my.bicycle

Aliens vs. Predator. 08.06.04 (I hope to see an 02:00 showing).

Some days, it's hard to know where to start. For instance, there is good news afoot in game development, as well as bad news, and a lot of stuff that is hard to figure out.

Sony is in a tailspin, according to the press, and is planning on laying of 20,000 people (13% of personnel) over the next couple of years. All this because their profit is down 91% from last year. This doesn't mean their in the red, it means they've got 9% of the profit they had previously. This seems to be readily attributable to the grotesque, and unpredictable success of GTA3 and a couple other big sellers, and the fact that nothing has /yet/ come out to buoy sales. Overall, this looks to me like a company that is still in the black spinning the situation to rationalize jettisoning their deadweight. So in essence, business as usual.

The US federal government, in a review of DMCA related issues, has granted a copyright exception for videogames that are based on obsolete systems. Does this make MAME legal? Can I expect to find Apple ][ games like Karateka legally now? What about arcade stuff? The one guy I'd most like to read commentary from on this is out of the picture because his wife is giving birth. The wording on the Gamasutra news bit is vague, but it seems more to be about being able to archive works that are specifically engineered around hardware that is no longer available. So no free games out of this, but it's no longer /illegal/ to hack a game that requires that a bit at a certain address on a 5/25" floppy be "bad" or the game won't play. This is a minor victory against the forces of the Copyright Industry, in their war to casually, indifferently rob us of the future.

Infinity Ward was captured, er... acquired by Activision, which is one of those "Yay... I guess..." moments. It's neat to see a new player on the scene, and it's probably great that they got bought by a publisher that seems to let the developer do what they need to, if they've a history of making hit games. On the other hand, publishers locking up a developer by definition gives them, by definition of ownership, the ability to mandate whatever they like. Any goodwill that had previously been in place because of the business realities of two entities trying to stay on each others' good side are transmuted into benevolence as an indulgence by the purchasing company toward it's new property.

Maybe it's not so bleak as that. Just an initial impression after only one cuppa coffee.

I live in a very strange country. If you continue to read the "wai-wai" sidebar's stories you'll probably figure out that a lot of them aren't true, and most of them are written by hacks that have been bashed with the wordplay hammer. No subtlety...

China Miéville unloads on the spinning corpse of J. R. R. Tolkien:

"Tolkien is the wen on the arse of fantasy literature. His oeuvre is massive and contagious - you can't ignore it, so don't even try. The best you can do is consciously try to lance the boil. And there's a lot to dislike - his cod-Wagnerian pomposity, his boys-own-adventure glorying in war, his small-minded and reactionary love for hierarchical status-quos, his belief in absolute morality that blurs moral and political complexity. Tolkien's clichés - elves 'n' dwarfs 'n' magic rings - have spread like viruses. He wrote that the function of fantasy was 'consolation', thereby making it an article of policy that a fantasy writer should mollycoddle the reader. "

Did the South Park gang save Raiders of the Lost Ark?

Neat blurb about a smartmedia-based video player for GBA. The smartmedia goes in the adaptor, and the adaptor goes into the GBA like a standard cartridge. It looks like you can buy as many cards as you want, then change the contents at a "gachapon" style kiosk for ¥200. The adaptor is ¥3800; it doesn't mention the media, though 32Mb SmartMedia is given away in breakfast cerel over here (just kidding). The 32Mb card holds up to 30 minutes of video, and the decoder is designed to play nicely with the meager CPU on the portable console.

For those of you who think that aftermarket strap-ons are a good way to prolong your pleasure from otherwise dead tech, ethernet is in development for 8-bit Atari hardware.

a couple of shocking events have taken place on the set of mel gibson's movie about god.

ENFJ:
Extroverted (1) | Intuitive (22) | Feeling (11) | Judging (33)
I am:
# slightly expressed extrovert
# slightly expressed intuitive personality
# slightly expressed feeling personality
# moderately expressed judging personality

It appears I almost no longer qualify as an extrovert. That's strangely comforting. 2 years in Japan, and I'm turning into a fucking wallflower.

NBC has commissioned a script for revisiting the world of "V". 20 years ago, this show rocked my sophomore-in-high-school mind. It was charming and groundbreaking at the time. But honestly, with Battlestar Galactica coming back as well, you'd think there was no idea under the sun that doesn't involve dragging the Trousers of My Childhood out, inverting them, and seeing if any loose change can be shaken from them.

Labels: sf

Sony Clie UX50: I think that PDA probably was intended to come out under their new Qualia label, for all the bells and whistles. I think if they'd timed the line-announcement a little better, that PDA would have been an appropriate addition to the luxury-focused nature of that line.

One of the reasons that the slider thang is big on the new Palms is that research showed most users accessing their PDAs to retrieve, rather than input data. I definitely fall in this category, using my Palm Desktop to perform almost ALL my organization and data-entry. The PDA's best function is to remember all that info for me, and for reading PDB format eBooks.

If I was really hardcore about having complete PC functionality in a PDA, I'd be looking at the Linux powered Zaurus, or one of the only slightly larger than the Clie, Crusoe-powered Windows notebooks that are available here.

offa mimi smartypants:

"TiVo should have an "IRONY" button so when you felt like recording, say, "World's Wildest Police Videos" (which I have renamed "Crippling Injuries Of The Poor"), because it's kind of fun to watch high-speed wipeouts with a six-pack of Tecate on a Tuesday night, you could push the IRONY button to let TiVo know not to add that to your profile, you don't really mean it."

"America would be a better place if everyone dressed and acted like Prince. (The Purple One. The Artist. Whatever.) Maybe not forever and ever, because that could get tiring (not to mention hot in the summertime with all the gloves and velvet and such), but it would be so great if the entire country participated in Dress And Behave Like Prince Week. I would very much like it if, instead of sitting on his duff and speaking dryly into a microphone, Alan Greenspan made his semi-annual monetary policy reports while dry-humping a purple guitar. The male members of Congress could wear identical white pimp suits and do a big dance number in the background. The female members of Congress could wear white lycra bodysuits and some sort of sex-kitten faux-militaristic garb, like PVC captain's hats. It would add so much to the day if you went to the dry cleaner and said, "Can you do something about this stain on my raspberry beret? I think it's salad dressing, don't ask me how it got there," and your dry cleaning lady and her friend were dancing all lesbotronically and playing single notes on a Casio keyboard. And who hasn't wanted, during a boring meeting, to throw a translucent black veil over his or her head and start crawling like a demonically possessed boa constrictor across the polished boardroom table? 'Sir, I move that this is what it sounds like when doves cry!'"

[This is from a Japan Tribe thread called Weird Japanese Moments]

When I arrived in 1993, the vibe was a little different than it is now, ten years later.

One weekend shortly after entering the country, I went to downtown Osaka with no plan except to wander around. I followed one of the major venues leading away from Namba station, and after about 20 minutes of leisurely strolling through the most crowded pedestrian streets I'd ever seen, found myself at the famous Dotonboribashi, a slightly arched pedestrian-only bridge that crosses one of the many water channels that crisscross through downtown. Something had been not-quite-dawning on me since I'd arrived in Japan.

When I reached the highest point on the bridge, I had a chance to look even further down the road ahead. I'm an average height guy in the US, but I'm at least half-a-head taller than most local Japanese, usually taller. So watching the crowd flow around me, it was with suprising visual clarity that the dissonance finally sprang into relief: I was up to my chin in a Sea of Black Hair.

The suburb of L.A. that I grew up in was quite racially mixed, with a predominance of Japanese Americans. Where I'd grown up, I could see all kinds of races and ethnicities. In that one instant, I realized that Japan is made up of (wait for it) Japanese people.
Now I know that there are a number of Asian ethnicities that make up Japan, and that it's far from a monoculture, but at the time, having grown up around whites, asians, pacific-islanders, latinos, blacks, and any range in-between one can envisage, it was really strange to look ahead of me, and see nothing but black hair.

On a side note, in 2003, so many Japanese bleach their hair various shades of brown and blonde that the same view does not occur when standing in the same spot. I've checked.

Labels: community

Again, I'm failing to address "moments" so much as weirdnesses, but:

In the USA, pretty much any eye-drop medicine is going to be some pH balanced, mild, tear-like liquid. Some of it may have allergy-medicine in it, but in general, dropping it in your eye is pretty the same substance one gets from crying.

The first time I bought eye-drops in Japan, it turned out to be FX or ICY EYE BALL RIPPER, or something. I was pretty sure I had dropped in crazy-glue, or some caustic acid by mistake. These are not mild little things, but some form of MENTH-O-LATUM that is applied to the eyeball. I freaked out, and started charging around the room, trying to get to the sink to wash out my eyes before they could melt.

My roomie at the time told me it was supposed to feel that way. This seemed about as plausible as intentionally putting a spike through one's own hand, but he seemed to be telling the truth, so I calmed down. Then I gave the stuff to him, because he liked it.

Ten years later, it was time to give it another go. It had the same general effect, but I was ready for it! Over the course of a couple days, used regularly, it became a kind of habit. It felt pretty nice, to "refresh" my eyes. Then I forgot to use it for a couple days. When I tried it again, it almost felt like that first time. I thought, "Why the hell am I doing this to my eyes?!"

The public transportation in Japan is SUPER cool. Usually when someone asks me what I like about Japan, it's usually in the first three things I'll mention.

There are traintracks everywhere, parallel, crossing, concentric. In any city, it's possible to get around entirely by train. In the countryside, well, there's at least a train to get one from the farms /into/ the city.

Trains are on time. It is almost possible to set one's watch by them. I've lived here a total of four years; trains I've been on have only been delayed twice.

Trains are clean. So are the buses. I rode buses home from school in L.A., and it always felt like the half-hearted attempts to clean them had been performed with some form of cooking oil and an unwashed t-shirt.

When there is no train, and the bus looks inconvenient, there are cabs. Lots of cabs. They're clean, too. Generally, the cabbies are polite, don't talk, and will not drive the long-way-around to increase their fare. My only other experience with cabs is from San Francisco, so you can draw your own conclusions about how that stacks up.

What am I forgetting?

...

I forgot planes. In the US, whatever passes for organization in the air transportation industry is a sad, sad joke. Unlike a lot of things that are different between the US an Japan, the tardiness, inefficiency, and lack of concern for the customer rampant in the USA's air transportation system can be readily identified and experienced without direct comparison against a similar thang.

However, once it's thrown into relief against the Japanese system, the contrast is fairly overwhelming.

Japanese planes are not as consistently timely as the trains, but they're surprisingly punctual. They can get delayed by weather, or people not getting on the plane after they've checked in. The weather tends to be the larger problem in my experience; strong winds and rain are common, not to mention a number of typhoons every year. I've been stranded at an airport before, once.

I think the biggest difference, and the one that I'm most appreciative of, is the way the care for the customer extends into the exchange. I hear the Automatic Ticketing Machines that deal with reservations, sales, or seating, are now used in the US. These things are ALL over the airports in Japan, and usually have a couple people standing by, watching like hawks to see if anyone needs help with them. They'll offer assistance before you have to ask for it. Maybe not so surprising in a department store salesperson, but this is airline staff. With human help, or just with the ATM, it's easy to get on your plane.

Alternately, if you're checking in earlier or later than you'd expected, changing flight is No Big Deal. The first time the counterperson offered to put me on a flight that was leaving in 20 minutes, instead of the one in 2 hours and 20 minutes, it seemed clear that my Japanese was faltering, or that my ears needed cleaning. In the US, if one wants to change their flight, it's going to be the absolute worst possible price, and a number of dirty looks from the staff. Honestly, who are we to throw a wrench into the well oiled machine that is United Airlines Domestic Service?

Most of my flights have been for work, and I've not entirely got the payment thing grokked, but it appears that there is no such disparity as exists between the 21-days-in-advance price and the that-day price. I'll wait for someone else to chime in about that. But every time I've had my ticked changed, it's been gratis, or less than 1500 yen to alter it.

Whew. I wrote a novelette. Suffice it to say, unless big things change in America's structuring of service, I'll probably stick to road trips there whenever possible.

I'm spending a lot of time writing about stuff that interests me on Tribe.net. Rather than limiting its existence to participation on those groups, it seems wise to put it here when appropriate. So, starting now:

Labels: community

I just put a blurb up on the new DOD interest in balloons up at Futurismic (see sidebar). I apologize in advance for the puns.

Labels: administrivium, web

Found this interesting story about one guy's addiction to Friendster. I can kind of relate, but after finding Tribe.net, fascination with F'ster seems really pointless. The author of the story realized this too, and took it upon himself to make something new and interesting out of it by turning his profile into a constantly changing, online art installation. Of course, once The Friendster Balrog got wind of shenanigans, it tweaked his account so he was no longer able to freely upload pictures without a time-consuming official review process. The same thing happened to me, and for both of us, it was the same reaction: there went the fun. There is SO much going on in the way of building virtual communities right now, and F'ster is missing the boat big time by trying to be what it was intended to be, instead of what the street has made from it.

Labels: administrivium, community

Six schoolboys took viagra during school hours, and were somehow caught. How could they tell these boys apart from any other 13-year-old? I thought persistent priapism is normal during that age, right?

"There is no adequate defense, except stupidity, against the impact of a new idea."
- Percy Williams Bridgman (1882-1961)
U. S. physicist, Nobel Prize, 1946

"There ain't no rules around here! We're trying to accomplish something!"
-Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931).

"Thus, the task is, not so much to see what no one has yet seen; but to think what nobody has yet thought, about that which everybody sees."
- Erwin Schrödinger 1887-1961

"Don't worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are that good, you'll have to ram them down people's throats."
- Howard Aiken

Robert Crais, a novelist I've never heard of, is suing Activision to prevent release of True Crime: Streets of L.A. barred from publication and sale. It is exceptionally unlikely that Crais has played the game, as it has not demo available, and it's planned release date is next month.
"Those who've read Crais' novels and seen footage of True Crime will notice Kang and Cole also share an affinity for mirrored sunglasses and beating criminals senseless." Damn, there go my plans to include a hard-boiled, tough-as-nails, crime-hating police officer in the next game we make. Good grief, what a desparate, attention-craving ass-hat.

Stop me before I hyphenate again.

I just finished watching Season 1 of "24" -- It was fantastic, but it felt like they dropped me on my ass at the end. I'm looking forward to getting my box of Season 2, and will be trying to avoid anyone talking about it, or Season 3. Were most viewers tremendously depressed at the end of s.One?

It's finally Fall here in Japan, which means that the massive, Godzilla-repelling heat-lamps and steam-engines that cause the appalling Summers here have been wound down, and mothballed for another 9 months. This year, like last was a little longer than expected, though it seemed like the finishing days of sun and humidity of 2003 were not so mean-spirited as 2002. The Sept. 14-15 festival I mentioned in an earlier post was definitely more tolerable than it had been last year, which meant that everyone was relatively nicer to each other.

It's important to note that this is still Japan to which I refer; the relative level of consideration, the average, the ambiguously named "mean" of behavior from one stranger to another is substantially more courteous than what I'm used to in America. There are times when it's hot enough that one feels like one may die, and humid enough that one wishes to take out another. Said result may actually transpire in the USA, whereas in Japan the person will just think about it, then expire, uttering apologies.

The winds have kicked up, and the electric festival lanterns strung up from post-to-post are bouncing and swaying. People consistenly mention the cold as they step out of the train stations and ubiquitous convenience stores, and into the brisk air. This is my season. I don't like being cold -- no one does; it's just easier to dress up for a cold spell than to try and dress down for heat. Jeans, microfleece jackets, pullover sweatshirts, thick socks, and any number of overcoats are in my arsenal. And my tolerance for any temperature is reasonably broad, but tends toward the cooler, where it's easier to think clearly. Now I only have to worry about when they fire up the heaters to OVERLOAD on the trains.

No one else I ever confer with seems to know about Defective Yeti. However, it is a source of many gems:

ANYway! I did like the ending of Logan's Run, simply because it was exactly the same as every 70's-era science-fiction movie ending: somebody blows up the computer by making illogical statements. You can't beat the classics. It's a shame they don't use that any more. Wouldn't it be awesome if that's how the Wachowski brothers ended Matrix Revolutions?

The Source: Your journey ends here, Neo. I am The Source, the self-aware synthetic intelligence that controls the Matrix and all of mankind.
Keanu: Up is down! Black is white! Cats are squirrels! I can act!
The Source: D0ES N0T C0MPUTE <crashes>

I'd pay nine bucks to see that.

Seanbaby rocks my damned world. Reading his stuff makes me laugh out loud, and his latest article is about as accurate, funny, and pointy as Shatner's famous SNL "Get a life!!!" skit. The wave also offers an archive of his stuff, if you poke around. I'm going to bed with a fever, and can't be bothered. :-P