The fix is in, Hypothetical Audience, the ballots have closed and the votes have been counted, the 2015 UK General Election has come to an end. The results? For me, at least, down right disappointing. Despite opinion polls to the contrary, things went the Conservatives way, allowing them an actual majority this time around, meaning 5 more years of David Cameron in power, but this time, with him having actually won, no other party involved to get in the way of his schemes. As someone who’s been pretty much opposed to most of the coalition government’s goings on since 2010 this has not been the result I was anticipating. Not in the slightest.
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Category / Rambling
On Left-Handedness
Have you ever noticed how much odd crap is ascribed to being left-handed, Hypothetical Audience? I sure have, by virtue of being left-handed all my life (at least as far as I know), and I can tell you the amount of things it’s assumed I can and can’t do, or must have to do differently, based on handedness alone by people of the alternate persuasion is vast. In both reality and fiction these range from the every day mundane, such as needing special scissors with the blades swapped around, to the oddly specific, like only a left-handed could have committed a murder because they can only hold knives in one specific hand. It’s a very strange bit of collective ignorance that afflicts a surprisingly large number people and one that’s probably worth commenting upon.
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In Short: Lets Plays and Lets Players
The internet is a curious place, Hypothetical Audience, especially how its effected entertainment. If you’d told anyone a decade ago that watching videos of someone playing video games and talking over them would be not only a popular mode of passing the time for millions, but also a way people could make a living, most would likely laugh at you, and the odd one who didn’t would likely say “Well that’s clearly inspired by Mystery Science Theatre.” I am talking, of course, about the world of Lets Plays. You literally can’t browse YouTube without tripping over people trying to get their Warhol-15 minutes by playing games for everyone else’s entertainment (which was literally 15 minutes relaively recently, as that was the maximum video length at one point). Like a lot of people, I watch a few of these guys, and am equally annoyed by a few others, so thought I’d share my thoughts on the subject with you guys.
In Short: The Apple Watch
Before we start, I’d like to announce a slight change to the continuing adventure that’ll be ongoing until easter at the very earliest. Du to a personal project I am embarking upon, I won’t be having that much free time to write until roughly the middle of April. Rather than go on hiatus, which I feel is A. Boring and 2. slightly disingenuous to whatever hypothetical audience I actually have, I thought I’d just make the weekly post far shorter, like a few paragraphs only, until such time I regain my free Sundays once again. Enjoy!
This time last week Apple had something of a shindig over in the USA to parade their latest shiny wares in front of us. As someone who’s used Macintoshes all my life, pretty much, I generally keep an eye on these kind of things to see where the company is going. And trot out a new Mac they did, and shiny it was indeed. But that wasn’t the focus of the event, oh no, this whole bash was predominantly to show off Apple’s entry into the Smart Watch market. Ho Hum.
On Skeuomorphism
Last week I embarked upon a brief aside into my professional world of Graphic Design, dear Hypothetical Audience, by casting a critical eye over the web design at the Guardian, and to follow up I’ve decided to talk a bit about skeuomorphism and the recent trends for “flat design” in the tech areas in recent years. So everyone’s up to speed, skeuomorphism is essentially when something has been designed to resemble something else, usually meaning a device replicates the look of a previous object that fulfilled the same roll. A brilliant example, and one I. going to talk more about, would be computer note taking programmes that have lined paper textures to emulate the note pad you would have used to have owned. They were incredibly populer towards the end of the twentieth century and whilst have been on something of a decline the last few years are still very much with us.
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On The Guardian’s New Website
Terribly sorry about missing last week, had a busy weekend punctuated by a bout of the dreaded lurgi, so didn’t really have the time not inclination to write anything. Could have sworn I’d scheduled a General Failure, but apparently not. Normal service resumes now! No, not now, then!
While I mostly fill my internet space with nerdy ramblings of varying consequence, dear Hypothetical Audience, out there in the horrible, depressing meat space we all occupy known as reality I am a Graphic Designer by trade, specifically one trained in layouting and typography. Given how we are pretty much surrounded by items of design, it’s pretty hrd to switch off the senses hammered into by your training in the creative industries, meaning you constantly analyse the world around you. To that end, I’ve decided to spend the next couple-or-so blogs talking about the world of Graphic Design. This week I thought I’d look at The Guardian’s new website. After about a year and a half of “beta” appearances randomly throughout the site it finally became the norm a couple of weeks ago, and if I’m honest, it’s not that great. I don’t mean it in a “They Changed It, It Sucks, Rabble Rabble” way either, some of the design decisions are ones I don’t particularly understand, and really don’t gel well with a major national and international news source.
Let’s Review: And Another Thing, by Eoin Colfer
Trying something new this week, Hypothetical Audience, and one I’ve threatened for some time now. You may remember I’ve called myself something of a “Media Soak,” as in I tend to absorb media from all kinds of sources and formats, gaming, books, films, the lot. It’s kind of a hobby, you see? Anyway, with this in mind I thought I’d put this media absorption to good use and share some of my opinions with you lot as a way of giving recommendations (or otherwise) to the internet masses. Yes, it’s kind of a cheap way to fill blog lines, but thats the way things are. So, without further ado let’s jump into the first of probably many and have a look at And Another Thing, book six of the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy trilogy by Eoin Colfer.
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On Smart Gadgets & Their Internet
Early last month over in Las Vegas, USA, the Consumer Electronics Show happened, allowing tech luminaries to hawk their latest goods to the world. I find this time of year fascinating, not generally because of what the big corporations bring to the table, because that is often the same old stuff updated for the latest cycle. No, what always interests me the most, dear Hypothetical Audience, is all the odd and/or crazy crap the smaller companies show off. Every year the various fringe companies seem to want to top one another for weirdness vaguely relating to whatever tech trend was going around the office a few months previous (well, that and fakes of big name products but thats a post for another time). This year it seems home automation is the buzz word du jour, and we’ve had a veritable glut of random items that are designed to integrate into the “Internet of Things” idea that’s been floating about for the last few years, all usually with the “Smart” prefix attached. Which is usually an indication that the device performs a task that doesn’t need to be smart at all.
On Scored Reviews
So, now I’ve gotten the angry political satire out of my system, for at least the time being anyway, I thought this week we’d go back to old staples and talk about the state of video gaming today. Always good to have a routine back up, eh hypothetical audience? Anyway, this month gaming press luminary Joystiq declared that it was to stop issuing scored reviews of new games in favour of adding a summary of key points to the end of each piece. The logic behind this was to both do away with the awful “8.8” thing that blights gamer culture, but also to do away with their role in Metacritic-style aggregators. The response was mixed, to say the least, but has rather conveniently brought back to the forefront an issue I feel affects not just gaming reviews, but any form of media review that exists at the moment.
On Encryption and Privacy
Dear Mr. Cameron,
Please allow me to congratulate you on your recent declaration of intent to destroy the menace to our modern society that is private encrypted communications. For too long, in my opinion, has our nation been blighted by privacy, banking, digital security and all the other terrors visited upon us by not allowing the government, and indeed anyone else, to access any and all information we possess and send digitally. A masterstroke, I say, and seeing such a high profile politician as our Dear Leader throw his weight behind the glorious Crusade against privacy and technology. And as if to add to the genius of it all, by making this announcement mere days after a terrible atrocity committed with the aim of stifling an alleged freedom (albeit in an entirely different, devious foreign country) it showed how utterly dedicated you are to the cause! Compared to those other johnny-come-lately alleged right-wing parties currently trying to challenge your dominance, you certainly are a shining example of what the conservative right is truly about! However, for all this outpouring of adoration for this new scheme, allow me to make one or two modest proposals on where to go from here.
Ndro's Adventures in Reality 