Bay 12 Games Forum

The societal and culture pressure that's forcing them into a position that steroid use is necessary to maintain social parity, of course.

Yeah, re: Antibiotics in the US, for patients: They had them out like friggin' candy. I'm not even joking, almost every bloody thing that's not heavily checked into first? Antibiotics. Cold? Yup. Sore throat? Sure. Fever? Probably. Aches? Hell, why not? Might as well throw it in, just in case!

The US is a drug culture down to its core nowadays, though, due in part to how hard the drug pushers ("big pharma") is doing their work and in part due to the fact that a significant portion of the population literally cannot afford to be sick (As has been noted previously) if they want to keep their job and a paycheck.

It's honestly a little sickening some days, but shit, what can you do? Most folks, if they can't get in 40 hours+ a week, they're going to be fired, no excuses, and ol' big pharma is funneling millions and millions (if not outright billions or more) into advertisement and shoving whatever particular brand of bullshit they're selling down the throats of individual doctors. I'd say probably 1 out of 5 commercials on most US TV stations is for some sort of medication; usually antidepressants or suchlike, but antibiotics show up, too. It's a pretty nasty situation, honestly.

News was saying Huntsman's dropped out. Does that mean there's no longer a (facsimile of a, at least) sane Republican choice?

Sharing: I saw an absolutely hilarious alt. history paperback in a thrift store that had Cannon Law in the title. Cover had a bishop standing beside a cannon. Cracked up a little, but I don't think I picked it up.

Canon law's the real religious law thing, though, not cannon. Cannon law is what came around when folks actually started using cannons in the military, in a certain sense.

The latter is much more impressive/amusing.

What is XCOM ?

X-COM is X-COM, one of the best games ever made and a preeminent example of "Tactical Turn-based Game Done Right." There's like a dozen LPs for one of the primary games in the series (Enemy Unknown, Terror from the Deep, Apocalypse) on this forum alone

You should probably get around to playing it. Either Enemy Unknown or Apocalypse would be my suggestion, primarily the former to get you started.

Cite cases of strong arming, please.

Trying to flood the market in question and get a lockdown on it before someone else comes along isn't sufficient? Especially re: difficulty of switching to something better (especially if, as mentioned, Apple pulls their usual in regards to cross OS stuff), when it comes along, and the education system's general reluctance to shift from "what works," even when it works poorly. If they were marketing something specifically built for education (and considerably cheaper) instead of the iPad, it'd be something different.

It's not quite going up to someone's door and saying "If yous don't buy dis, we's gon' break choo legs," but it's about as subtle.

This sort of thing could probably be done without involving Apple, but frankly, I've wanted to see the textbook industry go down in flames for a while now. Full electronic conversion would make production and distribution hellaciously less expensive than the (bloated, inefficient, overpriced) mess the current system is. There's already plenty of (pirated, in most cases) electronic textbooks out there.

iPads definitely aren't the way to go, though. Too bloody expensive, too easy to steal, and yeah, other companies deserve a piece of the pie. Desktop comps for the classrooms and maybe student issued flash drives. Rent/lend-able laptops for the low-income students.