Author: Nadreck

Blog Lifecycle

  • Blogger creates blog.
  • A huge flurry of initial posts ensues. Blogger describes such mundane topics as taking his family to McDonald’s.
  • Blogger realizes that perhaps the rest of the world isn’t so interested in his musings on McDonald’s.
  • Posting frequency drops off.
  • A last post or two.
  • Blog goes into hiatus.

    • […]

  • After some time away, blogger returns with a few posts.

(A Brief Return at Philsteinmeyer.com)

Welcome back, Phil.

Moo Cards

I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned them before, but their recent announcement for Moo Business Cards prompted me to call them out again. Each card can be customized, and allows for a wealth of photographic and other artistic material to be added and given away. Given the high quality, full-bleed custom work that is done, the pricing is really pretty good. Definitely worth checking out if you need some business cards done and want to do something a little different. MOO’s Website

No AP, Please

Patrick highlights recent unacceptable behavior on the part of AP over at Making Light. He makes some excellent points about how restrictive and ridiculous this sort of attempt at strong-arming individuals can be. A core principle of copyright law is the role of “fair use” to allow others to provide feedback, response, analysis, and commentary on a given work or material, since copyright law itself is provided as an incentive to promote scientific and cultural advancement. A blogger referencing (e.g. linking to the article, quoting specific passages, or re-summarizing/restating the basis of the article) a work clearly falls within this principle, on several fronts.

I will concede such cases as where the majority or entirety of the article is quoted, in particular in situations where it is done so without commentary, but that’s not what’s being discussed, here. What’s happening in THIS circumstance is pure, unbridled greed, without even a nod to the law as it stands.

Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include —

(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;

(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and

(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors. (Copyright Act of 1976, 17 U.S.C. § 107)

WiiFit's Role on Game Design

What Activities That Can Be Turned Into Games? over at Lost Garden. Fascinating article, discussing the role of things like the WiiFit on expanding the horizons of game design in society.

The harbinger of game’s ascendancy to all aspect of the modern life is not some piece of evocative art or Citizen Kane-a-like. Instead, our future appears in the form of a glorified bathroom scale. Still, if we can improve people’s lives with a bathroom scale, just imagine how games can transform the rest of our world. (Danc at Lost Garden)

Limbo of the Lost

What gets me is that there are assholes out there who manage to get funding to pull this sort of stunt, when there are hundreds, if not thousands of folks who are working on mods and indie games that would KILL to have even a share of their funding that can’t even get a publisher to pick up the phone.

What am I talking about? A little game called “Limbo of the Lost”, which has received publisher funding for at least 6, if not 10 (as claimed) years, which just recently came out. The vast majority (not 50 or 60%, but more like 80 or 90%) of the content is directly stolen from other games, often without even so much as a color change or added component. This is not an epic fail, this is a LEGENDARY failure, across the board, first on the part of the corrupt developers whom I hope NEVER work in the industry again (I’m sorry, you do not get a second chance after this), and on the part of the publisher for not practicing even an iota of due diligence in reviewing the game.

Some worthwhile links to read about this: Rockpapershotgun.com’s coverage, Zen of Design — “Call it a Remix”, and this forum post at cheapassgamer.com.

DailyLit

DailyLit is a system to receive books to read in small chunks via email or RSS. The basic idea is that as part of our day to day lives, we find it hard to find time to sit down and read, but we can usually find time to spend 5 minutes reading an email or post. So with that in mind, the folks at DailyLit took a bunch of books from public domain and creative commons licenses, and broke them into manageable parts, and allow you to receive these parts via email or RSS. They’re also experimenting with using Twitter, which is how I first heard about them. Very slick!

Detroit Book Depository

The deteriorating remains of the Detroit Book Depository. Jessica showed me this the other day, thought I’d share, as it’s really pretty impressive. The short version of the story is that they used to use a warehouse system for school books and materials, until a fire broke out, and decimated the building. Due to insurance settlements, they were never allowed to salvage from the building, and it was all left to rot.