Also, when a seller says they only ship to North America?

THEY MEAN IT!

Okay, so you received an item from us that doesn't work for some reason. Banged around too much in transit, got rained on... Or maybe you threw it in a bathtub full of water and aren't telling us, or maybe you're trying to send back your old broken item that you're trying to replace. Whatever the case, all I need to know is that the item was broken.

I don't want to know about or even care to know about how disappointed you were, how upset your emotional little kid was, how angry your grandma or how sad your cat was that the item was broken. It's not like we did it on purpose, and telling us how sad everyone was doesn't help the situation at all and makes it seem like you're trying to get some emotional response from us, as well.

Just tell me what the problem is and we'll take care of it. I realize you're probably not happy about it, but you have to realize that the seller isn't very happy, either, because that means they just lost money on something that was out of their control, too. We all just have to deal with it and move on, and when the buyers whine, it just makes it worse for everyone.

A Digg comment by someone named 'geoken':

So let me get this straight. When it comes to Vista we're allowed to take existing DRM shcemes, come up with unrealistic, contrived situations about how that DRM 'could' be used, then bash Vista as if the imaginary DRM scheme was already being implemented. When it comes to OSX, which has an even stronger, more invasive, hardware based DRM backbone it's perfectly fine to say 'yeah, they have EFI, which is way worse than any software based DRM MS has, but they aren't using it for anything right now so it's fine".

He is absolutely right. The article this comment comes from is a major trash against Vista and their "all-powerful Digital Rights Management" that "might be able to be used to lock your computer". Key phrase here is that "might" part, as in... Nobody's actually witnessed that ever happening before, but since Vista is capable of doing that, then it must be set up to do exactly that.

I'm actually impressed with Digg. Some of the more popular comments talk about how the DRM in Vista was required so they can legally play HD content... And an operating system that doesn't support HD content right now is a dead operating system. It's not Microsoft's fault the movie and music industry is innundating us with DRM, and that Microsoft had no choice but to include their DRM on Vista to remain legal and keep Windows support.

Honestly, we know you Mac addicts despise Windows for various reasons, how they copy Mac features (yet these are the people who would like to see patents go away so everyone can benefit from all technology), how it's susceptible to so many attacks (which I would bet is directly proportional to the market share Windows has), and so many other stuff. Fine. You hate Windows. Just stop talking about it because we already know you hate Windows and have undying love for Steve Jobs. Butt out and let us actually try to make intellectual decisions about the quality of operating systems.

Now I know some of you Mac users aren't crazy like this, and I'm not talking to you. But I also know some of you who ARE crazy like this, and I AM talking to you. (For the record, so neither of you are stuck thinking if I mean you or not, Capella and Iaian7 are not crazies... We may play around with Mac vs Windows fanatic talk, but when it comes down to it, I think we all know the pros and cons of both systems well enough to make educated, non-fanboy decisions about why each of us uses the other OS.)

http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/internet/01/24/microsoft.wikipedia.ap/index.html

So, in a nutshell, this is what has happened...

Microsoft noticed that some articles on their document file formats weren't entirely accurate. Due to one of Wikipedia's silly rules, you can not edit or create an article that has to do with yourself or anything you've created or something stupid like that. Basically, Microsoft isn't allowed to edit articles about, say... Windows or Office. This is supposed to cut down on bias, but not only does that not at all work, you've actually prevented the people who know exactly how things work from telling you how it works and have to sit back and wait for someone to get it close enough.

Microsoft decided to offer money to someone to change the article for them, since Wikipedia was ignoring their requests and since Microsoft wasn't allowed to change the article themselves. Unfortunately, people got wind of this and the creator of Wikipedia got really mad and now Microsoft is in trouble for essentially trying to fix an article that nobody else was going to do.

One of many reasons why Wikipedia is a bad idea. The people with the most knowledge... The people who actually made the object the article is about... They can't edit the article for their own program or invention or anything because "they'll make a biased article". Right. But it's alright for people who THINK they know about what the article is talking about to edit it. Even though they're completely wrong or have a little bit wrong or even if they're right. Say someone edits the Nintendo Wii article incorrectly and nobody catches it but Nintendo... The people who actually created the Wii. There's an error in the article and they try telling people to fix it, but nobody does. Nintendo just has to sit there and hope that someone, somewhere will actually change the article for them. (Or you can pay someone to keep it accurate, and then get in serious trouble by the weirdos who actually run the Wiki.) That's really... really... really stupid.

I've had my fair taste of Wikipedia article editing. When I first looked up the wolfdog entry, there was barely anything there, and none of it was accurate. Well... I had done a lot of reading up on them at the time so I actually decided to edit the article. Oh... A month or so passed. I checked back in and nearly everything I had written was reworded or completely removed and it was back to a washed out generalized article. I could have reverted some of it back to my wording, but what would've been the point? Someone else would have reverted it back to the latest misinformed stupid article because THEY think they know more than I do... When anyone who's actually read about wolfdogs knows they're completely wrong.

Oh well... The only thing Wikipedia is useful for is looking up the history of videogame consoles, because you simply can't dispute something like that. But if you ever look up something that could even remotely have a matter of opinion involved... You will have such a diluted, preachy, inaccurate and biased article that it's not even worth looking up on Wikipedia.

Welcome to the world of free information! Where anyone anywhere can offer their opinions on absolutely anything and successfully pass it off as fact. And when you try to correct inaccuracies on an article about you or something you've made? You get in deep trouble. Wow. I think I'll go back to using closed source encyclopedias. Or, better yet, I'll go dig up original articles for something I want to learn about.

Okay, by now, everybody knows about Uru Live being on GameTap, right? It's open beta, everyone's playing it... Everyone's relatively happy. (Except for the DRC Liasons, which, I'm sorry to have to say, I told you it wouldn't work very well... Ah, but nobody remembers that, nor believed at the time that I knew what I was talking about. They probably still don't.)

Oh well, that's not what I'm going to write about, because, frankly, what I have to say about the DRC Liason screw up will make so many people crazy mad that I don't think I'll even bother talking about it. Let's just say that the entire thing is a joke and people need to seriously stop taking this stupid game so seriously.

Anyway... What I'm going to write about is the introduction of a new puzzle in a small new Age called Eder Delin. It's an interesting puzzle... There's a Bahro door with a special lock. You click the lock, it flashes symbols, counts down, then resets. Click the door, it shows a new set of symbols, counts down, then resets.

I found it after reading someone's blog in passing and decided to check it out. Sure enough, there it was. I played with it a while, figured out what I needed to do, and then told TW to get his butt online because I needed help. So he did, and we spent a good hour further figuring out what we needed to do. Then we summoned Edrick to help us since it's a big ol' multiuser puzzle (about which I also have something to say).

We worked at it... and worked at it... and revised our solution... and worked at it... and worked at it... for nearly 2 more hours. There would be random reset as we were solving the puzzle that would totally screw up our progress and solutions. Finally, TW broke (yes, you broke and went for spoilers, haha!) and checked some online forums about what was happening. Sure enough, there seems to be a lot of people talking about buggy Ages where the door doesn't work. Perfect... We spent 3 hours on a door that was broken. Granted this is Beta, but it's open Beta and this is still to somewhat test how they can do things, and let me tell you, this test wasn't promising.

Look, I know coding is hard and we're only human, but when you release a puzzle like this and it's unsolvable because of a bug, you're in deep trouble. This game revolves around puzzles. People log in to play puzzles. They learn about a new Age, they go to visit! They find a puzzle. They work on said puzzle... For a very long time. They have, in all actuality, solved the puzzle, but a bug prevents them from actually completing it. They don't know there's a bug, so they think their solution's wrong and they try something new... And something else new... And something else new. Then they give up because nothing works... All because their first solution was correct, but the puzzle was bugged.

I'm not sure what Cyan can do about this other than do some whopper extensive testing. Like I said, though, this is a Beta and I'm probably one of the few who understand that Beta means "bug testing time", not "free play time for testers". But this puzzle ticked me off, because I had made a vow not to check the forums to see how it was done, but if TW didn't go and check anyway, we would have never learned that there was a bug.

So that was the first thing about this puzzle age. The second thing is that people were using a whole eight people to finish this thing. Eight people is a massive amount of people for a puzzle. It's almost like a World of Warcraft raid where you simply can't advance unless you throw yourself in with a bunch of random people to finish the job. TW, Edrick and I were enough to solve the puzzle with lots of running around. (Well, we didn't actually finish it, but it would have been solved if not for the bug.) I really don't look forward to Uru if there's going to be a regular amount of puzzles that require a lot of people to complete... Namely because I don't have that many friends! For various reasons, I can no longer stand most of the Myst community and, as a result, they can no longer stand me. I understand that, but not everyone is in the massive clique that is the "Myst community", and not everyone has access to a bunch of friends all the time. I suppose the point of Uru is to "make friends", but... Eh. Who plays Uru besides the Myst community?

I will currently adopt a wishy-washy stance and say "I will reserve judgement until the game comes out of Beta and they release a few new puzzle Ages". Hopefully that won't be too long, but it seems that the list of Ages to release are just regular Path of the Shell Ages... Boring.

I am now officially unimpressed with the quality of my internet classes. Don't get me wrong, I wish most of them were like this so I didn't have to drive into town everday, but the instructors are either completely ignorant of how things works, or they simply fail to explain how exactly they want you to do something.

Just this morning our instructor tried to grade our work and she even made a class announcement to tell us that we had all nearly submitted our homework incorrectly. I was included. This time I knew exactly what she wanted, but it was so confusing and contradictory before. See, this is a class where you actually read the book on the computer and then fill in the tests at the end. Simple, right? Well, your test reports are saved to a "tracking file" which logs your progress. The assignment submission form said "attach your tracking file". That meant attach the file the book saved your tracking information to, right? WRONG. That meant take a screenshot of the results of the tracking file, paste it into a Word document, and then submit it.

The fact that she said nearly everyone submitted the problem wrong tells me that someone royally screwed up in the explanation department. At least we know how to do it NOW.

So I decided to see what my site looked like on the Wii before I went to sleep... And guess what?! My site is completely text browser compatible by pure accident. (Not that the Wii is a text browser, but it has the option to strip away CSS, leaving only text.) I then decided to download Lynx, which IS a text browser, and yep! I could actually navigate my site in text form...

So I guess that's good news for all you Linux freaks out there...