Saturday 30 September 2006 at 12:46 am
Most games are designed where the road to victory involves becoming larger and stronger; to have more pieces on the board than your opponent or to have your hit points increase from a measly amount to almost godlike powers at the final boss. It is the incarnation of the Alpha Male into our entertainment. Some would argue that it propagates that value system into the gaming society. What if the path to victory in a game was being the player to lose the least?
DEFCON, a game produced by the critically acclaimed Introversion Software that was released today, is exactly that. It is where the cold war goes bad. Nuclear war is unavoidable and there will be millions of innocent civilians who die. From a technical standpoint the game is quite elegant: a simple interface, accessible concepts, only about 60 Megabytes in size installed, and very atmospheric. I generally have to take breaks in between games because it is rather unnerving. The game is multi-player centric, but there are AI bots available to play this 2-6 player game.
I very strongly recommend downloading playing the demo. It allows you to play the standard game (there are other settings), to host a 2 player game, or participate in a 2-6 player game hosted by someone else. But remember: everybody dies.
Tuesday 26 September 2006 at 5:09 pm
Facebook, a social networking site far superior to Myspace due to stronger privacy and much better site design, is now open to the general public.
Be my friend!
Tuesday 26 September 2006 at 12:31 am
The sun rose with me next to Derek and an alarm sound off at 7 in the morning. I very much enjoy seeing him more frequently. My snoozing continued but I managed to roll out of bed before he came back from class at ten. After lunch I took the hour and a half trip to downtown from his university via bus and MAX. Despite putting it in a stack to bring, I forgot my current book of Poisonwood Bible so I slept some more. Remember my plans to work for a year then return to school? That changed yet again.
I am now a part time Portland State University Graduate Student with five whole credit hours. My first 500 level class is Research Based Science Education which is a particular form of inquiry based education. On top of that I have a seminar as well once a week. Tomorrow, or today if you wish to be technical, I will be taking my GRE test. A load of horseshit if you ask me. An independent private company convinced schools that a degree and good undergraduate grades is not enough -- they need standardized test results as well. I coughed up over $100 just to take this silly test for four hours.
Saturday night, on a hunch, I emailed my old boss for my computer lab job what the credit requirements were to have a student position. Learning that its 5 credits for graduate students, and that they were needing to higher a new person for one untaken hour, I will be returning to my $8 an hour slacker job for 11 hours a week. At the same time I'm in contact with my boss from my Mentor job and I am in line to return in the winter for that position.
Returning to my class I was very surprised. Her face was familiar, her voice was familiar, but I didn't recognize her. When all 8 of in the class introduced ourselves she announced her name of Lori Lancaster, my high school chemistry teacher and one of my favorite instructors. She too thought she recognized me and realized who i was when I introduced myself to the class. I am very excited to be working along side someone I regards so highly. To top it all off she also offered me to student teach in her classroom when I reach that point. Another middle school teacher I worked with today also offered me the same and hope I could do it next year when she plans on getting pregnant. Said teacher also is friends with the Education Director at the Washington Park Zoo and she would be more than happy to put in a good word for me if I was interested. I know such offers are polite socialization, but it still helps validate me and what I wish to do with my life.
But now for the most important news of all, to me at least. I did not find out until today, I really wish Mom called me when she found out, and it is not a surprise at all, but early Sunday morning my Great Uncle Jack passed away in his sleep. His story will come soon.
Saturday 23 September 2006 at 11:32 pm
This Sunday Chris Wallace interview interview with President Bill Clinton will air on Fox News. Fox may edit it into misleading soundbites, but thanks to the glorious power of the Internet, we have the transcript.
UPDATE: It will air on the Fox News Channel at 3:00 pm Pacific Time.
Monday 18 September 2006 at 01:21 am
Disneyland was a lot of fun. We went with my gradparents and considering their health this is probably their last trip out of state. We also went to Hearst Castle and Winchester House. Grandma introduced me to a "life of sin" by playing my first game of slot machines in reno. (If she only knew ;) ). You can see pictures (and movies onces they upload) of my trip here. And how could I forget to mention the glory of the talking trashcan!
10 points to those who can guess the ride the title is talking about!
Thursday 07 September 2006 at 5:11 pm
I am off to DisneyLand until around the 18th. No hacking my site ;)
I've been playing with my new camera around the Portland area with the nifty colour features. Check out my attempts to be a wannabe photographer!
*whispers*Derek, I love you. */whispers*
Wednesday 06 September 2006 at 2:00 pm
"The comment has been made, and I agree: It's too bad students aren't this excited about world issues of a bit more over-all importance." -- Unknown
On Tuesday Facebook, a social networking site that targets the college demographic, rolled out a NewsFeed feature which aggregates the public actions of their Facebook friends onto the user's homepage. These updates range from changes to the friend's status to comments they made on someone else's wall. It is really no different than the RSS and Atom feeds found in the other section of my website that people can subscribe to with their favorite newsreader. This feature has been shown to be very unpopular because, to quote many Facebook users, "Its creepy and it violates my privacy."
You have got to be fucking kidding me!
The concept of a personal web page to bask in vanity is not new. A decade ago Geocities provided tool to allow users to create just as ugly and bandwidth intensive sites to talk about how miserable their life is. With the development of so called Web 2.0 and Ajax nothing more than a conglomeration of existing technologies it was only a matter of time before shitty websites were networked together in networks known as Livejournal and Myspace. In turn these sites became another mode of communication between friends in addition to in-class notes and cell phones. Sadly the Internet is not the home for private thoughts.
I've been on the Internet for a long time. I was introduced to it in 1994 and my family began subscription to AOL in 1996. There are probably those out there reading this who have been using the Internet before the World Wide Web was even invented (yes kids, there is more to the Internet than AIM and websites). The Internet is NOT a private place. Many of you have probably heard that potential employers scan candidates' Myspace and Facebook profiles and will reject applications because of PUBLIC information.
There are issues with the news aggregator now on Livejournal. The design does clutter the previously streamline interface and a whitelist/blacklist and other filter features for both the broadcaster and receiver would be nice. I drop friends from Myspace if they post 10 bulletins every day. But I laugh at the people who feel creep out about their privacy being violated. First of all not everyone can see your profile or the newsfeed. Unlike Myspace a profile is only visible to not only registered users in Facebook, but can be limited to only friends. The only things that are broadcast are the things a user sets to be visible based on the privacy setting for each item, and namely only those who are on the friends list.
The friend whores who boast thousands of "friends" are probably most upset by this as now all 1,504 of them can see all the meaningful status updates. I frankly like the NewsFeed feature. I do have interests other than clicking on every single person on my friends list and trying to figure out what changed. Heck I found out an old classmate of mine is getting married. That is something I would have not found out until maybe months after the fact.
User ClassicJBC from Digg posted this in one of the discussion threads on the topic:
"From a social-psychological standpoint, what this is really doing is forcing people to maintain a single identity. Previously, it was easy for people to do what they tend to do in the real world--maintain multiple identities for different friends, coworkers, relatives, etc. Now, though, you can't tell your best guy friend to "suck my balls" without your crush or your cousin or your ex seeing it. It forces people to maintain a single, muted self.
Granted, for some people this is easier than others, as some people don't change too much around different groups. But for someone like me, who tries to maintain a social life apart from my professional and/or academic life, this is really difficult with the new Facebook." Now THIS is a valid complaint. Amazing what an education can do! This problem can be mostly solved with existing privacy settings as the only thing visible on the NewsFeed are things that would be visible anyways.
So after this long winded rant here are the main points:
- The Internet, and especially social networking sites, is not suited for private information -- if you don't want people to see the picture of you holding jugs of beer then don't post it! Then you have to stop your friends from doing the same as well because sure enough, their profiles are just as public.
- Nothing is visible that isn't visible anyways.
Welcome to the Internet! Its a grand old place of the FREE MOVEMENT OF INFORMATION!
Friday 01 September 2006 at 10:25 am
This could go very well, or very very wrong. Probably the latter. I can understand doing digital enhancements (such as converting to 5.1) and cleaning up the video quality, but this?
http://comingsoon.net/news/tvnews.php?id=16298
Star Trek Entering a New Frontier
Source: CBS August 31, 2006
"Star Trek" is getting a 21st century makeover. CBS Paramount Domestic Television is releasing digitally remastered episodes of the iconic 1960s sci-fi series, with all new special effects and music, to celebrate the groundbreaking series' 40th anniversary, it was announced today by John Nogawski, president of CBS Paramount Domestic Television.
The new episodes also mark the first time in 16 years that the original "Star Trek" series can be seen in broadcast syndication. The episodes will begin airing on the more than 200 stations that own the rights to the weekend broadcast syndication window starting Sept. 16 (check local listings for station and dates). All 79 episodes of the original "Star Trek" series will eventually be remastered, with the first batch of episodes chosen from a list of "Star Trek" fans' favorite shows.
"'Star Trek' redefined science-fiction and constantly pushed the envelope with concepts that were ahead of their time," Nogawski said. "By giving the series a digital upgrade using the best technology available today, it will continue to be a leader in cutting-edge television programming as we introduce the series to a new generation of viewers."
The most noticeable change will be redoing many of the special effects, created with 1960s technology, with 21st century computer-generated imagery (CGI). That includes:
• Space ship exteriors -- The space ship Enterprise, as well as other Starships, will be replaced with state of the art CGI-created ships. The new computer-generated Enterprise is based on the exact measurements of the original model, which now rests in the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.
• Show opening -- The Enterprise and planets seen in the main title sequence will be redone, giving them depth and dimension for the first time.
• Galaxy shots -- All the graphics of the galaxy, so frequently seen through the window on the Enterprise's bridge, will be redone.
• Exteriors -- The battle scenes, planets and ships from other cultures (notably the Romulan Bird of Prey and Klingon Battle Cruisers) will be updated.
• Background scenes -- Some of the iconic, yet flat, matte paintings used as backdrops for the strange, new worlds explored by the Enterprise crew will get a CGI face-lift, adding atmosphere and lighting.
The refurbished episodes also feature higher quality sound for the famous opening theme. The original score by Emmy Award-winning composer Alexander Courage has been re-recorded in state-of-the-art digital stereo audio with an orchestra and a female singer belting out the famous vocals. A digitally remastered version of William Shatner's classic original recording of the 38-word "Space, the final frontier…" monologue continues to open each episode.
The remastered episodes have been converted from the original film into a High-Definition format, which gives viewers a clearer, crisper, more vibrant picture than before, even when viewed in standard definition. Once stations upgrade and start broadcasting HD signals, the episodes will be all ready for viewers to enjoy in HD."
