As an Icelandic man that loves his ancestry and the viking themes and styles accompanying that I just have this to say:
Right wing kheads, stop using our legacy and legends as a vehicle for your ked up beliefs! Vikings and norse people were not pure, they assimilated whatever culture they came into contact with, including blood, as they spread across europe. Seriously, go make up your own weird ass religion to cling your racist beliefs to. It worked for scientology!
I hate the fact that I have to think twice about getting a line from a viking script tattooed on my arm because it might be thought of as right wing.
* No DRM. I have been burnt several times by PC games on this front.
True, sometimes drm is an issue. To me drm hasnt been an issue for quite a few years.. I think it was with the last game I bought a hardcopy of. If you are talking about the gaming services everyone has different views on different vendors. It can be argued that the need for the console itself, created by a single manufacturer with sole control, is drm in itself.
* No viruses or malware to worry about
If you dont click suspicious banners or run spam executables you wont run into viruses (If you are a legit customer, if you download from piratebay or similar you can only blame yourself). I have been an active gamer most of my life (31 years old now) and I think I ran into my last virus back in windows xp.
* Far fewer updates to install and in general less maintenance
So you live with bugs for longer? Must suck... The awesome thing about pc gaming is that whenever you log on some issue you had in the past might be gone. Updates are there to improve your gaming. If you are talking about your OS, you forget that your computer is not just a game station, it is also a tool. The updates are there to keep things running smoothly.
* Warranty - if I build a PC myself and it breaks, I need to fix it (I recognise that for more technical users and/or people with more time, it's a plus that you can fix a PC yourself - but that isn't everyone)
If it breaks, call a repair guy. I refer again to my point about the computer not being a dedicated gaming platform.
* Compatibility. It's hardly rare to run into issues if you try to play a PC game on launch date, and often graphics card driver updates fix some games and break others.
What does launch day have to do with compatibility? I have never suffered not having up to date drivers if a high profile game using some weird functions not covered by previous drivers is about to be released. Again, I am an avid computer gamer.
* Noise and size (it's hard to make a small quiet and powerful PC on a budget)
No its not. Have you tried? It is cheaper to make a powerful and noisy computer, but silence is not super pricey, ya see. Your little console is partly built with pc components, so you should be able to create an equally powerful machine with the same noise level for just about the same price.
* Peripherals - there is a standardized set that "just works" for a console. On the PC, maybe half of my Steam library supports my controller out of the box.
Not every game uses a kinekt. Not every game uses a joystick. I have a pretty beat up x-box clone gamepad, a cheap joystick and a track ir at home. Never had any issues with them. For most games I prefer the keyboard tho so this might be a bigger issue for others.
And one non-technical aspect which isn't a concern for everyone, but is for many:
* My friends are all on [XBox Live|PSN] and I want to play with them
And there we get to the meat and potatoes of your post. You game with your friends, all your friends are on other platforms, so you do as well. That is fine. There is nothing wrong with it. You shouldn't listen to the hype that tells you consoles suck. They don't. They have points about them that are very valid (ease of use, portability, instant gaming). Just dont buy into the hype and use arguments made by 12 year old youtube jockeys to make your point. You do not need to excuse your gaming habits. Just go play, its fun.
If somebody had tried to shoot the crackhead it is very likely that an innocent bystander would have recieved the bullet instead depending on the skill of the marksman and the movement of the target.
Guns dont protect often (or the USA would be relatively crime free). They just give you an excellent opertunity to hurt/kill innocents instead of the attacker.
I guess they wont "need" to set up the camera. But it is recommended as it is there to help with head-tracking. So your movements inside the 3d environment will feel more natural with more degrees of freedom.
In the scope of my article, when will you be at your destination? Will you be driving at full speed on the freeway for the rest of your life until your car breaks down from wear and tear? Or would you not rather arrive there a bit later with your car still running and still in good health.
Talk about taking every single word I wrote literally :) Thats ok.
I do regularly work on side projects. But being 100% productive 100% of the time, in my mind, is not healty. This is my personal opinion.
The assumption you make about your vocation being your passion and for me it being just to pay the bills could not be more wrong. I have been a coder all my life. It is my job now and will continue to be as well as my passion. I will continue improving and working on all kinds of things.
The difference is that I allow myself some breathing room to be a person, not just a machine, on a regular basis.
If hacking away makes you happy, go for it :) I can only relate my own experiences. I do tend to code for hours on end on whatever catches my interest. The point was trying to make is to relax once in a while :) (Never expected this to reach nr.1 on hacker new, even if it is only for a couple of minutes)
Yep, lets just jump on the god-phone and call god to get him to help him out in this instance. Just like he helps starving or diseased people throughout the world every day. Or my uncle, who died of cancer recently.
The list seems material because he is worried about his family. They need to eat and they need a roof over their head. We are all a bit material. I notice you are using hacker news which suggests you must have some kind of an income and access to technology. He is dying. He is worried. Would you not feel the same?
How about, instead of quoting bible bullshit to help you not so silently judge a man with cancer, you shut the heck up and donate a tiny bit to the man so he can live the rest of his days with that much less worry?
Jonathan : Find solace where you can. My heart goes out to you.
On the flipside I grew up and decided I was a bit too smart for school, dropped out and tried on my own. After spending a few years doing pointless, manual, hard work I decided I should go back to school.
After graduating my life has turned around. I have a great job with a great pay, and I have massive opertunities to further my knowledge.
Dropping out works for some people. But it certainly did not for me :P
I live and work in Iceland as a software developer (C++, python, javascript and related libraries) and havent had a single e-mail from a recruiter for the past two years I've been on linkedIn.
This reminded me of the fact that I havent handled, or even touched, real paper money for at least a year now. Here in Iceland paper currencly is slowly being phased out, and has been for a few years.
Its double the pay. Just be honest with your current employer and be sure to gratuitously thank them for giving you a shot and wish them well in the future. Do not burn that bridge :)
Right wing kheads, stop using our legacy and legends as a vehicle for your ked up beliefs! Vikings and norse people were not pure, they assimilated whatever culture they came into contact with, including blood, as they spread across europe. Seriously, go make up your own weird ass religion to cling your racist beliefs to. It worked for scientology!
I hate the fact that I have to think twice about getting a line from a viking script tattooed on my arm because it might be thought of as right wing.