Thursday Next

I think at best it blurs the lines as to whether you are supporting the cause or the charity. At worst it damages the campaign as it allows Bioware the get out clause of "yeah, they've got like a bazillion signatures, but most of them are just along for the ride because it supports a charity." As others have said, attaching the name of respected charity legitimises the campaign or increases awareness. This may be considered as an unfair use of the charities intellectual property. If instead of donating to charity the cause asked that people by a Happy Meal and splashed some McDonald's links and images on the site, then Maccy D's would most likely have something to say about that. They aren't claiming endorsement, or affiliation, but the implication is there to be made which could (if a business was sleazy enough) be used to undermine the campaign itself.

I'm not really considering my link as a negative thing or whatever. Most of the stuff I 'share' is just a "Hey, I found this interesting. So might you." Why does Mercedes Benz have an anchor? This makes no sense.

I see it as a McRib.

Haha. Oh wait, just realised what they did. That is really fecking sly. I thought they'd just stuck pre-owned ME3 on the shelf (which would be sleazy enough).

Meh, just an example of how they will never learn their lesson. Gouging customers and annoying suppliers at the same time was never going to end well.

I don't really hate the people who moan about this stuff... well maybe a little bit.

I like beer. Find lager to be a bit flavourless. I only tend to switch to shorts when I am full of beer, even then I prefer (nice) vodka or whiskey over ice.

It's not 1%. It's less than 1%. It's also not 1% of the total player base. It's less than 1% of the Peak Simultaneous Users on EA's network. For an example where I know some of the numbers, Battlefield 1943 is still running and (last I heard) had server capacity for fewer than 3000 people. Yes, every consumer is a unique and beautiful snowflake and EA cherishes every one of them blah blah blah, but really, when you drop below a certain level it's simply not practical to keep the servers ticking over. I agree that it's not good business to piss off your fanbase, but I can assure that is not what happens when a game is sunset. CS are not flooded with angry calls, letters are not sent by people venting their frustration. The people who ( a ) give a crap and ( b ) know what has happened have already moved on to the latest title anyway, the others either don't know, or don't care and as Ethan says will go out and buy the next game in the series. That's not even the newest game. FIFA 10 was just shut down.relatively recently. FIFA 11 is still going and will be rather inexpensive by now, so it's not even a matter of EA forcing customers to buy the latest iteration (before someone plays that card).

Good to know someone can read! My point of recognizing the Constitution was to deter the inevitable "Oh you hate big government! Why are you okay with the Post Office??!!" comments that some people would've tossed out. Damned if you do; damned if you don't. But is your only reason for being ok with the post office because it is in the constitution? If the post office wasn't in the constitution, would you oppose it being added?

I've got one trophy left to collect. But it means not playing Journey for a whole week.

Getting other studios to input is not necessarily a sign of trouble. DICE chipped in with NfS Hot Pursuit, partly because they know Frostbite 2 inside and out, but also because you might as well have a separate team working on the background scenery while your racer guys focus on the cars and stuff. Similarly DICE developed the MP for Medal of Honor (personally I think that's an example where it didn't work so well) but it wasn't done because Danger Close were in trouble. It just seemed like a good idea at the time. If the other studios are lending technical support (this is Team Ico's first PS3 game after all) or are coding some of the background stuff, then it's just a sensible allocation of resources. That said, they could be in deep trouble and the other teams are being drafted in to shore things up.

As Hotty says, it's got less than three ingredients. You call a long island iced tea a long island iced tea because asking for a "gin, tequila, vodka, rum (sometimes triple sec and sours mix) and coke" is a pain in the butt. Martini is a weird one since it's vermouth and gin. I'd assume that as Martini is the biggest (if not the only big) brand in vermouths it's a "Bacardi and coke" sort of thing. And yeah, bloody mary is a complexity thing. "I'd like a vodka and tomato juice with some tobasco, Worcester sauce and pepper , oh and stick some celery in it too." But we are way off topic here, except to say that perhaps a Bloody Mary is as healthy as a vodka and orange. Especially if you eat the celery.

I know. It annoys me that people call it a screwdriver. You don't call a vodka and coke a "chisel" or a gin & tonic a "coping saw" so why give a name to that combination?

Because a normal person would say "my" and then the pun wouldn't work. Tell that to Dean.

I was gonna put a joke about the periodic table but all the good ones argon. P.S. Why a pirate?

I've recently started walking to and from work and college (just moved house). It's helped loads. Even considering running instead of walking... but maybe that's a little extreme.

Split from Fitness/Exercise I prefer Vodka and orange.

Nope it's giving me some shit about my account being limited. Maybe I'll just delete it and try again...

Oh my good fucking god. Paypal is a massive steaming pile of shit. Why do I have to jump through all these fucking hoops to chuck someone some cash??? I can't verify by landline because I don't HAVE a fucking landline. I can't verify by proof of address because I've moved house. Everything else requires cock-holing around with bank statements and credit card statements. Fuck them and the horse they rode in on. Gimme an address and I'll post you a cheque, it'd be quicker and easier than this bullshit..

This one only really works if you read it out loud... Why did the baker have smelly hands? Two snowmen in field, one of them says to the other "Can you smell carrots?"

I bloody love Blink. Wanted that chick to be the next companion. I think she'd be rather good.

Since when do you have to pay for a ringtone?

Loved when they chucked in something edgy for the grown ups. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LPTP9WsD8k

Why amusing? He was the last Republican President and the last President. They say you're only as good as your last whatever so bringing up Bush will continue until the US elects another Republican, or at least someone who is not Obama.

You seem to be arguing against your point. If the electricity companies will already cut off an entire house thus causing people to freeze to death, then surely it's better that they only cut off the non-essentials? Of course, this all presumes a certain level of external visibility that was not mentioned in the video, but if you bought a TV on hire purchase or rented it or whatever, and stopped paying for it, why shouldn't the owner of the TV have a kill-switch? Again, it's got to be a better alternative than having some heavies kick down your door and walk away with it and some other stuff to cover what you owe. It all seems a bit tin-foil hatted to me to worry about stuff like this. There are a lot of good applications for this technology, not everything in SONY's R&D labs is a form of DRM.