Questions you want answered.

Conscience now cleared, thanks.

Grenn wrote:
wordsmythe wrote:

Ninjas are vulgar bottom-feeders that can't stand the light of day. Now, pirates on the other hand ... .

Sounds like someone's got a case of Katana-envy.

No need to argue about whose crooked phallus is better. I note, however, that a cutlass has more girth.

MikeSands wrote:
Coldstream wrote:

Now, if we created a giant planet out of styrofoam... :D

My question: where is the SF film that has the characters visiting the STYROFOAM PLANET?

I think Kirk did that in one of the worse episodes.

Question: when will the HD channels start using the entire space allotted to them and start moving info/graphics out of the standard def dimensions? (I'm looking at you, every single sporting event and newscast.)

Ok, I just bought Amped 2 and am really enjoying it. Now I want to find other skateboarding games to play. SSX3 is available cheap (really, really cheap) and is on the 360 backwards compatibility list (I'm playing Amped 2 on the 360 with no problems) can anyone recommend it? To be honest I might have ordered by the time anyone sees or responds to this :D. Also are there any other games I might have fun with? (Shaun White snowboarding seems to have been panned.)

If you're looking for Skateboarding, go with skate for the 360. Not sure of price, but since skate 2 has been released for a while now, I'm sure the first iteration is fairly cheap on the used market. I've never played SSX3, but the first couple games on PS2 were always fun. If it's cheap and you never played any others from the series, it may well be worth it.

I've never even considered playing a skateboarding game but I might have to at least rent 'Skate' and see what I think. You're right about SSX3 I'll buy one of the cheap new copies I've found.

Does Wizards of the Coast have a trademark on "tapping" cards? I've been reading the rule sets for a lot of other TCGs, and all of them have found creative new terms for it (kneeling, spending, using, etc.) Is there a legal reason for these other games to not use the word "tap," or are they simply trying to differentiate themselves from the biggest game on the market?

dejanzie wrote:

How does the "credit rate" thingie work exactly? I've seen it pop up many times at GWJ, and I understand the basic premisse behind it, but I'm very eager to find out more.

Where I live (Opwijk, Belgium, Europe) my VISA expenses for the prior month are substracted automatically from my normal bank account. This always happens right after my paycheck appears on my account, which is very handy/dangerous (depending on how adventurous one is). Over here there's no plethora of credit cards either. Visa pretty much dominates the market, although some supermarkets are starting their alternative too. Mastercard is a small player.

When we negotiate a loan at the bank, they pull your debt numbers out of a central database and compare it to your paycheck and your savings up to that day. Well, it's a bit more complicated than that of course, but that's the jist of it. Is the credit rate like a loan database where every customer has an easy way of interpreting it through a score in numbers? Or am I getting it wrong?

Credit ratings are more or less FICO scores in the US. These scores often determine whether you will get a loan, what the rates for that loan will be, and whether companies send you credit offers. They include the history of all lines of credit (loans) that a person has. Individual lenders create their own methods of scoring customers, but they are usually quite similar. The factors that go into this score are aggregated by 3 credit agencies in the US, Transunion, Equifax, and Experion. These companies also sell other types of data such as census data and consumer expenditure data.

The main factors are how much credit you have (loans and credit card limits), how long your credit history is, how well you pay your credit (do you miss payments), the type of credit, and how much of your credit you are using. The last part is a bit tricky because they take a measure once a month, so even if you have no loans and pay off your credit cards in full every month, you still use a percent of your credit.

Things that do not effect this are income, rent, or anything else that isn't a loan.

An example set of data used to build the score,
Credit card with a limit of $10,000 (had for 15 years)
Mortgage of $200,000 (had for 5 years)
Car loan of $15,000 (had for 2 years)

Your history is 15 years, you have a credit total of $225,000, you are using $215,000 / $225,000 = 95% of your credit, you have a range of credit types (I think), and you haven't missed any payments (not shown above).

That's my understanding, but some of the details might be off.

More detailed information,

http://banking.about.com/od/loans/a/ficocreditscore.htm

lostlobster wrote:

Question: when will the HD channels start using the entire space allotted to them and start moving info/graphics out of the standard def dimensions? (I'm looking at you, every single sporting event and newscast.)

Sorry I'm late, but I can answer that one.

For starters, when money comes around again. TV ad revenue is way down. HD conversion is a lot of money. Gut master control, gut production, new cameras, lots of bandwidth, etc. That said, many local newscasts will likely move to HD in 2010-2011. We'll need to in order to remain competitive.

When will the graphics get moved out of 4/3 safe? Probably never. Satellite and cable tend to take the HD/Digital signal and center cut/downconvert it for their SD customers. If you move the graphics into non-4/3 space many viewers will lose them, which would be bad for things like severe weather warnings.

Does anybody work for the USFS? I'd be interested in figuring out how to get a job with them as I'd love something where I wasn't confined indoors.

Broadcasting/Television question:

Will we ever get rid of the stupid station/channel id "badges" that invariably cover up something important on channels like History or Discovery or NatGeo?

I hate those damn badges. Why won't they go away?

Asz wrote:

Does anybody work for the USFS? I'd be interested in figuring out how to get a job with them as I'd love something where I wasn't confined indoors.

Not to belabor the obvious, but are you looking for more insight than LMGTFY?
http://www.google.com/#hl=en&q=usfs+...
The first two results are probably a good start.

duckilama wrote:

Broadcasting/Television question:

Will we ever get rid of the stupid station/channel id "badges" that invariably cover up something important on channels like History or Discovery or NatGeo?

Probably not. Their primary purpose is as rudimentary copy-protection. Like badges or watermarks on images on the internet, they're intended to make the media's source a permanent part of the media itself.

The badges don't bother me, but I am getting rather sick of the pop-up advertisements across the bottom of the screen. They're usually over-animated and over-large so that they cover up a not insignificant portion of the picture. I'm especially annoyed when they pop up over movies with subtitles, obscuring the dialogue entirely.

duckilama wrote:

Broadcasting/Television question:

Will we ever get rid of the stupid station/channel id "badges" that invariably cover up something important on channels like History or Discovery or NatGeo?

I hate those damn badges. Why won't they go away?

They're also an effective branding method. The whole time you're watching a show you associate it with a network. Companies always want to build their brand. Also, what would a company gain from removing this logo? I can't think of anything. Are there any customers who don't buy cable because channels have these logos?

Where did the "tl;dr" meme originate, and what does it mean? The site search failed me. Anyone have a link to the original thread?

Higgledy wrote:

Ok, I just bought Amped 2 and am really enjoying it. Now I want to find other skateboarding games to play. SSX3 is available cheap (really, really cheap) and is on the 360 backwards compatibility list (I'm playing Amped 2 on the 360 with no problems) can anyone recommend it? To be honest I might have ordered by the time anyone sees or responds to this :D. Also are there any other games I might have fun with? (Shaun White snowboarding seems to have been panned.)

Do you mean snowboarding games? In the US, those are both snowboarding games while Tony Hawk and Skate are skateboarding games.

I found Amped 2 ok, but SSX is a much more fun game. I think Amped plays more realistic while SSX is all out crazy and fun. Tony Hawk is very similar to these games and I think works a lot better than snow boarding since you aren't being pushed down a hill. My favorite Tony Hawk game is Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2x (the Xbox version), but Tony Hawk's Underground is also good. Skate is another really fun skateboarding game. The first is great and the second adds a lot of tricks.

Minarchist wrote:

Where did the "tl;dr" meme originate, and what does it mean? The site search failed me. Anyone have a link to the original thread?

Too Long, Didn't Read. I don't know where it started.

Minarchist wrote:

Where did the "tl;dr" meme originate, and what does it mean? The site search failed me. Anyone have a link to the original thread?

It means "too long; didn't read." I don't know when it caught on around here, but I've seen it in the internet wilds for awhile. There's an Urban Dictionary entry for it.

PandaEskimo wrote:
duckilama wrote:

Broadcasting/Television question:

Will we ever get rid of the stupid station/channel id "badges" that invariably cover up something important on channels like History or Discovery or NatGeo?

I hate those damn badges. Why won't they go away?

They're also an effective branding method. The whole time you're watching a show you associate it with a network. Companies always want to build their brand. Also, what would a company gain from removing this logo? I can't think of anything. Are there any customers who don't buy cable because channels have these logos?

This. My old news director would call master control within thirty seconds of not seeing our bug on the newscast.

I have noticed them receding though. CBS's bug is translucent now. I even noticed Noggin's has gone with around 50% opacity, which is a definite change from their norm.

As for advertising snipes, I hate those too. I think bigger and more animated is the trend of the day however. You think they're bad now? Sound is coming ...

LilCodger wrote:

As for advertising snipes, I hate those too. I think bigger and more animated is the trend of the day however. You think they're bad now? Sound is coming ...

I'm pretty sure that Cartoon Network already uses sound in some of theirs.

duckilama wrote:
Asz wrote:

Does anybody work for the USFS? I'd be interested in figuring out how to get a job with them as I'd love something where I wasn't confined indoors.

Not to belabor the obvious, but are you looking for more insight than LMGTFY?
http://www.google.com/#hl=en&q=usfs+...
The first two results are probably a good start.

I know, i've done that and poked around but I was wondering if there was a goodjer here who's had any personal experience. Someone to point me in the right direction, pat me on the back and tell me that despite my complete inexperience in everything it'll be easier than it seems to me to get a job.

Minarchist wrote:

Where did the "tl;dr" meme originate, and what does it mean? The site search failed me. Anyone have a link to the original thread?

First time I ever saw it was on the WoW boards, but I'm sure it was around before then. A lot of crap on the WoW boards came from 4chan. This probably did as well. The source of all memes.

BadKen wrote:
Minarchist wrote:

Where did the "tl;dr" meme originate, and what does it mean? The site search failed me. Anyone have a link to the original thread?

First time I ever saw it was on the WoW boards, but I'm sure it was around before then. A lot of crap on the WoW boards came from 4chan. This probably did as well. The source of all memes.

It's from Usenet, I believe.

Asz wrote:
duckilama wrote:
Asz wrote:

Does anybody work for the USFS? I'd be interested in figuring out how to get a job with them as I'd love something where I wasn't confined indoors.

Not to belabor the obvious, but are you looking for more insight than LMGTFY?
http://www.google.com/#hl=en&q=usfs+...
The first two results are probably a good start.

I know, i've done that and poked around but I was wondering if there was a goodjer here who's had any personal experience. Someone to point me in the right direction, pat me on the back and tell me that despite my complete inexperience in everything it'll be easier than it seems to me to get a job.

I know we have at least one around here somewhere.

Zelos wrote:

It's from Usenet, I believe.

Usenet is the Great Rift Valley of the Internet. If you want to know where something started, chances are that it started there.

Is it ok for me to take a Centrum multivitamin along with a calcium vitamin every day?

My concern is the 18 mg of iron in the Centrum which is 100% of the Recommended Daily Value (RDV). From what I understand, men should not take iron as a supplement. Good sources of iron include beef and beans, both of which I rarely eat, so I probably don't get a lot. I mostly eat white meat chicken a few times a week and this has about 1/3 of the iron that beef has.

I mention the calcium vitamin because it also has 100% RDV of vitamin D which brings my total to 200% from just the vitamins. I don't think this will be much of a problem.

PandaEskimo wrote:

Banking and credit rate stuff

Thanks PandaEskimo!

PandaEskimo wrote:

Is it ok for me to take a Centrum multivitamin along with a calcium vitamin every day?

My concern is the 18 mg of iron in the Centrum which is 100% of the Recommended Daily Value (RDV). From what I understand, men should not take iron as a supplement. Good sources of iron include beef and beans, both of which I rarely eat, so I probably don't get a lot. I mostly eat white meat chicken a few times a week and this has about 1/3 of the iron that beef has.

I mention the calcium vitamin because it also has 100% RDV of vitamin D which brings my total to 200% from just the vitamins. I don't think this will be much of a problem.

The extra dose of vitamin D from the calcium supp won't do you any harm. Regular Centrums are a gender-neutral formula so it's perfectly safe for you to take them unless you get more iron than normal from your diet alone. If you're concerned about it, you can get a men's formula vitamin instead, but it doesn't sound like you need to worry.

Dark green leafies are a great source of both iron and calcium. Spinach and broccoli are the power hitters

clover wrote:
PandaEskimo wrote:

Is it ok for me to take a Centrum multivitamin along with a calcium vitamin every day?

My concern is the 18 mg of iron in the Centrum which is 100% of the Recommended Daily Value (RDV). From what I understand, men should not take iron as a supplement. Good sources of iron include beef and beans, both of which I rarely eat, so I probably don't get a lot. I mostly eat white meat chicken a few times a week and this has about 1/3 of the iron that beef has.

I mention the calcium vitamin because it also has 100% RDV of vitamin D which brings my total to 200% from just the vitamins. I don't think this will be much of a problem.

The extra dose of vitamin D from the calcium supp won't do you any harm. Regular Centrums are a gender-neutral formula so it's perfectly safe for you to take them unless you get more iron than normal from your diet alone. If you're concerned about it, you can get a men's formula vitamin instead, but it doesn't sound like you need to worry.

Dark green leafies are a great source of both iron and calcium. Spinach and broccoli are the power hitters :)

Dairy and good veggies can be a wonderful and wonderfully nutritious combo.

I don't think there's an upper bound on Vit. D, but I'd check into calcium. The upper bound might be closer to 1000%, but I think there is one.