The Power of Ten Mapmaking Contest

[vinylrake]

Baak make time! :p

Unfortunately, given my current work schedule I would calculate the odds of my participation to be approximately 7824.7 to one.

My current plan is to take my time and make a really kick @$$ map - though it will take me a couple of years given my lack of freetime and the fact that I have never done any myth scripting for solo maps. BUT once I finish the map I am going to get back to work on my time machine, and once I get that working I will just go back in time to the contest-end day and submit my map. Or if I am really lazy or get distracted by seeing Halo 2 in the bargain bin or something, I might just wait till someone else perfects time travel and then 'borrow' their machine. either way though, if you'd like to compete but are just too busy right now I'll loan you my time machine when it's done.

[Baak]

Baak make time!

Unfortunately, given my current work schedule I would calculate the odds of my participation to be approximately 7824.7 to one.

My current plan is to take my time and make a really kick @$$ map - though it will take me a couple of years given my lack of freetime and the fact that I have never done any myth scripting for solo maps. BUT once I finish the map I am going to get back to work on my time machine, and once I get that working I will just go back in time to the contest-end day and submit my map. Or if I am really lazy or get distracted by seeing Halo 2 in the bargain bin or something, I might just wait till someone else perfects time travel and then 'borrow' their machine. either way though, if you'd like to compete but are just too busy right now I'll loan you my time machine when it's done.

Brilliant!

[Two Saks]

VR - have you been watching 'Back to the Future' again?

[Frumius]

I'll loan you my time machine when it's done.

As I understand time paradoxes (and I've seen every Star Trek (billions of times)), you should have it available already, having already made it in the future and come back to share it. Unless you came back in time to a point in the future from this time, in which case please take this message with you as you slide into the future:

"Vr, can you bring that thing back to this weekend so I can borrow it real quick? That's Feb 3, 2007. I'll ally with you against Baak tomorrow night if you do. Thanks, man. Oh, otherwise I'll ally with Baak against you tomorrow. Thanks again!
--Frum"

So can I borrow it this weekend, please? Please?

[Baak]

As I understand time paradoxes (and I've seen every Star Trek (billions of times)), you should have it available already, having already made it in the future and come back to share it. Unless you came back in time to a point in the future from this time, in which case please take this message with you as you slide into the future

[Two Saks]

Frum, just remember when you go back in time - Edith Keeler must die.

[Baak]

Edith Keeler must die.

:: Frum Voice :: NOooooooooooo!

[Frumius]

"He knows, Doctor, he knows."

I'm on the verge of watching that one, City on the Edge of Forever. I think it may be next. I now have all of the TOS seasons on DVD, my dad having filled the last holes in my collection for my birthday the other day.

Prior to that, I had them all on VHS, recorded at varying levels of reception back in the '80s! So not only was the reception of the television signal iffy, but the tapes were getting moldy! Literally. I cringed a bit when playing them, fearing for the equipment, but sometimes you gotta say what the fudge and see a Trek and let the damn VCR get moldy. I mean, what's important in life?

But now all of them are in pristine DVD format! And I'm seeing scenes that had been deleted because in the '80s when I recorded them there was less was show time in an hour block (more commercial time) than in the '60's when they were created. Before the end credits they are about 50 min, so if you watch one on the air now-adays, you are missing about 5 min of scenes! Atrocious. It's terrible. I hate it, and rarely even watch TV at all, other than DVD's. When you watch an old show on commercial television, they hack the hell out of it in order fit it into a smaller time slot, made smaller in order to beat you on the head with more, more, more! commercial crap. Sickening.

[Two Saks]

I hear youg Frum - death to commercials viva la TiVo baby!

My favorite scene that was always cut in (voice of Ruk) 'the old days' is in the excellent 'Mirror Mirror' episode, where Chekov is shown screaming inside the Agonizer. The alternate Spock is just too cool.

[Baak]

Yeah, Frum - yet another reason why we gave up on TV completely a couple years back. Seriously. Haven't missed it one bit.

Even with TiVo they still cut the crap out of the shows themselves. Ad time has been increasing every year and once they started those idiotic popups several years ago - ads for other shows on the same channel on TOP of the show you are trying to watch (!!) - we said forget it. Oh and the fact that the bandwidth for channels has been going down which means the quality of the images are worse - well, you get the idea...

As of Jan 2004 - three years ago so it's probably worse now - a study on ads found:

Nearly a Third of Primetime Is Now Ad Time

A recent study by PhaseOne Communications has determined that every three hours of primetime programming includes 52 minutes of commercials and promotions, up from an average of 28.5 minutes in the 1980s and 38 minutes in the 1990s. PhaseOne's Terry Villines told the online edition of TV Guide Thursday that the current figure is 8 percent higher than it was four years ago. "We thought back then that networks had reached the breaking point," he said.

We've been watching everything on DVD's (and some VHS tapes) for the past couple of years. We recently started Perry Mason from the beginning - a great show. Not only is the quality 10x better than from DirecTV (it was airing on The Hallmark Channel when we taped it a couple years back), but there is about 10 minutes of material per episode we've never seen before (the stuff they cut) - often adding hugely to the plot. Amazing you can actually see the weave of their suits now the quality is so good.


Frum: I have The Nitpicker's Guide to Classic Star Trek (an outstanding book) and in it the author talks about having gone through both the syndicated and original "uncut" versions in parallel on two TV's. This was when they were out on VHS only (pre-DVD). He commented on differences and how some had no differences (only a few). Fun stuff! That's a *great* book for Trekkers.

We're going to watch Deep Space Nine from the beginning again soon(tm) as well - really a great series. Never saw a single Voyager (and never will) - Enterprise either. The Next Generation is mostly great too (except for some of the early ones and episodes like the Super String one with Picard stuck in the elevator...), but right now we're getting into the DS9 mood...