1. Your data will be used for our services.

2. We will not sell or give your data to a 3rd party unless you authorize it.

3. When you request us to delete your data, we will delete all of it. Data such as server logs which track basic info such as ip addresses hitting our site, will not be deleted as it is too time consuming.

4. We will not give your data to law enforcement unless we are forced to and will notify you 24 hours (if we can) before we are required to do this. Even if we can’t notify you in advance we will notify you after the event.

I just ran across a new site called Nextdoor. It tries to address the issues of bringing people together. The problem is that it is funded by venture capitalists, so this means there is one motive behind the community creation. MONEY. This means that you are going to be data mined. If they get big enough, they will most likely be taken advantage of by the NSA, CIA, FBI and other authorities who desire your info. They are right up front that the local cops have access to the site. Apparently the site is not about community about corralling the community together based on fear. If we look at their privacy policy we can see that they have no plans on letting your data go or giving it away:

Our “Corporate Family.” We may share your data with any parent company, subsidiaries, other entities under a common control or third party acquirers. We expect these other entities will honor this statement. Also, we may allow a potential acquirer or merger partner to review our database, although we would restrict their use and disclosure of this data during the diligence phase.

Government Relations and Lawsuits. We may disclose data about you to the government if we are required to do so or as we think is prudent for safety or security reasons; and you authorize us to make these disclosures. We may also disclose data about you in connection with actual or potential legal proceedings (a) in response to judicial or other government subpoenas, warrants or orders, (b) if we are required to do so in other ways, (c) if such disclosures might mitigate our liability, or (d) to enforce our rights.

Limits on Our Abilities. While we work hard to respect your privacy, like any other complex web service, we might inadvertently use or disclose your data in ways inconsistent with this statement. For example, a temporary software glitch could lead to public display of your personal data despite your contrary preferences. We might also make ad hoc uses of your data in ways not mentioned here. In these anomalous situations, we will try to rectify the anomaly as soon as we can.

Data Retention. Subject to any mandatory obligations to delete data, we may choose to retain information in our server logs, our databases and our records indefinitely.

Security. To enhance the security of your interactions with the site, Nextdoor.com uses https on its web pages to prevent unauthorized interception of your communications during your site visits and takes measures to protect passwords from unauthorized access. We also use a variety of security measures to protect your information in our databases. However, perfect security does not exist on the Internet.

The reality is that it would be way easier and safer to just go meet your neighbors in person, than use services like this. But if you are lazy and don’t really want to meet anyone in person, then the answer is clear that you should sign up for the site.

“I do not particularly like the word ‘work.’ Human beings are the only animals who have to work, and I think that is the most ridiculous thing in the world. Other animals make their livings by living, but people work like crazy, thinking that they have to in order to stay alive. The bigger the job, the greater the challenge, the more wonderful they think it is. It would be good to give up that way of thinking and live an easy, comfortable life with plenty of free time. I think that the way animals live in the tropics, stepping outside in the morning and evening to see if there is something to eat, and taking a long nap in the afternoon, must be a wonderful life. For human beings, a life of such simplicity would be possible if one worked to produce directly his daily necessities. In such a life, work is not work as people generally think of it, but simply doing what needs to be done.”

-Masanobu Fukuoka

After playing Neverwinter MMO for quite some time, my excitement for the game is beige. About as exciting as dead grass.

The only interesting things in this game are the adventure creation and the npc vendor who suggest equipment to wear. The fact that it touts being a D&D game and then finding out there is no, none, nothing that is D&D, well that doesn’t bode well. I could understand dumbing down some of the D&D mechanics, but gutting the system to the point of hey we will give you 2 die rolls for stats are almost meaningless, sucks the fun out of it. You do see a speck of D&D by the use of words such as drow.

This proceeds into more meaningless character creation that is all looks and no substance. Here let us give you the appearance of having lots of skills, but sorry we are kinda of control freaks and you can only choose a couple of pointless skills after 10th. These skills also have almost nothing to do with your character class. I don’t know why classes are even in this game. Because every class can solo to their hearts content. Basically you have the fighter, the fighters brother, and finally the fighter.  All the classes are the same.

I say this because the cleric isn’t a cleric because I had to use heal potions to heal myself. Self healing is almost useless. If anything you are fighter mage.

The thief is by far the most interesting, but once again you aren’t a thief. There is nothing thief like except for flipping around the screen in cool ways. I never once found myself disarming traps or being able to sneak past creatures or picking locks. It is just fight this and fight that.

Sure the game looks kinda of pretty, but try talking to any of the npcs walking around. YOU CAN”T. It is a dead world. But that is the way the entire game is. Pretty appearances with nothing underneath.  I could almost play the game blindfolded. You click on this npc, go from point a to point b, fight some creatures, hit some traps that can’t be disarmed and really aren’t deadly, because everyone has heal potions (another reason no one needs clerics), and fight a boss monster. Do it again and again.

Usually the one thing that saves many MMOs is character creation, but in this game you don’t notice it. None of the quests were really that interesting. Nothing encouraged me to group up with anyone. D&D is all about the group, yet this has none of it.

The storyline is fluff and meaningless. I never once felt like a hero, just some idiot who did what he was told. The begining makes it out like Neverwinter is under attack and for the first 10 levels, there is nothing going on. Just silly task quests.Why aren’t you first involved in saving the city before you go on all these stupid quests??

I really thought cryptic might have learned from it’s old mistakes, but no. I even thought, hey Turbine has a great D&D game, even though the graphics are getting outdated and maybe they would take some cues from there, but no. Then there is GW2, maybe they would get innovative with that, but no.

The game isn’t really bad, and it isn’t really great and it isn’t D&D and it isn’t really anything but beige and bland. Go try RaiderZ which is by perfect world and it is a million times more exciting and is free to play as well. The character classes are great, the story is great and the combat is way more exciting.

The combat in this game is like you are stuck to the floor with honey and it is struggle to move out of the way. The red areas that special attacks land in often hit you even if you have jumped out of the way (maybe this is a timing issue they haven’t fixed). Eventually it almost seems pointless when you can land a few more attacks and kill the creature and pound down a heal potion. Also sometimes it also seem pointless due to the sheer number of red circles that they put down. You jump out of the way only to land into another red area. I never once felt threatened or scared. I mean my 12th level cleric could take down a 19th level ogre with no problem. This game just babies the hell of you to the point that you aren’t even challenged. It almost makes you want to play Wizardy Online for to feel of being challenged again.

So the future isn’t a boot stamping on a human face, forever. It’s a person in a beige business outfit advocating beige policies that nobody wants (but nobody can quite articulate a coherent alternative to) with a false mandate obtained by performing rituals of representative democracy that offer as much actual choice as a Stalinist one-party state. And resistance is futile.

This is an amazing insightful article.

When I think of beige I think of dead grass.

I needed a new LCD monitor and shopping for one was a total headache. I had to return 4 monitors before I found a great one for $249. It was the E2752V AOC.

In the process of doing this, I learned a ton about LCDs since the last time I purchased one. For starters DVI is on the way out. The majority of new LCDs will have only HDMI. After doing some research I found that the speed of HDMI is the same as DVI and it carries sound. I also discovered some ways to test monitors.

1. Check for dead pixels, by using a black background or use this software: Monitor Test

2. Check red text on gray background.

3. Check movies for blurring when people walk from one side of the screen to the other.

4. Check viewing angle as this will throw colors off at the bottom or top of the screen.

Finally the next generation LCDs are IPS, which offer much better resolution and colors than current LCD but cost more. Make sure you have a video card that supports HDMI and an HDMI cable. In a year it is going to be hard to find DVI.