Game Reviewers Face Odd Bribery From Publishers 148
eldavojohn writes "You might be used to the idea that game reviewers receive games free and ahead of time, but Ars opens up a darker side to the mystery box. Like a $200 check from Dante's Inferno, reading, 'by cashing this check you succumb to avarice by hoarding filthy lucre, but by not cashing it, you waste it, and thereby surrender to prodigality.' Or how about a huge-ass sword from Darksiders. Or brass knuckles (illegal in some states) from the makers of Mafia II. Or rancid, rotting meat mixed with spent shell casings, teeth, broken glasses and dog tags from Bulletstorm. NCSoft gave out flight suits and trips to weightlessness. Nintendo apparently likes to send all manner of food, including elaborate cakes shaped as their consoles and games. Squeeballs sent a crate of stuffed animals. iPods from Activision and Zunes from Microsoft seem to be pretty tame bait for reviewers ... but there's one reason why this continues to happen: more news-starved review sites and blogs report on the extras and the publisher's game gets spread around just a wee bit more. Even if it is as freakish as bracelets from an insane asylum spattered with blood." I think we must be doing it wrong around here... we usually can't even get games before the release date, much less get free rotting meat.
Threats (Score:3, Funny)
Publisher: Give our game at least 8/10 or it's Two Girls, One Cup for you.
Reviewer: And if I refuse?
Publisher: Three Girls, One Cup.
Re:Threats (Score:4, Insightful)
GAME PUBLISHERS.PAY.FOR.ADVERTS.
MAGAZINES/WEB SITES SELL EYEBALLS
Then what's Gamer Reports? (Score:2)
GAME PUBLISHERS.PAY.FOR.ADVERTS.
Then what's the video gaming equivalent of Consumers Union, a non-profit organization that publishes a magazine called Consumer Reports that doesn't take ads?
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Better yet gaming news sites/review sites are mostly garbage outside of convenience of finding aggregated info, trailers and user reviews/forums.
http://insomnia.ac/commentary/the_videogame_news_racket/ [insomnia.ac]
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Wait what? They already started out with the threat, why would he ask?
If you have to ask, you overestimate the intelligence of game reviewers and publishers.
More seriously, that could be interpreted as
"if you give our game a score lower than 8/10 then 2 chicks 1 cup"
"What if I refuse to review it at all?"
Reviewing specialists (Score:4, Funny)
In these dire times, were I a reviewer, I'd specialize in Dead or Alive spinoff games.
Just in case they up the ante.
Re:Reviewing specialists (Score:4, Insightful)
In these dire times, were I a reviewer, I'd specialize in Dead or Alive spinoff games.
Just in case they up the ante.
Yes, because nothing guarantees a good review like sending a woman who can break your neck with her thighs.
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I don't know how you mean that, as in good or bad, but in case of good; I want gamplay, mutherfscker, I couldn't care less about gimmick shit like that.
Yes gamer of the very first commercial hour (read pong, Wolfenstein3D and PacMan), but games these days are movies.
Call me frustrated all you want, but games used to be tools to entertain yourself with, like chess, but today games are made to entertain you instead. No wonder multiplayer is so popular these day, but oh well...
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I'll get off your lawn in a minute here... I've been a (video) gamer since ET was a new release on the Atari, which means I started about ten years after you I guess, but your comment reads like you're just pining for the good old days when you had to plug your console in uphill both ways. You can still play Pong and PacMan or various other simple games (the one thing you can say Flash has going for it, in fact), and Wolfenstein3D was just a predecessor to the current crop of FPSs.
Your comment that games t
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Oh I don't mean to be like "Get of my lawn!", but what I mean is things like puzzles. Modern singleplayer games suck, I agree, althought there are exceptions but not many. But take a look at Portal for example; great game. It depends on how well you can think. Now take a look at the interactive Uncharted 2; great addictive game, sure, but it's basicaly a click-through (or button press next next next) movie.
Oh and I have nothing against a great story movie driver game. Take for example Metal Gear Solid; one
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In these dire times, were I a reviewer, I'd specialize in Dead or Alive spinoff games.
Just in case they up the ante.
Sounds like the cheerie Siberi-a of journalism.
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By sending dead hookers?
I swear they were alive when I put them in the shipping box!
Re:Real Money Is Taking Microsoft Halo Bribes (Score:4, Interesting)
As someone who works at a healthcare company, this amuses me. Up till not too long ago, we didn't have a lot of rules on this sort of promotion in our industry. There is some now in terms of doctors and other clinical people, however, I remember my days as a tech, I used to love fixing PCs for the mental health clinics because... they had all the best toys. I think one of em gave me a "Wellbutrin brain" (plush brain with a "Welbutrin" stamp on the bottom).
Now, we actually sometimes have to send things back to well meaning vendors, we are not even allowed to accept a free pen. Gone are the days when consultants could take us out to lunch on their companies dime. It doesn't even matter that we are tech folks and don't make purchasing decisions.
In fact, they have even gone so far as to come up with complicated rules as to whether or not we can eat at vendor events that supply free food. Seriously. The company took the fact that gifts could influence a persons decisions related to a product, and went so far to the other side, that we made the rules so complicated that people now think the company is being stupid. Excellent way to develop respect for doing the right thing... by taking it so far that its stupid.
-Steve
Not bribery; just PR stunts. (Score:4, Informative)
It's not (always) bribery, but just a PR stunt. They don't do these things for better review scores, but for media attention.
Serious, what good is "rancid, rotting meat mixed with spent shell casings, teeth, broken glasses and dog tags" or "brass knuckles"?
If it's not cash, or some other thing they can cash in then it's not really bribery.
Re:Not bribery; just PR stunts. (Score:4, Funny)
Brass knuckles make it easier to acquire your own cash!
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It's not (always) bribery, but just a PR stunt. They don't do these things for better review scores, but for media attention.
Reviews really aren't about the numbers though... They're about the publicity. Yes, sure, folks talk about what score some game got from some site... But the review itself is more than a number. It's generally several pages of description, a bunch of screenshots, opinion bits, memorable quotes from the dialogue... That's all PR. Even if a game gets a bad score, some folks will buy it because of a cool screenshot in a review.
Serious, what good is "rancid, rotting meat mixed with spent shell casings, teeth, broken glasses and dog tags" or "brass knuckles"?
If it's not cash, or some other thing they can cash in then it's not really bribery.
Pretty much all of that could be converted to cash on ebay. People will buy j
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Agreed (Score:4, Informative)
There have been situations with games such as Super Smash Bros Brawl where they drip feed you with information, every day you see a new character, or a new move, or a new item you will be using in the game. By the time the game comes out I'm sick of it already and I don't even want to see it anymore. Or sometimes development time will drag on and paying attention to a game's coverage is like torturing yourself, such as with Dragon Quest IX or Duke Nukem Forever. In that case, coverage will often turn me off of a game, and if I already know I want to play it, what's the point? I've got better things to do.
Nowadays I just listen to a few podcasts where people don't talk so formally about their experiences and they often talk game theory which is much more interesting to me compared to regurgitated PR. I would recommend A Life Well Wasted [alifewellwasted.com], The Brainy Gamer [feedburner.com], Gamasutra Podcast [libsyn.com], In-Game Chat [ingamechat.net], Irrational Behavior [feedburner.com], Mobcast [feedburner.com], and Retronauts [1up.com]. If you also like those, you might like Geekbox [libsyn.com], RebelFM [libsyn.com], 1up Oddcast [1up.com], Weekend Confirmed [shacknews.com], Player One Podcast, [libsyn.com]Joystiq Podcast [joystiq.com], Gamers with Jobs [gamerswithjobs.com], Drunken Gamers Radio [robotpanic.com], IGN GameScoop [ign.com] and CAGCast [cheapassgamer.com]. Hey, it makes work and commutes go by fast.
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Giant Bombcast, GameSpy Debriefings, CO-OP (video podcast, now defunct but still worth watching old eps), Downloadable Content (Penny Arcade podcast), EA Podcast (w/Jeff Green), Evil Avatar Shotgun, Podcast Beyond, Three Red Lights, Nintendo Voice Chat, The Kojima Productions Report, Pixel Revolt, Played, Shackcast, Re-Play Radio, At 1up, 1up Whiteboard, Active Time Babble, In This Thread, Retronauts Bonus Stage, and The Sound Test
If y
No, actually it IS bribery (Score:4, Insightful)
it's widespread among all industries - which is probably why there are so few reviewers who have anything approaching credibility. (not sure about what it's like in your country) In the UK there is a standard for travel reviewers that they should declare who paid for the trip / accommodation that's being reviewed - maybe it's time any product review carried a qualifier as to what benefits or freebies the reviewer received, too.
As it is the only real indicator of whether a product is worth a dam' is from people who have bought it with their own money. Having someone who had a product dropped in their lap, telling you that it's definitely worth the money (what money?) is so hollow as to be laughable. Hopefully as more bona-fide owners write about their experiences, all these media-tart reviewers will be shown up for what they really are: entertainers.
I'm With the Author (Score:1)
Guess they're too focused on the Lame Stream Gaming Media to care about us gamers on main street.
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Well, your gaming blog needs to seriously ROCK! If you don't influence enough of the worlds population of gamers into making decisions about game purchases, you're likely never to get a bribe, or even a goody for that matter.
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In order to get that, companies would have to send me a game early.
For that to happen I would have to give people what they want (previews and reviews of games before they come out).
Yup, that'd be what's known as a circular reference.
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No, it's just that you have to have patience and build yourself a reputation (a step businesses always seem to want to skip over), and then you get those pre-release privileges, but only for games you like. It goes like this
Game X comes out. You buy it on release day and post a favorable review.
Game X part 2 comes out. You buy it on release day and post a favorable review.
Game X part 3 is about to come out. The manufacturer says "hey, we like this guy's previous reviews". A week before release, you get a re
Re:I'm With the Author (Score:5, Interesting)
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Disclaimer: it's already free to play for everyone, but I figured I had to try. Hopefully, in some small way, this lame attempt at bribery will make your day.
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Getting swag (Score:5, Insightful)
Since you mentioned that you can't get any swag from publishers, here's the answer: get your reviews on metacritic.
That score determines a lot of things and you're much more likely to be bribed if you can make it look good.
Indeed, HTML5 and Microdata (Score:2)
Slashdot's always been a little behind the curve but considering what their review form looks like, you'd think it'd be a trivial thing to have the end product wrap the review in microdata so they too are suddenly influencing metacritic and com
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I also use http://www.gamerankings.com/ [gamerankings.com] to read various scores, reviews, etc.
Gee, what does that tell you? (Score:1)
I think we must be doing it wrong around here... we usually can't even get games before the release date, much less get free rotting meat.
Even by the extremely low standards of video game journalism [tumblr.com], Slashdot can't get any respect. Maybe you should think about focusing on the writing/editing. Or fix the awful bugs on this site that have been around for... well, decades at this point. (How about a rich text comment field? Let's join 2005!)
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More pedantic: Only if you're expressing it as a whole number.
Slashdot has been around for 1.3 decades.
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Adding a rich text command field is useless for the half dozen of HTML tags you can insert. Adding more tags would be counter-productive - the existing ones already let you structure your post, which is the important part; enabling style changes for each comment would make the site unreadable.
So that's not really important. I would prefer if they fixed the CSS for Idle - the comment textarea still doesn't use the whole width.
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I'm not opposed to it (having menus for formatting, not for styling, that is), I just don't care. But since there are plenty of bugs to fix, I'd rather they concentrated on them than adding (what I see as useless) features.
Besides, liking technology doesn't mean liking all technology. Just lik
Slashdot book reviews? (Score:2)
Or rancid, rotting meat mixed with spent shell casings, teeth, broken glasses and dog tags ...
So, are you trying to say McDonalds, or Taco Bell? (That editorial "food" review is probably not going to get me a new ipod...)
In comparison, what do slashdot book reviewers get? About the same?
The old Chaos Manor (Score:4, Interesting)
Back in the day when everybody read Byte Chaos Manor was probably the most important place outside of the cover you could be.
Jerry Pournell wrote what we would the column based on what he used.
His system was simple. Send me your stuff and I get to keep it all.
If he didn't like your stuff he would say so or just not write about it.
If he did like your stuff it was fantastic for you.
Borland as a company pretty much was born when Jerry Pournell wrote about how great this cheap Pascal compiler called TruboPascal was. Borland to a loan for their first full page ad based just on that column.
Now that would be considered not legit but at the time no one minded. Truth is that his reviews where brutally honest and very good.
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Why? Game companies give review copies to reviewers all the time.
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Yes but I am talking about $5000+ systems when that was a lot of money.
Honest Game Reviews: A Procedure (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't play games very often anymore, but I've found the easiest way to get an honest opinion of a game is to do the following:
That works well.
Reviewers who scored a game low were not compensated by the publisher, almost definitely had to buy the game themselves, and usually point out legitimate flaws instead of glossing over them. It's a great way to innoculate yourself against hype.
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I don't play games very often anymore, but I've found the easiest way to get an honest opinion of a game is to do the following:
* Wait for a few months after the game is released (initial or pre-release reviews are always too positive)
* Go to a game review aggregator site (metacritic, gamerankings, etc)
* Start reading from the lowest-scoring review, up
That works well.
Somewhat earlier in the release cycle, I've found torrent seeder/peer counts and especially torrent site comments help separate the wheat from the chaff. P2P sharers are brutally honest, especially if the software isn't even worth stealing or simply doesn't do what its supposed to. I have in fact purchased and paid for software on this basis.
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I wait an depend on my social network.
People who no me know what I like and visa versa. TI's the best way to predict enjoyment of any product.
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FTFY. I can't count how many times the game as a whole sucked much more than the few moments they put on the demo.
Personally, I like Zero Punctuation [escapistmagazine.com] reviews.
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You can do this with many products. The high-scoring long reviews of a mobile phone are probably written by fanbois, the short ones which list the defects are the ones written by people who know what matters.
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I do something similar, but different. I think low outlier review scores often has to do with reviewers using a point deduction scheme, which isn't all that indicative of how fun a game is.
What I do instead is I go to metacritic and note both the aggregate score for critics reviews and the aggregate score for user reviews. Critics reviews can be paid for, or sometimes nitpicky, whereas user reviews can be a gut reaction, based on superficial impressions, and susceptible to 'fanboi/hater' extremes. However,
Aggregators don't work (Score:2)
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would you say a "Good" game should be given a 50% score?
Yes. You mention it in your post, but the trend of only using the very upmost part of the scale is stupid. A game that really sucks might still get 40%. Not that score matters that much (read the review instead).
When reviewers give 100% [psillustrated.com] you just can't take it seriously. 100% is divine perfection, or should at least be reserved for a real-life Matrix. The reviewer even guzzles "The only trick now is to see how they can top themselves with the next game". Yes, that would be a trick indeed, Spinal Tap jokes as
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But in contrast small indie games or low budget releases are usually scored evenly.
Of course it could just be a combination of hype backlash, bribery and reviewers suffering from an unusual vulnerability to marketing ploys.
Some examples of high budget games with huge score disparities.
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/call-of-duty-movdern-warfare-2 [metacritic.com]
http [metacritic.com]
Money hat (Score:3, Interesting)
The rules are different at different outlets but you'll find most try to think about this subject and let their audience know how it affects or doesn't affect them. Giant Bomb [giantbomb.com] are headed up by people who left after a related incident at their previous employer. One of the founders fought to defend their review against a publisher and editor who wanted them to give it a more glowing review, and their previous job [wikipedia.org] was terminated for doing so, certain people quit in disgust and joined together to form a new site.
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Here's the real question. (Score:2, Funny)
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Yes, and the game was fantastic!
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Yes, and the game IS fantastic!
when you have a time machine, was and will be become is.
Bribery? (Score:2, Interesting)
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haha (Score:2)
"much less get free rotting meat"
That will go down in history of /, as the most regrettable thing ever posted.
Prepare for waves of rotten meat.
Same advice I got for consumer car reviews (Score:2)
When you're looking at reviews, you can almost always ignore the Five Star and One Star reviews. Five stars usually don't provide insight (giddy cheerleading) and one star reviews are usually hyperbolic reactions to problems.
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There used to be a time... (Score:4, Insightful)
There used to be a time when those gimmicks would be included in the retail box of the games.
Infocom comes to mind.
ok,no rotting meat, but a blood splattered bracelet would SO be in Infocoms style.
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They're still there, you just pay $10-100 more for the Collector's edition now.
makes me want to be a reviewer (Score:2)
What happens is I can never decide whether I should sell out completely to get the most stuff, or I should try to maintain integrity and relish the occasional oppo
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Damn Publishers (Score:2)
I wish the article really went more into depth. IMHO Publishers these days are not all that what they are cracked up to be , bunch of marketing whores. Look at the fiasco with CIV5 from 2k almost unplayable on most non english windows systems and the crash issues with most nvidia cards. http://forums.2kgames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=88969 [2kgames.com]
Every major gaming magazine has given it almost 8/10 , while actually (as I long time civ player) I don't think it is all that great except for the perty graphics. Dumbe
Brass knuckles aren't brass knuckles (Score:2)
Or brass knuckles (illegal in some states)
Brass knuckles are never sold as brass knuckles anymore. They're sold as paperweights so that they're legal everywhere.
Same old story. (Score:2)
Is this a surprise?
The crazy stuff is sent because it generates hype. Bloggers rush to post about every little thing they receive and routinely gush about how awesome it is that they have it in with the publishers. Publishers bombard publications with all kinds of assorted gifts and marketing crap to foster this sense of good will, they give them special behind-the-scenes access, they offer exclusive interviews. This is all done in an effort to foster this sense of goodwill on the part of reviewers. There's
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I'm Not Taking It Wrong (Score:2)
Still, this seems like a story slot that could have been better served covering something else...
That's why I, as the submitter, tagged it as idle & humor. Because that's all it is. Something that's funny enough to read when you're idle. CmdrTaco put it under games and he, as the editor at the moment, has that choice. I mean, is it any less newsworthy than your submission on PS3 Trophies [slashdot.org]? At least your attention is being brought to potential bribery here.
As always: If you're using the new index, there is an edit button in the upper left near the 'Stories' tab that will allow you hit 'Excl
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As always: If you're using the new index, there is an edit button in the upper left near the 'Stories' tab that will allow you hit 'Exclusions' and add 'idle' to your exclusions.
Good idea - shame it doesn't work. I've done it already, and I still see stories from idle on the front page.
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That's right...I'm a fanboy who hates Sony. I've only owned every gaming system Sony has ever released...as well as every gaming system Nintendo has released (minus all of the Game n Watches) and both gaming systems Microsoft has released. Just like how I owned an SNES and a Genesis way back in the day.
Yup...I'm a fanboy alright. A fanboy of video games. My allegiance is to fun, not a particular brand.
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I've made my case against fanboys [livingwithanerd.com], and I've presented a shortened version of my gaming history [livingwithanerd.com], which spanned many gaming platforms from many different manufacturers; that includes Atari, Sega, Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft, and PC gaming.
Full yet, or do you need to be fed more?
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In that case, I'm glad I could make you laugh :) Have a great day!
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No, but he just has to chime in somehow, even if he has nothing to say.. as usual.. he even admitted in another story that he is just posting these comments to advertise his website :/
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he even admitted in another story that he is just posting these comments to advertise his website
Not me, sorry. Provide a link and prove me wrong.
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Those post you were responding to was a response to a post by Pojut that got modded to -1 Troll; so in certain views, it appears that YOUR post was the parent.
Slashcode pwnage strikes again.
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Wha? I was talking about Pojut dude :)
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Well I don't mind slashvertisements if it is in the scope of intereseting, pressing todays issues and news for nerds. Games certainly is one of them and it is journalistic independance. You might not thinkg of games reviewing as journalism, but that's a different topic.
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I think this article is amusing (well, the summary is, haven't bothered with the article tbh!). I wasn't referring to that.
Perhaps you are browsing with -1 or 0 level comments hidden. I only hide -1 comments but I still get thrown off by it sometimes. Have a look through the parent posts!
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Moderators are humans ;) I always read at -1 for that very fact.
Well some are basement crawlers...
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I tend to expand a lot of posts, but yeah the GNAA and anal rape stories were getting to me a bit so I started browsing at 0 intead of -1.
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There are only so many stories that make it to the front page of Slashdot every day...my point is, why use up one of those "slots" with a retrospective on stories, some of which are well over a year old, instead of something that covers modern events?
Why not just ignore the stories that you don't consider news? It seems slashdot is often at least a few days behind whenever I talk about stories with one of my geeky friends, but I don't mind much as I don't often browse any other tech news/aggregation sites really.
I just was getting frustrated at the number of times I've seen you post near the top with some really obvious observation. I'd seriously just prefer you to say "first post!". I probably have done/will do this from time to time too, but most of t
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I usually want to say "don't you have a job or something?", then realise it would be amazingly hypocritical considering I'm often browsing /. at work ;)
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I do have a job, but it involves a lot of downtime :)
Seriously though...you're right. It is a bit overboard. Tell ya what, I'll keep my mouth shut unless I have something good to contribute (or if there's a joke just hangin' out there, waiting to be posted)
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You maybe have the same issue I have - things that you have to point out to other people irl, are obvious to most Slashdotters :p
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It's integral to my job, actually...business ops tells me what they want, I translate that into tech speak, and tell the production team what needs to be done. I also do the opposite, taking the production team's technical specifications and translating them into "business speak".
Re:Don't take this wrong (Score:4, Informative)
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I hate it when my ass balls are on fire, but when they're hell balls it's okay.
Do you have typing Tourette's syndrome?
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There was that story about that tea party candidate who used black magic to remove human causes from global warming, but not in Russia. But it didn't mention any tech.
Re:Bribe? (Score:4, Funny)
well, maybe not a Zune...
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But... I need a paperweight...