Nick.

Heidi and I just returned from dinner with her family and I’m feeling rather content. After dinner we gave Heidi’s old laptop to her niece and nephew, and they were very appreciative. I also showed my RockVomit prototype to Heidi’s brother, and his immense glee was very rewarding.

I’d spent a while setting up the laptop; I reinstalled Windows (after toying with Linux) so that Heidi’s sister and her husband could administer it, created accounts with limited access, and set their default homepages to ABC Kids. We even installed some additional RAM (I’ll talk about this more towards the end).

It was all time well spent though as they were absolutely estatic. I think that the stand-out comment was:

It’s absolutely lovely!

I thought that was a very grown-up expression for a 5-year-old girl! Aside from just being happy, it was good to see Heidi’s 7-year-old nephew so engaged and focused as we worked through the initial wireless network problems and configured the internet connection.

Anyhow, onto the RAM upgrade. I’ve always been fairly wary of RAM upgrades for notebook computers (they always seem inordinately expensive due to compatability issues) and also about buying things from China via ebay.

Since the machine only had 128MB of RAM, I knew that an additional 256MB would drammatically improve performance. It would be very expensive (over $AU80 to get the RAM locally) so I figured why not give China via ebay a shot (with prices of less than AU$20).

Postage was free, the RAM arrived within a week, it worked perfectly, and there was a nice note in the envelope:

I was initially confused by the “Warm Tips” title until Heidi mentioned that they must be like “Hot Tips” but less effusive. I can highly recommend memory_superman and their super ebay store.

Three random videos:

1. The new trailer for Spike Jonze‘s film adaptation of Where the Wild Things Are reminds me of childhood:

Found via VideoSift.

I’m very keen to see this film (and to make a similar wolf suit), especially if it’s anywhere near as good as Being John Malkovich.

2. Prototype looks like it could be good if you can stomach the ultraviolence. I find ultraviolence in real-world, modern-day settings more upsetting (when compared to say, violence in ancient Greece):

Found via Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

Maybe it’s unsettling because it looks like the protagonist is killing innocent civilians.

3. Finally, a nice song by The White Stripes: We’re Going to be Friends.

Also via VideoSift.

Let’s contrast two videos concerning copying media.

The first is an Australian Government advertisement targeted at young people and equating downloading movies to physical property crime:

Here are the words that appear during the video (copied from the YouTube page):

You wouldn’t steal a car,
you wouldn’t steal a handbag,
you wouldn’t steal a television,
you wouldn’t steal a movie.

Downloading pirated films is stealing,
stealing is against the law,
PIRACY IT’S A CRIME

Here’s a video of Jonathan Mann (of geek-culture videos fame) singing Nina Paley’s (creator of Sita Sings the Blues, an animated film that won’t get released because it uses compositions from the 1920s which are controlled under Intellectual Property laws) “The Copyright Song”:

Here are the lyrics to that song (and a link to the Nina’s original video):

Copying isn’t theft.
Stealing a thing leaves one less left.
Copying it makes one thing more.
That’s what copying’s for.
Copying isn’t theft.
If I copy yours, you have it too.
One for me and one for you.
That’s what copies can do.
If I steal your bicycle, you have to take the bus.
But if I just copy it, there’s one for each of us.
Making more of a thing, that is what we call copying.
Sharing ideas with everyone.
That’s why copying is fun.

Sounds a lot less sensationalist and fear-mongering to me. Maybe the Australian Government should run a more reasonable campaign aimed at proponents of restrictive copyright laws. They can use the following text with their original video (I won’t sue them for copying it):

You can’t copy a car,
You can’t copy a handbag,
You can’t copy a television,
You can copy a movie,

Downloading pirated films creates a copy of a video while keeping the original completely intact,
We need to reform our laws so that they appreciate the difference between stealing and copying and don’t criminalise the general population,
IGNORANCE: IT’S A CRIME

If you are interested in reading more about Nina Paley’s current legal problems with Sita Sings the Blues, QuestionCopyright has a long interview with Nina Paley. They also have a YouTube channel with other small videos.

Piracy is a complex issue that can’t be simply reduced to “stealing” and “protecting intellectual property”. We need to reasonably weigh economic considerations against freedoms (to create and share).

Here is a set of questions worth considering:

• Should piracy for personal use be decriminalised if the majority of the population generally feel that it’s “okay”?
• Is it ethical for news corporations to regulate, moderate, and censor the spread of information?
• If you could copy a car for personal use, should the automotive industry be allowed to stop you?
• If the poor could copy food as easily as you could copy music, would it be ethical for the farming industry to stop them?

Copying of digital material is cheap and easy. With new technologies, copying of physical objects will eventually become the same. At that point, copyright holders will be looking at digital copyright laws (that we are yet to write) to determine if people can copy “real” things. I hope we get these laws right.

The Let’s Make Games website is now live. 😀

Here’s a blurb from the introductory post over there:

“Let’s Make Games” is an initiative to foster the growing game development community and industry in Perth, Western Australia.

At Let’s Make Games, we want to do whatever we can to ensure that the local industry continues to grow and innovate. These are exciting and fun times!

Thanks to Simon for the cool logo.

With a little more time to work on personal projects, I’m revisting unfinished projects from the previous year. First on the list is RockVomit, which is a game that I was working on with Simon and Jim for last November’s Game Jam.

Here are some screenshots of a flash prototype I put together:

Aesthetically, RockVomit started as a very different game, but the basic premise of the game is unchanged: you listen to music and create a dance. You can then show this dance off to other people, and they can dance along.

To me, the game is meant as a sort of response to modern music games that make you perform something predetermined (hit the right note at the right time). I wanted to create something that allows you to be the choreographer, rather than just a technical dancer.

Mad props to Simon for the awesome art and post-golf discussions that led to a this fantastic representation of a rather basic concept! Hopefully we can look forward to more dancers soon! 😉

The Australian Interzone Futebol website is now live and the first announcement is that a local Closed Beta is just about to start.

Having been part of managing Interzone‘s development studio for around 18 months, I’ve know what’s gone into making this game and what the entire process has meant for so many local game developers here in Perth.

I also know that the game is much further along that one might usually expect when they see the term “Closed Beta”. Far beyond the game being stable and playable, there are heaps of features that you won’t find in any other online soccer game.

By participating in this Closed Beta, not only you will be one the first people who gets to play the latest and greatest version of this game, but you will also be supporting the Perth games industry. So be sure to sign up!

Here’s a gameplay trailer from the Interzone Futebol YouTube channel.

Every player on the pitch is a real person. How awesome is that!? Anyhow, enough plugging…

You can stay up-to-date on the Closed Beta by subscribing to the blog feed or following Interzone Games on twitter.

Just a quick post to welcome Mash back to Planet OneTwenty.

wb. 🙂

The official Australian Nintendo DSi minisite is now live. The main focus of the site is a promotional video (in their signature “all white” style) that demonstrate the new features in a very mass-market friendly way.

I loved the old Gameboy Camera, so I’m glad to see similar features returning to a handheld. 🙂

Although I now have two cats (Mao and Bruce), I was previously opposed to keeping pets because I felt that it was unethical to subject another sentient being to a life deprived of freedom.

Recently, my thinking is more along the lines of:

• Both are rescued cats that would have been put down otherwise.
• And (more importantly) freedom is defined in degrees, and absolute freedom is impossible.

Unlike cats with collars, we like to think that we are free. The truth is that numerous factors limit your freedom. Some are natural (eg. humans can’t fly), a number are psychological (eg. you’re scared), and a lot are circumstantial (eg. you have no money).

I’d define personal power as the ability to affect the limits of your freedom. This often mean making yourself or others work to facilitate what you want to do. On the other hand, collective power is the the ability of a group to extend everybody’s freedom.

Technology can bring great collective freedom. Advances in medicine and telecommunications potentially empower everyone beyond their natural and circumstantial limitations. Unfortunately, technology can also be restricted and controlled to benefit only a few. Similarly, money seems to often only bring power to individuals and groups, rather than all of humankind.

To many, life is a struggle to improve your level of freedom, and money is a straight-forward path to power. I think this is why so many people work hard to earn money. It affords them some self-determination, so that they can live without so many basic concerns.

Control of money often equates to control of freedom, and the more that you control the freedom of others, the more you can demand for yourself. I think that this is why there are those that seek control of money (not just acquisition of money, but control of the financial system).

Freedom should never be taken for granted. It’s important that we recognise our desire for reasonable freedoms, and that we contribute to securing these freedoms for others. Unnecessary imposition upon the freedom of others is reprehensible, but unfortunately all too common.

As evident throughout history, collective social power is usually the greatest form of power. We can all play a part in affording greater freedoms when unified by common philosophies and committed to standing our ground.

While trying to gauge the level of decline in the local real estate market, I came across this handy suburb snapshot feature on homepriceguide.com.au.

You search for an Australian suburb and it provides you with some high-level statistical data such as:

• Median price:The middle price of all properties sold as ranked from the most expensive price to the most affordable price.
• Auction clearance rate: The percentage of properties sold under the hammer or prior to auction compared to the total number of properties listed for auction excluding properties not reported to APM but including properties withdrawn from auction.
• Days on market: The average length of time a property takes to sell from the initial published advertisement to the exchange date of sale.
• Discounting: A measurement on how much (expressed as a percentage) vendors are having to take off their intial asking price to make a sale.

The discounting numbers are most interesting to me. For example, I found that apartments in Victoria Park have been selling for 23% less than the asking price. That’s really puts the asking price in perspective when browsing for housing.

This information seems to be presented more objectively than what appears on the REIWA website and realestate.com.au (I always get the impression that they are trying to upsell the current market).