Don't be your own worst enemy: A lesson I'm always learning

When I was young, I felt as if I didn't have control over my life. Part of it was social. I moved around a lot and never developed the sort of friendships that most kids use to build the social skills that they later use without thinking. Instead, I just seemed a bit ... retarded (and I mean that word in the clinical sense in which I was introduced to it when I volunteered in a special needs class in grade school).

As an outsider, I latched onto the few things that could act as a social crutch: being funny, being weird. These things at least made people pay attention and sometimes react positively. I also suffered from what was never correctly diagnosed as attention deficit disorder (ADD), and the memory problems that came with it were often a source of additional strange behavior. For example, I would carry around a giant gym back full of every book I might need because otherwise I would always forget to have any given book for a class.

As I grew older, these odd tics mostly melted away. I met enough people who were in the same boat, socially, in college to catch up and develop some social skills. But some of the tics stayed and became part of my persona. One of them was the urge to be strange enough to get noticed. The number of times in my life that I've created a situation that made me strange in order to stand out are... well, difficult to count. I've probably spent upwards of a working year explaining myself or trying to get a bureaucracy to cope with some strangeness or other. Why? Because it's how I roll, to use a phrase that's more modern than I am.

I suppose I should just be glad that I never did anything too permanent. I never changed my name to something obviously made up. I never got myself plastered with tattoos. I'm generally free of any major fits of poor judgement.

Now that I'm getting older and I'm starting to see those places where I've deliberately made my life difficult, I'm starting to unwind them, but let this be a warning to others: if something seems like a great way to draw attention, think carefully about why you want the attention. Don't tilt at windmills if you don't have to. At the same time, fight the good fight for your individuality if you must. There are times and places for it, but like all of life, there is a middle way.

Dangerous Software Gaming Essays: My four blogs

I'm currently actively maintaining four blogs. This is my random thoughts blog where I'll continue to post about things like politics, science, media, and so forth. Some of my posts will continue to be essay-like, and some will be more traditional blog posts in a mix that I'm sure what few readers I have have come to expect...

In addition, I have three much more laser-focused blogs that will get less frequent updates:

• AJS Gaming - Anything that's specifically video or board gaming-related
• AJS's Software Development - Thoughts on software, ongoing projects, etc.
• Dangerously Free Sounds - Reviews of freely downloadable music and related artists, Web sites and services.

Enjoy!

The Last Airbender movie review

The Last Airbender didn't suck. There, I said it. I put off seeing it for a long time, since the TV series was one of the few anime-style (I believe it was an American production with Korean animation) series that I've truly loved. The last thing I wanted to do was tarnish that memory with a crap movie, and everything I'd heard seemed to indicate that this was exactly what M. Night Shyamalan had done to it. Not so.

That's as much as you get without spoilers. From here on in, I'll assume that you have seen either the TV series or the movie. If not, go watch the TV series, and if you love it, see the movie, but don't expect a lot.

First off, let me be clear: I didn't think it was a great film. Casting was poor (though, to be fair, finding children that can carry an entire and relatively heavy movie is nigh impossible) except for Dev Patel and some supporting characters. The boy cast as Aang was acceptable, but not perfect. Part of my problem with him, though, was the writing, and I'll get to that. There was also a rush to tell the entire story of the first season. Frankly, this is where the movie made its largest blunder. If they had done a 2-movie set with the first and last half of the first season, then I think we could have seen a really great pair of films, but as it was we introduced and rushed past many interesting characters from the first season, just to get to the Northern Water Tribe. This had to be done, because Sokka's love is introduced and killed there... an arc which requires at least some time to explain and create an emotional resonance for. As it was, her death still felt artificial and rushed.

So, what did I like about the film? Clearly M. Night had a deep respect for the visual pallet of the series. He kept an awful lot of sets from the first season and they look beautiful. The core story is all there, and though there were some subtle changes, I mostly liked how it all played out. No one's back story was really broken, so much as just bent in places. Little bits of humor were much appreciated, especially Sokka's, "I always get wet!" Appa and Momo have sadly tiny parts, but what little we see of them is as fun as ever.

M. Night's writing has to be a major topic, here, though. He just turned what could be argued is the best children's drama of the past decade into a barely passable live-action film. It's not that he's a bad writer, but I think that he gets far too absorbed in certain aspects of a story or film, and he's just not that director that can write and direct his own work. This is made clear as he repeatedly has characters repeating themselves or consoling each other with platitudes that fall short of the dialog he was starting with. He has problems with pacing, structure and dialogue which simply cannot be ignored. Next time, Mr. Shyamalan, can I humbly suggest you get yourself a script doctor? Ask Joss Whedon (whose script doctoring is legendary). At the very least, he can probably point you at someone well worth the trouble.

Anyway, see the film and expect nothing. It's a fun popcorn movie and if you can get past the rushed storyline and late introductions of major characters, it will be worth seeing.

Why physical stores are better than online

I don't like online stores, but I love them. Until recently, I couldn't figure out why this was. I love the convenience and I feel like I get a better deal online than I do in a store, but for some reason I have this very low-level desire to go to a store to shop instead of loading up Amazon, eBay, Google Music or what-have-you. Why is that?

The other day, it finally occurred to me, and when I saw Tim O'Reilly's recent post about publisher ecosystems and the closing of Borders I thought I should post my thoughts on the topic. I suspect that many people love physical stores for the same reason, but can't quite put their finger on why.

Ok, so short answer: physical stores have a greater selection.

Yes, I understand that that's absurd, but it's actually true in a sense. The online stores that I use tend to have vastly larger selections. In fact, the smaller and more specialized they are, the larger their selections are within those niches. The Paizo store, for example, has the broadest supply of Paizo Publishing products that I know of (kind of obviously). So, why would I go to a store to look for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook? Well, I wouldn't, but when I want to browse, that's another story.

Browsing online is fun, in that I can navigate through items quickly without having to stoop over and look at the bottom shelf or otherwise contort myself to find cool things, but there's a shift in the power dynamic. In a physical store, the vendor puts everything they want to sell out on the shelves. Sometimes they might put out dummy items (like empty DVD cases), but in terms of browsing, I have everything right there to look at, and I can look at whatever I want, regardless of what the vendor wants me to buy (e.g. what has the highest margin, or what wholesale vendor they're trying to bump up to a larger order size). Sure, they can strategically place items in end-caps and on eye-level shelves, but ultimately I'm going to look where I want for what I want.

In an online store, the vendor decides what I'll see unless I do extremely specific searches. There might be items that they have for sale that, due to a desire to steer customers elsewhere or oversight, I'll never see. In fact, I can't know what all the books for sale on Amazon are at any given time. There's no master list that I know of, and certainly no wall of titles that I can just glance over and let whatever grabs my eye do so.

It's this subtle shift in the power dynamic where the online retailer isn't required to show me everything that's "on the showroom floor" that I instinctively dislike about online shopping. Maybe the last book on the end of the bottom shelf was just the one I was looking for, but would never have remembered the title or author.

Of course, when it comes to books, I can pick up a book in a bookstore and glance through the entire thing. Online, vendors simply can't get publishers to agree to such a thing (heck, they never would have agreed to it in physical stores if customers were willing to buy sealed books... but they're not).

Hugo: When 3D goes wrong

I was invited out by a friend to see Hugo. He chose the time, and I didn't think to question it. Only when we got there, did I realize it was the 3D showing. I despise 3D in live-action films. It's not always a travesty, but it's never as good as either 2D live-action. 3D animation, on the other hand, can work well. How To Train Your Dragon was, in my opinion, the best case to date for 3D in film. It actually added depth to the film, and not just to the scenery, but that's something I've never seen in live-action, and have serious doubts I ever will. If I do, it will likely be in Steve Jackson's The Hobbit, but I'm not holding my breath.

Anyway, we went in to Hugo and I settled in to watch not 1, not 2, but 3 trailers for 2D-to-3D conversion films: Star Wars, Titanic and Beauty and the Beast! This bodes ill for 2012... Then Mr. Scorsese's film began. Let me first say that the movie is wonderful. I love the story, the tour of early film history that the story revolves around, and I even loved a little bit of the 3D work when it came to flashback sequences around the makeshift movie studio. I didn't care for the security guard character. He was meant to be comic relief, but he came off as a misplaced character from another film whose sole job in Hugo was to keep the kids awake through an otherwise leisurely paced film. Ben Kingsley... what can I say? He's profound as Georges Méliès. When he breaks down and cries, he manages to pull me in and make me want to weep like no other actor I can think of.

But there was the damned 3D. It's not terrible for the full length of the film (other than the annoyance of wearing sunglasses to watch an already dark film). But there are some shots that recur over and over again that feel terribly gimmicky. The pendulum for the main clock in the train station is not as interesting, I submit, as Mr. Scorsese seems to think it is. Also, snow, dust and other motes floating right in front of my face aren't interesting. They simply make me want to look away.

Overall, I'd say Hugo is worth seeing, but not in 3D.

The Golden Age is over, long live The Golden Age

Recently, on Google+, David Brin said simply:

"Stop mythologizing the past. The golden age we dream of is only in the future--and only achievable by moving forward."

While I agreed with his general sentiment, I disagreed with the generalization, and said so. This sparked some debate with other followers that I thought I'd try to capture and clarify, here.

In my reply, I pointed out that some areas, such as personal electronics, seem to be on an escalating trajectory of improvement that is bringing increased quality of life to vast numbers of people. However, at the same time we have substantial changes to established areas which are profoundly negative. For example, food and music are two art forms that used to be taught pervasively and are now taught to a shrinking minority of enthusiasts. As the public becomes less educated about these art forms, the pinnacles of experimentation and exploration in these arts will diminish. It's not that there won't be great musicians and cooks, but overall we'll produce fewer of them, making fewer advances to the state of their respective arts.

In fact, I think it's safe to say that the golden age of food was either the 19th or 20th centuries, depending on the part of the world you are looking at, and it's likely that the 21st century won't make the same inroads except in less developed nations where the majority of the population still prepare most of their own meals in the home, and thus continue to share and teach their techniques as a cultural heritage.

For music, I think that the problem is not as uniquely tied to the developing world, but the real source of experimentation will certainly stem from cultural blending the way it always has, especially in the folding of Asian, Middle Eastern, African and South American music into the global culture (a process which began in earnest in the mid-1960s and continues to this day).

So, there are still good times ahead, but when you over-generalize about a "golden age" I think you're always likely to be wrong at some level (probably many).

Cheap DVDs this week

Keep an eye out on Amazon this week for cheap DVDs. For example, the Star Trek: Original Motion Picture Collection which contains movies 1-6 is down to $40 while The Lord of the Rings: Trilogy (Extended Editions) is $50! Nice for gifts or just picking these up for yourself.

Also, don't forget to peruse my list of top indie films that are available for streaming as well as on DVD...