Don't give up on her. Remember the rule of advertising - constant repetition works just as well as truth.
With free-as-in-market people I like to talk about how free software's lower cost to replicate and thus create a new competitor drastically improves competition in the market. Proprietary software markets suffer from monopolies and other distortions from the government granted temporary monopolies (patents, copyright, etc) and simple lack of source code.
She should be reminded that the payment for the software doesn't need to be done after it is made, especially when the copying cost is near zero. Payment for most free software is done upfront - paying people to write the code.
People like your sister-in-law usually don't grasp the important differences between information and physical items and how those differences require different economies. Sneak in as many thought experiments as you can about the nature of information. Here is one that I use: http://themagicfish.org/
The usual reading comprehension skill of ACs... sigh.
What I was saying is that it is *unlikely* that the fire dept brought the building down even though there is (mediocre) evidence that some people (like Larry) and some firefighters themselves thought they were bringing it down. If they had actually brought it down, I see little good motivation for them to keep that a secret and it would likely be difficult or impossible for the actual people who did the demolition work to be kept quiet.
That the buildings were already wired and were brought down by someone other than the fire dept is actually much more plausible, but requires a grander conspiracy - which is *much* less probable.
To sum up, for other AC and reading impaired folks. The chance that the NY fire dept pulled the buildings = almost zero. The chance that they were pulled by others = extremely unlikely. Good, conclusive evidence of exactly what happened that day is hard to find.
Larry: "I remember getting a call from the fire department commander, telling my that they were not sure they were going to be able to contain the fire. I said, 'You know we've had such terrible loss of life, the smartest thing to do is pull it.' Uh, and they made that decision, to pull, and we watched the building collapse."
I don't think there is enough context to decide whether: it = building it = the attempt to put out the fire
What I'd like to see is a full video of the simulated collapse superimposed on a video of the actual collapse and see how well they match up. I have a hard time believing that the fire dept (or someone from the dept) wouldn't admit that they had brought the building down.
[Game companies] put, in my estimation, 75% of the best content in the first 50% of the game. The hardcore gamers and series fans will always buy the next sequel. They're hoping that by front-loading the best content, the semi-casual player that only finished half of the previous title in the series will have liked it enough to buy the new one when it comes out.[quote] Having worked in the industry I can confirm this. The percentages are off but there is always an emphasis on front loading as it makes sense financially.
The other thing that "makes sense" in the industry but I find frustrating is that when you crunch the numbers (especially on already popular IP/franchises) marketing tends to give better returns than development. You need to hit that magic 80%+ review score but after that your money is better spent on marketing. This is especially true since increasing quality past 80% gets increasingly expensive.
There are only two real solutions (that I know of): 1) Reducing the costs of developing a game so much that it can be done by a single person. This allows more games to be "art" rather than business. 2) Open source games. Then the companies can release their 80% game and the community of fans (and other businesses) can trim the fat and improve the content until it (asymptotically) hits 100%. Games that allow user mods are the best approximations to this right now.
That looks really interesting. I'd love to use XHTML+CSS for both online and print. I haven't used (La)Tex before, can anyone who has used both describe the differences? In particular I appreciate the selectors of CSS, are there equivalents in (La)Tex?
If I was going to encourage someone to start programming today I'd probably show them Processing: http://processing.org/ From their site: "Processing is an open source programming language and environment for people who want to program images, animation, and interactions. It is used by students, artists, designers, researchers, and hobbyists for learning, prototyping, and production. It is created to teach fundamentals of computer programming within a visual context and to serve as a software sketchbook and professional production tool. Processing is an alternative to proprietary software tools in the same domain."
The other nice thing is that Processing is basically just a Java library so it is simple to move beyond simple visualizations, etc and do more serious Java programming.
I've been having great fun with it, I'm able to do professional work with it (using Eclipse as an IDE, etc) and there is a growing and quite vibrant community of artists and coders developing around it.
Some other possibilities:
- Python-based text adventure as a first (big) program.
Free respecc-ing made Guild Wars a million times better. I would push really hard for this in WoW, it will make a world of difference. We (mainly the expert PvP players teamed up with the casual players) had to complain and advocate for months on the forums for the change.
The only real problems it caused were that people strengthened their "the right way" attitudes, where there were particular specs that were deemed the best way to tackle any particular challenge. This happens anyways and people get left out because they don't fit (when they can't respec), but it meant there were even fewer times when players (in PvE mainly) tackled a quest/mission with something bizarre and sub-optimal and had a great time dealing with the extra challenge.
I downloaded the PDF and, after reading the first few chapters, I've have been looking for it in bookstores.
Definitely great reading material for teens. Fantastic reading for those with a taste of geek-pop culture. The story feels more "current" then anything I've read for awhile,.. a hard to describe feeling cousin to deja vu maybe.
According to the article the reproductive strategy of the "dark triad" males is the shotgun approach (affairs, etc) where others raise their kids. They are successful because of the number of partners.
Thus birth control (used by women, since obviously the dark triad males won't use it) seems to be the ultimate nice guy weapon to prevent the spread of the dark triad genes.
So I guess this means geeks should be promoting birth control... besides abstinence I mean.:)
You're assuming that "pirates" don't pay for their content. Many of the peg-legs that I know download their favourite movies (either before release in the theatre if they are in the boondocks or before the DVD release) because the legal distribution channel is not competitive with the illegal one. The content they really like they will go to see live or in the theatre and/or buy the disk. The shows they feel are only worth the time it took to view them get nothing further, and those that lie somewhere in between are the only shows that are getting "ripped off" because there is no system in place that allows them to pay the creators directly.
Unless you believe that the value of the content is not subjective and that all content deserves the same remuneration, "pirating" is empowering consumers to avoid paying for the crap that generates most of its revenue through advertising and other marketing techniques (rather than through the quality of its content).
There will always be free riders, but the benefits of empowered consumers far outweigh the costs of the free riders, especially with digital content. However, our culture needs to change support more sophisticated consuming, to reduce free riding and encourage free mass distribution of the highest quality content.
No force involved, we are taking about free access. Well, no. First, I was talking about forcing ME to PAY for it. That absolutely is force. Agreed. However, in a democracy, we would have come to a willing consensus to provide free healthcare, so you were not forced into the decision, it was decided democratically. Obviously, the state's role is to enforce the consensual decisions. I also agree that plans that eliminate choice beyond public healthcare are obviously flawed. There are fundamental differences between legislation detailing minimum levels of access and that which mandates particular solutions. May != Must.
Free access to a minimum standard of living that allows people to focus on a meaningful participation in the society (instead of a focus on obtaining food, safety, shelter, education or health) should be the goal of democratic government that espouses liberty for all. No, it should not. Those things have nothing to do with promoting either liberty or democracy. And to the extent it represents the democratic will of the people, it does so at the COST of the liberty of the minority that disagrees, which is why -- as per Federalist 10 -- we have a republic, and not a democracy. Meaningful participation in the society improves democracy and liberty because there is limited individual time and attention (the less spent on survival the better). The "cost" of liberty of the minority is an acceptable cost because the decisions are achieved consensually without force (i.e. how important is the cost to liberty in the time it takes to achieve consensus? Anything within reasonable limits is an acceptable cost, and the governmental system determines acceptable bounds... what constitutes a consensus/majority for example). The US republic system determines the bounds of acceptable costs, by accepting and participating in the system you agree to and modify the costs you are "forced" to pay.
Whether or not Congress has the power to provide for the "general welfare" through taxes, etc or healthcare remains the providence of the states is part of the systems decision about acceptable costs. To decide that universal healthcare is wrong because of the system of decision-making forbids it is putting the cart before the horse. If the US could add and then repeal the Eighteenth Amendment universal healthcare is possible, but I'm no expert.
I don't care. The government has no right to use force on the individual for his own good. By this same logic, government can force us to watch PBS and listen to NPR, because this helps the whole, which helps the individual. Also, get rid of all private schools and homeschooling, because this helps public schools, which helps the whole, which helps the individual.
This is not the government's job, ESPECIALLY not the federal government's job. No force involved, we are taking about free access. It can be the governments job to provide free access to PBS, NPR, public school and health care because that helps the whole. Free access to a minimum standard of living that allows people to focus on a meaningful participation in the society (instead of a focus on obtaining food, safety, shelter, education or health) should be the goal of democratic government that espouses liberty for all.
You want us to evolve beyond the cult of death?...until resources are even and ubiquitous this will never happen. Me, I'm going to go live in the real world, have fun in fantasy land. Since the real world is shifting from scarcity to abundance perhaps you should re-evaluate your position. Consider recycling, reuse, improved manufacturing to reduce material usage, digital goods and networks, improving energy tech, nuclear weapons, etc. While never perfect, these changes will lead to a point where we pass the "good enough" point where it will feel to the vast majority as though there is ubiquitous resources (sadly, this likely includes the abundance of weaponry). Bucky Fuller put it nicely: "It is now highly feasible to take care of everybody on Earth at a 'higher standard of living than any have ever known.' It no longer has to be you or me. Selfishness is unnecessary and henceforth unrationalizable as mandated by survival." (from http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Buckminster_Fuller)
This is a very interesting time where both the scarcity-based war system (that believes in "survival of the fittest" and a single authority as the only way to peace) and the rational, ethical, and scientific "living through truth" systems are benefiting greatly from the abundance we are already experiencing. I hope the hackers that the military tries to recruit instead choose to solve more interesting problems (although it is certainly possible for them to make positive change inside the military too).
The pullstring hand generation unit (that is designed to go with the OLPC) is from Potenco: http://www.potenco.com/
Unfortunately you'll have to join the mailing list (http://www.potenco.com/contact-us) to find out about availability since they are focusing on the kids (away from the grid) first.
Um... they don't have that freedom if their product is built with GPL3 software. That is the point of the changes. If you build your product with free software then you don't have the right to remove the freedoms you enjoyed.
I've been thinking more about the Cage example more...
Imagine John Cage's 4':33" piece as a good example of a extremely flexible but "properly" (i.e. makes it high art) restricted set of game rules. If you don't know this piece, it involves a pianist sitting at the piano for 4 minutes and 33 seconds without playing the piano, instead she lets the audience "play" the piece - the music is the sound of the audience (reacting). This is "high art" music, but it isn't that much of a stretch to call it a "high art" game as far as I am concerned, with the biggest mechanic being how quickly (if ever) the audience realizes they are the players of the game and the other mechanic being the existing cultural norms of concert etiquette.
It is tough for computer games to get that elegant and powerful, but there are already other games that have achieved "high art" and it is hard to believe the medium would control the message (especially after McLuhan).
Yup. Cage is an excellent example. I think that it is important to note that a work that is "high art" could be experienced as "low art" given a particular set of choices by the players/audience. For example, I'm sure you could ruin Shakespeare depending on the artistic choices you made.
I don't think that watching and playing are analogous. Playing is more similar to participating or interacting with art (music, installation pieces, sculptures, architecture, etc). This doesn't rule out art - consider music. Playing or singing can be considered art, especially when the players are making choices, say an improvisation in jazz music. Playing an old standard without any open/improve sections would probably not be considered high art, but it could be once the musicians start improvising (playing) with each other. 'Course there were lots of people (and no doubt still are holdouts) that wouldn't consider jazz an art and definitely not capable of achieving "high art". Great jazz players who were inspired by other greats probably find that laughable.
I think Ebert's fundamental, and most interesting, assertion is that because there is an aspect of player choice in a game it is more similar to a sport where the outcome isn't determined (by the artist). Without the control over outcome, Ebert believes that you can't rise to the level of high art.
This is where his unfamiliarity with the medium really shows. The outcome of a game is usually one of a set of outcomes (win or lose being the most basic), and there are certainly designers that want to expand those choices and make them more meaningful. If the game includes any outcome (that has been carefully designed) that would make it high art then the game as a whole must be high art, even though there could be many outcomes that are not. At first this seems to make games a poorer medium for the expression of high art. However, there is little difference between the players that choose the "low art" paths through a game and an audience who "doesn't get" a high art film. Both will come away from the experience thinking that the game or film was low art (or worse). Games only allow the the audience to interact with their low art interpretation of the game if designers allow the player the freedom to do so (eg. shooting everything).*
Games are generally made to be replayed, so that they can be explored in full: choice doesn't turn it into a sport, choice only increases the re-playability, or in terms of other art, the re-experience-ability. Like coming back to a complex and deep book or film and understanding it "better" because of insights learnt from the last time you experienced it, games hide part of their content purposefully. The choice of which content you experience is just more obvious in a game, but the knowledge and experience that allows you to make those choices to see that content is not very different from being able to "see more" in your other art.
Just like someone who can't understand the high art film, Ebert's ignorance of games prevents him from seeing if there are high art games. I'm not sure there are any myself - I'd say there are many that we will look back on and recognize as the precursors and inspiration to those that eventually get acknowledged as the first high art games.
* Note: much of the art of game design can be found in the options or available actions given to players. How the designers restrict the players into particular outcomes is the essence of the art. That Ebert doesn't understand this, or believes that multiple options is somehow incompatible with high art is testament to Ebert's unwillingness (or laziness) to think about games seriously.
Canada's federal income tax rate is:
* 15.5% on the first $37,178 of taxable income, +
* 22% on the next $37,179 of taxable income (on the portion of taxable income between $37,178 and $74,357), +
* 26% on the next $46,530 of taxable income (on the portion of taxable income between $74,357 and $120,887), +
* 29% of taxable income over $120,887.
Provincial income taxes range from ~5-15%.
There is also a 6% federal sales tax and generally a 6-7% provincial sales tax as well.
I've been waiting for a game to do this for ages. In theory it makes great sense, players enjoy different aspects of a game but usually have identical game experiences. For example, some players enjoy having every advantage over their opponents (and become known as "griefers" who prey upon those that are unlikely to beat them). It seems better to create a game mechanic that turns that style of play into something enjoyable for both sides rather than artificial rules that prevent player interaction.
I just wonder how many players will be interested being an expendable minion. The article/company claims that the PKs will be drawn to this role, but the griefer PKs will likely prefer the "elite" role that is closer to a PvE experience (griefing has always been closer to a PvE experience, but with realistic suffering/domination). The real PvP people usually prefer "fair" fights which might not make them that interested in fights against "elites". I suppose it depends on how it is balanced. If the fight is fair, but just asymmetric so that one side has few troops with great power and the other has many troops with little power, most PvPers shouldn't have an issue with that. I suspect though that the "elite" experience is supposed to be more like a PvE experience, i.e. you almost always win. In that case the minions can only strive for stats: to be the best of the chumps which may have limited appeal.
Regardless of the success of the mechanic, it is a great experiment. I can't wait to play.
Support Guild Wars. It's the only player-friendly pricing model for online role-playing games. The only sure-fire way to encourage publishers and developers to treat their customers fairly is for Arena.net and NCSoft to make a killing from Guild Wars. Plus you get to play a genuinely fun game.
For me, keeping the game running is secondary to getting the rest of the code base and art and other resources free to go along with the NeL GPL engine. For the sort of coding I do, access to that code is much more valuable than the engine code.
Imagine the difference growing up as a kid with the OLPC laptop vs MS monopoly and other non-free software and hardware.
Computer literacy suffers when software and hardware isn't free (as in freedom). The less literate a society, the easier they are to oppress and control. Microsoft traded our freedom for their profit. You can argue that it was a smart business decision, but ultimately it was a greater loss for everyone.
Obviously, there are a lot of smart people doing good things at MS, but putting a computer into every home only reaches it's true potential when that computer is running free software on free hardware.
allowing people to play with a real camera briefly would have the same effect.
I would (wildly) guess the same too, but then the real magic is with the static images and text: why do they not cause false memories and how can we use this phenomenon?
Slashdot Mirror
Don't give up on her. Remember the rule of advertising - constant repetition works just as well as truth.
With free-as-in-market people I like to talk about how free software's lower cost to replicate and thus create a new competitor drastically improves competition in the market. Proprietary software markets suffer from monopolies and other distortions from the government granted temporary monopolies (patents, copyright, etc) and simple lack of source code.
She should be reminded that the payment for the software doesn't need to be done after it is made, especially when the copying cost is near zero. Payment for most free software is done upfront - paying people to write the code.
People like your sister-in-law usually don't grasp the important differences between information and physical items and how those differences require different economies. Sneak in as many thought experiments as you can about the nature of information. Here is one that I use: http://themagicfish.org/
The usual reading comprehension skill of ACs... sigh.
What I was saying is that it is *unlikely* that the fire dept brought the building down even though there is (mediocre) evidence that some people (like Larry) and some firefighters themselves thought they were bringing it down. If they had actually brought it down, I see little good motivation for them to keep that a secret and it would likely be difficult or impossible for the actual people who did the demolition work to be kept quiet.
That the buildings were already wired and were brought down by someone other than the fire dept is actually much more plausible, but requires a grander conspiracy - which is *much* less probable.
To sum up, for other AC and reading impaired folks. The chance that the NY fire dept pulled the buildings = almost zero. The chance that they were pulled by others = extremely unlikely. Good, conclusive evidence of exactly what happened that day is hard to find.
My unofficial transcript of video:
Larry: "I remember getting a call from the fire department commander, telling my that they were not sure they were going to be able to contain the fire. I said, 'You know we've had such terrible loss of life, the smartest thing to do is pull it.' Uh, and they made that decision, to pull, and we watched the building collapse."
I don't think there is enough context to decide whether:
it = building
it = the attempt to put out the fire
Supporting the pulled building links:
http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/silverstein_pullit.html
http://11syyskuu.blogspot.com/2006/02/destruction-of-wtc-7.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58h0LjdMry0
(in this video you can hear explosions before it comes down, but perhaps not loud enough to cause the collapse?)
Supporting fires:
http://911guide.googlepages.com/danielnigro
What I'd like to see is a full video of the simulated collapse superimposed on a video of the actual collapse and see how well they match up. I have a hard time believing that the fire dept (or someone from the dept) wouldn't admit that they had brought the building down.
[Game companies] put, in my estimation, 75% of the best content in the first 50% of the game. The hardcore gamers and series fans will always buy the next sequel. They're hoping that by front-loading the best content, the semi-casual player that only finished half of the previous title in the series will have liked it enough to buy the new one when it comes out.[quote]
Having worked in the industry I can confirm this. The percentages are off but there is always an emphasis on front loading as it makes sense financially.
The other thing that "makes sense" in the industry but I find frustrating is that when you crunch the numbers (especially on already popular IP/franchises) marketing tends to give better returns than development. You need to hit that magic 80%+ review score but after that your money is better spent on marketing. This is especially true since increasing quality past 80% gets increasingly expensive.
There are only two real solutions (that I know of):
1) Reducing the costs of developing a game so much that it can be done by a single person. This allows more games to be "art" rather than business.
2) Open source games. Then the companies can release their 80% game and the community of fans (and other businesses) can trim the fat and improve the content until it (asymptotically) hits 100%. Games that allow user mods are the best approximations to this right now.
That looks really interesting. I'd love to use XHTML+CSS for both online and print. I haven't used (La)Tex before, can anyone who has used both describe the differences? In particular I appreciate the selectors of CSS, are there equivalents in (La)Tex?
If I was going to encourage someone to start programming today I'd probably show them Processing:
http://processing.org/
From their site: "Processing is an open source programming language and environment for people who want to program images, animation, and interactions. It is used by students, artists, designers, researchers, and hobbyists for learning, prototyping, and production. It is created to teach fundamentals of computer programming within a visual context and to serve as a software sketchbook and professional production tool. Processing is an alternative to proprietary software tools in the same domain."
The other nice thing is that Processing is basically just a Java library so it is simple to move beyond simple visualizations, etc and do more serious Java programming.
I've been having great fun with it, I'm able to do professional work with it (using Eclipse as an IDE, etc) and there is a growing and quite vibrant community of artists and coders developing around it.
Some other possibilities:
- Python-based text adventure as a first (big) program.
- Python and PyGame based game/app for the OLPC
Free respecc-ing made Guild Wars a million times better. I would push really hard for this in WoW, it will make a world of difference. We (mainly the expert PvP players teamed up with the casual players) had to complain and advocate for months on the forums for the change.
The only real problems it caused were that people strengthened their "the right way" attitudes, where there were particular specs that were deemed the best way to tackle any particular challenge. This happens anyways and people get left out because they don't fit (when they can't respec), but it meant there were even fewer times when players (in PvE mainly) tackled a quest/mission with something bizarre and sub-optimal and had a great time dealing with the extra challenge.
It is a free download on his website if you want to check it out:
http://craphound.com/littlebrother/download/
I downloaded the PDF and, after reading the first few chapters, I've have been looking for it in bookstores.
Definitely great reading material for teens. Fantastic reading for those with a taste of geek-pop culture. The story feels more "current" then anything I've read for awhile,.. a hard to describe feeling cousin to deja vu maybe.
According to the article the reproductive strategy of the "dark triad" males is the shotgun approach (affairs, etc) where others raise their kids. They are successful because of the number of partners.
Thus birth control (used by women, since obviously the dark triad males won't use it) seems to be the ultimate nice guy weapon to prevent the spread of the dark triad genes.
So I guess this means geeks should be promoting birth control... besides abstinence I mean. :)
You're assuming that "pirates" don't pay for their content. Many of the peg-legs that I know download their favourite movies (either before release in the theatre if they are in the boondocks or before the DVD release) because the legal distribution channel is not competitive with the illegal one. The content they really like they will go to see live or in the theatre and/or buy the disk. The shows they feel are only worth the time it took to view them get nothing further, and those that lie somewhere in between are the only shows that are getting "ripped off" because there is no system in place that allows them to pay the creators directly.
Unless you believe that the value of the content is not subjective and that all content deserves the same remuneration, "pirating" is empowering consumers to avoid paying for the crap that generates most of its revenue through advertising and other marketing techniques (rather than through the quality of its content).
There will always be free riders, but the benefits of empowered consumers far outweigh the costs of the free riders, especially with digital content. However, our culture needs to change support more sophisticated consuming, to reduce free riding and encourage free mass distribution of the highest quality content.
Whether or not Congress has the power to provide for the "general welfare" through taxes, etc or healthcare remains the providence of the states is part of the systems decision about acceptable costs. To decide that universal healthcare is wrong because of the system of decision-making forbids it is putting the cart before the horse. If the US could add and then repeal the Eighteenth Amendment universal healthcare is possible, but I'm no expert.
This is not the government's job, ESPECIALLY not the federal government's job. No force involved, we are taking about free access. It can be the governments job to provide free access to PBS, NPR, public school and health care because that helps the whole. Free access to a minimum standard of living that allows people to focus on a meaningful participation in the society (instead of a focus on obtaining food, safety, shelter, education or health) should be the goal of democratic government that espouses liberty for all.
"It is now highly feasible to take care of everybody on Earth at a 'higher standard of living than any have ever known.' It no longer has to be you or me. Selfishness is unnecessary and henceforth unrationalizable as mandated by survival." (from http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Buckminster_Fuller)
This is a very interesting time where both the scarcity-based war system (that believes in "survival of the fittest" and a single authority as the only way to peace) and the rational, ethical, and scientific "living through truth" systems are benefiting greatly from the abundance we are already experiencing. I hope the hackers that the military tries to recruit instead choose to solve more interesting problems (although it is certainly possible for them to make positive change inside the military too).
The pullstring hand generation unit (that is designed to go with the OLPC) is from Potenco: http://www.potenco.com/
Unfortunately you'll have to join the mailing list (http://www.potenco.com/contact-us) to find out about availability since they are focusing on the kids (away from the grid) first.
Um... they don't have that freedom if their product is built with GPL3 software. That is the point of the changes. If you build your product with free software then you don't have the right to remove the freedoms you enjoyed.
I've been thinking more about the Cage example more...
Imagine John Cage's 4':33" piece as a good example of a extremely flexible but "properly" (i.e. makes it high art) restricted set of game rules. If you don't know this piece, it involves a pianist sitting at the piano for 4 minutes and 33 seconds without playing the piano, instead she lets the audience "play" the piece - the music is the sound of the audience (reacting). This is "high art" music, but it isn't that much of a stretch to call it a "high art" game as far as I am concerned, with the biggest mechanic being how quickly (if ever) the audience realizes they are the players of the game and the other mechanic being the existing cultural norms of concert etiquette.
It is tough for computer games to get that elegant and powerful, but there are already other games that have achieved "high art" and it is hard to believe the medium would control the message (especially after McLuhan).
Yup. Cage is an excellent example. I think that it is important to note that a work that is "high art" could be experienced as "low art" given a particular set of choices by the players/audience. For example, I'm sure you could ruin Shakespeare depending on the artistic choices you made.
I don't think that watching and playing are analogous. Playing is more similar to participating or interacting with art (music, installation pieces, sculptures, architecture, etc). This doesn't rule out art - consider music. Playing or singing can be considered art, especially when the players are making choices, say an improvisation in jazz music. Playing an old standard without any open/improve sections would probably not be considered high art, but it could be once the musicians start improvising (playing) with each other. 'Course there were lots of people (and no doubt still are holdouts) that wouldn't consider jazz an art and definitely not capable of achieving "high art". Great jazz players who were inspired by other greats probably find that laughable.
I think Ebert's fundamental, and most interesting, assertion is that because there is an aspect of player choice in a game it is more similar to a sport where the outcome isn't determined (by the artist). Without the control over outcome, Ebert believes that you can't rise to the level of high art.
This is where his unfamiliarity with the medium really shows. The outcome of a game is usually one of a set of outcomes (win or lose being the most basic), and there are certainly designers that want to expand those choices and make them more meaningful. If the game includes any outcome (that has been carefully designed) that would make it high art then the game as a whole must be high art, even though there could be many outcomes that are not. At first this seems to make games a poorer medium for the expression of high art. However, there is little difference between the players that choose the "low art" paths through a game and an audience who "doesn't get" a high art film. Both will come away from the experience thinking that the game or film was low art (or worse). Games only allow the the audience to interact with their low art interpretation of the game if designers allow the player the freedom to do so (eg. shooting everything).*
Games are generally made to be replayed, so that they can be explored in full: choice doesn't turn it into a sport, choice only increases the re-playability, or in terms of other art, the re-experience-ability. Like coming back to a complex and deep book or film and understanding it "better" because of insights learnt from the last time you experienced it, games hide part of their content purposefully. The choice of which content you experience is just more obvious in a game, but the knowledge and experience that allows you to make those choices to see that content is not very different from being able to "see more" in your other art.
Just like someone who can't understand the high art film, Ebert's ignorance of games prevents him from seeing if there are high art games. I'm not sure there are any myself - I'd say there are many that we will look back on and recognize as the precursors and inspiration to those that eventually get acknowledged as the first high art games.
* Note: much of the art of game design can be found in the options or available actions given to players. How the designers restrict the players into particular outcomes is the essence of the art. That Ebert doesn't understand this, or believes that multiple options is somehow incompatible with high art is testament to Ebert's unwillingness (or laziness) to think about games seriously.
For reference:a tes-e.html
from: http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/tax/individuals/faq/taxr
Canada's federal income tax rate is:
* 15.5% on the first $37,178 of taxable income, +
* 22% on the next $37,179 of taxable income (on the portion of taxable income between $37,178 and $74,357), +
* 26% on the next $46,530 of taxable income (on the portion of taxable income between $74,357 and $120,887), +
* 29% of taxable income over $120,887.
Provincial income taxes range from ~5-15%.
There is also a 6% federal sales tax and generally a 6-7% provincial sales tax as well.
I've been waiting for a game to do this for ages. In theory it makes great sense, players enjoy different aspects of a game but usually have identical game experiences. For example, some players enjoy having every advantage over their opponents (and become known as "griefers" who prey upon those that are unlikely to beat them). It seems better to create a game mechanic that turns that style of play into something enjoyable for both sides rather than artificial rules that prevent player interaction.
I just wonder how many players will be interested being an expendable minion. The article/company claims that the PKs will be drawn to this role, but the griefer PKs will likely prefer the "elite" role that is closer to a PvE experience (griefing has always been closer to a PvE experience, but with realistic suffering/domination). The real PvP people usually prefer "fair" fights which might not make them that interested in fights against "elites". I suppose it depends on how it is balanced. If the fight is fair, but just asymmetric so that one side has few troops with great power and the other has many troops with little power, most PvPers shouldn't have an issue with that. I suspect though that the "elite" experience is supposed to be more like a PvE experience, i.e. you almost always win. In that case the minions can only strive for stats: to be the best of the chumps which may have limited appeal.
Regardless of the success of the mechanic, it is a great experiment. I can't wait to play.
Support Guild Wars. It's the only player-friendly pricing model for online role-playing games. The only sure-fire way to encourage publishers and developers to treat their customers fairly is for Arena.net and NCSoft to make a killing from Guild Wars. Plus you get to play a genuinely fun game.
For me, keeping the game running is secondary to getting the rest of the code base and art and other resources free to go along with the NeL GPL engine. For the sort of coding I do, access to that code is much more valuable than the engine code.
It's not about hate, it's tragedy:
Imagine the difference growing up as a kid with the OLPC laptop vs MS monopoly and other non-free software and hardware.
Computer literacy suffers when software and hardware isn't free (as in freedom). The less literate a society, the easier they are to oppress and control. Microsoft traded our freedom for their profit. You can argue that it was a smart business decision, but ultimately it was a greater loss for everyone.
Obviously, there are a lot of smart people doing good things at MS, but putting a computer into every home only reaches it's true potential when that computer is running free software on free hardware.
allowing people to play with a real camera briefly would have the same effect.
I would (wildly) guess the same too, but then the real magic is with the static images and text: why do they not cause false memories and how can we use this phenomenon?