OT: Why I think Amanda Palmer is semi-goddess

Coz she shares beautiful, wacky, amazing and special moments with us? Because she’s odd? Because she gets Neil Gaiman staying at her place? Because she’s my age, but gives me more food for thought than Seth Godin? Coz she can Google?
Because hearing her voice makes Ema smile in her sleep?

Yes.

Bug Bash And Meta

The amount of news happening in my life is inversely proportional to the frequency of posts on this blog. Since all three of us came down with a flu I've got some time to spare.
Our next project is a (fingers crossed!) female version of David codenamed Ivy. I'm guessing 10 megatons will compare to the yield of that event. So I'm kinda wondering if I should discontinue David.exe or expand it?
I mean - come September I'll have zero time to report and by January I'll have two projects on my hands. And we're moving to a new house! How much will Ivy differ from David? Can they both fit in the same blog? Is it too soon for David to start blogging himself?
Leave a note after the beep...

OT: Gaming

Just felt like sharing some of my favorite games. Surprisingly, most of them are free or really cheap games. Perhaps it's down to my c64 and amiga upbringing but games based on ideas attract me more then games based on polish and bling.
Also, most of the games are physics based. This is only natural as small scale / single developer games can't compete on professionally drawn graphics, orchestrated music, star actor voice-overs... A single guy doesn't have the time to draw all the baddies, but he can program them! So here's a short list:

Tower of Goo

Originally an experimental game-play project game (see below) but one that might have spun a new company for the author. The game is based upon a simple idea of having to build a tower using amorphous substance called goo. All you need to do is pick up a goo blob and stretch it to form a truss. Besides building a solid structure the player is rushed by remaining goo blobs which have a tendency to concentrate on the most precarious, the highest peek of the built structure. This shifting mass makes your buildings somewhat unstable and reaching the target height proves quite challenging.

Crayon physics

Another EGP favorite. The basic idea of this game is that your drawings become physical objects in the game. You draw a box and a box of the same size appears in the game, drops down to a see-saw and flings a ball across the screen. The object of each level is to touch a star with your ball.

Toribash

I bought this game a while ago but newer versions seem to be free. Also the rendering engine got upgraded a lot! The basic premise of this game is physics based fighting. You control a 3d fighter through issuing basic commands (relax, stretch, hold, grip...) to his joints. After making your moves the simulation continues a certain amount of frames whereupon you're given a choice to again issue new commands. In multi-player mode you have a limited time to issue your commands before the simulation continues. This results in an amazing combat game with no prefixed moves or combos but simply amazingly realistic action. The game is heavily modded and supports a wide array of game rules (most damage wins or player that touches the ground first looses etc.).

Zen bondage

In this game your task is to wrap a wooden object with a thread. Your task is to cover almost 100% of the object so any concave areas must be navigated with care.

Flow

An extraordinarily clever game following a unique game design philosophy. You control a small creature that gains size and speed by eating other creatures in the game. You're given free choice of progressing through the game levels (depth) in sequence or skipping through to the final level at once.

Bridge construction set

My all time favorite (although not free!) game. The history of this game started out with BridgeBuilder which was a 2d bridge building game. Next came Pontifex which moved the game in 3d environment and added different bridge building material. The last of the series called BridgeIt upgraded the graphics engine but for me BCS is still the best in the lot. Your task in this game is to use the available material (iron, steel trusses or cables) and build a bridge capable of passing a test (like having a train pass over it). It's one of those games where creativity rules. BBG still hosts contest where the most efficient bridge (read cheapest) which completes a level wins. Some of the entries just blow you away. Also somewhere along the line we started making walking / moving structures :). This was not something the creators of the game ever envisioned but clearly shows the power of building games as a platform for expression a not a collection of pretty pictures.

If you like games like these, then head over to Fun Motion, Experimental game-play project or Introversion Software. Those should keep you busy for months!

OT: Why I think William Shatner is a demigod

When you say William Shatner people think Captain James Kirk of the Enterprise. How his amazing career managed to get hidden is unbelievable. Did you know he starred in a movie with all dialog spoken in Esperanto? Did you know he recorded two studio albums (some songs with Ben Folds among others)? If you get a chance go listen to Has Been please do (here’s a live performance of Pulp / Common People from the album) . It’s an amazing album and it’s more serious than it first appears. Did you know he wrote books (yes he, not some ghost writers)? Did you all manage to not see him play Big Giant Head in 3rd rock or Danny Crane in Boston Legal? The guy even has a vlog!

Anyways – that’s all I needed to say. You're no common man and I’m your number one fan!

OT: International Slow Server Day

As a Chief Paradigm Administrator at my current place of employment I nominate this day - 13th of June as the International Slow Server Day. It's free - I checked!
You know those days when queries just seem to take forever, when transactions have a way of getting entangled, when every (l)user just has to access just about every record in the database, when rendering a simple "Hello world" is more then the poor ol' web server can handle, when disk access is maxed and constant and there's no free memory left? Well, today was that day...
So If you agree with my notion that we need a special day, dedicated to just keeping the servers cool and giving them a day off - sign up below.

OT: One-liners #1

On this sunny morning I feel like this should be discovered by WeFeelFine.

OT:Report and a Trixie suggestion

I’m sorry to report that family illness, accidents and work schedules prevented me from posting any updates. In addition we’ll be going off-line for the next few days for maintenance (off to the Jadran sea!). I’m sure you’ll be seeing other geek baby blogs. Some of you will even indulge in brief affairs. I’m sure you’ll claim it meant nothing and I’m sure I’ll forgive you.

In the mean-time, all you newfangled (or soon to be newfangled!) geek dads might want to check out the TrixieTracker. It’s your web 2.0 online baby management site. I have only three tiny little issues that are preventing me from using it:

1. It offers only paid subscription (Subscription fee in this day and age!? What kind of business mode is that?);
2. I discovered it just a bit late;
3. It was my bloody idea and they stole it two years before I thought of it!

OT: Re-labeling and stuff

You might have noticed that old TDE posts are popping up in your newsreader. I’ve decided to go through the old TDE posts and label them. Blogger.com didn’t have this feature when TDE started so most of the posts haven’t been labeled. I think TDE readers will appreciate the fact they can now get all the random things posts with one click.

For those of you that haven’t done so pls. re-subscribe to the new feed.

OT: Vanity? Surely not me!

After reading Haacked vanity piece I decided to check up on you - my reader(s). I’ve moved my rss feed to FeedBurner so if you get the chance please re-subscribe.

Or just leave a comment detailing why you do not wish to do so…

Or whatever...

Or come back tommorow for an on-topic post...

Your DNA?

An interesting visualization project is up on baekdal.com. What does your DNA look like?

Marry Christmas

And a happy New Year!

OT: Daydream in blue

Recently net’s crackpots were stirred by news about a little company called Steorn. Apparently Steorn invented a device that produces free energy.
That’s right, free energy – and I quote:

1. The technology has a coefficient of performance greater than 100%.
2. The operation of the technology (i.e. the creation of energy) is not derived from the degradation of its component parts.
3. There is no identifiable environmental source of the energy (as might be witnessed by a cooling of ambient air temperature).

While 1. is meaningless and 2. is debatable - 3. is just too vague to approach. Is there an outside source of energy or isn’t there? Or to put it more simply – where’s the little hamster at?
I guess insolitology needs an update.

OT: My friend needs the internet

This is both funny and sad. In the 21st century, the future of all my childhood SF movies, with most people talking about broadband, net neutrality and web2.0, my friend lost his internet connection.
He was trying to switch his ISP (i did the same last year) and ended up in a no man's land between the bullying former ISP's parent company (i know!) and the incompetent current ISP (who now claim to be able to connect him by the end of next month).
I hope my netless friend gets back to the future soon as I miss having him around. But then again, internet is a big place. Perhaps there's a 2.0 version of him floating around...