And society became salt…..

Hello again readers!

 

It’s been a bit of time between posts, mainly because I’ve been writing them and hen not actually posting them.  A lot of them felt incomplete, but what the heck, I’m not being paid to do this so I’ll be posting them in their ineloquent form. That’s the update there, so without further ado, today’s posting.

 

I was perusing the internet, looking at various sundry articles about 3D this, that, and the other.  Seems a lot of pundits and professional prognosticators seem to think 3D is a gimmick and is destined to fail.  I’m an ardent believer in 3D, ever since I learned of the premise and saw my first Star wars movie I’ve believed 3D is the way to go.  I actually remember my first 3D experience, I was about 8 or 10, I’d say and was living in P.G. County Maryland. On tv, channel 20 WDCA (I was a big fan of television and it guided my day then) announced a special event. They we’re going to broadcast a 3D movie, The Creature From the Black Lagoon!  Let me tell you as a kid nothing made me more excited then the idea of seeing this legendary movie monster coming out of the screen at me.  The advertisements were very much a draw when you were a little kid and the big gimmick was you needed the free 3D glasses from the 7-11 (marketing tie in!), on top of that going to the 7-11 for a kid is like going to freakin’ Toys R Us, they have the knock-off cheapy toys Trans-Changers, G.I. Jeneric, those balsa wood flyers, green army guy parachute dude, you name it and they had candy, some other stuff chips, and the Coup de grace, the tie-in Slurpee!  If I recall it was Creature Lemon-Lime (get it? it’s green) and you could get the glasses at the register, the old red/blue ones  

and let me tell you it was fantastic!  Sure it was in Black & White (and Red & Blue), but when that arm came towards me I was hooked.  I remember I even kept moving the glasses up and down to see the difference in the blurry multicolored picture and my sorta blurry 3D picture.  I generally try to see movies in 3D whenever possible, I saw the Nightmare On Elm Street 3D movie, now in blurry color!!! And it was good (I mean relatively speaking, it was Nightmare on elm Street).  I saw Avatar back in January of last year when it came out.  That movie was technologically life changing.  It also kicked off the current arms race to see who will be the premiere  consumer 3D sales company.  In Best Buy I’ve fallen in love with   I visit it every time we go.

You know how you can tell though, that it’s both the End of the World as we know it AND totally awesome?  It’s when lingerie goes 3D!  It’s already happened you know… I ran across this little doozy online, totally randomly Feel free to click the link for a bigger pic and also if you have any of the aforementioned glasses, well, go for it. And this my friends is how society ends distracted consumers crashing their hover cars and hover boards into buildings and each other! Sparks and flaming debris reigning down on hapless drivers and pedestrians!! But, at least it’ll be entertaining… well, after they install the gender filter, I don’t wanna see some dudes junk ‘comin’ at me in 3 Dimensions… not cool. Not Cool At All.

Why it’s better to be Beta….

So, you may’ve heard of Google Wave, it was ‘The Next Big Thing.’  Well it was until it’s disastrous unveiling which co-opted user privacy in Gmail and summarily destroyed any chance it had of catching on.  Sure there were some other nifty features it had:

“A wave is equal parts conversation and document. People can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.

A wave is shared. Any participant can reply anywhere in the message, edit the content and add participants at any point in the process. Then playback lets anyone rewind the wave to see who said what and when.

A wave is live. With live transmission as you type, participants on a wave can have faster conversations, see edits and interact with extensions in real-time.”

And there was the nifty video

 

In late June Google Wave finally came out of Beta and no longer needed an ‘invitation’ to join. Hooray! A google product not in Beta, well that is definitely a feat.

Coincidentally, I actually figured out a use case for Wave!

But alas, a product that COULD have been great was left to twist in the wind and slowy asphyxiate as the google machine thrummed along.  Now, I’ll admit, I never used it, but then again, you probably hadn’t either.  The main problem with Google Wave is it was an answer looking for a problem. Not to mention noone ever really quite ‘got it.’ So this week is it any surprise that the news is “Yesterday, Google announced that they are halting development on Wave. The webapp will be available till the end of the year—with mechanisms to export your current wave data—and the code will remain open source.”

Part of the problem is, people are just used to Beta, they’ve become used to products that don’t work or kinda work while the user’s figure out the problems and the kinks and suggest work arounds for the publishers to use.  People also, seem to have forgotten what a Final version is, they want all the versatility of a Beta but none of the finality of a Gold/Final version and so you have half-assed products with no clear direction that are kinda designed by committee, unfortunately the Internetz makes a lousy committee. I could go on with other flaws but here’s a kicker that everyone seems to forget.  Google.Is.An.Advertising.Company.

Google offers you all these nifty ‘products’ because they sell ads.  They aren't a tech company, but people are so fascinated by “new” they jettison common sense, then get mad when a company that yes, has engineers, can’t seem to get the pulse of the community.  They don’t have to, it’s not their core business, they sell ads.  A lot of ads. But they aren’t marketers, they also, aren't designers.  So yes, their designs look like crap, most prototypes do.  Make no mistake, everything Google does is a prototype and a hobby.

Oh… you didn’t realize that did you?  Yes, Google Docs, Gmail, all those “cool services” in the cloud you enjoy for free… they’re all just a hobby.  Google has a ton of hobbies, just look

(click pic to goto Google option page)

and the thing is, you probably didn’t even know about 80% of them.  The thing about hobbies though, is they’re fun, like a game and they aren’t: Work.  hobbies aren’t your job, you do them because you want to not because you have to and when you get bored or tired, you stop. In this particular case Wave went from a hobby, to work and frankly, Google didn’t want to do it as work because it wasn’t as fun or profitable as they’d hoped. So, what about the people that got to attached to it….?

Just try to remember, using a Beta is like hooking up, it’s wild and fun and you both had a great time, but you really didn’t think it was a relationship did you?

The other war...

There's a war going on all around you, but you probably don't even realize it.  Your a combatant.  No, you didn't enlist in it but it's still being waged against you and it's slowly becoming a losing battle for you.  The battlefield is your home, your pocket, your car, your free time.  To me it's more important then whatever is going on in the Middle east.  I'm American and frankly, we'll never actually 'know' what is indeed going on, therefore I don't care.  Muslims on a whole are not evil or even our enemy, no more so then Buddhists, taoists, pagans, or jewish individuals.  Religion on a whole is a destructive topic to discuss however and an entire subject better reserved for another post.

It bothers me that reviewers are apparently bought and paid for these days, no longer even pretending to be helpful or useful, they all seem to be shills.  Worse then that, they are shilling for the enemy of you and I!  I'm talking about online services.  Laugh if you'd like, your probably thinking that's nuts, this dude is paranoid or a nutjob.  Hear me out, it costs nothing to listen but a little time and you might see my point.

First an example. http://www.onlive.com/ Onlive is quite the potentially awesome prospect.  It's a company that streams, via their servers, games, high end games! At that, in real time and you can play then, no matter what type of computer hardware you have.  Now, that's pretty epic!  Just look at some of these titles it's mouth wateringly tempting. But here's the catch, the first year is free subscription, so you buy your little titles, so you can play them. you don't actually get a disk, you get access to the game as it's stored on their server, so they in effect act like your gaming system. There's no mess, no wires, nothing for you to do but log in and play. You do need a high speed connection, but that's not that bad a deal is it?

Yes, actually it sucks. The service itself seems to work without a hitch but don't be lulled into this sterilized bliss. Your not getting a game! On top of that, your subscribing to a service to play a game you bought! This means you HAVE to have internet to play and you HOPE their servers arent down for maintenance, or for repair or overloaded. Hell, twitter cant keep their servers up and you only write 140 character messages. Your supposed to be cool with this why? Oh, because it's 'The Future'. Man, let me tell you, I'm sooooo over hearing that crap. The 'Future' is you being forced to spend money on a sbscription just to use something you 'bought' and did I mention if you let your subscription lapse, then well, you lose your games you paid for after a period of time. See, so you pay for a 1.) computer, 2. Internet... broadband at that, 3.) this service after the year free subscription, and 4.) the games you want to play. Well hell, that seems like a nice racket to get into to me, you funnel money to the ISP, then this game company...twice! Once for the honor of playing the game and second to actually 'buy' a game you don't get.

But you aren't the only victim, this little double dip is also aimed at screwing over the game resellers like the oft evil Gamestop. Now, I'm not a fan of Gamestop persay, but, they do buy back games. Yes it's at a ridiculously low.. I would go as far as to say loansharkian price, but something for a game I dont want anymore is better then nothing. Not to mention the money can be applied to a used game you buy at a significantly reduced price. So, it's cheaper then new and the game gets re-sold as used and everyone is happy... well, except the game makers. See, they want to make more money off of you, it's not enough they sold the games to the original owners. They should get a cut of everytime it's sold because ... well, just because. So, to give you a ludicrous example, you buy a shirt, you wear it til your bored with it, you want to sell it at a yardsale, well... that's not fair to the manufacturer! They should be the only one selling that shirt. In fact, you should be leasing that shirt monthly and if you discontinue your subscription, they should just keep the shirt. That's the state gaming is moving towards. It's not just gaming though, music has fought this battle and lost. People use Netflix (myself included) but we still like to own physical media. So the corporations decided the best way to get around our reluctance to give up buying physical media is to push the new buzzword 'online services' and spin it as a good thing. "You don't have to worry about updates!", "It just works", "Let us do all the heavy lifting", but really... why should it be THAT simple? I mean really? Are you THAT lazy? Is it THAT hard to take some initiative and not just give up all your rights to property? What if you don't like the new version? What if you don't need some of the features? What if you need more features?? What if you dont want to be 'connected'?

But it's an invisible battle because most consumers hear 'Cloud' (another buzzword) and thinks it's the greatest thing since sliced bread. It's not, that's why server computing failed as a platform in the 70's. Not to mention, bandwidth. Slowly over the course of the next 3 to 5 years you'll see a guerilla campaign to assassinate unlimited broadband. Now all these 'Cloud services' start looking a bit pricier because your using YOUR bandwidth and there are caps, no more doing what you want online, no more watching what you want, when you want, downloading what you want. it's a clever ruse. You can't go back once the final onslaught begins. Want to cut costs? Tough, you pay and your going to keep paying because 'they' have all your information, all your stuff, and you gave it to them for the sake of convenience. And now, like extortionists, your beholden to someone else, nothing more then an indentured servant.

And then, it's too late. Yes, it's possible that I'm just paranoid but just look around you. Streaming games, streaming music, Google docs, all in the cloud, somewhere....

I like my stuff. I like putting a cartridge or a disk in a system and playing a game when I want, how long I want, and with no additional costs unless I buy an optional addon. I like using the programs I buy without worrying about having an internet connection or paying additional costs. I like having CD's and DVD's or music players/multi media devices. I can go where i want, when I want, and watch/listen to what I want. In the end it's all about choice. Either you don't care or don't want it or you do...

And you fight for it.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

The Future is… Now! Well, sorta….

So, i was talking to my little brother on PlaystationHome yesterday and we were discussing some of the things he’d been missing out on because he doesn't visit it regularly.  For instance, every Thursday (as of this writing) there’s an update to Home.  Considering the online service is free and a place for PS3 owners to meet up it’s actually quite the added value.  Some of the things added were an upgrade to the virtual theatre (from 1 to 10 theatres) the addition of the bowling alley

Good luck finding a free lane, I really think they should be ‘Instanced’ like in World of Warcraft. 

Instancing is a new feature where people are in the same generalized area but a small group can enter an area that is already occupied and access a small ‘instance’ of the same area so they can access the same things as the occupying group.  The two groups don't interact per say but can use the same facilities simultaneously. and are in a localized setting, then when you finish using the ‘instance’ for say… bowling… you and your little group pop back into the real world.

 

Anyway, there are also new zones added, they’re generally game themed for popular games on the platform such as Uncharted, Killzone, Siren…. etc. 

One zone in particular is of interest because I mentioned it in passing to my brother is Xi (Xi overview),

  Xi was actually alot of fun and engaging.  It is an ARG an alternate reality game. It is actually the second ARG I’ve ever played, the first was ilovebees (I provide an article with a link towards the end also,btw) which totally blew me away.  Interestingly, it’s totally marketting for Halo 2, but you don’t really know if you just listen to it.  ARG’s are an underground phenomenon that happens and most people don’t even know about it.  My other half is a fan of ARG’s currently she’s trying to find a fun one to participate in. The best part is they’re free and most are still enjoyable even if your looking at them as a story and not participating.  So, I wanted to draw attention to something your probably missing out on.  Give it a try, you won’t be disappointed and most of your friends won’t even know what’s going on, hehe.

 

Here’s an engaging quickstart guide: An example and overview of ARG's and how to play

Hello Robots Overlord!

How many people really give thought to the fact that we're supposed to like crappy service?  Sure your told this and that, but when did most people decide to give up independent thought?  This isn't my own personal paranoia, it's all over television and the radio.  It's things like, getting worse service for higher prices (hello airplanes....), or purchasing products are at a premium and finding out they aren't yours (hello music industry...) or how about the discouragement inherent in voting (The 2008 Presidential elections, anyone....)?  Maybe it's just me.

I'm not really that old persay, but I remember when consumers had fair rights and you could have a  disagreement with someone and you could agree to disagree.  Apparently everything's become so divisive that's becoming a bigger and bigger problem for people.  An example,  politics.  In the United States, we are supposed to have a multiparty system.  In case you didn't know, multiparty systems generally consist of more then just two parties in the political process.  Somewhere along the line, most Americans seem to have forgotten this little fact,  now it's Democrats or Republicans, Red vs. Blue, Conservatives versus Liberals, in other words it's all B.S.  When your given a chance to vote, most people (myself included at times) don't fully appreciate the freedom of being able to decide for themselves.  I used to be one of those people "Back in the Day..." as they say, I used to listen to the angry gangster rap and be all "down with the man" and this and that, but it wasn't because I had a reason to be, it was because I was slowly hypnotized into believing that's how I was supposed to feel, I was subliminally co-erced or as Malcolm X famously said "I was hood-winked, bamboozled, led astray,run amok...." It didn't take overly long for my cognitive abilities to kick in and say "hold on, dude, think for yourself..."  Sadly, alot of people these days don't have the same cognitive abilities.  Republicans have branded themselves as the right wing, conservative, Christian party. They represent the old guard, the standard of American values.  The Democrats on the other hand have branded themselves the liberal left wing party,  as far as the media espouses Democrats don't have any similarities with the Republicans, Republican = pro-life, Democrat = pro-choice, Republican  = solid Christian, excuse me as John McCain put it Judeo-Christian values, Democrat = multi religious beliefs, monotheistic, polytheistic, Patriarchal, Matriarchal, etc...

 

This simply isn't the case,  both parties have a lot of similarities but that's all drowned out by the media hype.  Most of the times you have a choice, it becomes drowned out by the pomp and circumstance of smoke and mirrors.  See, we're not supposed to think for ourselves, we're supposed to do what we're told, believe what we're told and doubt or cast aspersions on anyone that dares question that which is believed to be the "gospel"  (religion pun intended).  Don't get me wrong, stereotypes do serve a minute purpose, they give us an inkling on how to deal with a specific type of situation.  The problem with stereotypes is often their used to instill fear or racist beliefs in people and that's never of use to anyone.  I'll give you a typical stereotype.  Tech support phone calls are routed through foreign countries.  This is usually the case, of that I don't deny, I honestly don't remember the last time I called tech support for anything and spoke to another American on the line.  Now that's not to say, foreign help desks are bad.  I'm sure some are quite good, BUT, for the end user it can be a massive headache and can actually turn them off to ever buying from that company again.  It has nothing to do with patriotism, it has to do with convenience and trust me trying to decipher what each other is saying is far more exasperating to both parties then the reason for the phone call, but I digress.

 

We're talking about stereotypes and their uses  the aforementioned scenario brings to mind two different thoughts, the first is sub-par service, the second is a aggravating phone call.  The stereotype should actually help with the situation however.  If you know the person on the other end is going to be fluent in another language and yours may be a distant third then there's no reason to get upset when they don't understand you.  You should also alotte additional time for the phone call and  you shouldn't get frustrated by the experience because really, it should be expected.  If anything, a good experience should be bumped up to excellent because your expectations should have started off low.  But back to the main point, you have a choice in this situation as well, don't deal with that company, not the tech support people, they're doing their job, the company you purchased from however should be penalized.  They know the situation, they know customer unhappiness, but because its cheaper, they outsource and so they should reap the full gamut of good and bad from it.  You have a choice to end or perpetuate the cycle of poor customer experience.

R.I.P. Microsoft Office

Via Article: r-i-p-microsoft-office

My Unabridged Rant~~

The "Cloud" has been around for like, 30 years, it's not new or anything interesting, in fact in the beginning, most corporations used the "cloud"; at the time, it was called a Workstation. I'm sure all the technarati love this "new" concept. "You mean, I can carry a client like a Macbook Air? I don't have to have a harddrive? All my apps can be run from the 'internet'?" Yeah, in theory that all sounds amazing, people love Gmail and google apps but I'm just not a fan, here's why.

In my computer history class, we looked up the prehistoric days of computing, I got to see old harddrive platters (As big as a car tire!) and we evn had to do some reading and research. According to one of the interesting textbooks and site my Professor offered there was this nugget in 1974 "Researchers at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center came up with Alto, which was the first workstation with an inbuilt mouse. It had a fair amount of storage capacity and offered menus and icons. It could also connect to a network." Via computer-history... Let me tell you, back then I was like 'Wow, seriously? People had to 'purchase' time to use a mainframe? That's so archaic!' Archaic? Yes. Profitable? Hell Yeah!! Funny thing is, they didnt realize how long term profitable it was. You could sell desktops for more money upfront and be done with the consumer, then flash forward like 30 years and suddenly... Subscriptions are the way to go! As a consumer I hate a subscription, I like a product in my hands, not to mention if you dont control your data, it can be altered, encryption or not. I've been on sites where a news story was 'corrected' or 'pulled' and all trace of the old version was erased, without notice, imagine a world where there are no hard copies, no thanks, I like my quaint, antiquated, slightly cryptic desktop, it's mine, the data's mine, the records are mine, and as long as it's not hacked or formatted the truth/facts/data, whether accurate or my interpretation is mine. Citing security is just whining by lazy people, the same people that would whine if the government were to put in place laws to "make" you be responsible, rather outsource their responsibility, it's pretty sad and kinda pathetic.

But, let's go back to the cost issue. A common misconception is that if everything moves to the web, things will be cheaper, because there wont be exploits or service packs or any other chaff you wanna throw into the air. This is a flawed concept. Regardless of where the actual software is stored, there's going to be R&D and security concerns, there's going to be people paid, the same number of people no doubt, who will troubleshoot, research, and patch flaws, holes, and bad code. These people will still be paid, the only difference... the ONLY difference is the company as a whole will make a hell of a lot more. Now instead of you paying anywhere from $20-$500 for a program they make a continuous stream of revenue from you. Sure they dress it up in s shiny suit and say we're not reaming, but newsflash, if a person gives you a cute card saying they're not reaming you and you feel like your being reamed and they're the only one there.... they're reaming you.

You paying more doesn't even translate to you getting more anyway. An example: I play World of Warcraft, I paid for a retail box, installed the game and I pay a monthly subscription. While paying the subscription and getting minor tweaks of the game, I still have to buy expansions with even more tweaks then before and new zones, places, races, bells and whistles, and it all sounds really awesome. So I buy the next expansion, never mind the fact alot of times it breaks my game and I have to reinstall and alot of the time although I dont get a prorate the system may go offline for "maintenance" for an indeterminate amount of time, I still keep spending my fee to play. Then the new expansion comes out, it promises a ton of new crap to do and see and

Dances

A dance studio is being worked on to allow players to add and change dance animations. This was not featured on release; however, it will most likely be introduced in one of the future content patches for WotLK.

Date published November 13, 2008 and still... no new dances. Sure there were alot of other things added, but I bought it and was excited for new dances. But what incentive is there to provide the feature now? I bought the software, I still pay my subsription and even if I quit I still paid for something I won't get. But see, thats the magic of subscriptions, you can say whatever wacky thing you want, promise it and never have to make good on it. So what if the customer was lied to, they have your money, they even have your subscription from the months you pitifully waited for them to make good and if you give up, well... so?

Conversely, money talks with a retail box. If a reviewer or someone you knows gets a product and it doesnt do what it says, well, noone buys it. There's accountability. You'd better damn well make good on what you say or you wont be around long. That's really what it comes down too, noone likes being accountable anymore, from companies, to politicians, to parents, to children people don't like to have to follow through on what they say. It must be nice to run your business or industry on a quote from a musical.

The sun'll come out
Tomorrow
So ya gotta hang on
'Til tomorrow
Come what may
Tomorrow! Tomorrow!
I love ya Tomorrow!
You're always
A day
A way!

~ Annie

The hilarity of politics.

A lot of people ask me "Why do you watch politics?", "Why do you watch that stuff?", "What do you get out of watching those liars?", etc, etc.... Well, other then you know, knowing what's going on and being informed on what the "liars" are doing. I like to be able to have an intelligent conversation when I come across an intelligent person. That's not saying that people that don't watch politics aren't intelligent, that is saying they're uninformed. I suppose there's nothing wrong with being blissfully unaware, it's just not something I like to be. I like to see the train before it hits me, maybe I can even get off the tracks. But that's not what this post is about, no this isn't about that. This is about some of the funny levity that comes up when watching some pundits, todays example, Chris Matthews...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036697/vp/35881265%2335881265

Now let me show the key portion that actually made me laugh....

"(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, “FOX NEWS SUNDAY”)

ROBERT GIBBS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Whoever sits here this time next week, you all will be talking about health care reform not as a presidential proposal, but as something that will soon be the law of the land.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTHEWS: You know what? I thought Axelrod was better than the president this weekend. That will get him in trouble, but he really was. He was a mensch. He was human—human. I‘m from Philly. And he really seemed to make the case.

You don‘t think you have lost the moral high ground here? How would you like to be a person who says, I don‘t want working people to have health care; I want them to just take their chances in the emergency room; to hell with those people; if they can‘t pay, live with it?

(CROSSTALK)

HARRIS: You sound like Alan Grayson. I don‘t know of a single Republican who says anything remotely close to that.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Maybe that‘s a crude way of putting it.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: What is your position...

(CROSSTALK)

MCMAHON: No.

(CROSSTALK)

HARRIS: Look, our position...

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: The 30 million people without health care, what are you saying to those people? Forget it?

HARRIS: Our position is that there a lot of things that both parties can agree on, and we ought to start by passing those.

MATTHEWS: OK.

HARRIS: Both parties get to claim...

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: There‘s one thing you don‘t agree on.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: This party wants to insure the 30 million people that don‘t have health care, and you don‘t.

HARRIS: No, no, no, no. What we don‘t agree is on a 2,300-page, trillion-dollar bill that‘s not going to solve the health care crisis in this country.

MATTHEWS: How long was the Social Security bill?

HARRIS: I have no idea how long...

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Neither do I. Why are we talking about this number?

(LAUGHTER)

MATTHEWS: Anyway, thank you, Steve McMahon.

Thank you, Todd Harris.

(LAUGHTER)

MATTHEWS: How long was the bill that took us to the war in Iraq? I don‘t know. It doesn‘t matter. We went to war. "

He totally nailed it, talking about the number of pages is kinda stupid, complaining about the content is debatable, pointing out sections, making a valid point, I can go along with that. I'm even willing to debate a point and listen to the other sides argument. But yeah, talking about somethings too long to read when that's... kinda your job, that's funny.

Revamped for 2010

Today, I was listening to the radio and there was a whole call in session about airport security, scanning residue of gunpowder, and what have you. The problem isn't so much that the scan is intrusive but it's "lnconvenient" to have to be pulled aside and questioned, it's unamerican, unconstitutional, blah, blah, blah. Here's my opinion on this complaint: shut the hell up.

Seriously. No one is trying to take your stupid guns, which by the way, the rest of us can seem to do without Davey Crockett, and if your feeling inconvenienced--tough. You know what, I don't feel safe with you yahoo's running around with your guns. And guess what else, your not the police, your not the military, your not an air Marshall, your a cowardly wannabe cowboy and you should be held up and inconvenienced and ridiculed since you can't seem to function without a crutch like a gun like the rest of us.

See, this isn't the Old West and it's not Nazi Germany, noones gunning each other down in the street and no ones kicking in your door to take your perfectly legally purchased guns. Also the government you fear so much doesn't really care about you having a gun, just what you do with it. Personally I think anyone found guilty of killing someone with a gun, not at their home, on their property or in self defense at the aforementioned should get automatic next day execution, as part of the right. It's fair, considering most people say they wanna be able to hunt, so if you kill a person well you forfeit your life as well, period.

See, this isn't a debate, it seems simple to me, if your "Man enough" or "Women Enough" to carry a gun you should have a pretty easy to understand and expeditious law to govern you. Why do you need a gun in a restaurant? Why on an airplane? Why in a public building? Thats why there is security and domestic police. If you can't understand that, you should move...to another country frankly. I'm not looking to hear "the other side" of the argument, there isn't one. Like I said, I'm for gun rights, I just think there should be fatal penalties, having a weapon is a responsibility, one I think isn't fit for most people in the U.S. but it is your right, just be prepared to face the ultimate price if you like having the ultimate freedom--- The ability whether justly or unjustly in your mind to take another life.