gamer in the heyday on the Atari 2600 days. Watch the reaction. It's true, graphics are a big part of the game, but they aren't a make or break factor. Just go ask The King of All Cosmos.

Most games try to emulate real life in some way, weather in the past, present, or dystopian future. And newer hardware is allowing that. But there are many games out there that don't need bleeding edge graphics. Graphical funhouses like Katamari Demacy don't require 512 gagillion of video memory. They don't require 32x antialaising.

They're kitsch. They're fun. They don't try to emulate real life in any way, shape, or form. They just do their own thing. It's these types of games that really wont benefit from all the raw graphical power that the net gen consoles can put out.

There will be your Call of Duty 3's and your Splinter Cell: Double Agents, but remember those kitsch games that put a smile on your face and little dent into your wallet.

Artificial Stupidity

Yeah, there's a buzzword for ya. AI, or artificial intelligence. It's been a main staple in any game since ever, umm, ever. But nobody gave much of a care till games entered the third dimension. Ever since, it's been thrown around more then Paris Hilton.

Numerous games have tried to claim the AI crown. From Space Invaders and it's relatively simplistic enemy AI action, to Oblivion and its so-called "Living, breathing world", AI has seen a major leap forward. No longer will gamers tolerate allies running into walls, or kamikaze enemies that aren't normally violent.

Yes, gaming has taken a huge step forward in the AI department. But is AI, or gamers for that matter, ready to take the next step? The goal of AI is to emulate real life (or as close to real in the context of the game), right? Then why is AI so perfect all the time?

Let me explain. When it applies to games, programmers are always to make their games more realistic. Too bad life isn't always perfect. Take Halo 2 for exapmle: Sure, walking around the game, grunts would fall asleep, and act surprised when MC awoke them.

But it's not that realistic! If you were an elite, and you were bored with a tank, you wouldn't just sit there, waiting for MC to come around and you could blast him. Nope, you would probably take the tank, and have a little fun. I'm sure it would seem odd to come upon a new area, and not find the elites al lexpecting you, but that is more realistic!

Take oblivion for example. Sure, the NPC's seemed pretty real, not just standing around to offer you a quest. And for the most part, this is pretty real. But not quite enough.

See, NPC's need to have lives that extend far beyond the moment you kill them. Pretend a NPC is going through a big break up with his "wife". He might have a nervous breakdown, and decide to kill everything that moves. Place that near the character, and you'll have a villager come out of nowhere and attack you with a knife.

Or GTA. In San Andreas, I believe there were a couple of NPC's that would in a sense jump from a high place and commit suicide, kind've like lemmings. Here, I was at the local grocery store, and I decided to take a nice evening stroll through the parking lot. Now, put that into a sandbox game like GTA. It's probably look weird and feel odd to watch a NPC walk around the parking lot for no reason.

Yeah, that's the problem. AI like that doesn't fit into a videogame. Gamers are used to their enemies lying in wait around the next objective for them. Heck, I'd feel weird watching a NPC stroll around the parking lot in GTA. And not being told why a character does something unexpected like that can be frustrating for a gamer.

I dunno, maybe there will be a shift, and AI like this will become more of the norm. But I would like to be told why NPC #365 just attacked me with a knife. Who knows?

Real Men Play Videogames

See, this is one thing the bothers me. Apparently, the collective intelligence doesn't believe video games to be very manly. Ask my dad, video games aren't manly, mowing the lawn is manly. Ask the rednecks, NASCAR is manly. But apparently, video games are not.

But why? Is it the adrenalin rush? If NASCAR can provide a rush, then can't a racing video game? Or if Not NASCAR 06, how about a horror game? It mustn't be the rush, because video games can provide the same rush.

Is it the getting down and dirty part? Like fixing a car? Personally, I don't care about cars. I don't care wither the axel attaches to the drive shaft or the transmission. I would rather spend a day playing Halo 2 online with some buddies, then on the ground, covered in engine oil, hoping I remember how to put this damn contraption back together.

Or maybe it's the game play itself. I suppose that some men out there only have the attention span to watch a wrestling match or a 500 lap race. But, throw a couple of video gamers their way, all ones that control and play different, and they just freak out.

Maybe it's the game play in general. I mean, compared to the old atari joystick, today's controls are pretty scary looking. I guess most men out there don't have the coordination out there to handle 2 analog sticks, as well as 10 or so other buttons.

Or it may be the lack or realism. I suppose getting out on the football field and getting sacked in the chest is more "fun" or "manly" then acting it out with your XBox 360. I guess sadism and being emo is more manly then having all your body parts intact.

I dunno, I guess I'll never understand why videogames aren't considered manly. Personally, I'll keep playing them until the day I die.

Oh, Call of Duty 3 is slated to come out November 17th.