Alex has a bit of blasphemy here, where he takes the 1999 best-seller Cryptonomicon to task for a number of various shortcomings. This book is among my very favorites, second only to Lord of the Rings when it comes to reading for enjoyment. It is a long-held tradition among geeks that we have to stand up and defend our treasured books / movies / videogames / TV shows / crossover fanfic when someone else makes disparaging comments about them.
When in school, the tough kids fistfight. The Jocks arm wrestle. The losers try to drink each other under the table. But when nerds compete the ritual usually takes the form of long debates on the merits of Kirk vs. Picard. It’s just the way we’re wired.
He is aware at the outset of just how dangerous his words are:
I realize that a good few of my few good readers are big fans of Neal Stephenson. I do realize that if I say anything against him I'll never be allowed to release any fiction of my own.
Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.
I seem to have bad luck with webcomics. They tend to run into the ground or stop updating as soon as I bookmark them. It’s gotten to the point where I avoid new webcomics, because I don’t want yet another unchanging webpage to check every morning. Still, Basic Instructions is a pretty interesting concept and manages to deliver a steady supply of funny.
It’s been around since 2006, so there are plenty of archives to enjoy. Maybe this one won’t go belly-up on me in the next week.
Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.
So Dan at Dan’s Data is having a tiff with a company that sells fuel additive pills. Dan has done a bunch of mean things to their company, like demanding they back up their fanciful claims about what their product supposedly does. He’s even gone so far as to suggest that the product in question might not actually do those things. The company’s strategy so far has been threefold:
Call Dan an idiot. (No, really. They began their letter to him with the phrase “You are an idiot.”)
Threaten to sue.
Demand, more or less, that Dan give them back their lunch money and stop picking on them.
The most amusing thing they’ve done so far is demand that Dan stop linking to their promotional materials. I can’t find a permalink on his site, but you can see the post on his main page. (Look for the 19th February 2008 post.) This is, of course, akin to demanding people stop pointing and laughing at your billboard. This is made all the more giggle-inducing by the fact that they demanded that he publicize the thing in the first place.
Anyway, Dan has responded to this foot-stamping according to the ancient traditions: He’s made the thing available on a Torrent, where it will be seeded and shared all over the place by people who would otherwise never have taken an interest. If we’ve learned anything from people trying to sue the internet, it’s that the quickest way to get lots of links is to threaten to sue somebody for linking you. I just realized that this is a fantastic way to boost your popularity and bring new people to your site. I’m going to try it:
I am proud to announce that I have proven via a scientific study that reading Twenty-Sided encourages safe, effective weight loss after only a few visits. This is due to secret, proprietary methods of designing site layout that stimulates neuron… activators in the upper… lumbar that… enhances your Circadian Rhythm and optimizes your metabolism via your browser cache. It’s embedded in the CSS. It’s all very scientific and complicated but trust me, this site will allow you to safely lose 10-20 unwanted pounds after just a few readings, as well as helping you to regrow lost hair. And make you more attractive to the opposite sex. Or the same sex, if you prefer. Pretty much whatever you’re into, really.
Furthermore, I demand that all websites stop linking to this post, as you are infringing on my right to not be made fun of when making an ass of myself. It is forbidden to link to this post and if you do so I will be forced to take legal action within 48 hours of my lawyer sobering up after I bail him out of the drunk tank. Again.
I should have thought of this ages ago. I’m going to be famous!
Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.
Sometimes I get emails from people asking what plugins I use for various features on this blog. I thought I’d post a quick list here for anyone else who might be curious. Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Plugins Used”
Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.
A three year old girl sums up the plot of Star Wars:
Although, it’s possible she was just reading George Lucas’ original script.</snark>
Man, that is one cute kid.
Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.
Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.
Here is a YouTube video for Enlighten, an SDK that game developers can use to add indirect shadowing and radiosity to a scene.
Radiosity is where it takes into account the fact that light bounces off of things. Your closet isn’t pitch black just because no lights are on in there. Light is bouncing off the walls in the room outside, and being reflected into the closet so you can still see the boxes of Christmas decorations and your dusty golf clubs. Also, radiosity lighting takes into account the color of the walls. If you shine a white light on a red wall, stuff nearby is going to look a little pink. The light coming off the wall is going to be red, and it’s going to illuminate stuff in red.
I guess I should get this out of the way: Yes, this is very impressive. It’s wonderful what technology can do. Just ten years ago effects like this were so insanely expensive in terms of processing cycles that you usually didn’t even want to use it for pre-rendered stuff. Now we can do it in realtime. The effects demonstrated are an amazing accomplishment, a blend of artistry and mathematical prowess.
But so what? Aside from saying, “gosh, look at this cool rendering stunt they can do”, why should I care? Is it nice? I guess so. Even under the idealized demo conditions the effect is so subtle I probably wouldn’t notice it if I wasn’t looking for it. Is it worth running out and buying a new graphics card? Nah. Is it worth the increased expense of development, because of the cost of the SDK and the work required from artists in order to take advantage of it? Of course not.
Yes, I’m on another one of my luddite rants. Note that I don’t have anything against pretty graphics, but I do have a problem with graphics at the expense of the game itself. As the race for better graphics goes on, developers are finding themselves making games that cost twice as much to develop, run on half as many computers, and look 8% better. We passed the point of diminishing returns with this stuff years ago, but PC developers, publishers, and reviewers can’t seem to stop the mad pursuit of the Shiny New Pixel. When a reviewer feels the need to ding STALKER because it only looks as awesome as last year’s games, the review system has graduated from mild eccentricity to full-on bat-shite crazy.
Longtime PC developer Cliff Bleszinski says that “PC Games are in disarray”. Epic Games, who began life on the PC platform, now see their PC efforts as “secondary”, and therefore (I assume) see themselves as primarily console developers. I doubt the thought has entered Bleszinski’s considerably intelligent head that maybe some of the blame for this goes at the feet of places like Epic. I had many, many gripes with the Unreal Tournament 2k series and with Unreal 2. I had long lists of things that put me off of both games. Nowhere on any of those lists was, “the graphics should be better.” Put the pixel shaders down and go make me a game I want to play, man.
I guess at some point enough PC developers will go under or get bought up and converted into console game developers. Once the herd is sufficiently thinned, the remaining ones might act on survival instinct and start looking for ways to stay in business, graphics be damned. There are more PCs in the world than all three of the major consoles combined. The PC has a few technological and interface advantages that can still set it apart. I’m convinced that the PC market doesn’t need to “die”, and it doesn’t need to be in “disarray”. It just needs developers that learn, or remember, how to make fun games.
Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.
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