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Living Room / Re: Let's face it: the ebook market is FUBAR, thanks to pure greed

« Last post by wraith808 on February 04, 2011, 11:57 AM »

How is software a question mark?  Every reader (even the doomed Kobo) has a software equivalent on the major platforms.  That's one of the reasons I ended up getting a iPad rather than a Nook- I run stanza, eReader, Kindle, and Nook apps on it.  When the last Dresden Files novel came out, it was only available on the Nook.  My friends that had a Kindle were out of luck.  It wasn't even in eReader format even though that format is the same as the B&N format.  You could only get it electronically if you had a Nook.  But I was still able to get it, because I had the Nook app.

It's alot like the argument for Final Draft or MS Word as far as "typing" goes.

Nook has one of the better business models (although I don't monitor e-book news so I don't really know of your specific tid-bit) but it's not a "killer app".

It's a great app (although I had assumed it was hardware) but it's taking the same model as before and just making it better or making it more interesting to interested people.

E-books though are bigger than that. That's why they are so hard to sell and the current business model is at the same time so easy to corrupt. This is all my uneducated opinion mind you but it's just what I see.

E-books have something bigger to them, that's why even though the final product is mostly the same - it tooked E-Ink Readers to get a small set of people interested in the actual idea of an e-book reader as opposed to a natural pattern where technology just caught up.

-Paul Keith (February 04, 2011, 11:20 AM)

The nook is the hardware and the app.  I'm not saying it's a killer app.  iTunes isn't a killer app.  Most people don't even like it.  They put up with it because of the hardware.  That's why software isn't the issue- it's more hardware.

To the other argument about using PDF... did you ever experience the abortive effort by Adobe with it's reader editions?  That was a very big fiasco, and there's one other problem with that- PDF isn't an open format.  Adobe has shown this several times in trying to exert muscle over the use of PDF.  

You're actually making my case. PDF is bad but why did it take this long before something like epubs appearing? Let's not even consider PDFs but factor in the difference between how many people know of every popular types of e-book readers from how many people subconsciously have an idea of what Adobe Reader is showing on-screen?

-Paul Keith (February 04, 2011, 11:20 AM)

You're missing one part of the point.  Adobe tried to get into it after the market started maturing.  PDFs have never been considered a big format in the game.  The formats from the beginning were .mobi (which is now owned by Amazon), and .pdb (which is now owned by B&N).  People try to compare .epub in the same category, but the format was not created until 2007... well after the other two had become entrenched.  Though the market was not as large as it is now, it was large enough that neither of them had any pressure to drop their format and change to a non-tested format.  And both had secure and non-secure formats, so it wasn't like .epub was offering something that wasn't there.  That's my point.  An open format can't be an also-ran, or there won't be an argument towards moving to it, other than we don't want to use a proprietary format.

The RIAA analogy isn't based on software, hardware, or anything of the sort.  It's based on content not delivery.  And in the same way, the big publishers are the same as the RIAA, just not as in bed with each other, so not as easy a target.  They rip off authors in the same way as the RIAA does with artists, they control the channels in the same way as the RIAA.  They are the choke point, and the source of the issues.

Actually it's based on all of that but we're mostly talking about semantics at this point. Even if you just took the content argument, it's still not 1:1 comparison between how people share and perceive the contents of an e-book from a movie/song/audiobook.

They are one of the major choke points but let's not kid ourselves and think e-books or even books never had a marketability issue compared to movies and music.

-Paul Keith (February 04, 2011, 11:20 AM)

I'm not really getting the point here.  There is a 1:1 comparison between books, movies, and music.  They are all content delivered by a medium.  If you give someone an empty cd, they have the same problem as if they have an empty book- there is no content.  Add content to that delivery device, and you have a product.  In both cases, there are other ways to deliver the content- digital being one of them.  So the content is the big thing here- not the delivery mechanism.

Amazon didn't start the rise in eBooks.  They took a risk, but it wasn't as big of a risk as you make it out to be.  They did innovate, but they weren't the first to try.  What they did was buy the correct technology, then leverage it with hardware at the exact time that the market was starting to take off.  If they hadn't done it, it would have still happened IMO- there were signs pointing that way already.

Amazon didn't have to start the rise of anything. That's kind of the point of the killer app category right? It's not who begins but who ends up sticking around and growing and redefining the users.

In that sense, the Kindle was the equivalent of the first netbook. It wasn't the OLPC but once the EEEPC got out, you knew netbook was a category of it's own and even today you could make the argument that netbooks doesn't have as huge a market despite not having to carry a format on it's shoulders.

-Paul Keith (February 04, 2011, 11:20 AM)

The killer app analogy doesn't really equate in this situation.  A killer app is something that is content that sells hardware.  A whole different paradigm.  And even if you do try to equate the two, a killer app is something that starts critical mass.  With consoles, they have exclusives that everyone *has* to have... and once it's in their possession, the sales of other things on the console rise because people now have the big investment part out of the way.  With the kindle, there was no killer book that made people buy the kindle.  It was bought because it was cool, and useable, and people could consume books on it.  *Any* device that could have satisfied those needs would have slipped into the same profitable area.  It was just the Kindle that did it first, right as there was a critical mass of ebooks starting in the market.  That's one of the reasons that they bought the .mobi format rather than making their own- it was proven, and there were *already* books in that format; only minor tweaking was needed to bring the content to market.

As with anything, it's the content that drives the market, not the other way around.  There are other ways of getting content to the users, but without content, the deliverers of that content are dead in the water.  So just as it is the RIAA standing in the way of the progression of the digital music movement, the publishers are the same gatekeepers for the switch from analog to digital in print media.

Is the e-book the content? Not really. In this topic alone, most everyone commented about the format more than the concept.

-Paul Keith (February 04, 2011, 11:20 AM)

The format isn't the concept either.  It's the content within the e-book, and that's what the publishers control.

When you mentioned the exclusive Nook files, were you selling the book or were you selling the idea of certain exclusive books like how gaming consoles work?

-Paul Keith (February 04, 2011, 11:20 AM)

To continue that ... the exclusivity on consoles is *again* content.  The reason that it works like it does is because of the number of publishers.  There aren't as many publishers of books as their are of games.  And as the number of publishers dwindle in the gaming market, the number of exclusive titles also dwindle.  Have you looked at what's exclusive now?  Only games that are published by the manufacturers of the consoles.  That doesn't really create lock-in.  I want infamous, but it's not enough to make me buy a ps3.  But if a large publisher consistently made games only for one console, then that would be more of a draw.

The RIAA is standing in the way of digital music that has pretty much been maxxed out except for certain audiophile people as far as everything goes.

There may be a better format but it's an uphill "upgrade" format at this point. E-books on the other hand, even if you don't choke that out, it's full potential isn't really out there yet.

Or rather you could say even if you accept all the current concepts and forms e-book selling has taken currently minus the DRM, it doesn't mean it has the same mass adoption yet so everything that's being stifled now is like trial by fire in my opinion to force content providers to adapt to a paradigm shift and that's really just my stance. I'm not really saying ok there's no problem, let's wait it out. I'm just saying it's not FUBAR yet. It may become dormant because of the corruption but it's this type of corruption that is going to upseat a new form of format acceptance as well as new forms of delivery and even opportunities for other businesses to "make up" for where these companies have massively failed and that still includes software even though now it seems e-book readers are known by most.

-Paul Keith (February 04, 2011, 11:20 AM)

Do you *really* think another format is going to come along at this point that's going to change the way that things operate?  Unless it gives something radically new, I think you're dreaming.  You can see that in the market even now.  Sony has a hard time, and they have a lot of leverage behind them from other entertainment markets.  Borders is a huge chain, but they came a bit late, and so are falling a dollar short... if someone that large can't make it, then who can?

It's more the fault of greedy publishers than of greedy eBook marketers.  E-books make money for their pushers due to bulk -- the high quantity of distribution.  It's the publishers who don't want their hard-copies of titles to be undersold that are driving up the per-book price of any given eBook.  Even at that, lots of eBooks are still considerably less expensive than the hard-copy equivalent.  Take, for instance, the Stephen Donaldson title I just bought for my Kindle.  Total cost to me was $6.52, as opposed to the paperback version, which at $7.99 plus shipping/handling, comes in at over $10.00.  Not only did I get my book instantaneously, but I saved $3.50. 

But your more expensive books are not going to see such a discrepancy in hard-cover versus eBook price, because, hey, the publishers don't wanna lose money on that big expensive book (say, certain programming books, for instance).

-kyrathaba (February 04, 2011, 11:46 AM)

My exact point.  But it doesn't seem that many recognize this- it's easier to blame Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Apple than Harper Collins, et al.  Most people don't even *know* the names of the publishers.  They just aren't as easy a target, especially since they don't have a self created one like the RIAA for people to focus their ire on.

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Living Room / Re: Let's face it: the ebook market is FUBAR, thanks to pure greed

« Last post by wraith808 on February 04, 2011, 10:54 AM »

^ How is software a question mark?  Every reader (even the doomed Kobo) has a software equivalent on the major platforms.  That's one of the reasons I ended up getting a iPad rather than a Nook- I run stanza, eReader, Kindle, and Nook apps on it.  When the last Dresden Files novel came out, it was only available on the Nook.  My friends that had a Kindle were out of luck.  It wasn't even in eReader format even though that format is the same as the B&N format.  You could only get it electronically if you had a Nook.  But I was still able to get it, because I had the Nook app.

As far as your point about the transfer of media, there isn't really that problem with e-Books; they're smaller than other media by a great percentage.  So much so, that when I downloaded my complete collection from Fictionwise (to make sure I had a backup of everything), which consists of well over 500 books purchased over the last 10 or so years, it was still less than 100MB.  Try that with music purchases for any length of time.

To the other argument about using PDF... did you ever experience the abortive effort by Adobe with it's reader editions?  That was a very big fiasco, and there's one other problem with that- PDF isn't an open format.  Adobe has shown this several times in trying to exert muscle over the use of PDF. 

The RIAA analogy isn't based on software, hardware, or anything of the sort.  It's based on content not delivery.  And in the same way, the big publishers are the same as the RIAA, just not as in bed with each other, so not as easy a target.  They rip off authors in the same way as the RIAA does with artists, they control the channels in the same way as the RIAA.  They are the choke point, and the source of the issues.  Amazon didn't start the rise in eBooks.  They took a risk, but it wasn't as big of a risk as you make it out to be.  They did innovate, but they weren't the first to try.  What they did was buy the correct technology, then leverage it with hardware at the exact time that the market was starting to take off.  If they hadn't done it, it would have still happened IMO- there were signs pointing that way already.  And while it's true that anyone could have tried- it's also true that people did try.  It's just that the deals behind the scenes limited the penetration, and Amazon also shot themselves in the foot by trying to follow Apple's example of playing hardball with their pricing when they didn't have the leverage to win that particular battle.  As with anything, it's the content that drives the market, not the other way around.  There are other ways of getting content to the users, but without content, the deliverers of that content are dead in the water.  So just as it is the RIAA standing in the way of the progression of the digital music movement, the publishers are the same gatekeepers for the switch from analog to digital in print media.

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Official Announcements / Re: January 2011 Giveaway - Winners Posted

« Last post by wraith808 on February 04, 2011, 09:09 AM »

Wow! Thanks!  And thanks to vastamil also

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Living Room / Re: Let's face it: the ebook market is FUBAR, thanks to pure greed

« Last post by wraith808 on February 04, 2011, 08:18 AM »

No matter their few compatibilities here and there, Apple, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble have quickly succeeded in making the ebook market horked beyond recognition with their proprietary formats and [proprietary] hardware.

-zridling (February 04, 2011, 02:07 AM)

I'd disagree.  I don't think it's the fault of the companies that you quote, but the actual publishers.  This fact is obscured by the fact that the publishers became overly greedy about the time that the larger distributors came into the market.  I've been buying e-books for a while, and have seen the market shift a few times.  First, when MS was pushing its reader, DRM was as prevalent as it is now.  (They weren't the first... just hte first that were really truing to push it for commercial gain)  It's about that time that Mobipocket began to push its .mobi books alongside .lit books.  Of course, MS had the most leverage, but the market wasn't mature, and it wasn't profitable enough for MS, so they bowed out.  There was a rush to fill the void, and basically the .mobi format began to be seen a lot more.  Adobe tried to get into the market, but (thankfully) bumbled the attempt.  There was growth, and there were two kinds of books sold, pretty much alongside each other- secured and unsecured.  Fictionwise was the big distributor of e-books, though Mobipocket distributed some of its own.  But the format was pretty much the .mobi format.  Then Fictionwise began to get a bit leery of depending on someone else's format for their product.  They still distributed .mobi formats, but began to push their own format, based on the old palm format (.pdb), that they called the eReader format.  That's when the market began to splinter, though it was still possible to find pretty much every book in both formats, so it was a matter of choice.  Unprotected eBooks were still sold at the author/publisher's discretion, and many books were sold unprotected.  The market started to thrive, and this was its downfall.

Amazon bought mobipocket.  Barnes & Noble bought Fictionwise.  The IDF developed ePub.  e-books sold like hotcakes.  And the publishers decided, "Hey, it's time to exert muscle again!".  And so they applied pressure through their normal channels against Amazon and B&N, books began to be unavailable on certain platforms because of licensing.

If way back when there were few books sold, one format had been decided on and supported, and the publishers brought in at that point, maybe things would be better.  Maybe if an open format had been written a lot sooner things would be different (.epub wasn't brought about until 2007, 7+ years(!) after .mobi and .pdb) But because of the publishers controlling the channels, and the amount of money spent on e-books, and the already fragmented market, it's very unlikely that anyone else will be able to get in on the scene.  Hardware... maybe.  Because you can support the e-reader software of both.  But to actually get in the market is pretty hard, as Borders and Apple have found... they just can't get the licenses to support a new format.  And because of the purchase of the .mobi and .pdb formats, they aren't open.  But in reality, it's the channel agreements that are killing the ebook market.  And even the owners of the formats are held at the mercy of the publishers.  Fictionwise has been very adversely affected because of this.  Of course the owners have already made their money, but the shell that's left keeps getting gutted because of limitations placed on it by the channel agreements- not it's parent company.  It's the RIAA all over again... but in this case, the distributors take the heat, and the publishers play their puppets behind the scenes, screened from the negative PR by their pawns...

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General Software Discussion / Re: Outlining software recommendations?

« Last post by wraith808 on February 03, 2011, 03:14 PM »

^ Oooh... thanks!  I'd never seen that before!  It looks like a cool piece of software.

...D'oh!  I already bought Writing Outliner, so this just gives me a reason to maybe think I spent money needlessly. 

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General Software Discussion / Re: Outlining software recommendations?

« Last post by wraith808 on February 02, 2011, 11:10 PM »

^ I think that you might have misunderstood what it is.  It doesn't create outlines in Word documents; it organizes Word documents.  When you're working on a large project, in a lot of cases, you're working with more than one document.  This allows you to organize them, rather than have to manually keep up with several word documents.

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Living Room / Re: Unable to compete with the Kindle, Apple wants a cut of ebook sales

« Last post by wraith808 on February 02, 2011, 11:06 PM »

^ But what about developing vision?  As I said, I'm looking at the nook for my daughter simply because she's 10.  Would the increased strain from an LCD be bad for her eyes?  I don't know.  But I figured I'd take the lesser risk any day.

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Living Room / Re: Unable to compete with the Kindle, Apple wants a cut of ebook sales

« Last post by wraith808 on February 02, 2011, 10:10 PM »

They're going to keep saying that the e-ink displays are better on the eyes vs the tablet screens, but that's a bunch of bullshit.

-superboyac (February 02, 2011, 11:07 AM)

Slightly off-topic, I guess, but that's quite something to state as a bald fact. Many would disagree. I can't read anything on an LCD screen for more than two or three pages without my eyes burning (and I've always bought very good screens). I send any long article I want to read to my Kindle, which is one of my best ever purchases.

-johnk (February 02, 2011, 06:48 PM)

As much as I like my iPad, and read on it and my iPhone, I'd have to agree with you on this.  One of the reasons I that I think I'm going to get my daughter a nook instead of a nook color.  She reads *a lot*.  And considering that she's 10, I don't want her reading that much on the lcd of the nook color.  I've seen them side by side (and compared to an iPad), and the e-Ink does make a huge difference.  The iPad screen is a lot more vibrant, and looks a lot better, and updates faster... but the e-Ink is just less stressful on the eyes.

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General Software Discussion / Re: New (Feb 1 2011) "Starter" Editions of Delphi and C++ Builder

« Last post by wraith808 on February 02, 2011, 02:49 PM »

^ I think that was sarcasm (Wow... two threads to point that out... LOL)

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Living Room / Re: Unable to compete with the Kindle, Apple wants a cut of ebook sales

« Last post by wraith808 on February 02, 2011, 02:48 PM »

^ I think that was sarcasm 

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General Software Discussion / Re: New (Feb 1 2011) "Starter" Editions of Delphi and C++ Builder

« Last post by wraith808 on February 02, 2011, 12:41 PM »

• This weekend the company announced new "Starter" editions of C++ Builder and Delphi, priced at about $200.

-mouser (February 01, 2011, 09:48 AM)

...or you could get the (IMHO superior) Express editions of Visual C++ and C# instead, for free. Hard decision, hard decision.

-f0dder (February 02, 2011, 05:43 AM)

I don't think superior- just different.  I too made the switch (for the major reason that Borland/Inprise had no marketing saavy and made some bad decisions, so I could see the writing on the wall... and Embarcadero doesn't seem much better), and haven't looked back.  But the products themselves as development environments were way ahead of their time.  They just didn't take advantage of it.  The big advantage that you'll get on the Embarcadero products over the Express products is the fact that there aren't the inbuilt limitations that come with using the Express products.  That's a big plus... potentially worth the expenditure.

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Living Room / Re: *URGENT* Patch IE security flaw (31 January 2011)

« Last post by wraith808 on February 02, 2011, 12:38 PM »

My concern would be users of sites like Twitter, where shortened links are routinely used and you don't really know where they are going. Could one of these specially crafted links be shortened and then posted on Twitter with a catchy headline promising news about current events or other attractive content?

-app103 (February 02, 2011, 03:58 AM)

Now, that is an interesting question... While I'd be inclined to say no - exploit should have no effect if sent to the wrong page processor - I'm not entirely sure. But I've always had an aversion stubby links.

-Stoic Joker (February 02, 2011, 06:50 AM)

NPR had a talk with the head engineer (or some such title) at bit.ly.  She said that there was inbuilt protection against this, using a combination of whitelists/blacklists and heuristics... if a link is questionable (it's not in either of these lists) it goes to a list to be manually checked... but they only have 20 people *total* so there is a window where a potentially malicious link is waiting to be checked and in the wild.

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Living Room / Re: Unable to compete with the Kindle, Apple wants a cut of ebook sales

« Last post by wraith808 on February 02, 2011, 10:40 AM »

^ That sums up my thoughts.  At least the first part about how other companies waste (and I mean WASTE) opportunities, and Apple comes along and 're-innovates' old ideas to make something that completely changes the game.  How many years were the *same* companies that are making *killer* smartphones *now* in the game before Apple arrived?  Why couldn't they do *then* what they're doing *now*?  The same with *anything* that Apple produces?  It's like they need Apple to lead the charge to usability before they'll waste their time on something so inconsequential.  It's *so* frustrating!

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Living Room / Re: *URGENT* Patch IE security flaw (31 January 2011)

« Last post by wraith808 on February 01, 2011, 09:32 PM »

^ But do you have it on your machines?  Because of certain sites, I have to have it on my machine for work.  I don't actively use it unless I'm using those sites... but still it's there...

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Living Room / Re: Google sets up a sting against Bing

« Last post by wraith808 on February 01, 2011, 04:08 PM »

Take a look at the article on TechDirt for another perspective on this.  It seems like the pot calling the kettle black in an attempt to prove their relevance.

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Developer's Corner / Re: Choosing a CMS

« Last post by wraith808 on January 30, 2011, 10:51 PM »

^ What was it in the interpretation of GPL that killed Joomla/WordPress for you?  Just wondering, since I'm looking to upgrade my site also.

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Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Bookmark Docs

« Last post by wraith808 on January 30, 2011, 04:25 PM »

I posted a mini-review here and on my blog... hope that helps someone interested in it.  Short summary- it's definitely a good product, and one I would have bought without the promo.  There are a couple of issues and a couple of things I'd like, but no real showstoppers that stop it from being a useful utility.

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Mini-Reviews by Members / Bookmark Docs - MiniReview

« Last post by wraith808 on January 29, 2011, 01:42 PM »

App Name:	Bookmark Docs
App URL:	http://www.bookmarkdocs.com
App Version Reviewed:	2.1.1
Supported OSes:	Windows XP, Windows Vista
Tested OS:	Windows Vista
Support Methods:	Free Lifetime Technical Support by E-mail
Upgrade Policy:	Free upgrades for 1 year after purchase, 40% discount on purchases after upgrade protection expires.
Trial Version Available:	Yes, fully functional for 30 days.
Pricing Scheme:	$24.95 with volume discounts.  Licensed per user, instead of per installation.

Introduction
I found out about Bookmark Docs through a thread here.  

From the site:

Bookmark Docs lets you precisely "bookmark" any places in various documents and then quickly return to them whenever you need, and do all that in a unified manner.  Add bookmarks and hyperlinks to Microsoft Office Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF, CHM, and MSDN documents, and to Web pages.

I've seen many bookmark managers over the years (and have bought more than a few), and haven't found anything that really satisfied my needs, so the idea was interesting to me.  The installation was professional and seamless, though you will want to pay attention to the options at the end; Bookmark Docs by default does not put an icon on the desktop, but does want to run at startup, so set your options accordingly.

Overview
When you first run bookmark docs, you are presented with a pretty simple interface.


It shows a list of your currently available windows in applications that are supported as links, a link to add a manually created link, and a list of supported applications at the bottom- a welcome bit of foresight.  When you click one of the links, you are presented with a dialog that shows what will get created.  You can also expand the bottom portion to show a bit more detail about where the link will be stored (more on that later), and what the actual link to the document is.  Just conjecture, but it appears that an absolute link is stored along with a relative link, so I'm not sure what the ramifications of changing one or the other is.  There is also a place to tag your links- the usual sort of tag rules apply, i.e. word tags, separated by commas.  A drop down showing the tags that you have used before is available, though one oversight is that you can't add/remove more than one tag in this manner.  If you want to have more than one tag, you have to type it in yourself.


Once the bookmark is added, the other tab shows a list of the bookmarks.  It has an incremental search, also, so that you can search when your list of bookmarks (inevitably) becomes too large for the screen to display.  


There is also a taskbar notification icon that allows you to invoke the add window, or to add a bookmark link to your active window.  I did note that if you are in an unsupported application, the application that appeared in this window seemed random; there might be logic behind it that I haven't yet figured out.



There is also access to the help documentation (online only), and the Bookmark Manager.  This is where the more advanced aspects of Bookmark Docs can be found.



In this window, you have a breakdown of the tags that have been used in links, and the ability to filter based on those tags.  You can also drag tags to links in order to quickly tag them.  Renaming tags is also possible from this interface.  The more exciting option is hinted at by the bottom window in the interface.  You can load different bookmark files, so that you can have more than one set of bookmarks.  One list of bookmarks can be kept in a version control system, or on dropbox to sync between machines/users, and the other kept private to your machine.  The application also supports copying the url of the documents (in full or shortened format), so that you can use other applications to manage the syncing of links, such as google bookmarks.

In practice, I've found the linking mechanism to be quite reliable, even if I've found quirks in certain applications.  Web pages and PDF files work splendidly.  In Word documents, in 2003 documents, the link shows up at the top of the application when you are taken to the page, but less conveniently, in 2007 documents, the selected location shows at the bottom of the screen.  Not a crippling issue, just a little less than optimal.

Suggestions for Improvement
The interface for accessing documents is a little less accessible than I'd like.  Though it's definitely easy to bring up the document links, I think that a shortcut menu of your most accessed links on the taskbar notification icon, and perhaps shortcuts to them would be a definitely welcome improvement.  The ability to copy links out of the application, however, might possibly mitigate this; I will have to see how it works in practice with other productivity applications that I use to speed up the launching of documents and applications.

Comparison to other apps
I've used a few bookmark managers over the years, and the bookmarking facilities included in several other applications.  I have to say that this is the most slick implementation, from adding bookmarks, to the tagging of them.  The ability to bookmark a certain area in a document is especially great, as many times I have to reference certain parts of a document, and finding it each time that the document is opened does reduce productivity.

Conclusions
I foresee that this will become one of those applications that I come to rely on heavily.  Though there are a few niggling areas that could be enhanced, it does what it sets out to do, and really is a timesaver.  I give it my recommendation.

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DC Gamer Club / Re: RIFT - MMORPG Beta Invite

« Last post by wraith808 on January 29, 2011, 01:17 AM »

Ok ok ok...

For speed of play, Palladium rocks.

Muahahahaha~!

-Renegade (January 26, 2011, 09:50 AM)

Must.not.reply.  Must.not.reply!  

-wraith808 (January 26, 2011, 10:10 AM)

Hahahaha~!

Do we have a d20 die hard?

-Renegade (January 27, 2011, 07:08 AM)

Nope... I've played everything under the sun pretty much.  I'm running a 4e game right now, but that was just the choice of the people I'm playing with.  My favorites have been Amber, the FATE system, the One-Roll Engine, and RoleMaster.  I just don't really like palladium (too dry) or hero (too many rules for no reason)

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General Software Discussion / Re: How to create a shortcut for the "wireless network connection" in Windows XP?

« Last post by wraith808 on January 28, 2011, 07:43 PM »

^ What are you having a problem with?

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Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Writing Outliner for MS Word

« Last post by wraith808 on January 28, 2011, 09:56 AM »

Nothing yet... it takes me a while to get to these things 

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Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Bookmark Docs

« Last post by wraith808 on January 27, 2011, 10:22 AM »

^ Thanks for the heads up!

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Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Office 2010 discount

« Last post by wraith808 on January 26, 2011, 12:54 PM »

^ Agreed. +1

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DC Gamer Club / Re: RIFT - MMORPG Beta Invite

« Last post by wraith808 on January 26, 2011, 10:10 AM »

Ok ok ok...

For speed of play, Palladium rocks.

Muahahahaha~!

-Renegade (January 26, 2011, 09:50 AM)

Must.not.reply.  Must.not.reply! 

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DC Gamer Club / Re: RIFT - MMORPG Beta Invite

« Last post by wraith808 on January 26, 2011, 09:47 AM »

It's a bit rules heavy, but if you know how to play, and can use the rules fast, it's far better than other systems. Especially for building characters.

-Renegade (January 26, 2011, 01:43 AM)

You *do* realize that this is a debate even worse than the OSX vs Windows vs Linux debates, don't you?  So don't get me started... this is one that I can *really* get into.  It even involves prob and stats!