blueZhift Blog

During the big tech boom, I used to joke that the reason there was a shortage of programmers was because they don’t have girlfriends/wives and thus never reproduce. The boom has gone bust and interestingly enough, the programming jobs have gone to the two most populous countries on Earth. But that’s not what I’m writing about today.

Yesterday I started teaching my 9 y.o. son to program. He thinks he might want to write games for Sega someday. Granted, the odds are against this happening, but that’s okay. I’ve wanted to teach him anyway and I can learn some new things too. So we’re working our way through Java Programming for Kids, Parents, and Grandparents by Yakov Fain. Why Java? Why not? All of the tools needed are free and downloadable, and what he learns writing in Java can be applied when writing in other modern object oriented (OO) languages. I don’t currently use Java for anything (using Python more and more), so this is a great opportunity for me too!

I might actually get two more programmers out of the deal as his little brother and sister have been looking over our shoulders during the lessons! Meanwhile his older sister, who’s away right now at the Concordia Japanese camp, Mori no Ike, has expressed an interest in 3D modelling. So I’ll be firing up Blender pretty soon too!

My little staple head is doing just fine today. No one would ever know all of the drama that my youngest son caused yesterday after banging his head on a radiator and precipitating yet another largely uncoordinated dash to the ER involving seemingly far more blood than was necessary. But he’s okay now and playing happily, now with a few staples in the back of his head to close the inch long (2.54cm) gash.

It’s really amazing to see how indestructable and unstoppable the little guy is. I think he’d make a great racer!

Whoa, talk about adding insult to injury! India is demanding that the H1-B visa cap be raised to 195K. Now I can understand jobs going overseas because of cheaper labor there, even if I don’t like it personally. But for another nation to demand that we allow more of their workers to come here and take jobs that there are plenty of Americans willing and able to do is just insulting. India is doing pretty well in the current outsourcing climate, IBM is about to add 14K jobs in India (while cutting 13K in Europe and the US), so to demand more is really to overplay their hand and invite a backlash. Maybe they aren’t getting enough online poker spam to understand how to play the game.

There’s yet another story at CNet about the declining representation of women and non-Asian minorities in tech jobs in the U.S.. Well duh, tech jobs have been flying overseas for the last several years. When the massive bloodletting of outsourcing began, it was very likely women, minorities, and older tech workers who lost their jobs first. In an interesting twist, in Illinois at least, the age discrimination laws essentially require that a mix of employees be laid off along with older workers in order to avoid trouble. So as long as the workers with less seniority (and in jobs more likely to be outsourced, like coding) were getting the axe anyway, they decided to unload the higher salaried older tech workers as well.

The thing I continue to find interesting about stories like this, is their failure to state the obvious question. Why should women and minorities pursue career fields that at present appear to have little future? The big corporations are really not interested in developing talent here at home when they can get something that is at least good enough overseas for far less money. Being an American is a liability these days in tech because it means you cost more than most companies want to pay. Even if you took no salary, paying for  benefits still makes you more costly than a worker in India or China. I won’t be telling black kids to go into jobs that won’t be there once they finish school. I’ll be telling them to use their talents to start their own companies rather than work for companies that are ultimately not interested in the well being of their workers or their country.

I just got back to my office after my lunch time walk. The weather is great and the streets are full of tourists and office workers. The streets are also full of pretty good looking people of a variety of shapes and sizes. Observation has convinced me that the vast majority of people are attractive given the right presentation. So don’t believe what Hollywood says! Everyone does not have to look like hot actor A or sexy actress B to be all they can be! Most of the time looking nice just means paying attention to the colors and fashions that are most suitable for one’s body type.

The other thing that occured to me walking about was the large proportion of women out there with, well…really large boobs! Geez, is this the land of livin large or what? Now I understand why my Asian brothers got so nuts over the women they met in college. I’m not a large breast fan myself, but I was a bit shocked at how much was just "out there" on the street today.

On Father’s Day I was doing what I usually do on a spring time Sunday afternoon. I was watching the NASCAR race taking place at the Michigan superspeedway. This year, the tires supplied by Goodyear and used by all entrants are using a softer rubber compound. On this afternoon, these soft tires were not getting along with the track at all. The Michigan track is 2 miles around, giving most cars a 40 lap fuel window. This Sunday, the tires weren’t surviving more than about 30 laps before being worn to the threads, not a good thing!

Watching any NASCAR event, you hear a lot about tires, how they wear, how many to take, yadda, yadda, yadda. But never before had I heard of teams dropping out of the race because of tires, even before it began! This is indeed what happened at the U.S. Grand Prix this year. Seven teams refused to race citing concerns that Michelin raised over how its tires would fare on the Indianapolis track. As a result, only six teams raced (all with Bridgestone tires) and Michael Schumacher won the race. Now several fans are suing over it.

As a race fan, I can only see this as another reason I believe Formula One is in decline. I’ve watched the races in the past, but stopped because they simply weren’t as competitive as NASCAR or Indy Racing League. Last season, a single driver, Michael Schumacher won most of the races and of course there was the infamous "team orders" race in which a teammate who was winning the race, moved over to let Schumacher win! What happened to putting on a good show for the fans? Those teams that pulled out of the U.S. Grand Prix must have had other options than that. I don’t think you would ever see something like that happen in NASCAR because, for now at least, there appears to be a very conscious desire to put on the best show possible for the fans. They haven’t lost touch win the single reason modern sports exist in the first place, the fans! And as competitive as race car drivers are, it must have been a bitter pill to swallow for the seven drivers who didn’t get a chance to race at the U.S. Grand Prix.

I can only guess that the latest Formula One fiasco is just the surface layer of deeper problems. Those seven teams didn’t pull out just because of tires. Maybe they were trying to make a statement of another nature. Maybe they too would like to see a more competitive series where the team with the most money isn’t the one to win week in and week out. But I think it would have been better to settle these problems off of the track rather than leaving the fans hanging out to dry.

Come on now, how transparent can they be? GamesIndustry.biz reports that while Sony Computer Entertainment is dismayed that adult content is going to be released for the PSP in its UMD video format, they are powerless to stop it. Didn’t Sony create the UMD format in the first place? And who actually manufactures the disks? This looks like a pretty transparent tactical move to me. The article speculates that one reason the VHS format won out over Sony’s Betamax was the refusal of Sony to allow pornography on Betamax. I’d never heard that one before, but clearly, with respect to competing with Nintendo in the handheld console space, porn is something we will never see allowed on any Nintendo machine. So by giving a wink and nod to porn on the PSP, Sony can score points on a field where Nintendo will never play. Oddly enough, if pornographic movies do happen to boost PSP sales, it will likely encourage the release of more "legitimate" fare in the UMD video format.

American moralists need not get upset yet. Adult movies will only be available for the PSP in Japan. And we all know how much Americans hate to import porn….riiiiiight…

Once again Grand Theft Auto is being blamed for murder. It is likely that the lawsuit will fail otherwise the door will be wide open to "the devil made me do it" defense. So far, to the best of my knowledge, there has not been a single case where a criminal defendent has been able to shift his/her responsibility for their actions to an external non-physiological agent, such as a book, game, movie, or a far rightist Wall Street Journal editorial. But if any of these suits against the video game publishers ever succeeds, then bar the door! If people are given a way to shirk responsibility for their actions, they will seek to do so almost every single time. Yeah, that’s right officer, I was speeding because I watch NASCAR every Sunday. Yeah Jeff Gordon made me do it. Right…

Yay! School is out for summer, no more homework to check and no more yelling encouraging the kids to do well in school! After a rough year, the kids pulled out the bottom of the ninth, full count, bases loaded come from behind victory that is the stuff of American legends. Jessica made the honor roll, won an award for excellence in Japanese, and had good standardized test scores. Jacob got 4 A’s and scored very high on his tests (high 90s, a frickin genius!), only missing the honor roll because he talks too much in class… And Vanessa ended a completely stellar K-year with great praise from all of her teachers. Best of all, the lovely WillowBrow, who doesn’t at all buy into the come from behind victory, was a  very very happy mommy. She did a lot of work with Jessica to make it all happen.

The kids did great, all winning prizes in the household Scholar’s Cup for their excellent school performances. Now I don’t have to feel guilty if I allow them to have some fun! Now we can all get down to some serious gaming!

Another sign of summer in Chicago is the arrival of downtown street performers. Silver Man has been around for years, just imagine a man with a short afro, formal jacket, sunglasses, and top hat all painted silver. He stands on a silver box motionless like a statue. If you want him to move, just put some money in the jar. You can usually find Silver Man near the Water Tower park south of the Michigan Avenue Borders.

This year Silver Man has some competition! Today I saw Robot Boy standing outside of the Michigan Avenue Apple Store. He’s very much like Silver Man, but he looks like a version of those boxy robots in the sci-fi serials from the 50s. And I had the impression that he/she is a little younger than Silver Man.

Yes, summer is here in Chicago, just in time for the last day of school! Yay! No more checking homework!

When I heard that Michael Jackson was found not guilty on all charges, I was genuinely surprised. Given that Jackson has got to be one of the most despised public persona’s in the U.S. these days, I was sure the jury would find it easy to convict him based on distaste. But I guess the system has proven that it works, as long as you are rich that is! Even though the evidence was circumstancial and testimony contradictory, I don’t believe that the average Joe would have escaped conviction without a team of expensive high powered lawyers. And maybe Michael Jackson’s fame helped him as well.

So Jackson is free to await the inevitable civil trial… If I were him, I would spend a bit of time doing some low impact touring outside of the U.S. and a little relaxing. He has a lot of issues to work out (as does his accuser) and now would be as good a time as any. But lay off the "Jesus Juice" a bit and don’t start hangin out with O.J.!

Carl Edwards gave some credit to "those guys who make video games" for his win today at Pocono. This is only Edwards’ second Nextel Cup win and until Friday, he had never even seen the track at Pocono, much less raced on it! He didn’t say which game/games he used to practice, but it would be a good guess that he used EA’s NASCAR 2005: Chase for the Cup, given their exclusive rights to NASCAR video and computer games.

Most of the publicity video games have been getting recently has been negative because of a few high profile violent titles. It’s nice to see them mentioned in a positive light for a change and Edwards’ comments are a real tribute to the hard work that the game designers, artists, and programmers have put into their craft. So hats off to ya and a big ol’ Carl Edwards backflip!

Some time before this year’s ACEN, my daughter Jessica decided to "go goth" and started wearing black clothes, and belts in all kinds of interesting fashions. I wasn’t exactly expecting this, but it’s been really cool to see her express her creativity in this way. She’s always had a very good fashion sense and is an artist with a lot of talent and potential. But up until now, this had been expressed in a relatively quiet and private way. Her goth inspired attire coupled with a (pardon the expression) killer bod, is attracting attention that I did not think I’d have to deal with so soon. Despite that, I’m actually very proud of her and it is with great pleasure (and her permission) that I post a poem she wrote in literature club at school. In a poetry collection where most of the students are writing about video games and fantasy themed subjects, this really stood out.

Okay now maybe this post from a while back doesn’t mean I have a crystal ball or anything, but it sure is fun being right! According to Yahoo! Game News, D3Publisher has signed a contract with Cartoon Network for exclusive rights to publish video games based on Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi, the show based on the Japanese pop duo Puffy. The first game release is slated for the Gameboy Advance. I don’t know if they’ll go with a Parappa style music game or not, but one can hope that it won’t suck ass.  Call me biased, but since D3Publisher is a Japanese video game publisher, I would guess that there is a good chance that the game will be good, or at least interesting since Puffy is still relatively popular Japan. On the other hand D3Publisher is primarily known for value titles, which could translate into games that are cheap, shallow, and have little polish. I tend to be optimistic, so I’m going to assume for now that we’re in for a nice treat and I won’t be reading about the game on Sean Baby’s crappy games page in EGM!

In other news, Puffy is coming to Chicago on Saturday, August 27th at the Vic theatre! So I guess I know where I’m going to be that weekend! Uh, if I’m lucky!

During college at the University of Chicago, I attended an event called the Lascivious Costume Ball (LCB), a rather interesting party featuring mostly erotic costumes or in many cases, no costume at all! I was fortunate enough to attend the last of the "authentic" LCBs before its popularity (ie, a Tribune article) forced university officials to shut the whole thing down. Anyway, during this event I stepped into a room where X-rated movies were being shown and took a seat. Onscreen a young man provided to give another young man a serious blow job. Well, I don’t know what happened next (I could guess of course) because it wasn’t what I was looking for so I left. I cannot say that I was disgusted, just shocked and a little amused to have stumbled into something I had not expected.

I’ve just finished reading Legal Drug Vol. 1 by CLAMP and I have that same sort of amused feeling because I’ve stumbled into something I was not expecting, yaoi! I know what yaoi is, and I know that it is rather popular on the Japanese manga and anime scene right now, but it was not something I would seek out (yuri maybe, but not yaoi). Unlike the gay porn at the LCB, I’m not planning on walking out on Legal Drug because it is an interesting story with interesting characters and it’s pretty funny at times too. If volume 1 is any indication, the yaoi elements are more of a tease than hardcore shonen ai, boy on boy action. Everyone’s brain should be tickled on occasion, so I’m looking forward to more! Besides, I’m a big CLAMP fan!

Here’s some CLAMP info in English on the Anime News Network.