Lolz in Translation

At this point of time, it probably isn’t worth mentioning that I give no sort of regard to copyright law whatsoever, but seeing as how I’ve just started this article and have absolutely no idea how many words I can possibly crank out like a broken record, it’s my firm belief that I should just play safe and throw in a couple (it can be seen from this that my definition of couple has led to the possibility of the family line either ending here, or branching in all directions) of words here.

Abbeh has already written something along the lines of this topic, but I’m still going to write about it, so if you don’t like it, then feel free to stick your fingers in your eyes and pretend I’m writing about something else.

Before that though I should probably say that this article’s topic was a result of the mini blogger’s circle that we held on Thursday (in fact, it wasn’t so much held as passed around like some sort of diabolical potato), and it being the first blogger’s circle, there really isn’t much to compare it to so I suppose we can’t even call it mini. But the main point is that it achieved it’s purpose in giving me something to write about. And while the Daily Refusal pretty much remains in limbo, I should probably add that it might take on the form of a new blog, so keep your hopes (and suspicious) up.

It wasn’t long after we all got together at the canteen and started randomly drifting into two groups, consisting of Me and Abbeh in the first, and the other consisting of everyone else. Shudder was sort of a drifter, and if there’s one way to describe his involvement in the discussion, then I’d have to say that he was doing a cross stitch.

Abbeh brought up the topic of everyone’s favorite cake firing, portal eating fun-fest, Portal. Kylie, strongly believing that such a topic alienated everyone that wasn’t completely obsessed with Portal (No, I know, someone needs to help her), gathered her brethren and started another discussion. At this point of time me and Abbeh pretty much slogged out on an article that she found (shut up), which can be seen here:

http://digg.com/gaming_news/Portal_is_a_feminist_masterpiece_great_read

Trying to make my article feel like two articles instead of one has already been tried and pretty much failed, so allow me to summarize the article in the following way:

1. Portal is feminist.
2. The portal gun is analogous to vagoo.
3. GlaDOS is a maternal figure.
4. The Cube is a paternal figure, which is later incinerated.
5. Ergo ergo ergo, QED, W5, Portal hates 49 percent of the world’s population.

All the allegories drawn in that article were pretty much viable, save for number 4. While I would have accepted the analogy of the Cube being representative of emotional burden or emotion itself, I never thought of the Cube as a father figure (and I refuse to acknowledge that floozy of a pyramid) to begin with, and still can’t. And while it is true that all the other allegories drawn are less masculine in nature than the other elements you see in other first person shooters, and give it a more female friendly atmosphere, if you take away the allegory of the Cube, you pretty much tone down or entirely remove the element of feminism.

It’s at this point of time where the topic of over-interpretation comes in.

One just can’t help but feel that the author of that article is just trying too hard to get that interpretation out of Portal, despite the fact that Valve might be half composed of curly mustaches with matching berets, with bodies to go along with them.

In other words, how far can one go before in his (take that, Portal) interpretations before they can be considered “too far”?

Some might suggest that the point where the interpretations are no longer of the author’s intentions might be a limit, but then you have works like those in visual arts, where the works don’t have a definite interpretation, and are just left there for the sake of making you think (once in a long while).

So does this mean that any work can be used as a basis for any argument, provided that the one using it can provide proper justifications for such a link? And I believe that given enough backflips and literary spasms, a link can be made between the most distant of things, such as children and childhood, or holidays and enjoyment. Given enough effort, such links can be made.

Probably not. While such links can be made, the limit to which these links are believable would be dependant on the audience.

But to a certain extent, such as in milder examples, like the article above, certain stretches can be made, and while I do find that disagreeable, it really all matters on how much I find it believable, and that pretty much varies from person to person.

So not having enough motivation to link this to the topic of peer pressure and the power of the majority, let’s just end this article here, and go back to whatever it was that we were doing, be it writing another article or making fun of the opposite gender.

Writer's Blog

It's been quite a while ever since my last entry touched upon anything in detail that would shame Blu-Ray, so I've decided to do that once again. This post will most possibly be concerned with the Blogger circle. Most probably having blogged more about the blogger circle than during the actual damn thing, in this entry I hope to discuss and meander about a few key issues and concerns with the event.

The blogger circle was put together when Cancy and I started discussing about the inadequecies of our school's Journalism club, and their ability to publish 2006's yearbook and the year 2007 (punctually, of course). And having decided on the fact that there wasn't any interesting material to read within the school compounds (save for the library, but we're specifically talking about quiet places here). So I suggested something along the lines of a self-written, community based paper, and decided to dub it "The Daily Refusal", mostly because it was a catchphrase, but also mostly because of fun, laughter, peace and joy.

The blogger circle eventually came into the picture (albeit somewhat disorientated) and the idea of it started meandering around until we invited more people, and then finally decided on actually having the event. And while I do admit we may have gotten our priorities a bit mixed up, variety is always important, as is the reason why I never intend to go into medical practice.

The idea mostly sprung from countless random yet intellectual conversations about homework, work, and everything else. The common sentiment was that these conversations were mostly wasted, since we all we had from them was lots of fun, and that being of no practical use whatsoever, decided to put these conversations into tangible and incriminating form.

The only remaining minor details include how the circle will actually be conducted.

The strange thing about doing things in general is that its usually most difficult when you're conciously trying your best to carry them out. This means that actually getting the usual ramblings so easily avaliable to us is actually going to be harder than a titanium gobstopper during the actual event.

The best possible way in which the circle can be conducted would be to simply find a nice place to gather, get food and drinks, then let the conversation slowly flow in as much as the drinks. I'm also sure that we're all appreciative if more than drinks flow into this event, so if anyone recently defied the laws of improbability and casino blacklists, we'd be more than happy to bear the burden with you.

The only problems (aside from all the other problems) with this sort of event is that it tends to peter out after a while, and the partcipants and guests start to float away to attend the more exciting blogger circles in the region of Clementi.

So alternatively, we could just hold the whole event in a podcast sort of style, but that in turn forces those who would rather be talking about something else in the discussion (everyone taking EL4103 reading this is experiencing an emotion known commonly as nostalgia. Everyone else is experiencing an emotion called dread.)

So the final alternative I have to offer is this: (hopefully resulting in four mechanical tentacles being welded to my back)

Have three or four mikes in seperate places, with plenty of food and drink around (because mikes and drinks go together like the characters of everyone's favorite Shakespearean tragedy), and everytime a conversation results in a discussion going on, those involved can then shimmy over to the mike and begin their discussion there, sharing the mike (hopefully simultaneously for the sake of my photo album) and sharing their thoughts. Anyone who wants to join the discussion can then shimmy over and subsequently fight for possession of the mike (or the nearby Lays).

Ideally, such a setup allows anyone to join a discussion when they want to, and also allows multiple discussions to go on at the same time.

Of course, having been expelled from the heights of Olympus, this setup is clearly vulnerable to all sorts of drawbacks and as a subsequent result, needs meatshield.

Tagboard?

The Hypathetical Effect

Everyone in the right state of mind (namely, not in Iowa), would have noticed that the school holidays are here (unless you happen to be a member of a lineage of katana wielding badasses). And while it has been something of anticipation for the last six months or so, it probably still is.

It simply isn't what you would have anticipated it to be. And while that may not be true as of yet, by the laws of induction it should be quite safe to say that from the last nine years of our lives, a trend can be observed. The holidays usually seem to be a lot more thrilling and relieving before the actual thrilling and relieving happens. That is to say, it disappoints.

Strangely enough, such a phenomenon is no longer limited to holidays (as of the 2008 patch). Many other things are usually a lot better and appealing before they're actually avaliable. And while the examinations do come to mind upon first mention of such a thing, it can't be denied that many a time, disappointment should be attributed to not to the object of disappointment (no suprise there), but to the human imagination.

Having such a lengthy amount of time to ferment thoughts of anticipation across the period of time in which one is deprived of the object of anticipation, by the time the object is acquired, the actual experience is terribly dampened by having experienced the... experience about ten times or so mentally.

Now about that blogger circle...

Food for Blog

It's been about six hours or so since I knew the sweet scent of freedom, though the possiblity of being institutionalized is marginally possible, I'm thinking that attempting life in the outside world is still possible as long as I have a second chance.

That said, I believe it's important for all ex-convicts like ourselves to get together and talk about how the world has changed since we last saw it. But no longer having access to old woodland sheds in the middle of the forest, we now have to make do with classy cafes and pristine eateries. Dark times we live in.

There are a few tentative locations for such a meeting.

a. Someone's house, preferably one with a trampoline.

b. A cafe, preferably with coffee that costs more than the caviar at the Ritz.

c. The Ritz.

d. In the event that we can't possible have access to any of these places, we could attempt some sort of pilgrimage through the city, and generally talking about things.

Any suggestions, on the tagboard please.

The Circle of Lies

For those who speculate that the writer of this blog might have turned to self blood liberation and poetry, fear not. He's still as jaded as a old Singaporean pawn shop. But the purpose of this post isn't to discuss the profits of such an establishment or to offer emotional help to those who need it, rather, it's purpose is to call for a blogger circle gathering.

The wonderful BCG (because everyone knows that without an acronym, something couldn't possible last for more than 1 month) is a hypothetical meeting, but we aim to remedy that. It mainly consists of roughly as many bloggers as possible getting together in person (though some online meetings may be held) to talk about stuff. Recent issues, the future, and possibly even clothing sales should the situation get desperate. In other words, it is not a meeting with conversation, but rather a meeting FOR conversation. In other words, come on down here and talk.

No one can possibly imagine my ecstacy at the moment.

And so, I beseech (not since 3 years ago) to all bored bloggers and adolescents to tag my tagboard (although if you are a boring and out of fashion individual then you could simply type in it.) if they're interested in such a potentially pointless meeting. But then again, who believes in this sort of wishful thinking?

Right back Edu

One flaw of the education system is that it assumes the simple child is 100GB thumbdrive. The other flaw of the education system is that it assumes that this harddrive will never crash.

But really, at the end of the day, there is only so much one can learn during their sixteen or more years of sentence, And this is where some interesting points start to rise out of the ground after all three magical jewels have been placed at their respective goddess statues.

Suppose there was a kid that possessed the maximum learning ability of his generation. (I'm afraid that due to privacy reasons I cannot give you Darr- whoops, said too much) Now suppose that his entire life was dedicated to the pursuit of new knowledge, and that all his income comes straight from an unlimited source. His entire life is spent searching for new breakthroughs and so on and so forth. (Except for his PS3 sessions and bus pilgrimages on weekends.) After he dies (shattering the faith of many female high school juniors around the world), he leaves behind all the knowledge, wisdom, and torrents he had discovered. The next generation in turn has its own Darryl work on this knowledge.

So the question is (after many paragraphs of blithering) is this: how long can this cycle go on? And while I could turn you to the Tour de France what I really should be telling you is that the possibility of a point where the amount of knowledge learnt in one's lifetime is no longer dependant on how much there currently is, but the amount of knowledge learnt in one's lifetime is dependant on... well, one's lifetime. Will there be a time period where one's lifespan is no longer enough time to learn what has been discovered over the past years before one finally gets all the answers anyway? In more other words, when will it be that the human brain cannot accumulate all learnt knowledge before it dies?

So where is this all going? (And while I am tempted to ask for a minute or two and get back to you later, it looks like I'm going to have to do some impromptu) What this might mean is that there might be a point in the future where no more scientific advancements can be made because no one can learn all the knowledge necessary to make those advances before they die (and even Walt Disney won't help us then). Throw in the fact that lifespans have been dropping ever since Adam got his craving for deliciously evil fruits and there really is a reason to fill the basement with dried rations. But there might be a solution.

Using previously accumulated knowledge, if we could somehow extend our own lifespan, more advances could be made. And this is where topics like transhumanism (and the Florida Bar) start popping in.

So while we're all hurrying down to the grocery store to buy the necessary food and ammo, let's just give this topic a little thought.

Tagboard, anyone?

Hol's well that ends hell

Having takne it upon myself at the beginning of every school holiday to contribute to the giant gaping void that is our planet's ozone layer, I've decided to write about the rather controversial topic of controversy.

It would be rather expected if about half my readers (I'm sorry, wrong word there? "my"?. Silly, arrogant little me.) immediately made the planet less unhappy by a negligible amount the moment I mentioned this topic, but this is probably what writers (from this it can be seen that I am really not one individual, but a collective entity composed of thousands of individuals) as "self topic syndrome" or STS, if you're the kind of person who goes through a cardiac arrest and dies if you don't get the opportunity to puzzle people every half a minute or so.

In fact, let's drop all this controversy nonsense and just talk about STS instead.

Many a writer tends to reach a certain point in their lives where they can no longer write anything (or think about anything to write about) the topic that they've been writing about for years. This may range from large smelly pointed hats categorizing young children, or generally insulting things about the physical form of God who came down to wash our sins away so that we may be entered into the kingdom of heaven. And many a writer will then try to write about writing itself.

This usually results in the vain sacrifices of millions of trees around the world for the cause of dissecting the process of sacrifing millions of trees around the world.

But the root of this problem usually comes around from trying to write something for the sake of being different, and this is where Dan Brown needs to start being ashamed of himself. So before I'm silenced let me just say this:

There's really no need to write about something different. What a writer really has to do is... well.. bonus points for the one who guesses this. Very simply, write. Write about what you want people to know, or what you think about something. Many a time have I found my thinking process get cut off by simply thinking "Is this going to be a good one?". If you're currently experiencing that, my advice would be to shut down your computer (or typewriter, depending on how many medical conditions you have at the moment) and go for a cup of coffee (or an IV drip), then come back when you've seen the error of your ways.

The-vice

So after having shamelessly delayed all of my china entries save for the one promising them, I have had no choice but to churn out useless filler entries to appease the general masses (Norwegians not included).

Allow me to defend myself, Your Honor, by clarifying that this is due to the advent of the new school year and that most of the time that would have been spent sitting on my bed and sipping apple juice mixed with sprite while mercilessly massaging my keyboard are now spent sitting in a classroom with twenty one other people who would rather be sitting at home on their beds sipping apple juice mixed with sprite and massaging their keyboards. In other words, it's been a productive first month of the new school year.

But every weekend I do get the opportunity to sit down on my bed and pull out my beloved laptop (or Palm, in this case) and catch up on old times, as well as liberate at least forty people of their heads virtually. Of course, most of the time was spent on the latter but now that the recent head pandemic has passed, it now gives us the opportunity to move over to more intellectual entries. (These may include the vague possiblity of Samuel finally producing another entry, but as I said, intellectual discussions please.)

So once again we find ourselves brushing upon the topic of De Thevice, a hypothetical device that boasts the features of all the current portable devices that are relevant to us today, such as the mobile phone (which also happens to be a hybrid device) and the mp3 player and laptop.

But why bring up such a controversial and heretic topic at such a controversial and heretic time?

For those who happen not to own a 360 or Wii (look, it's a fact that we're going to have to face sooner or later, my dear Sony fanboys.), many other devices may have drawn your attention (with the merits of Adobe Photoshop).

Most of them may be hybrid devices, (though it is my strict belief that we should judge them based on their character and not their parentage) such as the PSP, PS3, iphone, and so and so forth and God forbid that Sony every create any thing that doesn't have a name starting with P. Earlier on, a similar attempt to bring two distant devices in holy matrimony ended in a abrupt seperation: The N-gage.

We have yet to see how the iphone performs (hopefully something along the lines of beatboxing), but the PS(P+3) have both failed, or at least not performed as well, in terms of the secondary functions they boasted. In the PS3's case, the features of a home entertainment system (also known locally as the little sister), and in the PSP's case, also an entertainment system, but rather portability instead of resolution ten times higher than anything to be found on the USS Enterprise.

The PS3 failed because of its irrational need for Blu-Ray (still it refuses any help, much to the dismay of its family), a new disc format which capable of holding a lot more than DVDs (in the same fashion where Jean Grey can hold a lot more than the Juggernaut), but because of the already existing popularity of the more masculine DVD (a great apology to all the feminists reading this blog, and a greater enquiry as to why they are reading it). The blu-ray disc also seems to fail in the very area it claims to excel in: resolution. While it may be true that blu-ray holds more than your average RPG character (will the real Link please stand up?), it fails in allowing the human eye to catch up (since the days of being able to project this month's stocks onto a wall using your eyes are still but a dream), since most people agree that there doesn't seem to be any noticeable difference in terms of resolution between DVD and blu-ray. So while blu-ray may be superior to DVD technically, in terms of praticality mother still knows best.

And yet despite the failure of such devices, the market moves increasingly towards the siren-like wails of multi function devices. The mobile phone (or comms droid, if you've decided to pop back into the 20th century to get away from all the nukes) you carry in your hand is a testament to this. Chances are if you aren't playing Snake 2, you've got a camera in your phone. Then after failing miserably at level 250, you proceed to enquire of your friend about a multiplayer bluetooth match. Suddenly the mobile phone is an entertainment device as it is a communication device. (Studies have shown that entertainment and communication are not to be confused, especially if you have a diplomat for a buddy.)

So why is it that the multi function mobile phone (or as everyone calls it today, the mobile phone) has thriven like Soviets in a library, and yet devices such as the N-gage have failed despite their very aim being incoporating multiple functions into one device?

Let's take a look at the problems with the N-gage, as well as other issues that might arise with similar devices:

1. The N-gage can be compared to that of progressive creationism. By compromising in both areas of a phone and a gaming device, it proceeded to flip on its transexual arse and die. The screen was taller than it was wide, which was more of a desirable feature in women than electronics, and the dialing pad was impossible to use without both hands. The original N-gage is also well known for glueing tacos to people's heads: instead of putting the screen to your face as you talked, you had to press the side of the N-gage onto your cheeks (hi there!), leading to great distress and a rapid climb in employment of personal pyschiatrists. So what did the N-gage fail in? User friendliness. By trying to stuff too many features into one device than was possible at the time the N-gage compromised on all of them, as well as user input.

2. As demonstrated in Iron Man's fight with the Hulk battery life is terribly important. And since fuel cells and strange aliens from space that supply infinite energy haven't been discovered yet, we require the use of the Lithium Ion/ Lithium Polymer/ Nickel Ion Battery. So far, these work fine in common devices, lasting about three days, in the case of phones, without charging and several hours for laptops. But what we can see from this is that different devices have different power requirements depending on their features. So while it might be possible to play cell-shaded games on the PSP, you might end up getting defeated by the devious "Low Battery" alert than the final boss' desperation move.

3 Fermat is generally known as a very mean person who enjoyed leaving mathematical dilenmas for the rest of the world to disprove/prove/get infuriated by even after his death, so it's no suprise that a single "o" could change anthing, because format is usually one of the problems when it comes to a portable electronic device. To solve the problem of having different formats for the exact same thing, many companies churn out converters, which usually can't be uninstalled or send adware into your computer like Noah sending chupacabras into the top deck of the Ark.

4. One common thing between women and electronics is that size does matter. Bringing your girlfriend to a bowling alley can be very embarassing without the right kind of girlfriend, especially when it turns out that the bowling alley was in fact your new portable cell phone. It's generally a rule that durability is inversely proportional to size, because as more features get crammed into a device, more components are needed and to keep the little bugger in the palm of your hand the components have to be made smaller, and thus more vulnerable to damage. Size may also affect user accessiblity, as seen in the case of small keyboards.

So what are the features to be desired in The Device?

Read everything that has been written since the numbers started. Now rectify those problems.

But as seen from the failure of the N-gage, we probably won't be getting such devices till the advent of the PS5 (or perhaps when Sony stops naming everything with the suffix of P and a numeral).

But there are also problems with the very concept of a multi purpose device covering all your needs.

Technology is a wonderful thing. Many a method has been devised to protect the IT user from various threats and heresies such as viruses and spam. Norton, however, does not provide protection from the actual physical laws of the universe. F=ma still applies, as does the usual law of “they didn’t see me do it”. Losing a mobile phone at this current time can already be a traumatic experience, so losing possession of your future ultimate device essentially erases your presence from the world, till of course you get another one and provided you backed up all your documents and files. Most shops however, have strict policies about serving non existent customers, so recovery may prove to be slightly difficult.
Losing your device would mean losing access to your bank accounts, your contacts, your clearance to the Bat Mobile, and more importantly, the possibility of someone else obtaining them. And while stronger security devices may be implemented to prevent access of another person’s information, humans, in their infinite creativity (in the presence of caffeine) and adaptability, will always find another way to be a thorn in the arse of the human race.

Funtionality

Over the past few days I've been fooling around (or as the British would say, faffing about) with the multimedia functions of my new phone and I'm been, so far, quite impressed with all the features that can be fit into that little Snickers of a device. But at the end of the day, whether you're a high school teacher or a Republican politician that aims to shut down Rockstar Games, you have to admit that a phone's most ability intense feature is that of the games, in other words, 3D Java applications.

The pre loaded games that you get when you first purchase your phone are no doubt that of mediocre quality. Knowing that there was no way in hell (or Singapore) that I would be able to get the greatest possible enjoyment from playing Multiplay Tennis, I proceeded to an old associate of mine which I call www.mobile9.com.

mobile9.com is about as close to mobile content piracy as you can get, though it's not really piracy because no one actually gets the moolah flowing in from uploading content on mobile9.com, so we prefer to refer to it as sharing, something that used to be quite evident until the Boys in Blue came in and cracked dow-

And now that I managed to find some extra rope in my closet (as well as space, in case they kick about), we can get back to mobile9.com. I proceeded to download every single game with good looking screenshots and then uploaded them shamelessly onto my mobile phone like a poacher in Kenya loading up ivory onto his truck. The problem with the games I found was that most of them were clunky. Splinter Cell didn't give me the feel that I did in the PC version and Aero Mission 3D didn't aim properly. I did, however, find V Rally 3D, which led me to another site called www.mobiletoones.com. (Which also leads me to check the condition of the lock on my closet.)

I would just like to say that I do not have the soundtrack "Stairways to Heaven" and that the temptation to play it backwards has long faded away.

I would also like to appeal to those who have a spare computer monitor.

Mobiletoones.com is amazing. Signing up is required but free (what was that first part again?) 3D games are galore and all wonderfully put the monetary system to deep blushing shame.

Which is where we get to Robot Alliance.

Later.

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After having received my first phone that actually has more memory than that of an Alzheimer's patient or an JRPG protagonist, I've been plunged into the world of multimedia on my cell phone. I'm now able to use my phone as more than just a phone: a radio, a music player, and also a poor man's PSP just in case the MRT overshoots the last stop and the waiting lines upstairs happen to be longer than I expect to be.

Which leads us to one realization:

The lines between different kinds of devices are getting blurrer, which is an odd choice of words because now your cellphone happens to at least have a 2.0 mega pixel camera built into it, and there's really no excuse for that kind of resolution.

It turns out that most electronic devices these days no longer have one purpose, they simply excel more in one than they do the other. This means that one day, the possiblity of an ultimate device which fares equally well in all aspects could very well be in the palm of your hand soon, or in your cerebral cortex, depending on whether the biologists have been going heavy on the coffee or not.

Comments on the tagboard, please.