[{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"A few months ago, I found myself hacking chunks out of a monolithic Python repo to break out a few generic reusable packages. Splitting out the libraries had a number of benefits beyond being able to reuse the code in other places: it gave a much clearer picture of the test coverage, provided a chance to ditch some vestigial code, as well as some impetus to pay off roll over some old technical debt. But one area that gave me a few headaches was getting the packages to play nicely with existing CI/CD pipelines.\nI tend to rely on Poetry for managing requirements, even when I’m not explicitly building packages. Whilst adding the new packages to the pyproject.toml was simple enough for local development, I ran into some permissions issues. Originally I used a trick described by Edmundo Sanchez here to modify the source of custom packages as part of the workflow, but unfortunately it seems to break with more recent versions of Poetry, complaining quite reasonably that the poetry.lock file is out of date.\nSo rather than find another workaround to fix this already somewhat hacky workaround, I decided it was time for a proper fix. The packages belong in a (private) registry where they can be installed irrespective of source. Here are the two basic steps.\nBuilding Packages Getting the packages built and added to their own registries was fairly straightforward, basically adding a new version on tagged commits with something like the following:1 build: stage: build image: python:3.11 rules: - if: $CI_COMMIT_TAG script: - poetry config repositories.gitlab ${CI_API_V4_URL}/projects/${CI_PROJECT_ID}/packages/pypi - poetry build - poetry publish --repository gitlab -u gitlab-ci-token -p ${CI_JOB_TOKEN} Installing Packages In the tools actually consuming these packages, the additional registries are then added as extra Poetry sources, explicitly adding PyPI as the primary source for all other packages:\n[tool.poetry.dependencies] python = \u0026#34;^3.11\u0026#34; mypackage = { version = \u0026#34;^0.1.0\u0026#34;, source = \u0026#34;gitlab\u0026#34; } [[tool.poetry.source]] name = \u0026#34;PyPI\u0026#34; priority = \u0026#34;primary\u0026#34; [[tool.poetry.source]] name = \u0026#34;gitlab\u0026#34; url = \u0026#34;https://\u0026lt;gitlab_url\u0026gt;/api/v4/projects/\u0026lt;project_id\u0026gt;/packages/pypi/simple\u0026#34; priority = \u0026#34;supplemental\u0026#34; Giving the packages access to one another in Gitlab was then just a case of providing them access via Settings → CI/CD → Token Access → Limit access to this project → Groups and projects with access.\nHowever, installing packages locally proved to be a pain to set up. It should simply have been a case of creating a Personal Access Token and then adding the relevant credentials to Poetry:\npoetry config http-basic.gitlab \u0026lt;username\u0026gt; \u0026lt;password\u0026gt; Following several comments online, I tried various combinations of username, PAT name as username , blank username etc. which all failed, despite being able to install the package via pip as expected:\npip install -i https://\u0026lt;username:password\u0026gt;@\u0026lt;gitlab_url\u0026gt;/pypi/simple/mypackage Ultimately the problem turned out to be my PAT permissions. While read_api is the only scope required, it appears that the default Guest role provides insufficient permissions:\nOn self-managed GitLab instances, users with the Guest role are able to perform this action only on public and internal projects (not on private projects). External users must be given explicit access (at least the Reporter role) even if the project is internal.2 Creating a new PAT with the Reporter role was all it took to get the pipelines pumping again, ensuring local dev and online tests are all singing from the same codesheet. Now I just need to turn all them tests green!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2024/08/04/pipeline-poetry/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Ci-Cd","RelPermalink":"/tags/ci-cd/"},{"LinkTitle":"Gitlab","RelPermalink":"/tags/gitlab/"},{"LinkTitle":"Poetry","RelPermalink":"/tags/poetry/"},{"LinkTitle":"Programming","RelPermalink":"/tags/programming/"},{"LinkTitle":"Python","RelPermalink":"/tags/python/"}],"title":"Pipeline Poetry"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" ‘I’ll be gone, you’ll be gone.’ That supposed shibboleth of the turn-of-the-century captains of finance, whose unrestrained pursuit of profits led western economies to the brink of collapse less than two decades ago, provides a suitable refrain to this review of the financial services industry.\nIf, like me, your understanding of the world of finance doesn’t extend much beyond trading cows for magic beans, this book does a decent job of explaining how this ‘industry’ developed, how it became so dangerously interwoven, and ultimately so seemingly detached from reality. Taking at its core the questions of what finance is actually useful for – facilitating payments, mediating between loaners and lenders, managing finance between generations, dealing with risk – Kay is fairly ruthless in taking to task the young scions whose gigantic balance sheets represent little more than houses of cards built by other players of the same game.\nMany of the general tenets in the book are fairly logical and unsurprising. Why should a person with no skin in the game care very much about the risks of a transaction? Why shouldn’t traders adopt a nach uns die Sintflut mentality, when the likelihood is that failure will be borne by someone else? How should a person with no links to a community have any inkling about the actual financial situation of their customers (in contrast to Kay’s idealised bankers of yore in Captain Mainwaring or George Bailey)? Why should the sector reform when banks can afford to accept eye-watering fines as a minor inconvenience of carrying on as normal? When the system becomes so complex, how can it be possible to prosecute any but the most egregious of rogues? Why should we be surprised that bankers receive such stark opprobrium in contrast to similarly well-remunerated footballers or businessfolk, when their contribution to society appears to amount to little more than increasing our tax burden and giving our economies the wobbles every couple of decades? And what is the point of having some of the more intelligent minds of our generation spend their energies developing algorithms to outperform the algorithms of other intelligent minds for Mammon’s purpose?\nThe latter third of the book deals with potential reforms and – for a layman who otherwise only ever hears the word ‘regulation’ as some kind of financial thermostat for keeping these ills from boiling over – interestingly this isn’t the core of Kay’s message. In fact, increasing layers of regulation only make the loopholes more convoluted and difficult to police; and when those investigating potential wrongdoing are funded to a microscopic level in contrast with their charges, while wrongdoers can afford to pay the fines anyway, making their jobs more difficult only adds to the problem. However well-intentioned the regulatory framework, ‘money will find a way’, as some visitors to a dinosaur theme park famously never said.\nSo what’s the solution? Honestly, I’m too thick to understand. But the overall tenor of the book seems to be one of pessimism. It isn’t more regulation but better regulation that is needed. And while there are potential ways to improve the system, they are politically unworkable without collaborative effort. Since the only people in whose interest that would be are in the bottom 99%, it seems an unlikely prospect. After all, the 99% managed two months on Wall Street, before having to go back work. We successfully survived the last crisis by hoofing the can down the road. May our future selves deal with it the next time the house of cards threatens to come crashing down, and the queues at Britain’s foodbanks can breath a collective sigh of relief that the cap on bankers’ bonuses aren’t coming back any time soon.\nIf you know what you’re talking about, Athan Tolis’ review seems like a fair and balanced critique of this book which suggests Kay’s proposals and conclusions often miss the mark, but for the rest of us, the book is digestible enough to provide some meagre understanding of an opaquely complex system, its origins, problems, and potential solutions.\n[Photo by Pixabay from Pexels ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2024/03/08/other-peoples-money-masters-of-the-universe-or-servants-of-the-people/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/tags/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Finance","RelPermalink":"/tags/finance/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Other People’s Money: Masters of the Universe or Servants of the People?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Personal","RelPermalink":"/categories/personal/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was","RelPermalink":"/categories/that-was/"}],"content":"So 2022 was the end of the plague. After two years of monotony and drudgery, this was the year that the virus lost its potency, and people gave over caring. The virus is here to stay, joining the other collection of seasonal ailments that fill beds in the wintertime. While many countries have dropped all restrictions altogether, in Germany the regulations have become less transparent, with the occasional strange restriction still in place seemingly for the sake of it. So while masks remain compulsory on public transport, the word compulsory has evolved to mean ‘suggested’.\nJoining the yearly round-ups from 2015 , 2016 , 2017 , 2018 , 2019 , 2020 and 2021 , here’s looking back over the final year of the plague, 2022.\nSummary Best PC games: Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons, Gorogoa, Frostpunk, Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak, Slay the Spire, The Witness, Zombie Army 4: Dead War\nWorst PC games: As Far As The Eye, Guns, Gore and Cannoli 2\nBoard games played: 29\nBest board games: Concordia, Cross Clues, My City, Paleo, Targi\nWorst board games: Ys\nFilms watched: 30\nBest films: The Journey, Knives Out, City Lights, Les parapluies de Cherbourg, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold\nWorst films: Four Horsemen, Independence Day: Resurgence, Fast \u0026amp; Furious Presents: Hobbs \u0026amp; Shaw\nBooks read: 34\nBest books: The Complete Maus, The Point of Departure, Land of Big Numbers\nWorst books: The Whisperer in Darkness, The Possessed, Singularity Sky\nA Year in Gaming This year hasn’t been much of one for solo gaming, at least not in the second half of the year. I polished off the DOOM reboot started last year, a beautiful hi-octane re-envisioning of the granddaddy of FPS titles. Largely mindless, though with some fun shooting mechanics and a rip-roaring soundtrack, it managed to be at once reminiscent of those pixelated 90s environs, whilst delivering the type of gameplay expected of a modern-era title.\nDoubling down on finishing off games, I also returned to finish my cerebral punishment in The Witness . After sharing horror stories with a colleague, I fired it up again just curious about how far I still had to go, only to discover that I’d actually already completed enough to take on the final challenge, and only been put off by assuming the entire island needed to be complete before heading for the top of the mountain. Not that the final challenge didn’t also have my brain dribbling out of my eye sockets, but I bow down to Jonathan Blow’s design talents. Genius work, just a bit heavy for an addled brain.\nOn the lighter end of the puzzle spectrum, Gorogoa is a delicious little adventure in pictures, with a unique system of panels. It’s a game which breaks its own fourth walls, providing just enough of a challenge, with a few tricky sections, but the game doesn’t overstay its welcome and can be completed in a couple of hours.\nSticking with puzzles, perhaps my biggest surprise of the year was an epic Swedish fairytale, Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons . Essentially a solo coop, the game revolves around controlling two brothers simultaneously on their quest to cure their ailing father. I wasn’t overly enamoured with the opening chapter, and even abandoned the game for a while before returning, but gradually the world unfolds to Tolkeinesque proportions, with glorious vistas, memorable set-pieces and a truly moving story, helped along by the fantastic decision to have wordless voiceovers, spoken in the universal language of grunts and sighs.\nMore from the solo front, according to Steam’s yearly round-up, Slay the Spire was the game which occupied most of my time, making up nearly a quarter of the time played over 55 games. Easy to pick up and play (or perhaps interrupt and drop), it’s an intriguing card game which has depth, without being overly complex, and provides just the right amount of information to offer tactical confrontations gelled with more strategic deckbuilding, whilst being short enough that having ‘just one more go’ can easily eat into your time.\nWorst PC games: As Far As The Eye, Guns, Gore and Cannoli 2\nOn the flip side, there were only a couple of games which disappointed. Whilst visually very appealing, I just couldn’t get into the rather tedious gameplay of As Far As The Eye . Despite being turn-based, it felt like there was a lot of waiting around between doing things, and rather than the sense of exploration and adventure a game like Civilization offers, felt like more of a chore. The interface was somehow unclear, leading to a lot of trial and error, and since every decision was so tight, a few misclicks easily spelt defeat and having to start over. When you can expect to fail even the tutorial, there’s honestly something off with the design in my book.\nGuns, Gore and Cannoli 2 meanwhile was a recommendation from a colleague also into his two-player coops. It’s silly over-the-top action, everything it says on the tin, but it just fell rather flat with me.\nA Year in Boardgaming While our boardgaming habits have picked up a little in comparison to last year, we’re still far from the levels of yore, when we could expect to meet up at least once or maybe twice a month on average for an evening.\nThe worst game of the year has to be one we tried again many years back by the name of Ys . Basically a semi-blind bidding game in which players attempt to place workers to earn goodies, there’s a push-your-luck element to the game, but with four players at least it feels highly random in who comes out victorious in any bidding war, and it’s easy to come out empty-handed on every front and waste an entire turn, or else scoop up lots of unclaimed goodies with no competition.\nConcordia was a decent tactical trading-in-the-Mediterranean game, ostensibly quite peaceful, albeit relatively cut-throat at four players. Whilst the flow of the game is fairly straightforward, with actions being played via a deck of cards which needs to be cycled through, and players principally vying for the placement of towns, I’m not too convinced about the final scoring. At least with four players, the game feels like it overstays its welcome, and the scoring at the end is pretty surprising if you haven’t been keeping tabs on what everyone is doing.\nIn terms of smaller games, two simple grids made a pleasant surprise this year. Targi is basically a classic at this point, a streamlined two-player worker-placementesque game about desert markets or some such. What’s so unique about the game is the way the workers interact with one another and block the other player; where many games of this ilk are virtually solitaire affairs, this game has a much more chess-like feel of trying to predict how your opponent will act to plan your own moves\u0026hellip; and watching it all go south when they do the opposite. The other grid-based filler was Cross Clues , a classic word game in the vein of something like Codenames , but one in which the connections are already laid out in front of you, as everyone works together to clear the grid.\nA Year in Cinema One of the stand-out films this year was one I’d never heard of. The Journey is an excuse to imagine how an hour of discussion between Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness might have gone. It’s contrived, ahistorical, slow and largely meaningless, but the performances from Spall and Meaney are excellent, which gives this fantasy some credibility.\nAnother film I didn’t actually plan to watch, Knives Out made me at least reassess my views on Rian Johnson somewhat. I didn’t in the slightest ‘get’ Brick , and thought the sequel Star Wars trilogy was utter garbage, though that isn’t all Johnson’s fault. Nevertheless this little Christie-inspired whodunnit put together a stellar cast in a dysfunctional family, plenty of red herrings, and Daniel Craig with a crazy accent. Pure light-hearted entertainment.\nAt the weaker end of the projector, one of the films I presumably watched too late, but on the advice of an old friend, was the documentary Four Horsemen . Some clever voices edited together in a vaguely synthetic order to produce various assertions about the way of the world and the economic order. Oh yes, and gold is the panacea. I’ll retire to bedlam.\nBut at least there was some vague attempt to form a cogent argument in that film. Fast \u0026amp; Furious Presents: Hobbs \u0026amp; Shaw surely invites you to leave your brain with the usher. Do they make the CGI first and then write the script afterwards?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2023/01/20/2022-in-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was-the-Year","RelPermalink":"/tags/that-was-the-year/"}],"title":"2022 in Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was","RelPermalink":"/categories/that-was/"}],"content":"Another year of the plague behind us, another 365 days of solitude. It’s hardly Marquez, but it certainly feels like life has been chugging along in neutral after so many heady years in first gear. The year was mostly dominated by work, with little in the way of holiday breaks, social activities or other diversions to break up the monotony.\nSo joining the yearly roundups from 2015 , 2016 , 2017 , 2018 , 2019 and 2020 , here’s looking back over the second year of the plague, 2021.\nSummary Best PC games: Return of the Obra Dinn, The Witness, Zombie Army Trilogy, DOOM\nWorst PC games: Heaven’s Vault\nBoard games played: 10\nBest board games: Photosynthesis, My City\nWorst board games: -\nFilms watched: 31\nBest films: The Three/Four Musketeers, Psycho, Whiplash, One Hour Photo, Four Lions\nWorst films: Train of Life, You Were Never Really Here, The Evil Dead\nBooks read: 34\nBest books: The Secret Barrister: Stories of the Law and How It’s Broken, Kleiner Mann - was nun?, Julian, Troubles\nWorst books: Winnetou 1, The Marshmallow Test\nA Year in Gaming Continuing the theme of working from home and trying to avoid spending too much time in the office, 2021 wasn’t much of one for gaming, although I did upgrade my hardware for the first time in the better part of a decade.\nThere were a couple of solo adventure games which provided fair diversion. Return of the Obra Dinn definitely stands out as one of the more interesting games I’ve played in recent years. The basic premise for the player is that a ship has entered port in the late eighteenth century, and all the crew and passengers are either missing or dead. Tasked with finding out what happened, you get to see and hear the final moments of every corpse you discover, slowly piecing together bits of the puzzle through deduction, elimination and, certainly in my case, a good dollop of guesswork. I can’t say my efforts were particularly successful, but the unique flavour of the mystery, together with the beautiful pixelated sepia aesthetic, kept me coming back for more.\nA technically more imposing puzzle game also worthy of mention is The Witness , written by the author of Braid , a game that had already battered my meagre brain into submission. As with Obra Dinn, I was likewise too stupid to unravel The Witness, and sadly didn’t see it through to the end (Edit: This changed in 2022.), but the mixture of puzzles and secrets, as well as the unique art style around the island itself definitely made the visits worthwhile.\nMy worst game of the year was unfortunately also the one which should have been most up my street: Heaven’s Vault purports to offer an adventure in which the player must decipher an ancient language. The premise was intriguing, but unfortunately I simply couldn’t get into the story for just how slow the game’s execution is. Everything just trudges along to such an extent that, only a few hours in, I still hadn’t seen more than a few words of the strange language, and haven’t been inclined to return.\nSlow is a word which cannot be used to describe the DOOM reboot, which I’m still in the process of playing through, half an hour at a time. In comparison to the last outing in DOOM 3 , this feels far more like the hi-octane classics of the 90s, and the developers and designers really put together a solid engine to drive the game forward, putting action right back at the heart of a classic shooter.\nOn the multiplayer front there wasn’t anything particularly new this year. In the spring we completed the surprise hit from last year, Gunfire Reborn , before heading back down the galaxy’s darkest mines in Deep Rock Galactic . Trying to avoid the cheatathon that Counter-Strike: Global Offensive has become, we tried out a few alternatives like Splitgate (Slipgate?!) and Rogue Company , eventually returning to Overwatch as we were often five players. Why does no one make cooperative (or competitive) games for five players? Why do they always cap out at four? There are so many titles out there which just don’t suit our player count.\nSo perhaps the only positive surprise of the year was returning to the hordes in Zombie Army Trilogy as a two-player escapade, retreading old steps and exploring a few new haunts. The weird combo system they’ve added, which rather punishes the player for trying to use a sniper rifle rather than running around rocking a shotgun or even pistol, made for something of a strange bastard hybrid for a ‘Sniper Elite’ game, especially with the way the two-player game could easily have you shooting at freshly blown up targets and breaking that all important chain.\nA Year in Boardgaming Sadly, this year was about as sparse as it can get when it came to the table. Aside from a couple of coop escape room style games when we had the occasional guest, we managed all of two gaming evenings with our usual partners. We’ve made a promise to at least try to meet up once per month in future, so hopefully that will change for the better in 2022.\nThe two coop games we got through were both from series we had previously played. The first of these was the set of three Unlock!: Mythic Adventures . These are generally a pretty good series, neatly interweaving cards with a dedicated app which allows for more interesting solutions than mere card-based options (the Exit series in particular suffers at times from generally having to hunt for 3-digit solutions). The three adventures in this set are pretty varied, though the technology did fail us badly on two occasions: one puzzle required us to take photos of cards, which given us playing in poor lightning, meant we were sometimes led down the wrong path by the app not recognising our solution; the other problem was a minigame which should have been straightforward to complete, but actually took us upwards of 15 minutes on multiple devices trying to find one which would finally recognise our inputs. Those glitches aside, the puzzles themselves were fun to solve, fairly logical, with enough variety in difficulty levels.\nThe second game was 50 Clues: The Fate of Leopold , the conclusion to a three-part adventure which we started back in 2019. Game noire, in terms of mechanics the game doesn’t do anything too special, but the topic is that little bit darker, the solutions that little bit more visceral than any of the other offerings out there. Fairly recommendable purely on that basis.\nIn terms of bigger titles, there were literally only two to mention. Photosynthesis is a cute abstract about growing trees and harvesting sunlight. Players place seeds in the forest, evolving them from tiny saplings to mighty trees, before harvesting them for points; but the energy needed to do all these things comes from sunlight collected by the trees. It’s an interesting balancing act, and timing actions to maximise the energy harvested as the sun rotates around the board with the concomitant changes in shadows make for something of a brain-burner. Unfortunately the point-scoring seems a bit random, with big scores but small differences if everyone has played a similar game. Plus there’s a fairly counterintuitive way of paying for things which everyone fell for at least once.\nThe second biggy was Reiner Knizia’s legacy title My City . Basically a board game version of Tetris played over 24 rounds, with changing boards and rules. The basic game wouldn’t hold my attention held for long, but being a legacy-style game means it at least earns points for tickling your curiosity. Nevertheless, it still it feels more of a gimmick that will outstay its welcome before the final envelope.\nA Year in Cinema One series I revisited was the 1970s Musketeers films of Richard Lester. These brought to mind exactly the kind of thing King Solomon’s Mines was presumably aiming at, and which I so panned last year . The Three Musketeers and the simultaneously filmed The Four Musketeers brilliantly tell the well-known story, combining swashbuckling adventure and derring-do, with moments of high drama, and absolutely gallons of humour. It’s definitely towards the comedic end of the scale, but there’s something about that combination of Pythonesque quips from the extras, the roughshod and often slapstick swordfighting, and of course the characters played by the likes of Roy Kinnear and Spike Milligan, that keeps me revisiting these films. The simple ordinariness of so many of the settings, combined with the brilliant costume work, gives the films a charming authenticity; we’re watching ordinary people, in ordinary seventeenth century France, who are ordinarily funny, ordinarily clumsy, ordinarily charming. Damn good fun!\nContinuing with films of an older vintage, one of the gaps I finally managed to plug was watching Hitchcock’s Psycho , a film which lived up to its expectations, despite being so famous and so often referenced, you’ve already seen it even if you haven’t. On the one hand, it reminded me very much of Hitchcock’s own Vertigo , in that the film is very much a film with two distinct acts, where the breathless crescendo of the first leaves you shocked there can even be a second. But it also reminded me of how a simple story can be told so magnificently, which is a failing of so many films which try to lay it on too thick: such as the modern retelling of that other Hitchcock classic Rear Window in Disturbia .\nWatched as part of some research for a scriptwriting job, one surprise hit for the year was Whiplash , a film very much in the vein of Black Swan , but one which probably tells the story of an all-consuming passion in pursuit of one’s art even better. The film takes a few wrong turns in my opinion, but the final scene is a breathtaking catharsis for everything which went before, and passes without barely a line of dialogue.\nSticking with the one-man studies, One Hour Photo was probably my surprise treat of the year. A fantastic performance by the late Robin Williams, there’s something so effortlessly natural about this miscentred antihero, a likeable and yet worrisome main character who keeps the scars on his personality visibly hidden. Truly edifying.\nSwitching to the worst films of the year, there weren’t really any particular stinkers, but a few which were for one reason or another disappointing. The comedic story of a runaway train of Jews escaping the Holocaust, Train of Life was certainly an interesting film, but there are some subjects which simply don’t lend themselves well to satire, and unfortunately this one left something of a foul taste in the mouth. Which is a pity, because one of my absolute favourites of the year was Ianoucci’s The Death of Stalin ; despite the very serious subject matter, I think it was the absolutely over-the-top performances and casting which allowed this film to work as well as it did, capturing the absurdity of reality in Stalin’s Soviet Union.\nThe final two stinkers are there for different reasons. You Were Never Really Here ended up being a film I wanted to enjoy, but aside from a few interesting scenes left nothing in my neurons to reflect upon. I think it was a case of false expectations rather than any particularly bad filmcraft. But the final film of note enjoys a reputation beyond its years that frankly, I fail to understand. The Evil Dead is a cheap and drearful horror\u0026hellip; comedy, I assume? Low-budget yadda yadda, maybe I was in the wrong frame of mind or the wrong company to enjoy it, but it had none of the visceral horror of Romero’s ilk, few of the real chills a Carpenter might produce, and honestly little in the way of laughs.\nA Year in Books A fairly typical year for books, about on a par with my reading habits for the past few years, there weren’t many titles that really jump out from the stack.\nAfter following him on Twitter and catching the occasional snippet on television, I decided to give The Secret Barrister: Stories of the Law and How It’s Broken a go. For someone not particularly well-versed in what ‘the Law’ really is, it provides a decent summary of how the British system came to be the way it is, and what years of austerity have done to break things. If I had the time, I ought really find a volume comparing that system to others.\nApparently I found more time for reading fiction this year, knocking off some shorter classics like Siddhartha or The Handmaid’s Tale , but there were three in particular which really stood out. Another of Hans Fallada’s oeuvre, Kleiner Mann - was nun? is simply amazing for its prescience, published as it was in 1932 and so poignantly describing the economic and social woes of the depression years on Weimar Germany, the daily grind and struggle to survive and maintain some semblance of dignity.\nFor slightly different reasons I found myself enchanted by J.G. Farrell’s Troubles , a book set in the brooding revolutionary period of immediate post-WWI Ireland, where the setting sun of the British Empire is epitomised in the form of a crumbling hotel. Humorous and melancholic, it’s interesting that this was written at the start of a fresh set of troubles, being published in 1970.\nGoing slightly further back historically, I ploughed through Gore Vidal’s Julian , which in contrast to I, Claudius or Memoirs of Hadrian (both read 2018 ), takes a look back over Julian’s record in the form of a series of letters between two scholars in how to deal with the matter of Julian’s diaries. Perhaps it was the anti-Christian flavour which attracted me the most.\nTurning to the worst books of the year, and there weren’t really any terrible stinkers. Not particularly well known in the English-speaking world, Winnetou is a German institution, a collection of western stories that spawned whole series of films , festivals and an extremely successful spoof . But plodding through Winnetou 1 , it was difficult to see how. The basic material of White Man and Indians is obviously fertile ground for any story, but the cardboard characters, plodding exposition and lack of dramatic merit makes you wonder how it became so popular with anyone in long trousers. Though I haven’t read James Fenimore Cooper either, so maybe my expectations are at fault.\nMeanwhile, the biggest disappointment of the year was probably The Marshmallow Test . I’d certainly waited long enough to read it, probably having learned the gist of the argument sometime in primary school. But there’s basically nothing in this book that you don’t already know, nothing that isn’t already well trodden or implicit in what the test purports to tell us. Are the implications really that profound? Is the test really an indicator for the future or a reflection of the past?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2021/12/30/2021-in-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was-the-Year","RelPermalink":"/tags/that-was-the-year/"}],"title":"2021 in Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Argh! One of those maddening adventures down the digital rabbit hole later, and the solution turned out to be quite simple. Every time I clicked to import files into Lightroom 5.7 (because yes I’m that old) the program crashed without so much as a smell you later. After checking plug-ins, corrupted preferences files and databases, and avoiding various people suggesting I needed to re-install Windows, the solution turned out to be rather straightforward:\nDo you have an Android device attached to your computer? If so, unmount it and try again.\nJeffreytranberry That was all there was to it. Сharging an old tablet was enough to cause Lightroom to fall over itself when presumably being refused access to read the attached storage device.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2021/07/03/lightroom-crashing-on-import/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Lightroom","RelPermalink":"/tags/lightroom/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Troubleshooting","RelPermalink":"/tags/troubleshooting/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows-10","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows-10/"}],"title":"Lightroom Crashing on Import"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"I recently gave my machine a long overdue brain transplant, but stupidly didn’t consider what would happen to my Windows 10 licence after making a major change to the hardware. Of course, upon booting back up I was greeted with the friendly warning that my OS installation had not yet been activated.\nWhile it is possible to reactivate Windows after a hardware change , this relies on you having linked the licence to your Microsoft account, which I hadn’t done beforehand. Various attempts to troubleshoot the problem just had me going around in circles navigating the same help pages from different angles (“have you tried turning it off and on again?”) And as tempting as it sounded to spend another evening elbow-deep in transistors restoring the status quo ante, there’d be no guarantee that my copy would be activated again with the original hardware in place (anyone know if this is the case?)\nSo the only option was to buy a new licence. I was a bit loath to fork over the full price for a license from Microsoft, given that I’d only lost my original one through stupidity. But there are plenty of third parties selling licenses for throwaway prices, which are presumably legitimate for at least some value of legitimate. Off I go and basket up a Microsoft Windows 10 Pro licence for a reasonable price, wait with baited breath for a licence code, plug in the numbers and… it failed.\nIt was then that I noticed I had Windows 10 Home installed but had actually bought a licence for Windows 10 Pro. Fine, it should be possible to upgrade Home to Pro using my licence without having to install fresh, right?\nApparently not. After a few attempts at entering my key while trying to install Windows 10 Pro, I searched around and found various websites supplying generic keys for installing whichever version of Windows you prefer. Unfortunately, entering one of these keys would initially tell me my copy would be upgraded, before complaining that my version of Windows wasn’t activated, but would I like to troubleshoot my problem again?\nFortunately, there was a simple low-tech way out of this particular Catch-22. The solution was to cut the internet connection after entering the generic code for upgrading to Windows 10 Pro. The upgrader moaned a bit, but otherwise did its thing. Once the system was rebooted, I could then enter the licence key I’d purchased and boom. Back to having a fully licensed copy with no more annoying watermarks. Troubleshooters be damned.\n[Photo by Tadas Sar on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2021/02/27/windows-10-home/pro/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Software","RelPermalink":"/tags/software/"},{"LinkTitle":"Troubleshooting","RelPermalink":"/tags/troubleshooting/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows-10","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows-10/"}],"title":"Windows 10 Home/Pro"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was","RelPermalink":"/categories/that-was/"}],"content":"This year has been anything if not interesting. At the start, a lot of people around me seemed to answering the call for change, with numerous friends choosing to up sticks, start new careers, move houses, or meet new partners.\nWhile little changed for me beyond shifting to working from home, one difference was saying goodbye to a forum I’d been running for nearly two decades. As no one had posted anything in nearly twelve months, and its use had been dwindling for some years already, it seemed the time had come to save some computing cycles and lay the bits to rest.\nNevertheless, one tradition I wanted to continue from its pages was an annual post taking stock of a year’s media consumption. I’ve gone through the database dump and scavenged previous summaries from 2015 , 2016 , 2017 , 2018 and 2019 . So for the first time in another seldom visited corner of the web, here’s looking back on 2020 in all its quarantined glory.\nSummary PC games played: numerous\nBest PC games: Gunfire Reborn, Sniper Elite 4, What Remains of Edith Finch, Strange Brigade, Inside, Two Point Hospital, Catastronauts, DOOM 3: BFG Edition, Warhammer: The End Times - Vermintide, Pyre\nWorst PC games: Californium, Unfortunate Spacemen, Crucible, Jet Set Radio, Killer Is Dead\nBoard games played: 39 (75 plays)\nBest board games: Sail to India, Majesty, Short List, Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig, The Crew: The Quest for Planet Nine, Piepmatz\nWorst board games: Chada \u0026amp; Thorn, Detective Stories: \u0026ldquo;Gattardo\u0026rdquo;, 5-Minute Dungeon, DOG Royal\nFilms watched: 38\nBest films: Paddington 2, Blade Runner 2049, Full Metal Jacket, The History Boys, I, Daniel Blake, The Princess Bride, Stand By Me\nWorst films: The Detonator, Empire State, King Solomon’s Mines, Mad Max\nBooks read: 32\nBest books: The Last Resort, The Remains of the Day, Eine Frau in Berlin, We Wish to Inform You that Tomorrow We Will Be Killed with Our Families\nWorst books: Ficciones, Lord of Light\nA Year in Gaming It’s actually been an interesting year, multiplayer gaming wise. Over last Christmas enough of my gaming group had finally had enough of the widespread cheating in Counter-Strike: Global Operations that we quit playing it altogether. The search was then on for a title to fill our weekly sessions. For a while, Valorant took the reins, though its extremely slow pace, focus on abilities, and the punishing gameplay for a team with a fairly wide range in skill levels, all meant that we soon tired of it.\nIn its stead, we shifted to a variety of lighter titles. Catastronauts was an entertaining take on the Overcooked genre, giving four furry astronauts plenty of headaches as they attempt to keep a ship patched and maintained in a series of confrontations in space. Playing the game over Steam’s in-built streaming service meant we could play it as a ‘couch coop’ on a couch several hundred miles long, with only occasional interruptions and lag spikes… the wonders of modern technology!\nLater we switched over to the summer’s surprise smash hit Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout , a digital jelly bean version of ninja warriors. Chaotic, random, frustrating and hilarious, I remain the only bean without a crown and will probably stay in that virgin state until I can take on a stage uncontested. But in the spirit of athletics, it’s the taking part that counts, and it can be just as much fun to fail your run, or spoil someone else’s!\nOur latest squeeze is a rogue-lite from Hong Kong entitled Gunfire Reborn . It’s been a challenging endeavour so far, with us gradually getting stronger each week, unlocking new upgrades and weapons. Unfortunately, my current internet connection makes the game virtually unplayable, so not sure if I’ll see any real progress any time soon.\nIn the solo gaming department, I didn’t tackle any particularly long games. At the beginning of the lockdown, I felt like I should probably use the opportunity to try to work through some of my Steam backlog, finally playing through the DOOM 3: BFG Edition , including the original DOOM I/II. It was fun to explore those grandfathers of the genre some quarter of a century later, and amazing how the layouts of some of the levels were still so clear in my mind. While the basic shooting mechanics were child’s play with a mouse (had I really used arrow keys to turn back then?), one thing that I’d completely forgotten was just how convoluted the map design was, with scores of hidden rooms, secret buttons and special tricks. After completing the original pair, I finally succeeded in completed DOOM 3 at the third attempt, a good fifteen years after it first came out, but baulked at the idea of spending even more time playing through its expansion.\nAfter slogging through the Martian hellholes, I only otherwise took in some shorter titles this year, not wanting to spend as much time in the office as what lockdown was already demanding. One of the titles which stuck out was What Remains of Edith Finch , a beautiful walking simulator exploring the biography of several generations of an eccentric family, with each member’s story told through its own separate vignette. It’s easy to see why the game won a BAFTA. I also ticked off the two Playdead adventures LIMBO and INSIDE , the second in particular being a delightful brain-tickler, a noire puzzle platformer lovingly rendered and brilliantly directed.\nThere weren’t any really major stinkers this year, though a few disappointments. In the multiplayer department, we tried out Amazon’s very short-lived Crucible on its beta release. While the basic premise and mechanics were sound, we were left feeling distinctly bored by what we’d tasted, and it wasn’t a surprise when the initial closed beta stage was withdrawn. Still, it certainly was a shock to hear some months later that they’d pulled the plug entirely. I guess the competition for free-to-play titles is so great that it was deemed unworthy of further funding, despite it having been in development since 2014.\nOn the solo front, there were two games which fell a little flat. Californium sounded like a fascinating concept, a small adventure set in a drug-addled and Philip K. Dick inspired multi-layered universe, where the player peels back the real world. I was expecting something in the vein of A Scanner Darkly, but what I got was something more like a hidden object game. Frankly the overarching gameplay is far too simplistic, and the world-bending effect soon gets boring. The second game which didn’t live up to expectations, though through no fault of its own, was Into the Breach . The basic gameplay boils down to an agonising game of 3-piece chess, with the player in full command of the information, barring a few statistical chances. A limited number of moves, yet with tons of different combinations, different pieces, different abilities, taking moves in different orders, and even the option to restart each scenario once, make each encounter a brain-burning conundrum. What’s not to like? For me the major detraction was the fact that the developer’s previous title – FTL – was frankly even more brilliant!\nA Year in Boardgaming It was a somewhat weird year in boardgaming. Overall we didn’t play as much as normal, though we started out the year meeting up with our friends extremely frequently, had a massive hiatus in the middle during the lockdown, and again picked up the pace in the autumn, before dropping it altogether in the winter again.\nIn terms of new games, the biggest surprise of the year was far and away The Crew: The Quest for Planet Nine . A simple trick-taking game for four players, what absolutely flabbered my gast is that no one had come up with it before. A pretty standard set of cards, some basic objectives, and a very limited ability to communicate, this game had us entertained for hours on end over a long series of evenings. While I find the Kennerspiel des Jahres category rather ill-defined, it came as no surprise to hear it had won.\nOn the hunt for some smaller, more family-friendly board/card games, I bought a couple which resonated well. Piepmatz is a set collecting game I picked up after a recommendation from The Spiel podcast. We’ve only ever played it four-player, and I think it’s probably a bit too random for my tastes at that number, but otherwise it’s a cute little diversion which doesn’t overstay its welcome. The other game I found second-hand was Sail to India , which packs a surprising amount of gameplay in a little box (though requires a fairly large table once all spread out).\nThe only notable ‘larger’ title of the year was Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig , earning a place as a very special mashup of two other games, being a semi-cooperative tile-laying game which is something of mix between Carcassonne and 7 Wonders. I’m not sure how much strategy is really involved, though there’s enough decision-making to keep you engaged, and the way that the game is played cooperatively yet competitively at the same time works well with the right group.\nDuring the lockdowns, we didn’t get much gaming time in as we hadn’t found ourselves anything interesting for two players, and the only two games we already had around make it onto my list for worst games of the year. The first was Chada \u0026amp; Thorn , a small spin-off from The Legends of Andor series which Steffi had so devoured. It felt rather clunky and lifeless in comparison to its larger brother, with none of the depth of an LCG like Lord of the Rings, nor the interesting discussion a four-player game can bring.\nThe second flop this year was a rather odd acquisition Steffi found somewhere, actually being a demo for a series, called Detective Stories: Gattardo . We’ve played enough escape room games over the years, and this one relied more on open facts and clues rather than the gimmicks that many others use. However, we completely failed to read the signs in front of us on a number of occasions, eventually coming up with a solution to the case that was wrong in just about every single aspect… probably including even the identity of the victim! Maybe if we’d had some more sensible heads with us, the experience would’ve been less demoralising, but instead it felt like a wasted evening.\nA Year in Cinema Obviously, this year lent itself rather well to watching the box, and once lockdown started we stuck fairly religiously to our weekly film evening. Often overwhelmed with choice, Steffi tried a new tack this year, choosing to work her way through the alphabet of our backlog and what’s available to stream online, so while many of her choices were a far cry from her usual comic-centric tastes, there were as many pleasant as disappointing surprises in the mix!\nPerhaps the two immediate stand-out films for me were both sequels. Paddington 2 managed the rather rare feat of actually being better than its predecessor, at least from what I can remember. Where the first was a sweet family film, the second seemed to inject even more humour, with an entertaining plot and the usual slew of jolly actors. Blade Runner 2049 meanwhile was a film I approached with some trepidation, as the original has stood the test of time well enough on its own. But the cinematography is just as delicious for this second outing, Ryan Gosling was perfectly cast as the new blade runner, and the film had a meaningful story of its own to tell, rather than just riding on the coattails of its ancestor. Guess that’s what can happen when Disney isn’t involved.\nThis year I also managed to plug a few of those gaps for films everyone has seen. Full Metal Jacket was a somewhat surprising war film in how seemingly aimless the script was constructed, although the first and second halves of the film stand fairly well on their own merit, the overarching message was muddy. But despite having never seen the film before, the scenes often felt familiar, having been parodied and quoted that often. The same could be said for The Princess Bride , which I felt like I’d seen vicariously often enough (was there a Simpsons parody?).\nThe most disappointing film of the year was probably a result of misfiring memories from childhood, but I expected Mad Max to be something more along the lines of a Kevin Costner dystopia, with less melodrama and stupidity. Probably I’m just remembering snippets from its sequels in my mind. However even this disappointment couldn’t beat the hands down the worst film of the year: King Solomon’s Mines . Honestly, how did they get Richard Chamberlain, Herbert Lom and John Rhys-Davies to star in this mess? It’s like someone had seen the success of Indiana Jones and thought: what this needs is less plot and more slapstick. It wouldn’t have been out of place in the Carry On series.\nA Year in Books I’d expected that in the year of the plague I’d have ploughed through a lot more pages than I managed of the previous 12 months, but I guess not having that daily commute cut a lot of my reading time.\nStill, I managed to knock off a few of the books that have been on my wishlist for the longest. The Last Resort , for example, must’ve been on my list since about the time of its publication, being a sometime first-hand narrative about a small white homestead in Zimbabwe, and their attempts to keep going during Mugabe’s descent into populism, as the economy crashed around him and he resorted to whatever means necessary to stay in power. The crisis was broadcast often on British news, but this book brought home what it was like for people on the ground, trying to go about their lives despite the ever-present potential threat to life and limb. At times harrowing, but always a very human account.\nIn a similar vein I read the anonymously written Eine Frau in Berlin , the accounts of life in occupied Berlin in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War, when life was cheap, food scarce, and rape a daily visitation. Aside from how well written the accounts are, the memories from those two months are honest and matter-of-fact, leaving it to the reader to pass judgement. Only published after the author’s death, nearly 60 years later, the dairy makes for difficult reading, but an important one.\nIt seems I didn’t pick up much fiction this year, so the standalone favourite was Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Remains of the Day . Beautiful characters, beautiful prose, a subtle tale and extremely believably narrated, this is a slow-burner which is in turn amusing and poignant and arrives where you expected it to.\nTwo of my worst reads of the year were some which had also been in my to-read pile for the longest. I’d read about Borges somewhen and heard about these magical constructions and thought experiments all encapsulated into tiny vignettes, and figured they would be right up my street. Unfortunately I found plodding through Ficciones to be utterly mind-numbing, a style akin to reading a textbook on metaphysics, with pointless asides and deviations about nonsensical figures and oh god get to the bloody point. I see praise wash up on his shores like crates of whiskey after a propitious sinking, but mine is his style not.\nThe other disappointment from the to-read pile was Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny, though I feel I was rather more to blame for it failing to land. The entire premise of the book was interesting enough for me to keep reading to the end, but too much of the content was lost on me for a lack of knowledge of Indian deities.\nThe final book which I’d have to say I really regret reading was the programming book Head First Design Patterns . The content is all solid, but the style in which it is presented just isn’t me. Instead of obtuse non-real-world examples it felt like they shoe-horned in some better non-real-world examples and then proceed to lay it on thick. So many asides and cutsey comics and conversations between non-existent people and not enough plain text. I don’t mind a few bullet point summaries and diagrams, but when that’s the main bulk of the text, it makes navigating what’s important to read only more difficult!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2021/01/05/2020-in-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was-the-Year","RelPermalink":"/tags/that-was-the-year/"}],"title":"2020 in Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"}],"content":" One of the key ways we know how genes work is to look at what happens when they go wrong. We do this deliberately in experimental animals, precisely or randomly disrupting genes to see what happens. For obvious reasons, we don’t do that in people, but the equivalent is to study the genetics of disease and disorders.\nA Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived: The Stories in Our Genes by Adam Rutherford I wonder how small a minority I belong to when I react allergically to such naval-gazing conceitedness as this (emphasis my own).\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2020/01/13/hubris/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Biology","RelPermalink":"/tags/biology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Genetics","RelPermalink":"/tags/genetics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Quotation","RelPermalink":"/tags/quotation/"}],"title":"Hubris"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"A linguistics professor was addressing his class one day, and made the following remark: “In some languages, like in English, a double negative will make a positive. In some other languages, such as Russian, the double negative will remain a negative. Yet there is no language on the planet in which a double positive becomes a negative.”\nA voice from the back of the room popped up, “Yeah, right.”\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2020/01/13/unknown-anecdote/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Anecdote","RelPermalink":"/tags/anecdote/"},{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/tags/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/linguistics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Russian","RelPermalink":"/tags/russian/"}],"title":"Unknown Anecdote"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was","RelPermalink":"/categories/that-was/"}],"content":"Another year, and time again to look back over 12 months of consumed media. Following on from 2015 , 2016 , 2017 and 2018 , here’s another summary of what I’ve been reading, watching and playing over the past year.\nSummary PC games played: numerous\nBest PC games: Abzü, Overcooked 1/2, Risk of Rain, Firewatch, Battalion 1944, We Were Here Too, Hard West\nWorst PC games: Prison Architect, Lethis - Path of Progress, Rage, A Story About My Uncle, The Last Express\nBoard games played: 41 (81 plays)\nBest board games: Decrypto, In the Year of the Dragon, Unfinished Case of Holmes, Codenames: Duet\nWorst board games: Sherlock: Whereabouts Unknown, The Mind\nFilms watched: 41\nBest films: Her, Hunger, Senna, Doubt, Star Wars, Jurassic Park\nWorst films: Suicide Squad, Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker\nBooks read: 48\nBest books: The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion , Reality is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World, The Comedians, SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome, This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor, Bad Science, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, Battle Cry of Freedom\nWorst books: Cybercrime And The Darknet, No Need for Geniuses: Revolutionary Science in the Age of the Guillotine\nA Year in Gaming Another twelve months down the line, and not much has changed on the multiplayer gaming front. Counter-Strike: Global Operations remains our go-to watering hole of a Thursday, despite the incessant wave of cheating accusations that accompanies it. I still play Quake Champions occasionally, though it normally takes me a season to play all my placement matches, and so my rank is only visible for a while before it gets reset. Similarly I play the odd game of Heroes of the Storm , but haven’t done any ranked matches this year as far as I can remember.\nApart from the usual suspect, we played a few weeks of Paladins in recent months, which was a nice distraction and fairly enjoyable. It reminded me a blend of Team Fortress 2 with some extra layers of complexity a là Overwatch , but without the same level of seriousness. Certainly there seemed to be lots of players of dubious skill level on there, so maybe once we reach a ranked level, the matches might be more regularly challenging, rather than alternating between walkovers and walkunders. That is if we ever go back to it!\nIn the background we’ve been playing some Civ VI in the new PBEM variety , two games in parallel thanks to Benno quitting the first one before it had been set up! With Tesh’s rash exit from the second game, both were soon down to three players, so we’ve been progressing fairly fast, and the new cloud save system is a vast improvement on sending save files around. I have to say, I’m not particularly enjoying the game though, and it reminds me of how things went in our old games of Civ III; an interesting start until you realise what vital resource you’re lacking, a moment of dispair when you realise all the iron is in your neighbour’s back yard, then someone quits and we start again. I’m pretty much just clicking through my turns waiting for the games to end, though it could still take some time. But I’ll probably write something about that separately.\nFor solo gaming, I did squeeze in a few interesting titles this year. Abzü and Firewarch stand out for being somewhat less ordinary, I suppose basically both of them pure exploratory adventure games, the latter even carrying the moniker of a ’walking simulator’. Relaxing, intriguing, beautiful to behold, both offer a short diversion of a few hours that doesn’t overstay its welcome and definitely places a different slant on what you expect of a computer game. Another game of a similar ilk I tried was A Story About My Uncle , which was however more of a freaky platformer and fell rather flat with me.\nA few more worthwhile mentions for the year: Hard West is an XCOM-style tactical shooter set in the American west, with several short campaigns which are interesting enough in their own right, and only consist of a few short missions. An enjoyable game, even if I didn’t get particularly far in it. Risk of Rain was a fun multiplayer roguelike platformer, which had us struggling to beat it the few evenings it appeared on the menu. Quick to pick up and play, with that ’oh just one more try!’ that comes with failure in roguelikes. Battalion 1944 scratches the itch that Day of Defeat left, and is actually a pretty competent shooter in its own right, though it has some very annoying movement mechanics that slightly detract from my enjoyment. We Were Here Too , the sequel to a puzzle game I think I reviewed here some years back, was a pretty straightforward but nevertheless enjoyable escape room relying on asymmetric knowledge, where communication is the key, as well as a bit of lateral thinking. And finally I can’t leave 2019 without mentioning the Overcooked games, which Ric introduced me to in spring, and which Steffi became addicted to and had us spending many an evening finely honing our tactics to unlock an elusive fourth star. It was actually quite impressive how we would barely scrape enough points to clear the three-star requirement, and yet we’d practice and practice until we could jump the four-star hurdle which was twice as high. Certainly helped being able to stream this to the TV in the lounge and play it on a controller.\nDidn’t play any particularly terrible games this year, but one vague disappointment was trying to play through The Last Express . It’s one of those overlooked gems from the mid/late 90s, with a unique art style and ambitious gameplay, an adventure with real-time elements and multiple different endings. I imagine if I’d played it at the time, I’d have had the patience (and the boredom!) to explore every nook and cranny, trying to get through every ending, and never give up, but today I’m just too impatient and we couldn’t get into it at all.\nA Year in Boardgaming It hasn’t been a particularly great year for us in boardgaming with only 81 plays, certainly on the lower end for us, and there hasn’t really been very much new in all that. The Exit Games series remains one of Steffi’s favourites, though I have to say I’ve played enough now that I’m not really excited by the prospect of any more. We’ve also played a fair number of other games of a similar ilk, and whilst some of them at least offer slightly different challenges, with many using an app so you have to enter the answers in a more detailed way than you can get with a three-digit code, there are still only so many ways you can hide a solution in a box of bits.\nStill, we did see a few new games to the table this year. We had a lot of fun with two party-esque games in Codenames: Duet and Decrypto . The former is just a slight tweak on the earlier version, but I think makes the game more enjoyable overall; instead of playing in two teams against one another, you play in two teams cooperatively, with everyone being responsible for both making and guessing clues. Certainly worked for us. Decrypto on the other hand relies on teams of players communicating codes to one another using a common ’codebook’. But the other team always gets to hear the code too, and must try to intercept the message, so players not only have to come up with ever new clues for their partners, but also work out what the cryptic clues their opponents are giving could mean. It’s fairly easy to put together your own version to try out too!\nA short mention to The Quacks of Quedlinburg which won the Kennerspiel des Jahres 2018. While a fun little push-your-luck game, I’m hard pressed to understand how it was the Kennerspiel, nor really how it won at all. We played it with 4 players and it felt like it wasn’t really designed well for that number, with the starting two players able to capitalise on the cheaper chits and the other players then locked out of certain tactics. Otherwise the game was basically like an elaborate game of Pontoon, each player holding a bag and deciding whether to keep drawing or hold their current scores – twist or stick?!\nThere wasn’t really anything that I didn’t enjoy playing this year. We had a few lacklustre escape room games, both from Exit games series and others, but they’re generally one-off games which still have some entertainment value and don’t overlast their welcome. One game we’ve started playing as a filler is The Mind , which I really can’t rate and always feel is a bit of a waste of time. Basically 100 cards in total, starting off with each player getting one, then without communicating they have to play them in ascending order; then the round repeats, each player getting two cards etc. There are a few rules with lives and special abilities, but this is a game you could easily play with a pack of regular playing games and is basically a game of \u0026ldquo;can you all count together in your heads at the same speed?\u0026rdquo; Yawn.\nAnother game I have to mention and I’m dead on the fence about is Detective . It’s pushing a bit really to describe it as a game: essentially the players take on the role of detectives and have to solve five cases. Each case has a stack of cards which the team can explore, plus there’s a detailed app database containing extra info on lots of characters and events in the game, and some puzzles even require a bit of Googling to find the answer. You then decide when you think you’ve got enough info to solve the case, and the app takes you through a few questions and tells you your score. Each case is unique, but they are all somehow interconnected, with the same characters and locations reappearing. What’s not to like? Well, for one thing the game comes with a board, different characters, some silly tokens and really a whole load of guff which is just absolutely unnecessary. There’s a board just for the sake of having a board which is supposed to indicate where the investigation team currently is, and moving around costs time, but quite frankly that makes no sense. Sure, it’s important to keep track of time, and I can see that there has to be a ’currency’ of sorts to force players to make decisions about how much to research or what leads to follow, but then each investigator has a certain number of ’special ability’ chips which only they can use at a certain time. But why? It just adds pointless cruft to the game, where all the fun comes from theorising, putting the pieces of the puzzle together, working out the who, what, where and why. Where’s the fun in not being able to read the back of a card because computer specialist John already looked at the back of a different card? The other major criticism is the way the time pressure in the game works: it’s fairly straightforward in principle, you have for example three days to solve the case, each day has 8 hours, and each lead you follow will cost a certain amount of time. But you don’t know how much time, and often the ’story’ has stupid things like traffic jams costing you extra hours all because\u0026hellip; reasons! We’ve done three of the cases so far, and while the first felt too easy (maybe a nice introduction?) we completely failed the second two. I hope we return to it, because the actual story is very interesting and feels well constructed, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to wholeheartedly recommend it.\nA Year in Cinema Although we haven’t kept it up quite as religiously, Tuesday evening remains film night and we watched about 40 this year. A few films I hadn’t seen before stuck out, as well as a few rewatches.\nHer with Joaquin Phoenix was fantastic, and I found it really interesting how the perception of talking to an intelligent AI massively reminded me of the uncorporeal minds of the early internet, back when cyberspace really felt like something distinct and separate from the real world, where other people were faceless intelligences in the void. The main character’s connection to his AI reminded me of some of my early experiences with people on the fledgling internet, people I would never see, never meet, and could only engage with through words.\nOn a less upbeat note, we watched Hunger about Bobby Sands and the Maze hunger strikes. It’s not a film I’d particularly recommend, decent acting and cinematography notwithstanding, as there isn’t really much substance to it that you don’t already know (if you know about the events). Nevertheless I found it particularly interesting to see how allergically Steffi reacted to the inmates’ decisions, a very visceral inability to see things from their perspective.\nOne film I enjoyed while Steffi was away one evening was the documentary of Senna . The first thing I ever heard about Senna was probably when he died, and remember the funeral in Brazil being broadcast on TV, probably on news reports, though at that stage I hadn’t really watched any F1 races and had only otherwise heard of Mansell. The film was an interesting look at his life, the controversies, the rivalries and the sport of F1 in general in the late 80s/early 90s.\nAnother dramatic outing which had some extremely good acting was Doubt , starring Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Amy Adams. There isn’t really very much in the way of ’action’, being based on a play, but it is not a surprise that all four main actors were nominated for an Oscar.\nA couple of films I rewatched this year, just because they happened to be on telly, but which reminded me of how good they are, were the original Star Wars and Jurassic Park . Yes, Star Wars is relatively cheesy, yes it has some god-awful dialogue and dated cinematics, but the overarching storyline is simply good. The few plot holes can easily be put down to dramatic licence, almost everything in it makes sense within the universe Lucas created, and the result is a solid and enjoyable opener to the saga which stands alone in its own right and remains entirely watchable today. I already ranted about Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker in another thread , but even trying to judge the films in their own right, which is obviously impossible, I’m not sure A New Hope comes off any worse for its age. I don’t think you could say the same about the moneymaker.\nJurassic Park is a similarly well constructed story. Watching it with a particular eye to the scriptwriting, it’s amazing how effortlessly the characters are introduced. The first few scenes lay the groundwork about who everyone is without any exposition, any uncharacteristic or irrational moments, and sow the seeds which will be harvested by the end of the film. Simplicity like that takes a lot of work, even if you only went to watch the film for the dinosaurs. The special effects are also still decent, I think the film was made just early enough to avoid the early wave of terrible CGI, but late enough that it stands up cinematographically.\nIn terms of stinkers, we sadly watched quite a few this year. Two comic book films stood out as being particularly awful, with Suicide Squad quite possibly winning my award for most pointless comic book film I’m seen to date. No drama, no character development, too many minor characters who had no purpose, exposition slapped on like it was directed at retards, there was nothing to like about this film beyond Harley Quinn (who was admittedly excellent). Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice wasn’t quite as awful, but had absolutely none of the drama of Nolan’s Batman films, none of the positivity of Reeve’s Superman, and Batman beat Superman (FFS!)\nA Year in Books I managed to smash previous records with more than 15,000 pages read this year and nearly a book a week. Maybe I should actually make that a target for 2020?\nAmong the hits for this year was an interesting work on psychology and morality entitled The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion . Not sure where I got the recommendation, but it’s a really fascinating look at how we consider questions of morality, how certain aspects can be measured on different axes, and where for example people on the right and left of the political spectrum differ is generally in how these axes are weighted and/or how they are interpreted, but a lot more binds the two together than separates them. Indeed, two things become clear from his thesis: that most decisions we make of a moral nature are first made, then justified (i.e. we feel something is wrong, and only later when asked to justify it do we come up with reasons, which generally don’t make any sense – cup of Brexit anyone?), and that today’s politically divided societies have more to do with people not talking to one another, than with actual radical differencies, i.e. things feel more polarised today because of social media echo chambers, rather than our views becoming radically different.\nOn a more upbeat and positivistic note, I finally got around to reading Reality is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World , a look at how computer games successfully manage to do what we in society really need to learn from. Some of what the book covers is a bit wayward and comes from her research work, but a lot of the core message is sound and has very interesting implications for everyday life. Nothing much of it is new, but the book summarises it fairly succinctly: gaming succeeds because it rewards achievement, binds people together, creates a sense of accomplishment, teaches new skills, etc. A bit dated now, but worth a perusal (or reading a summary) nevertheless.\nOn the history front, I continued my Roman history trip with SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome by Mary Beard. I understand she’s something of a TV personality as well? The book is a brief overview of Roman society, rather than a blow-by-blow look at events, and I found it to be very balanced, despite many decrying too much conjecture.\nAnother history gap I tried to fill this year was in reading two books I’ve had on my list probably since Dublin – i.e. for more than a decade! – those being Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee and Battle Cry of Freedom . The first is an amazingly sad history of what can only really be called the genocide of the native American tribes, showing how different tribes reacted in different ways, and the result in each and every instance was expropriation, exploitation, maltreatment and/or eradication. A very depressing chapter of history, from which no lessons have really been learned as far as I can see. The second is a detailed account of the American Civil War, which I knew pretty much nothing about beyond a few western films. Aside from the course of the war itself, it’s fascinating to look at how the issue of slavery was at once the cause of the war, and its ultimate end, without ever actually being the casus belli. Similarly mindblowing how the Democratic Party remained officially opposed to the 13th Amendment even after the war as \u0026ldquo;unwise, impolitic, cruel and unworthy of the support of civilized people\u0026rdquo;. Such an enlightened heritage!\nA couple of books with a slightly sciency/political bent tickled me this year. This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor is more amusing than enlightening, but it certainly had some eye-opening passages about how health care is actually delivered in the UK, as opposed to how it is perceived. At once hilarious and terrifying. Bad Science on the other hand is a more engaging and sober look mostly at how science is portrayed in the media, and the concomitant problems that brings. Ben Goldacre wrote (writes?) a column for the Guardian and a blog of the same name, usually highlighting badly reported findings and the like, and this book is just a more in-depth exposition of a few of those topics. Pretty much nothing unexpected in there, but it’s still maddening when you see the kinds of rigorous argument that can be arrayed against the most insidious of lies, and yet still fail to land in the minds of the converted. It reminded me of both The Righteous Mind (above) and Thinking Fast and Slow (also highly recommended) which I read some years back. Goldacre’s ultimate message seemt all the more realistic/pessimistic for it.\nI didn’t seem to read too much fiction this year, at least not much I could unreservedly recommend. The longest book of the year was the nearly 1000-page Der Schwarm by Franz Schätzing, which while certainly interesting, read too much like a silly Roland Emmerich film and overstayed its welcome a bit. The best on my list was probably The Comedians , just another classic from probably my favourite author. So much depth in so little material, truly refined, his books are only short but pack so much of the human experience into so far words. I also read his England Made Me this year, and it goes to show how much he developed as an author over the years. The lack of plot in the latter book was no different to the former, but the characters were soulless in comparison.\nTwo books get my stinker of the year award. The first is No Need for Geniuses: Revolutionary Science in the Age of the Guillotine by Steve Jones, who normally writes pretty interesting popular science books. But I couldn’t really see any purpose to this book, it’s just a collection of small vignettes which may or may not have some relation to the French revolution, but generally didn’t. Jones isn’t a historian and it clearly isn’t his suit.\nBut hands down the worst book of the year goes to Cybercrime and the Darknet . One of those books my dad picked up on the cheap somewhere, he read it first, probably learned a few things, and sent it to me thinking I’d be interested. And oh my god, what a badly hashed together mess! I don’t wanna go hating on the author, she generally writes books for kids which I’m sure are perfectly fit to purpose, and maybe if you know absolutely nothing about the internet, then you could learn a few things from this book. But otherwise, everything about it was pathetic, and worse. It was like an undergraduate essay, written with an eye on the word count, trying to squeeze in footnotes which aren’t required (and missing ones which are absolutely vital). It was journalistic to the point of maddening, always looking at individual instances and extrapolating to general rules, with whole chapters dedicated to theorising about things that may/may not have happened and showing how that is the way of the internet… unless it isn’t. She peppers the text with statistics that bear only a passing relation to the subject matter at hand, no explanation, no interrogation, they’re just left hanging in the air as if self-evidently supporting her thesis (Goldacre would’ve torn her a new one). I don’t think I’ve ever facepalmed so many times in 150 pages. If she’d been an undergrad, I’d have given it back and had her re-write it. But she already has a degree – from Cambridge no less! – and works at a fucking university. I’ll retire to Bedlam.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/12/31/2019-in-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was-the-Year","RelPermalink":"/tags/that-was-the-year/"}],"title":"2019 in Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Editing memoQ’s light resources can be a painful experience, with somewhat clunky interfaces, intimidating lists, small default window sizes, and the inability to add comments to rules written with regular expressions. Anyone who’s tried to pin down an error in a list of dozens of autotranslatable rules will know the maddening experience of trying to wade through to reams of similar-looking rules to find the culprit, especially as any edited rules are automatically re-added to the bottom of the list, so any initial effort at structuring rules according to their purpose gradually falls apart over time.\nAs Kevin Lossner recently pointed out, one clever strategy is to export copies of the rulesets and, adding comments to these XML files, essentially manage these rules outside of memoQ. This makes the rules themselves easier to navigate, and indeed edit, with changes being implemented with a simple reimport of the file.\nHowever, there can be a couple of disadvantages to this solution, depending your workflow. Firstly, the comments only work in one direction, as they’re lost on import. If you make any alterations to resources from within memoQ, exporting the updated ruleset would mean having to combine the files or otherwise restore all the comments. Secondly, memoQ prevents you from overwriting resources on import, so while you can always add a new version and delete the previous one, it can prove to be a royal pain if you also need to update a large number of templates and/or ongoing projects which are using the resource.\nFortunately there is one more cheeky option available to us to make our rules easier to read, however, and that is to abuse named capturing groups and use them as comments. For example, take a rule from a cascading filter for tagging the asterisks in a Markdown list:\n^\\s*\\*\\s+ We can simply give this group a name and make it easy to identify:\n(?\u0026lt;unordered_list\u0026gt;^\\s*\\*\\s+) Once all rules have been commented, we immediately have a much cleaner overview of the ruleset, especially useful when you need to go back in and tweak or add something later.\nExample cascading filter for Markdown\nNote that one potential side-effect of this strategy is that mixing named and numbered capturing groups may upset the numbering, so particularly for autotranslatable rules it may be easiest simply to use named capturing groups consistently throughout.\n[Photo by Daiga Ellaby on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/09/22/commenting-memoq-light-resources/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Memoq","RelPermalink":"/tags/memoq/"},{"LinkTitle":"Regex","RelPermalink":"/tags/regex/"}],"title":"Commenting memoQ Light Resources"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/categories/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"You almost have to feel sorry for Greg Hands, sitting as a guest on Anne Will’s show, trying to defend Tory policy. Invited to a five-to-one Brexit bashing, it’s a debate of the ilk where the quacks aren’t invited in the name of \u0026lsquo;balance\u0026rsquo;. From the off, and as if to distance himself from the madness he’s supporting, Hands immediately claims to have been anti-Brexit, to have been anti-Boris during the leadership change. But not one to let principles get in the way, he’s supporting both of them because \u0026lsquo;democracy\u0026rsquo;. What follows is a virtuoso display of logical acrobatics skills as he attempts to defend his position: the shittiness of Britain’s democracy (being old is apparently a compliment?); that the referendum somehow showed clarity of purpose; that Boris threatening to ignore the law to push through a no-deal Brexit is democracy in action; that proroguing parliament is standard procedure and clearly shouldn’t be reconsidered at such a crucial juncture; that an election could show what the people want, but a second referendum would be undemocratic. If he weren’t sitting there looking like a naughty schoolboy called to the headmaster’s office, his mind-bending mental tricks might have earned some applause.\nUnfortunately for him, the loudest applause comes when Rolf-Dieter Krause said that the only time Boris Johnson doesn’t lie is when he says his name. You kinda want to give Hands the benefit of the doubt, acknowledge that he’s standing with his back to the wall, maybe find the language barrier in his favour. But then the contents of his words would sound hollow in any tongue. ‘I didn’t vote for Brexit,’ he protests on more than one occasion, trying to distance himself from the shitshow he’s fighting for. Because ‘democracy’. Already proud to show his lack of a spine or conscience, Greg shows he’s also packing a crate of gullibility, when arguing that Johnson is trying to renegotiate, that negotiations are taking place, that there is a solution to the backstop.\nHe almost looks like he’s break down in tears when discussion turns to the little bone Frau Merkel threw Boris, the notion picked up in British newspapers that the German chancellor was keen on finding a solution within 30 days. The irony of the situation is completely lost on him: the true of the backstop is that it only comes into effect if Britain fucks up in resolving the Irish border, and it is entirely unpalatable to the British parliament because they know they will fuck up.\nThis is where Hands proudly gets his homework out: a special report he’s been preparing that will finally solve the Gordian knot. I couldn’t help laughing at the top-rate accidental trolling which followed from host Anne Will. Asking the rhetorical question, whether the EU needs to take Britain seriously when they say the ball is in Britain’s court, ‘well here’s Greg Hands, and he not only has a ball, he’s brought a brochure too.’ Sorry Greg, everyone else knows that someone asked you to write that report so they could throw it in the bin. Hope you didn’t put much effort into it.\nWhether it’s stupidity, gullibility, or simply brazen loyalty to his football club party, Greg is dancing to the nationalist tune like a good little boy, genuinely espousing the lies and subterfuge of the hardliners or, more likely, swallowing them whole himself. As he seems to keep reminding us, he didn’t want this, he didn’t vote for this, but he’s happy to play his part as a useful idiot. Sitting as a guest on the show, isolated and alone, trying to defend someone else’s corner across an ever widening gulf whilst simultaneously protesting his own innocence, Greg perfectly embodies a microcosm of the shitshow playing out on the European fringe.\n[Full programme ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/09/09/brexit-in-germany/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Brexit","RelPermalink":"/tags/brexit/"},{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/tags/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Eu","RelPermalink":"/tags/eu/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/tags/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"}],"title":"Brexit in Germany"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nWho Wants to Live Forever? – Married happy-go-lucky outdoors-loving sex-mad hippy party-girls in senior management with cats. Apparently.\nWhat If the EU Had 28 Member States With Equal Populations? – Rearrange the borders and build a new Europe!\nPaul Ryan’s Long Con – An interesting article from Vox on this failed poster boy for an almost sane GOP.\nSee How Your Take Home Pay Compares to Workers Around the World – An unwieldy title for an interesting infographic.\n[Photo by Fabian Blank on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/08/13/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Eu","RelPermalink":"/tags/eu/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/tags/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Income","RelPermalink":"/tags/income/"},{"LinkTitle":"Longevity","RelPermalink":"/tags/longevity/"},{"LinkTitle":"Maps","RelPermalink":"/tags/maps/"},{"LinkTitle":"Paul-Ryan","RelPermalink":"/tags/paul-ryan/"},{"LinkTitle":"Statistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/statistics/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"https://twitter.com/ _waleedshahid/status/1159297993780203520\nAs Thomas Hobbes once fathered the phrase, life before the central state was solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. In Jimmy Aldaoud’s eyes, life with the United States wasn’t much better. Aldaoud was victim to the kind of cretinous bureaucracy touched by a sprinkling of laughable xenophobia. Not that there’s anything funny about the result. A man died as a direct consequence of the kind of senseless and callous rule-making that surely the gobbiest semi-democracy in the world ought to be a little ashamed of.\nWhat’s particularly interesting is the reactions on both sides of the spectrum. Those more moved by their hearts wonder how this differs from murder, somehow an interesting hyperbole given the fact that the American state does in fact take lives on a regular basis, whether through using excessive force in policing, enjoying a bit of Goliath vs. David on the international stage, or occasionally executing its citizens.\nMeanwhile, the heartless end of the spectrum wonder what all the fuss is about. On paper, everything was legitimate: the man was an illegal immigrant, he committed some petty criminal acts, and he was duly deported to his home country. Never mind the fact that he had never been to the country he was being deported to, that he was clearly unwell and in need of medical treatment, that he was a member of a minority who had fled religious persecution, and that his death was an entirely predictable outcome from his deportation.\nThe case is clear as mud for anyone with a couple of braincells, though it would be going too far to assume that the persons processing his case would be in possession of such aptitude. But that’s why it’s mind-boggling that safeguards are not in place to prevent this. Clearly for a person who missed out on being a citizen by 6 months, who had never known another country, who had been invested in by the state for the formative years of their life, who were to all intents and purposes already citizens of the nation, surely the first response should be to give him a few forms to fill out and a helpful nudge that ‘we consider this important’? For a nation built on the expropriation of land from other people, it’s insane how the United States are so blindingly obsessed to birthrights being tied to the soil.\nBut who gives a shit, right? He was only an Iraqi.\n[Photo by Joshua Hoehne on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/08/12/jimmy-aldaoud/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Immigration","RelPermalink":"/tags/immigration/"},{"LinkTitle":"Iraq","RelPermalink":"/tags/iraq/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Usa","RelPermalink":"/tags/usa/"}],"title":"Jimmy Aldaoud"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/categories/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":" If at first you don’t succeed, you fail.\nGLaDOS, Portal\nArdent Remexiteer Theresa May managed to spend the latter half of her illustrious spell as prime minister trying to ram her deal through the Commons like a skipping needle on a strong and stable turntable. Now she’s abandoning ship, the sycophants and navel-gazers are lining up around the block to be the next hero to try to pull the sword from the stone. Unfortunately, with yon parliament rejecting the deal, and selfsame parliament rejecting no deal, the likelihood of the next helmsman managing to successfully navigate this particular brown waterway looks slim. And with the public still split down the middle , even a new referendum would probably only turn back the clock as far as 23rd June 2016.\nMeanwhile the EU looks on in amazement as the revolution eats its children . They can wait; it’s Britain that so desperately wants to leave… ish. If only the Conservative Party were thinking with Portals… instead they’re all obsessed with having/eating the cake.1\nSince Article 50 is turning into a euphemism for perpetuity, here are seven bloody ways to break the bloody deadlock.\n1. Bosworth Field It’s been far too long since the Glorious Revolution saw that conclusive and permanent defeat of the traitorous papist Tory party [wait, what?]. No doubt some of the current crop remember it well. In the spirit of fair play, it would only seem appropriate to give them another crack at the whip. Rather than assaulting one another with American cowjuice , maybe the hardest of Brexitards and Remoaniacs can meet on the field of battle for a glorious victor-takes-it-all decider. I’ve no doubt traditionalists like Jacobus Moose-Rogg have only been chomping at the bit to saddle up and fly the standard.\n2. Partition Party Cyprus, Israel, Ireland, India – Britain has its fair share of examples around the world for peaceable coexistence between loving neighbours. In fact, British meddling consultancy work was often instrumental in setting up those amicable arrangements in the first place. The next government could have the whole thing unravelled in two shakes of an ear of wheat , and Britain can both have its cake and allow someone else to eat it. We’ve already got a map . Maybe that nice fellow Trump can do us a deal on a wall pretty garden fence in part-exchange for some bits of the NHS in his free trade agreement.\n3. Nigel Mandela Gandhi marched to the sea, Mao slogged it around China, and the Crusaders of Jarrow trudged down to London. If only Farage had listened to The Proclaimers, he might not have flaked on his own little galumph to the capital.\nBut while marching is one way of showing your staying power, some long walks don’t need you to move anywhere. Instead of drowning the airwaves with their gobshitery flawless political debate, maybe our most impassioned politicians could give their mouths a rest and let their arses do the talking. All we need to do is lock up the loudest Remoaners and Brexiteers for as long as necessary; they can leave at any time, and whoever gives up last, gets to decide the outcome. Maybe while they’re in there the rest of parliament might be able to get some actual work done, and the rest of us can enjoy some semblance of normalcy. Well, at least for one morning… given his track record, Farage would be out by noon!\n4. Toss a Coin When things get too close to call, sometimes there’s no better way to prevent a logjam than call on the wisdom of chance. The London Eye would only need a quick lick of paint to make a wonderful symbol, dismounted and rolled into Trafalgar Square to decide the nation’s fate. The mother of parliaments can vomit its members onto the square to form the biggest assembly of tossers the planet has ever seen, while the nation watches the televisualised event as their alderpeople reinvent the time-honoured tradition of casting lots.\nAfter all, more important things have been decided on the flip of a coin before now.\n5. Neverendum It’s been over four hundred years since Britain added something worthwhile to the national calendar, and what better way to commemorate buffoonery and intolerance than through an annual celebration. Every 23rd June should henceforth be rejoiced as Referendum Day, when the polity goes down to the ballot box to check if the political barometer has discernibly changed, before sitting around a burning effigy of David Cameron and celebrating the almighty fuck-up their greatest democratic achievement as a nation.\n6. National Lottery Brexit Special Lottery tickets have been changing people’s lives for a quarter of a century, ever since King Arthur granted his house a royal commission [is this right?]. Why not furnish one winning ticket the right to change everyone else’s lives? The Brexit EuroPhilians Lottery would give the lucky crackpot winner the right to decide exactly how the Brexit debate should be settled.2 (Guaranteed no winning tickets to ensure the decision just keeps rolling over and over and over.)\n[Photo by Alexander Andrews on Unsplash ]\nSpoiler alert! \u0026#160;\u0026#x21a9;\u0026#xfe0e;\nThis would also make a great way of choosing the UK’s Eurovision participant. Surely they couldn’t do much worse than average.\u0026#160;\u0026#x21a9;\u0026#xfe0e;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/06/05/6-ways-of-breaking-the-brexit-deadlock/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Brexit","RelPermalink":"/tags/brexit/"},{"LinkTitle":"Eu","RelPermalink":"/tags/eu/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/tags/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Satire","RelPermalink":"/tags/satire/"}],"title":"6 Ways of Breaking the Brexit Deadlock"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"}],"content":"It’s interesting to watch the ways in which the current crusade against plastics manifests itself. The basic message – plastic is poison – gets through to everyone, but the reactions sometimes resemble a Chinese smithy melting down his tools to increase steel quotas during the Great Leap Awkward.\nAfter a number of do-gooders complained, our company canteen recently replaced its plastic containers with cardboard packaging, for all those people too busy to sit down with a knife and fork. The move was celebrated as a great boon for the planet, maybe a potential way to minimise that already minuscule proportion of plastic waste that leaks out of European rivers.\nMayhaps. I’m not a materials scientist, but since the cardboard is plastic-coated and thus presents problems with recycling, the gesture has probably replaced a product that could be easily managed and recycled, with one which must be burned.\nNothing against using resources sparingly, but a bit of uncommon sense often helps. Just because something is plastic, doesn’t necessarily mean that the alternatives are automatically better for the environment. Think beyond the mantra. Or maybe just sit down with a plate like the rest of us inmates next time.\n[Photo by John Cameron on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/03/17/the-poisonous-thought-of-plastic/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Ecology","RelPermalink":"/tags/ecology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Recycling","RelPermalink":"/tags/recycling/"}],"title":"The Poisonous Thought of Plastic"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/categories/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Surveying today’s political landscape, it’s easy to suppose we’re approaching a precipice. Passionate intransigence divides societies into blocks which, even where decidedly secular, are rallied around with religious fetishism. It seems that ideological boundaries are increasingly hardening, poisoning the political dialogue, preventing constructive discourse and contributing to almost maddening levels of senseless blustering.\nIn The Righteous Mind, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt investigates the concept of morality and shows how differing political groups can reach such disparate conclusions from the same starting point. Gradually building up his argument, Haidt succinctly retreads a lot of territory covered elsewhere in more detail, but which is vital to understanding his standpoint.\nOf particular importance is the idea that morality has little if nothing to do with rational thinking. The human mind reacts intuitively to situations at a very basic level, leaving our cerebral rationality running to catch up when it comes time to explain ourselves. Moral reasoning is almost a misnomer; moral intuition is at the core of our decision-making. What this means at a basic level is that people tend to react to statements with their guts, and later defend those reactions with their minds. In politics, this is epitomised by the kind of debate you find on populist media stations, like this example from LBC’s James O’Brien (also available on their website should YouTube receive a letter):\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWzIdA2TemA Moving the goalposts\nIn the exchange, Brexiteer Ashley is asked to justify his strongly held position. Pinning down his argument is like trying to catch an errant moth flitting around a brightly lit room. It’s all those EU laws the country won’t have to obey. Which laws? Well, it’s not so much the laws, as how political the discussions are in Brussels. Politicians talking politics? Well, it’s not really the politics, it’s the uncontrolled immigration. From outside the EU? Well, if Britain were no longer in the EU, it would be better able to integrate the immigrants. Err\u0026hellip; right.1\nIt makes for amusing radio, but for O’Brien it’s an exercise in futility. This kind of spiralling debate has no end, because the fundamental impetus for the decision wasn’t arrived at rationally, but rather – at least judging by the responses – morally. Tear down the edifice stone by stone if you will, the invisible foundations go much deeper, and cannot be struck by logic’s hammer. When every vestige of rationality has gone, the argument generally reverts to something along the lines of ‘I don’t really know, it’s just wrong.'\nWhere the book gets interesting is where Haidt investigates the different reactions to moral issues amongst people of different social backgrounds and political persuasions, and attempts to weigh their stances up on a six-axis matrix. This ‘Moral Foundations Theory ’ measures the axes of care versus harm, fairness versus cheating, liberty versus oppression, loyalty versus betrayal, authority versus subversion and sanctity versus degradation. While as human beings we are all affected by these, the differences between us are essentially down to our weighing and valuing these axes differently.\nAn interesting theory, though his ultimate conclusion seems to be the laudable but rather yawnable axiom that people need to understand where the other party stands and find the middle ground. A laudable suggestion, but one which doesn’t really do anything to help solve our intractable problems: as Theresa May might one day realise , a half-baked Brexit is about as likely to please all parties as a half-aborted baby.\nI’d argue that’s why you shouldn’t ask people a stupid question, but that’s a debate for another post.\u0026#160;\u0026#x21a9;\u0026#xfe0e;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/03/17/the-righteous-mind-why-good-people-are-divided-by-politics-and-religion/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Brexit","RelPermalink":"/tags/brexit/"},{"LinkTitle":"Morality","RelPermalink":"/tags/morality/"},{"LinkTitle":"Philosophy","RelPermalink":"/tags/philosophy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"}],"content":"It’s good to see American politicians taking inspiration from Africa . Maybe their derg won’t be so funereal.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/03/04/america-tikdem/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Satire","RelPermalink":"/tags/satire/"}],"title":"America Tikdem!"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nReflections – A fabulous series of photographs from Tom Hussey showing elderly people looking at the reflections of their past selves.\nAnthea Bell Obituary – One of the most prolific and successful translators into English from French, German and Danish, and brainmother of the brilliant Dogmatix and Getafix generation of loveable Asterix characters.\nPaul Ryan’s Long Con – An interesting article from Vox on this failed poster boy for an almost sane GOP.\nTED: Economies of Growth – Economist Kate Raworth on the importance of breaking out of the growth trap. I’m sceptical that mankind will voluntarily find a happy equilibrium, but Malthus will get us in the end.\n[Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/01/26/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ted-Talk","RelPermalink":"/tags/ted-talk/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/tags/translation/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" As society tries to catch up with the overwhelming advancements in technology of the past few decades, it is unsurprising that governments and legislators find themselves plugging the gaps where criminality can flourish. Developments in encryption, obfuscation, distribution and anonymisation give criminals and privacy activists alike a broad toolkit for conducting their activities away from prying eyes. In Cybercrime and the Dark Net, Cath Senker offers a brief and easily digested overview of this bewildering digital landscape. The book is essentially a collection of short vignettes covering a wide variety of different forms of cybercrime, with an essentially separate second section surveying the dark net.\nThis is a successfully written book, but unfortunately hardly a well-written one. There is nothing wrong with the craft, nothing wrong with the content per se, but it reads very much like an undergraduate essay written with an eye to meeting a word count, rather than sculpting a theory or trying to convey specific information. I would call the style journalistic, in the sense that there is a tendency to focus on individual instances, leading to sweeping generalisations without any valid attempt at contextualisation. We’re treated to two pages detailing an instance of a young American woman whose social security number had been stolen and used to file false tax returns. Senker makes some unfounded statements about what the thieves could have done with the information, and offers the rather dubious claim that people are now filing their tax returns earlier for fears someone else will file them first, before then revealing that the IRS responded to the woman in question saying that the issue had been settled. The victim never discovered how the security breach had happened, ergo this needn’t even have been a cybercriminal offence and has little relevance for the subject matter.\nSenker has clearly done a decent amount of research into this subject. Give that this is designed to be a popular introductory book on the subject, a few small mistakes in the technical nuances are relatively moot, and can certainly be forgiven given that the author isn’t an expert in the field. Subjects are well introduced and explained, while plenty of footnotes are provided for those interested in following a matter of particular interest. But again, bearing more than a passing resemblance to a university essay, the text is peppered with quotes and statistics which only ostensibly support the text and in fact rather serve to bring up more questions. In a section on online grooming, we’re told that technology facilitates the contact between paedophiles and children. A fair claim, but to bolster this argument, the next sentence tells us that Childline reported a 50% annual increase in online grooming cases in December 2015. That’s it; the line is left without further comment. But how does this bombshell fact actually support her argument? Did technology change so significantly in 2015 to lead to such an explosion in online grooming? Is this part of a general year-on-year trend or a statistical outlier? Maybe this is evidence that support services are using more successful tactics to reach those in need and should actually be interpreted as a positive indicator? Or is this evidence of groomers changing their tactics? Since the site reveals that the sample size is only in the hundreds, it would seem rather sensationalist to see any significance in the figure, and its uncommented conclusion here seems not only unnecessary, but extremely misleading.\nWhile many of the footnotes feel like cosmetic extras, there are also occasions in the text where it is anything but clear what the author actually wants to say. In the section covering the darknet and methods of encrypting emails, we’re told that Irish-Islandic privacy activist Smári McCarthy encourages people to use encryption to increase the costs of government surveillance. This is followed by the statement: ‘if they did the cost would rise from 13 US cents a day (9p) to US $10,000 (more than 7,000 GBP).’ The cost of what, government surveillance? Measured in what? Obviously this statement can’t be taken at face value, but I’m stumped as to what these numbers are supposed to refer to. She concludes this short section by stating that this might lead governments to place only suspicious persons under surveillance, or alternatively for governments to spend more resources on surveillance, driving ever more people to communicate via the darknet. While I don’t expect the author to have access to a crystal ball, the entire section is muddled and lacks clarity.\nFrustrations like this sadly abound in this lightweight volume. Somewhere under the editor’s chisel there may be a fairly decent introductory book. As it stands, I found the numerous non sequiturs, sensationalist statistics, minor inconsistencies and incongruities to make this a dissatisfying reading experience. The book lacks a certain clarity of purpose and instead attempts to cover and tie together too many bases in barely 150 pages.\n[Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/01/20/cybercrime-and-the-darknet/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cryptography","RelPermalink":"/tags/cryptography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cybercrime","RelPermalink":"/tags/cybercrime/"},{"LinkTitle":"Dark-Net","RelPermalink":"/tags/dark-net/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Cybercrime and the DarkNet"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"I recently set about migrating an aging phpBB forum to NodeBB and ran into enough problems that I considered cancelling the whole project.\nThe phpBB exporter script has been updated various times, and I managed to find a fork which appears to work with phpBB 3.2 . Unfortunately, it refused to install itself correctly and appeared to land in the wrong directory, so I had to manually clone the Github project into the expected subdirectory.\nAnd bingo! The import worked, and after disabling/deleting unnecessary plugins and updating NodeBB to the latest branch, the majority of things were working as expected. A few things remain to be fixed, in particular navigating mongodb’s structure to perform a few custom replacements where the import script had trouble deciphering bbcode.\nFortunately StackOverflow provided a good start:\nvar bulk = db.getCollection(\u0026#39;objects\u0026#39;).initializeUnorderedBulkOp(); var count = 0; db.getCollection(\u0026#39;objects\u0026#39;).find({$and: [{_key:{$regex: /^post:\\d+$/}}, {content: {$regex: /\u0026lt;size size=\u0026#34;150\u0026#34;\u0026gt;(.*?)\u0026lt;\\/size\u0026gt;/}}]}).forEach(function(entry){ var newContent = entry.content.replace(/^\u0026lt;size size=\u0026#34;150\u0026#34;\u0026gt;(.*?)\u0026lt;\\/size\u0026gt;/gm, \u0026#34;## $1\u0026#34;); print(newContent); bulk.find( { _key: entry._key } ).updateOne( { $set: { \u0026#39;content\u0026#39;: newContent } }); count++; if (count % 100 === 0) { // Execute per 100 operations and re-init bulk.execute(); bulk = db.getCollection(\u0026#39;objects\u0026#39;).initializeUnorderedBulkOp(); count = 0; } }) // Clean up queue if (count \u0026gt; 0) bulk.execute(); Using this I was able to find and replace those tags which had been missed and replace them with valid markdown.\n[Photo by Kobu Agency on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2019/01/09/migrating-phpbb-to-nodebb/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Nodebb","RelPermalink":"/tags/nodebb/"},{"LinkTitle":"Phpbb","RelPermalink":"/tags/phpbb/"},{"LinkTitle":"Regex","RelPermalink":"/tags/regex/"},{"LinkTitle":"Software","RelPermalink":"/tags/software/"}],"title":"Migrating phpBB to NodeBB"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was","RelPermalink":"/categories/that-was/"}],"content":"To keep up an ancient tradition, I figured I’ll keep up my review of the past twelve months in consumed media goods. So following on from 2015 , 2016 and 2017 , the first wrap-up on the new forums! (I normally draught these things and write them over a series of days, but since this software doesn’t seem to offer draughts, I’ve penned this in one sitting and it’s probably riddled with typos. :) )\nSummary PC games played: numerous\nBest PC games: Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes, HELLDIVERS, Transistor, Quake Champions, Bomber Crew\nWorst PC games: Stardew Valley, any Battle Royale title\nBoard games played: 88 plays (48 games)\nBest board games: Exit (series), Azul, Goa, Magic Maze, Terraforming Mars\nWorst board games: T.I.M.E. Stories, Naufragos, Sebastian Fitzek Safehouse\nFilms watched: 47\nBest films: Shaun the Sheep: The Movie, A Man for All Seasons, Trainspotting/Requiem for a Dream, Zodiac, They Live, Frost/Nixon\nWorst films: Four Brothers, Total Recall,\nBooks read: 45\nBest books: The Selfish Gene, I, Claudius, Memoirs of Hadrian, Master and Commander, Wesley: The Remarkable Story of an Owl\nWorst books: The Infinities, JavaScript in Ten Minutes, The Shortest History of Germany\nCountries visited: UK, Austria\nA Year in Gaming Just re-reading my round-up from last year and it all sounds very familiar. While I keep meaning to play through some of the many titles littering my Steam list, most of my gaming time involves returning to those few favoured watering holes of old. Or new! This winter I decided to try out the ranked games in Heroes of the Storm and am actually rather enjoying it. Apart from my very first placement match, where I was presumably thrown in with all manner of pillock, the games have been pretty relaxed and now I feel like I’m definitely in the right league for my skill level, the games are fair and rarely snowball, and the draught is usually where the weaknesses show.\nQuake Champions has obviously been another highlight these past months. For a few weeks I was fair addicted to it, there’s something about the instant gratification and low downtime that I really enjoy, particularly standard deathmatch or instagib. It was also nice to see my stats improving a little as time went on, gradually my average deaths dropped and my damage increased slightly, though sadly that didn’t actually help my victory stats. I think I had multiple DM games where I’d top the scoreboard in damage, alive time, accuracy and K:D ratio, and still come 7th of 8 players! However I seem to have broken the addiction now, not having played for about a month. I’m sure I’ll return to it to try out CTF, but I dunno if it’ll have the same relish as a few weeks back.\nIn terms of solo gaming, I did manage to get into a couple of little titles. Bomber Crew was one which showed a lot of promise in the premise, and it definitely scratched an itch which FTL left throbbing all those years ago. Basically you pilot a bomber during the Second World War, taking it out on various types of missions, earning money and slowly gearing up your bird. There are the same kind of calculations to make, with more action stations than crew members, things like fires and broken equipment to repair, ammo to restock, and the same trade-offs in terms of whether you should upgrade the guns or the armour etc. Unfortunately it never got quite as intense as FTL, especially as you could crash your plane and continue with a new one, so progressing through the main storyline ended up becoming a question of grinding repeatable missions to earn enough money so you could afford an all-singing, all-dancing beast on your factory bombing run, and then to hell with the crew after that.\nFor games with actual storylines, Alan Wake is one I’m still trying to play a bit of but kinda have to force myself to bother. It’s fairly enjoyable in terms of the story – a horror writer with writer’s block ends up living out his nightmares on a holiday retreat, very Steven King – but the game itself just feels a bit dull, gradually bungling through the levels, fighting lack-lustre enemies. In particular I was annoyed that you’re supposed to pick up pages of the novel and discover the story that way, but I’m sure I missed some of them in the levels I’ve played through, and there’s no way I’m going back looking for them. Maybe I’ll carry on at some point, but probably not.\nAnother I’ve been trying to play recently is Transistor , which is a seriously delicious game from the polish and visuals, but in terms of gameplay just hasn’t really gripped me yet. The skills seem to all chain onto one another, so a bit like Magicka there’s a large number of potential ways to use those abilities, and I’m not really interested in experimenting with them, although I presume that’s a large part of the appeal. The storyline so far has been pretty intriguing though, so maybe I’ll stick at it.\nA couple of honourable last mentions: Papers, Please has been on my list for long enough and I finally got around to giving it a run. A couple of hours with it was enough for me, but it’s a superb idea and really well implemented. Sit in your customs booth checking the papers of all people trying to cross the border, gradually ramp up the difficulty, include a few little subplots with certain recurring characters and decisions to make – do you take the bribe and let the criminal through or call security? Brilliant. The only problem I had was that I played it in short bites, half an hour here and there, and since each level adds an extra layer of complexity, I never got proficient enough to feel like I was learning anything. Maybe playing the game in one sitting makes for a more enjoyable experience.\nI can’t say that for my final pick, where you definitely feel the improvements as the game continues, and that’s in Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes ! A really fantastic idea for a game, we played a fair bit over Christmas with Steffi’s parents. Basically only one person can see the screen and has a bomb in front of them with various wires, buttons, batteries, symbols and the rest of it, and the other player(s) in the game have a manual of how that all fits together. The defuser has to explain exactly what they see in front of them, while the others have to work out what the defuser has to do, which wires to cut, which buttons to press etc. At the beginning you’re figuring out how to defuse a single module with loads of time, but gradually you get familiar with how they work and so the time starts ramping up, the number of mistakes you’re allowed is reduced, and we’ve got to the stage now where there are additional elements the defuser has to attend to to stop the thing going off. For a family game it was probably a bit too complex, and certainly gave Steffi’s parents headaches, but it actually helped in a way that the game is only in English, as some of the modules are designed to cause confusion in what information you give, but the homophones and potential misunderstandings are lost when you’re using German pronunciation. I guess Steffi and I will soldier on with the game as a twosome, but I may be roping in you guys to help when it gets really hard!\nI didn’t really play any stinkers this year, but the one thing that just doesn’t appeal to me in the slightest is this whole Battle Royale fad. I already wrote about that in another post , but whichever version we’re talking about, whether Fortnite, Blops IV or the shitty CS:GO version, I find the whole concept boring. The scale of those games is nice, the idea of large battles certainly appeals to me (and I always thought it’d be cool to have a big 100 vs 100 on something like Operation Flashpoint), but Battle Royale is more like a big game of hide and loot. I can’t be arsed opening boxes to find guns, especially not opening ten boxes to still have nothing more than a shitty pistol. I don’t get any real sense of achievement for killing someone, in comparison to say vanilla CS or Quake, so there really isn’t much left to appeal. The recent CS:GO version feels like a particular waste of time, we’ve won a few rounds on there and most of the time you’re still sporting a pistol with three bullets at the end. Just not my flavour at all.\nFinally, a game which I thought I’d take a look at and almost immediately gave up on for the sheer time-sink factor was Stardew Valley . I thought it might be a nice relaxing \u0026ldquo;farming sim\u0026rdquo; of types, but no, it’s an entire microcosm you could probably spend hundreds of hours in and still be none the wiser. I’m sure it’s amazing if you’ve the time to kill, but I don’t.\nA Year in Boardgaming Back to the analogue world and we spent about the same amount of time around the table as usual. Most of our gaming has been relatively light, though we did try out a few heavier games, including some real stinkers.\nFirst up has to be the Exit Games series I mentioned last year. I think we’ve now played all of these, at least all which aren’t ranked ’easy’, going through them with different people. For a short little adventure which takes about an hour to ninety minutes all in one small box, you really can’t knock them. The only couple of criticisms I would have is that you’re supposed to ’destroy’ the contents when you play it, which is totally unnecessary and really just serves to waste paper and force you to buy the game new. In fact we just photocopy the few things you’re supposed to cut up and then pass the games on to friends when we’re finished. The other is that the clues can get fairly samey, which is understandable enough, but even within the same game sometimes they rely too heavily on a certain mechanism.\nAnother light game, and this year’s Spiel des Jahres, was Azul . Dead simple to play, I’d say fairly similar to Splendor, it’s one you can break out with just about anyone and they’ll soon get a feel for it. I don’t think it’s particularly strategic, particularly with four players there seems to be a lot of randomness to the scoring, but for a quick starter or as a family game, I can’t knock it.\nIn terms of heavier titles, we got around to playing the two games I bought alongside Caverna last year. One of those was Goa , which felt a bit like a light version Puerto Rico. Instead of trading goods back to the Old World for points, you ship them back to upgrade your skills, and like most games of that ilk you always run out of turns before you can really achieve what you wanted. There’s also a nice auctioning phase at the beginning of each round to add some player interaction which is kinda missing from Puerto Rico.\nAnother heavy title is one currently ranked very highly at BGG and that’s Terraforming Mars . We only played it once, so we were kinda just getting familiar with the rules after the first playthrough, but I can certainly see the appeal. Most of the game is based around playing out unique cards, similar to something like Seasons, so it’s a lot about maximising your hand to get the most out of your cards, and each player is playing their own game to some extent. But what was particularly cool is that there are some basic parameters for Mars itself which the players can influence through their actions and which affect everyone equally, such as the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere. In order to play your card, you might need the oxygen content to rise to X, but if that happens, another player won’t be able to play card Y. Obviously that means you need to be familiar with what’s available in the deck to really plan your strategy well, but otherwise that meant it was a nice mix between complex solitaire and interactive strategy title.\nI think my favourite new game of the year was a surprising coop game our friends borrowed from the library called Magic Maze . Super simple, four players control four mice, directing them around a maze where they have to collect their weapons and get out of the labyrinth before the time runs out (if memory serves, maybe the goal was described differently). Every player can move every mouse at any time, the trick being however that the players can only move in one direction (e.g. only south, only north) and they cannot communicate! The maze itself is modular, being built up of smaller cards which add on as the mice explore the boundaries. The game then gets more complex as you work your way through the mazes, but that’s all there is to it in principle, and it’s surprisingly challenging and fun at the same time. Since the goal is almost always obvious, you don’t need to communicate (there are a few ’breaks’ where it’s allowed), but because you’re concentrating on four different mice, it’s easy to overlook the fact that everyone is waiting for you to move that one mouse one bastard square north!\nSadly, there were also a few tripe games this year. We went to our local little gaming convention again in winter and got a few things to the table, one being Sebastian Fitzek Safehouse . Having his name on the front (German thriller author) probably doubled the game’s price, because the game itself was pretty awful. It was like a cut-down and weak game of canasta against the clock, ostensibly you’re running through town being chased by a murderer and have to make it back to the safehouse before he does, and\u0026hellip; yawn. Totally forgettable.\nAnother which was disappointing but for other reasons was the other game I’d bought together with Caverna, called Naufragos (or Castaways). Basically it sounded like a neat coop survival game, the premise being similar to Robinson Crusoe et al, where you’re stranded on a desert island and have to work together to escape. Fair idea for a game, but the execution was just terrible. First of all, the rules were so badly written my copy came with a second revamped versiom, and even they were so incoherent I had watch a video online to work out how to set the damn game up. But I could overlook that if at least the game mechanics had been solid. The game was basically divided into two halves, one part was kinda organising, the second part adventuring. The large island was divided into three parts, and the idea was that by adventuring through the deck, you would progress from the beach, through the interior, to the uplands from where you could spot ships or planes and get rescued, something along those lines. But the adventure cards were 90% of the time either ’X happens to you’, or ’roll a dice, if you get a 6 X happens to you’. There was no way to actually plan ahead or make proper decisions, and sometimes you’d just find yourself rolling over and over again just to survive. And that was the ’exciting’ bit of the game! The bookkeeping part sounded all well and good, placing workers on the board to harvest food, build shelters, chop wood, tend to the campfire, all things which made sense for the theme and should’ve been fleshed out more. Unfortunately it basically meant that one/two people simply spent their entire time moving wood from the forest to the basket and from the basket to the building site/campfire, while the other players rolled their way through a deck of cards. Yay. Given the fact that I couldn’t follow the rules, I couldn’t even recommend it as a light family game, it was way too dense for that, yet far too boring for adults.\nBut the most pathetic game of the year goes hands down to T.I.M.E. Stories ! I am seriously at a loss as to how this game can be currently ranked 60th on BGG. We’d seen the name a few times and heard a few things about it, so when a colleague at work sold his copy, I thought it’d be worth a whirl. I suppose you could call the game a ’system’, where each mission is a deck of cards which uses the basic components of the game. There is no real board per se, but rather you travel back in time, taking on the bodies of four ’hosts’ in the past, each with their own special abilities/traits, and then explore a location to find whatever it is you’re supposed to fix. In the mission in the main game, you’re back in a French asylum in the early twentieth century investigating the disappearance of some patients. We’d read the one major criticism, that you generally fail on your first attempt(s) and have to start again and go through the same steps, but that didn’t sound that bad until we actually had to do it ourselves. Honestly, the entire concept of the game seems to be that you’re to work your way through each location through trial and error, finding out what you’re supposed to do in what order. That’s it. There’s no logic to your choices, no way of knowing or even guessing beforehand whether what you’re doing is correct, you just plough on through and find out which cards you need to look at, which rooms to visit and what to ignore. Boring as sin! There was one fairly decent puzzle in our mission, but even that we failed to crack because we just didn’t expect there to be anything like that as the rest of the game had been so asinine. And at full price it would’ve cost something like €50 for ONE adventure! Each expansion costs another €25 or something daft, so in comparison to one of those Exit games mentioned above, it just doesn’t bear even the slightest comparison. Obviously a lot of people have found something enjoyable about this title, or it wouldn’t be ranked so highly, but for me it felt like a waste of time and money, and I’m only glad I didn’t pay full price for it!\nA Year in Cinema After last year’s pitiful 16 films, this year’s haul of 47 films looks very healthy indeed. Steffi and I have made Tuesdays our film night, and we take turns choosing a title to watch. She’s a big Marvel fan, so we’ve gobbled up most of that series so far.\nJust to pick some of the highlights, we saw Frost/Nixon earlier in the year, about the interviews between David Frost and Richard Nixon following his resignation and withdrawal from public life. Obviously a pretty slow film, and with a fair amount of dramatic leniency, it was still really interesting to watch and the two main actors did an awesome job, especially in trying to mimic their ways of speaking.\nWe had a bit of a drug-themed season with both Requiem for a Dream and Trainspotting , both really cool films for different reasons. Requiem is pretty hard-hitting, but beautifully put together cinematographically, its acts divided into different seasons with a chilling soundtrack, I loved how it explored the nature of drug abuse and addiction from different perspectives. Trainspotting is obviously an entirely different kettle of fish. I saw it years ago, and it scores high on the nostalgia points for the fantastic soundtrack, but it has a much more up-beat vibe than Requiem while still being a pretty dire portrayal of the dangers of addiction.\nSticking on the serious side, I watched Zodiac for research purposes, the Fincher film about the Zodiac killer in California, one of those uncaught serial murderers of which America has so many. The fact that the resolution to this story is known from the outset is what made it interesting to watch from my perspective, how to build suspense and tension when the information is already out in the open. I only felt the film was a bit on the long side, since it covers the case from three different perspectives over a period of several decades.\nA Man for All Seasons is a 60s film which has I think been on my \u0026ldquo;to watch\u0026rdquo; list since Dr Holland mentioned it in an English class. Basically about Thomas More and his inability to accept Henry VIII’s divorce on account of his religious conviction, it’s an excellent period drama with some awesome performances, showing its clear theatrical origins. A slow watch, but very enjoyable.\nSlightly more tongue-in-cheek, we also watched They Live this year, an 80s Carpenter sci-fi thriller about aliens who have infiltrated society and the down-and-out hobo who saves the world. It’s suitably cliched to be something of a bubble-gum film, but there are a few scenes which really make the film memorably stand out. Definitely worth a watch if you haven’t seen it before.\nThe major disappointment of the year was hands down the 2012 Total Recall remake. I’m a big fan of the original, and I have nothing against a remake adding a new twist to the story or bringing something fresh, or even just a straight remake of the original movie with a few fresh ideas. But no, they managed none of the above. They rewrote the story but placed it in a world even more absurd than the original, taking the over-the-top characters and trying to play them seriously, and yet somehow even less convincingly. It’s not really Total Recall, and it doesn’t try hard enough to be something new either, so about the only moments in the film which end up being enjoyable are those which directly cite the original (e.g. three-breasted prostitutes and exploding head masks).\nBut Total Recall gets points for at least trying. Scraping the bottom of the barrel was Four Brothers , a film which had me muttering \u0026ldquo;fucking Americans\u0026rdquo; under my breath for about two hours. Loud, stupid, unrealistic, violent, vigilantist bullshit. Somewhat akin to Pain \u0026amp; Gain , I guess this is one Benno would enjoy!\nA Year in Books I managed to munch through another 45 books this year, roughly on a par with previous years for number of pages. One theme recently seems to be an interest in Roman history, with two of my favourites being I, Claudius and Memoirs of Hadrian , two extremely well researched and fascinating books written from the perspectives of the two emperors, the first as a kind of history of the Julio-Claudians, the second in the form of a letter to Marcus Aurelius. Both are fairly dense to read, not exactly page-turners, but very rewarding.\nSlightly more exciting perhaps was Master and Commander , the first book in Patrick O’Briain’s nautical series which was turned into the film with Russel Crowe. It’s often compared to the Sharpe series in terms of being a series of multiple books on an English hero in the Napoleonic Wars, but judging from this first volume that’s pretty much where the comparison ends. Based on historical events, the book goes into some nauseating detail about ship’s rigging and the like, which leaves your head spinning if you’re trying to follow along, but otherwise it was a highly enjoyable read and is probably a rewarding series.\nIn terms of non-fiction, I’ve read a fairly eclectic mix again, though a couple are worth mentioning. The Selfish Gene is one of those classics of evolution which seems just as important to read today as on its publication in 1976, looking at evolution from the perspective of the gene rather than the organism. It’s the kind of thing that is barely even touched on in schools but really deserves more consideration. I’m currently reading The Righteous Mind which is more about moral psychology, but interestingly covers some of the same topics from the angle of the group.\nAnother random read, but one which pleasantly surprised me, was Wesley: The Story of a Remarkable Owl , recommended to me I believe because I read Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? last year . Basically this short memoir is the story of an owl taken in by the author, and their relationship together over the course of nearly two decades. The author turns from surrogate mother to life partner for the owl, and becomes a mass murderer of mice for good measure in the process. While not scientifically written, there are tons of fascinating titbits and anecdotes, along with touching observational insights.\nA weird book I read this year was The Shortest History of Germany . One of Steffi’s colleagues leant it to her to hear her opinion, but she didn’t have any time so I gobbled it down one weekend. While there’s nothing particularly surprising about what you’d find in there, it’s seriously amazing how twisted the agenda is inside. Basically he puts forward the theory that any time Germany’s east gets the upper hand, things go awry. Everything west of the Elbe is okay, between Elbe and Rhine suitably westernised under Roman influence, but everything else is danger zone. That’s where the Prussians came from, the Nazis, the Stasi and now the AfD. Maybe an interesting gedankenexperiment for some folks, but it seems odd coming in a book with such an innocuous title. Maybe the author’s just a raging Catholic, I can’t tell.\nMy worst book of the year however has to go to The Infinities . Not sure where I got the recommendation, but I wish I knew so I could block them in future! The plot sounded interesting enough – a man lies at death’s door when his family flock around him, as do the Greek gods, the perfect setup for some antics and mischief – but basically nothing at all happens of any consequence. I ploughed through it because it’s short enough my frustration was never bigger than my ambition for finishing it, but the taste in my mouth never got any sweeter. I guess Banville is one of those writers who are praised for their elegant prose by other thumb-sucking navel-gazers but who remain beyond comprehension for ordinary folks. And to be honest I didn’t even find his writing worthy of a letter home.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/12/31/2018-in-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was-the-Year","RelPermalink":"/tags/that-was-the-year/"}],"title":"2018 in Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/categories/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"A German-British dual national changed her name by deed poll to give herself the name Silia Valentina Mariella Gräfin von Fürstenstein. Armed with a passport and presumably enough ancillary documentation to cosh an elephant (or at least a German bureaucrat), the woman attempted to have her decision acknowledged back in Germany. She was rebuffed, however, on the grounds that the surname contained an aristocratic moniker, and this decision has now been upheld by the German Federal Court .\nIn Germany, even marginally unusual names can be a difficult prospect at times, decisions by the European courts occasionally drag the country into the past. Double-barrelled surnames are of particular contention, although some ten years ago the European Court of Justice indicated that Germany cannot reject the names of fellow Europeans as accepted in their country of birth.\nInterestingly then, it seems the same doesn’t hold true for persons attempting to game the system by changing their names abroad. The court’s refusal to acknowledge Frau Gräfin von Fürstenstein’s name draws on a law dating from the Weimar Republic which, in the name of equality, abolished noble titles, at once turning them into regular surnames and preventing their being awarded in future.\nSo quite why it should be a problem for such surnames to be invented, rather than awarded, defies all logic. Surely acting in such a way is entirely counter to the whole purpose of the law. If your precious countess is no longer a countess, but no one else can call themselves countess, then that title becomes special again. If you really want to wipe out the nobility, then there’s no better weapon than the disdain of ubiquity. Florian König is no more a king than a flower, and I’m sure the courts wouldn’t have raised any objections had the fair lady changed her name to Silia König. But to call herself a countess? The cheek!\nAlthough Silia would have recourse to defer the matter to the European Court, it would unlikely provide any succour in this instance, as Peter Mark Emanuel Graf von Wolffersdorff Freiherr von Bogendorff previously discovered. The German state’s sworn aim to provide equality for all German citizens before the law would apparently be endangered by allowing a pleb to change their name to look like it were an aristocratic title. This honourable goal, enshrined in Article 109 of the Weimar constitution , is fast approaching its hundredth anniversary. Using that as an excuse to prevent little people changing their names screams of hypocrisy writ large. If the alleged goal is to burn down the palace of prestige, couldn’t we find some more effective methods than matches? A compromise that lasts a century isn’t conciliatory, it’s a full-blown concession. In comparison, just over the border in Austria, the same noble goal was managed at a stroke by having all noble titles expunged. That decision has seen support at the level of the European Courts even today when trying to ‘import’ noble titles from Germany.\nMore than a century on and Germany is still ostensibly waiting for its noble titles to go extinct , while the courts effectively defend their right to be worn and not to be diluted. If we’re really to put an end to the stigma of nobility, Germany needs to progress beyond the compromises of a century ago and offer something recognisably approaching equality before the law. The law claims to be blind, but behind closed doors it seems it still wears a monocle.\n[Photo by Cederic X on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/12/30/a-pleb-by-any-other-name/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Germany","RelPermalink":"/tags/germany/"},{"LinkTitle":"Law","RelPermalink":"/tags/law/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nobility","RelPermalink":"/tags/nobility/"}],"title":"A Pleb by Any Other Name"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nGood faith, bad faith and no faith in reasoning – With the world seemingly going mad and history tending to repeat itself, this post on the dangers of offering debate to the intolerant.\nPoliticians are people too! – This tweet is a wonderful reminder of how politicians can wonderfully embody their principles.\nMap of quotation marks in European languages – Probably one of the more versatile punctuation marks in European written languages.\n15 Images That Show Why Letter-Spacing is Important – Learning kerning: sometimes a second pair of eyes can go a long way!\n[Photo by Jordan McGee on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/11/19/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Debate","RelPermalink":"/tags/debate/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Punctuation","RelPermalink":"/tags/punctuation/"},{"LinkTitle":"Twitter","RelPermalink":"/tags/twitter/"},{"LinkTitle":"Typography","RelPermalink":"/tags/typography/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/categories/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"}],"content":"Back in the UK for a while watching the Brexit bullshit slowly roll from one stagnant puddle to the next, occasionally spattered by the shrill wailing tweetarrhia from Trump’s cot, it’s sometimes tempting to imagine we are really all lying inert, plugged into machines while hackers play pong on the Matrix. Is there an infectious disease going around causing collective cerebral atrophy? Maybe a race of bodysnatchers seeding the populace with cretins wondering how long it will take us to twig? Or are we just watching the unfolding of H. L. Mencken’s prophecy and the glorious consummation of democracy and technology?\nPolitics isn’t normally something I bother writing about, but occasionally peering into the quagmire every few months and seeing the same revolving vortex of bullshit is as maddening as trying to thread a needle with no arms. I need to vent.\nWhat Brexit Means As Danny Dyer so succinctly put it , no one knows what Brexit means. It isn’t quite the riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma as Churchill once referred to the Soviets, even though it’s entirely possible those selfsame Russian national interests are the key. But it isn’t surprising given the fact that the referendum on the subject was more of a gesture than a manoeuvre .\nFor me, the issue is simple: Brexit is backwards. Look to the future, and what world do we want to see? A world governed by sensible values, humanity living in harmony with itself and its environment, where equality is more or less a reality rather than a buzzword and people are free to live their lives with equal opportunities yadda yadda. Wait for the bile to go down, but that’s an essential hope and dream that we find embodied in any image of the future. I’m no trekkie, but I don’t recall there being a footnote for sovereign island rights under the United Federation of Planets.\nNation states were a nice stepping stone to an organised society, but they must shrivel to the fake sound of progress and become a vestige of the past. Brexit is the childish fear of change embellished by the subcutanean jingoism that riddles the British psyche and is perpetuated by its education system. Splendid isolationist Britain went it alone before, it can do it again. None of that kowtowing to unelected Brussels, we have our own laughably undemocratic philistines to obey. Take back control, give our sovereignty back to someone else!\nIt’s here that several points of view conflate. Who voted for Brexit? There are obviously a few core groups. By far the largest I would maintain is made up by the Thickies, Brexit’s rank and file. Before you start, yes, there’s a whiff of condescension on your retinas. These are people who lose out during every economic hiccough, and have done significantly badly since the last singularly spectacular singultus . Meanwhile they devour mendacious tabloid headlines and have neither the time, the inclination nor the wherewithal to really inform themselves. For them, the EU bogeyman is responsible for all the woes that could fairly be placed at the British government’s feet.\nWere it not for that amorphous mass of malleable mammothrepts, Project Brexit would never have gotten off the ground. But useful idiots can easily be manipulated into nayvoting, rallied by the Reactionaries and roused by the Cynics. The former are the classic Tories of yore, the true believers still sore about the ’45, who genuinely believe that the ‘great’ in Great Britain is synonymous with ‘excellent’ rather than ‘large’. The latter are harder to distinguish, except that they couldn’t care less about the political outcome, as long as their hunger for self-importance is slaked. Economically they’ll do just fine thank you very much; in fact the greater the upheaval, the better the opportunities.\nWhat the People Want The soup is rather clouded by the cynicism in the recipe. The Brexit referendum was advisory, but is being treated as a binding mandate; the people most directly affected by the decision – EU nationals in Britain, as well as many British nationals in the EU – were excluded from the vote; the result was not statistically significant. The classic argument from the hardliners is that whatever deal is proposed or muted, it’s not ‘what the people want’. Which is just a petulant way of saying it’s not ‘what I want’. Otherwise such paragons of democracy couldn’t give two figs for what ‘the people’ want. Assisted dying? The legalisation of cannabis? A reformed House of Lords? More money for the NHS? Nuclear disarmament? No, no, no, ‘the people’ don’t know their own minds! But backing out on Brexit would be a betrayal.\nWe’re told Brexit is all about money and sovereignty. £350 million per week which could be spent on the NHS, if it weren’t for foreign intervention. To say nothing of £900 million per week spent at the behest of Brussels… oh wait, that’s NATO’s 2% guideline. Brexiteer politicians remain curiously silent when it comes to fawning to demands from another organisation with its headquarters in the Belgian capital. Hell, Britain’s about one of the only sodding states to pull its weight on that particular demand. Presumably because the table-bashing comes indirectly from Washington and is only routed through Brussels? Gotta keep that special relationship sweet, or sugar daddy might start looking elsewhere.\nWhat the People Will Get Ever so occasionally I’m lured into believing, however briefly, that May is playing a delicious sleight of political grandmastery, a glorious symphony of subterfuge to bring Project Brexit crashing back to the status quo. Or it may be that May be taking an even longer look at history than Braudel , and hoping to see Britain reapply for membership under normalised terms. Then I remember her professional career and realise I’m daydreaming. And so is she.\nBrexit will not be a disaster. It’ll bring plenty of setbacks and hardships, cause difficulties and unnecessary stress for millions of people, flow tears as businesses go belly-up and families are faced with extremely hard decisions. But it won’t be a disaster. Like the linear model of radiation poisoning, the few million microsieverts from the Brexit fallout will seed plenty of cancerous harm throughout the population, but the seismograph will barely waver. When London’s streets are packed with protesters on 20 October , nothing will change except that perhaps another generation will be disillusioned with our sham democracy.\nBrexit is liable to end without a deal. Britain will spend some years catching up to where it was, while with any luck the rest of the EU just bloody gets on with it . The aftershocks in Britain may cause some fault lines to crack, with Scotland, Northern Ireland and Gibraltar likely candidates for a realignment. Some years ago I’d have burned the big fish in the SNP at the stake for high treason; now I’d be willing to fund their next kickstarter for independence. And then burn them.\nWhat the People Deserve The Brexit beans are out of the tin now, and tensions are too high to solve it without sparks flying. While many just want it to be over, the shadow is likely to hang over the nation for a while whatever happens. Perhaps the die-hards can all be rounded up and sent somewhere to settle their differences. Naseby perhaps?\nOtherwise it’s time to move the democratic experiment up a notch. When more than 60 million people can cast their votes for an unelectable dunce, people are clearly crying out for an end to the suffering suffrage. Voting rights should be limited to the likes of th’X-Factor and Britain’s Got Talent. Before that, Britain’s political landscape could use some topiary work. We should find the time machine Jacob Reese’s Moggie fell into and send him back to the early 18th century where he belongs. Boris John’s son should be reverse expatriated and forced to resume his Americanhood. Meanwhile Theresa Mayday should be given a brain and a conscience and sent on a package holiday to a place with lots of cornfields so she can let her hair down.\nBut enough ranting, it’s a waste of good vitriol. I’ve some naturalisation papers to fill out.\n[Photo by Sara Kurfeß on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/10/13/brexit-bullshit/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Brexit","RelPermalink":"/tags/brexit/"},{"LinkTitle":"Eu","RelPermalink":"/tags/eu/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/tags/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"}],"title":"Brexit Bullshit"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nWhat If English Were Phonetically Consistent? – Seriously impressive little piece of Thespian skill, almost like going through the English fossil record.\nThe Rogue Consultant – One man fed up with Brexit has decided to say it loud. One van, 32 countries, 30,000 km, two words.\nAuditorium – A playful mix of colour and music all packaged in a little Flash game.\nBadger or Bulbasaur – have children lost touch with nature? – Young children are now more capable at identifying Pokémon than real animals.\n[Photo by Hans Veth on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/09/19/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Brexit","RelPermalink":"/tags/brexit/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/tags/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"Flash-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/flash-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/language/"},{"LinkTitle":"Pokemon","RelPermalink":"/tags/pokemon/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"}],"content":"Watching Stefan Raab punch the air with a full-blown Yank whoop and vainglorious ‘Yes!’, it’s easy to forget for a second that this is RTL. At least until he loses the subsequent round, punctuated with a fat Teutonic ‘NEIN!’\nGerman is a sad language. To express moments of joy, Germans prefer to fall back on English. People stand around singing ‘Häppi Bersday’, send one another cards congratulating them when ‘It’s a boy!’, drive off from the church to the clatter of cans and a creamy white ‘Just married’ in the rear windscreen. But only the native language is good enough for the morose. Surveying the greetings cards, there are no English options for sharing your Beileid or showing your Anteilnahme.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/09/15/german-melancholy/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"}],"title":"German Melancholy"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Pet-Hates","RelPermalink":"/categories/pet-hates/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"}],"content":"Yesterday, I failed a human test. Quarter of an hour clicking on random pictures trying to prove I’m flesh and blood to a machine. But the sad thing is: a machine would’ve done a better job.\nCaptcha Issue We were unable to validate you using our CAPTCHA service, which we use to prevent automated purchases. If this is the first time you have seen this message, please hit the back button and try your purchase again.\nI don’t know how many attempts it took me until I stumbled across the combination they were looking for. The challenges were straightforward enough; something any human could do, surely? Except when you’ve failed for the third time, you start to wonder just how distinct the answer really is. Like identifying store fronts. For one thing, that’s a shop for me. It’d be helpful if the Yankee-Doodle-McNumpties could localise their bloody products! For another, what really constitutes a shop front? That colourfully pixelated image could be a market stall, an advertising banner or indeed a flower shop for all I can tell. And where does one draw the line? Does the hairdresser’s count as a shop? How about a funeral director’s?\nAnd then there are the street signs. What exactly is one of those? For me, a street sign is one with a named road on it; anything else would be a road sign. Logically. Ignoring those doesn’t work, so maybe they should be included. But how far do you go? Do those pixels in the next box count? Does the edge of the sign? Does the post? What about that sign in Japanese? It could be an advert for free beeswax for all know. And that grey triangle is clearly the back of a road sign. Include it or no?\nEven something as mundane as identifying roads left me scratching my head. I clicked whenever I saw tarmac, but apparently there’s more to roads than just the road itself. But then including every picture with a road sign didn’t seem to help either, and if we’re going to that extent, virtually all the horizontal landscape shots they show will probably have some kind of road component to it.\nAfter a tiring quarter of an hour clicking through picture after picture, I finally lucked out and was verified as a human being (with some severe cyborg tendencies, it would appear). If I hadn’t been trying to donate, I’d probably have given up much sooner. Life’s too short for jumping through electronic hoops. Now where can I find an automated captcha script?\n[Photo by Austin Chan on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/08/07/captchivating-or-why-im-doubting-my-humanity/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Captcha","RelPermalink":"/tags/captcha/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"}],"title":"Captchivating, or Why I’m Doubting My Humanity"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nThe Innovation Station – A miscellany of videos on a wide variety of innovative topics, ranging from 3D printing to virtual reality.\nGender Shifts in American Baby Names – An interesting study of the gender flips some names undergo over the generations. Would be interesting to see if patterns can be found in the shifts, maybe tendencies for certain underlying phonetic elements to shift in gender?\nDeep Sea Fish – The stuff of nightmares? Photos of some catches from the depths of the Arctic circle. [Deu/Rus]\nUltimate P2P Backup Software – If I knew my arse from my elbow, this’d be one of those projects I’d love to tackle in my spare time. I used CrashPlan until recently, and finding a replacement backup solution has been something of a nightmare. Anyone volunteering to please write this?\nGank, To Steal – Interesting chat about the verb ‘to gank’ on A Way with Words. Only ever previously heard it in a MOBA context, it seems it has a much earlier meaning (as seen in hip-hop ).\n[Photo by David Clode on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/07/14/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Backup","RelPermalink":"/tags/backup/"},{"LinkTitle":"Etymology","RelPermalink":"/tags/etymology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fishing","RelPermalink":"/tags/fishing/"},{"LinkTitle":"Innovation","RelPermalink":"/tags/innovation/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/linguistics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Software","RelPermalink":"/tags/software/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/categories/photography/"}],"content":"Up until now I’ve been using Olympus’ handy little Android app (OI.Share ) to create a GPS log for photos taken when going walkabout. It’s easy to hook the device up to the camera afterwards via WiFi and automatically tag any photos taken during that time.\nAs idiot-proof as that is, the logs remain useless for anything else. The app ignores any videos taken, and there’s no straightforward way to tag photos taken by another camera. Fortunately, the solution is simple enough. You can grab the log file (i.e. ‘share’ it via one of many services) and use the converter available at GPS Visualizer to transform it into a more widely-supported GPX format.\nThanks to hambier for sharing this information (although sadly not in Lëtzebuergesch!)\n[Photo by Rosie Kerr on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/05/21/converting-olympus-share-gps-logs/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Gps","RelPermalink":"/tags/gps/"},{"LinkTitle":"Gpx","RelPermalink":"/tags/gpx/"},{"LinkTitle":"Olympus","RelPermalink":"/tags/olympus/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"}],"title":"Converting Olympus Share GPS Logs"},{"categories":[],"content":"About this website This privacy policy pertains to the personal blog located at: https://www.amindatplay.eu .\nPersonal data Comments When visitors leave comments on the site, we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.\nAn anonymised string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available here: https://automattic.com/privacy/ . Once your comment has been approved, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.\nMedia If you upload images to the website, you should avoid uploading images with embedded location data (EXIF GPS) included. Visitors to the website can download and extract any location data from images on the website.\nContact forms Cookies If you leave a comment on our site you may opt-in to saving your name, email address and website in cookies. These are for your convenience so that you do not have to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies will last for one year.\nIf you have an account and you log in to this site, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. 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Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.\nThese websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.\nHow long we retain your data If you leave a comment, the comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so we can recognise and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue.\nFor users that register on our website (if any), we also store the personal information they provide in their user profile. All users can see, edit, or delete their personal information at any time (except they cannot change their username). Website administrators can also see and edit that information.\nWhat rights you have over your data If you have an account on this site, or have left comments, you can request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided to us. You can also request that we erase any personal data we hold about you. This does not include any data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.\nWhere we send your data We collect information about visitors who comment on Sites that use our Akismet anti-spam service. The information we collect depends on how the User sets up Akismet for the Site, but typically includes the commenter\u0026rsquo;s IP address, user agent, referrer, and Site URL (along with other information directly provided by the commenter such as their name, username, email address, and the comment itself).\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/privacy-policy/","tags":[],"title":"Privacy Policy"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" What happens when we are no longer able to recognise objects, but there’s nothing wrong with our ability to see? When we lose our sense of self and no longer feel the body we’re in? When the concept of ‘leftness’ is severed from our reality?\nOliver Sacks describes cases involving all these issues and more in a classic survey of ‘losses’ and ‘excesses’ in the human brain. The patients are a fascinating array of characters each suffering from such unusual problems that the symptoms seem almost comical. The eponymous man who failed to identify his wife’s head suffered from a form of visual agnosia , leaving him incapable of identifying objects, although his visual acuity was not impaired. Another sufferer had lost all ability to form new memories, and indeed was stuck at some point in his past, incapable of progressing past that point.\nIn a similar vein to Phantoms in the Brain, these eye-opening cases teach us much about the inner workings of the brain, they also encourage reflection on what it really means to be human, how our sense of self and perception is far more illusory than we really feel comfortable believing, and how little we really understand about how our cranial chemical factories really work.\nIf there’s one major detraction from this book in my eyes, it’s probably the fact that it’s written in English. The neglect the language has been shown by science leaves it so singularly pathetic at describing medical issues that we’re left with a gobbledegook of foreign words, even where Sacks tries to make the subject digestible for the average reader. Proprioception , for example, is a fascinating concept, and one so familiar to all of us that it’s amazing we don’t instinctively expect it to belong to that elite club of five senses , yet you won’t find me slipping the word into casual conversation any day soon.\nOn a side note, his descriptions of aphasia rather reminded me of my own feelings when learning a foreign language; that severe headache caused when trying to ram an idea down a set of neural pathways far too small to accommodate it.\n[Photo by Jens Kreuter on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/05/08/the-man-who-mistook-his-wifes-head-for-a-hat/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Biology","RelPermalink":"/tags/biology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Neuroscience","RelPermalink":"/tags/neuroscience/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science","RelPermalink":"/tags/science/"}],"title":"The Man Who Mistook His Wife’s Head for a Hat"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"https://vimeo.com/259989412 ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/05/05/arena/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Google-Earth","RelPermalink":"/tags/google-earth/"},{"LinkTitle":"Urbanisation","RelPermalink":"/tags/urbanisation/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"}],"title":"Arena"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nWikipedia’s Lamest Edit Wars – An infographic looking at some of the pettiest squabbles on the interwebs.\nMeet Tabarnia – What better way to mute a secessionist movement than to secede from the secessionists? When’s the next Scottish independence vote again?\nFilm Dialogue – An interesting analysis of dialogue in 2,000 Hollywood productions. Guess what, men talk a lot.\nMuseum of Endangered Sounds – Where old sounds go to dissipate. A wonderful collection of noises from the not-too-distant past.\n2 Kinds of People – They say there are 10 kinds of people in this world. This minimalist Tumblr blog explores the differences.\n[Photo by Tiago Gerken on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/04/28/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Big-Data","RelPermalink":"/tags/big-data/"},{"LinkTitle":"Catalonia","RelPermalink":"/tags/catalonia/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cinema","RelPermalink":"/tags/cinema/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/tags/technology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wikipedia","RelPermalink":"/tags/wikipedia/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":"Maths is a powerful tool, but in the wrong hands it can be pointless at best, dangerous at worst. Unfortunately, most human beings are a wrong pair of hands. We weren’t designed for handling numbers of any complexity, and tend to be out of our depths once they go beyond single digits. But a basic knowledge of numbers makes us overconfident and keen to interpret figures and statistics we don’t really understand as if they were cold hard facts. You only need to watch someone trying to work out which packet of washing powder presents the better deal when the supermarkets add a few percentages to the labels, or our reactions to opinion polls or the latest cancer-scare headlines.\nWhich makes books like this important, at least superficially. Ellenberg covers a lot of ground, explaining various ideas and highlighting common fallacies and paradoxes caused by our general weak understanding of basic statistics. He uses some excellent real-life examples to highlight what the numbers can teach us, but also what they can hide. Like how someone tasked with studying how to improve aircraft survivability in the Second World War realised that they were only analysing the bullet holes on the planes which made it back; the answer to this survivability bias was to increase armour to the places the raw data wasn’t showing them.\nAnother case in point is the classic disease afflicting the scientific community, that focus on statistical significance (and the Whorfian perversion of calling it significance at all). Papers tend to be published when they prove a point; negative science, for all its benefit, doesn’t enjoy the same kudos. Which fact alone means that many statistical outliers get published where the overwhelming unpublishable results tend to indicate the opposite. And that’s before taking into account how the researchers massage their results to hit the threshold of significance. After all, a few small tweaks here and fortuitous rounding decisions there can make all the difference for publication.\nAside from headline-grabbing scientific papers, Ellenberg uses other real-world examples to highlight his points. A large amount of space is taken up with the risks of playing state lotteries or the pitfalls of various electoral systems. Yet despite numerous practical applications, it remains a difficult book to recommend. For all its interesting asides, the title is just too schizophrenic to ever come to any real conclusions. Often it’s as if the author got carried away guiding the reader into some favoured corner of the mathematical jungle, only to forget why he ever led us there in the first place. Certain ideas are explained in fairly pedantic fashion, taking it a few steps further than even this particular pleb needed to grasp the concept. Other times it’s as if the target group has switched and the details become more turgid and difficult to follow.\n[Photo by Roman Mager on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/03/31/how-not-to-be-wrong-the-power-of-mathematical-thinking/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Mathematics","RelPermalink":"/tags/mathematics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"How Not to Be Wrong: The Power of Mathematical Thinking"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Doubtless recommended to me because I enjoyed Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? by Frans de Waal, this story was at first somewhat disappointing in the sense that it is to a greater extent a personal memoir rather than an investigation of animal intelligence. I had been expecting a heavier, more science-laden account of their relationship, but once I’d adjusted to the style and tone of the book, I found plenty here to enjoy.\nIn the mid-80s, Stacey O’Brien took it upon herself to adopt a young barn owl and started what became a relationship lasting nearly two decades. She packs a lot in this short and compact volume about their life together, which is filled with anecdotes and fascinating titbits, as well as a fair few fundamentals of owl biology and psychology. Stacey progresses from surrogate mother to partner for life and mass mouse murderer for good measure. While not offering the scientific rigour of a book like de Waal’s, there is still plenty of observational evidence. Aside from which it’s a touching story, with a predictable end, but one which offers a fascinating insight into the nature of owls and the intelligence and individuality of animals.\n[Photo by Doug Swinson on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/03/26/wesley-the-story-of-a-remarkable-owl/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Animals","RelPermalink":"/tags/animals/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Wesley: The Story of a Remarkable Owl"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"}],"content":"One and a half years and two tins of paint over budget, the Bremain campaign’s battle bus gets under way.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/02/22/bremain-battle-bus/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Brexit","RelPermalink":"/tags/brexit/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"}],"title":"Bremain Battle Bus"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"Over the years I’ve run through a number of plugins on this blog, many just for fun, adding non-essential little features for giggles or purely for show. Often the plugins run their course within a few years, going through a period of rising popularity with improvements, additions and occasional feature bloat, before ultimately overwhelming the poor one-man development band who subsequently goes silent and drops all support for their once pet project. Sometimes the functionality is superseded by happenings elsewhere – another plugin, an external service offering their own widgets, added functionality in the core – but othertimes the plugin just slumbers by the wayside and it falls to the community to pick up the pieces and carry on the torch.\nSo it is with the demise of the latest multilingual plugin. I’m honestly unsure how many different plugins I’ve used over the years, but certainly watched the demise of Polyglot, Language Switcher, qTranslate and most recently qTranslate-X . A new champion has started up a project to continue the crusade, but I honestly don’t have the energy or enthusiasm to mount up and join. For a blog with a readership slightly smaller than its authorship, it hardly warrants the effort.\nThe current plugin, qTranslate-X, seems doomed to break with the integration of the Gutenberg editor at the latest, but as ever with any unsupported software, it will fall on its heels sooner or later, so I’m determined to deactivate it and return to a monolingual setup. That will mean cleaning a lot of SQL tables and perhaps duplicating some contents for a few posts, but long-term it’s an easier prospect than hunting for another horse to back and watching it flogged to death like all the others.\n[Photo by Lucas Gallone on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/01/27/return-to-monolingualism/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/language/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"Return to Monolingualism"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nBlack Mirror – A wonderful photo project with Deddeh Howard, highlighting the lack of racial diversity in major advertising campaigns.\n#MoreThanMean – Give a man a soapbox to stand on and a wall to hide behind and watch the torrents of abuse they sling. [Via Coding Horror ]\nBBC News – Something I apparently missed: now you need to visit your doctor to get a ‘fit note’ designating you unfit for work. Presumably in extreme cases you get an ‘alive certificate’ certifying that you’ve shuttled off your mortal coil?\n[Photo by Jesper Aggergaard on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/01/20/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cyber-Bullying","RelPermalink":"/tags/cyber-bullying/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Racism","RelPermalink":"/tags/racism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" What you need to know about humans is that they are dicks. And if you give them any power their dickness prevails over everything else.\nThat beautifully succinct phrase comes from a review on Good Reads and is an understandable frame of mind to find yourself in after reading this book. Reading it ten years after publication, it’s almost surreal how little has changed in the intervening period, how the wheels of progress continue to grind on the gears of conservatism. In Freedom Next Time John Pilger surveys the state of peoples suffering under the weight of ignorance, ill-will, apathy and condescension in various theatres of the world, turning the spotlight in turn on Palestine, India, Afghanistan, South Africa and the Chagos Islands.\nThe Chagos Islands is a pretty clear-cut test, and one which our western democratic system will likely fail miserably. In the dying days of empire, the British government swapped a conveniently located group of rocks in the Indian Ocean for a few bits of military hardware from the Americans. The people living there were forcibly evicted and will never be allowed to return to the place of their birth, never mind that their removal constitutes a crime against humanity. As Pilger attests, this buck will be passed back and forth, the Brits blaming the Yanks, the Yanks blaming the Brits, while the case is shuttled often enough through the courts until everyone affected by the travesty is tidily dead. Maybe in the middle of this century we’ll see an official apology to the victims’ descendants, similar to the likes given to victims of slavery and oppression elsewhere in the world. But the political establishment doesn’t give a rat’s arse, and those individual politicians who might are far too lightweight to go tilting at such windmills.\nAt least with the Chagos Islands, the case of moral virtue is clear and it is merely the duplicity of realpolitik which means that justice will never be served to the islanders. In covering Palestine, however, Pilger covers an area of the world which can only get worse until it gets better. The social equation underlying the political facts is a simple one, even if it remains unwritten: Jews \u0026gt; Arabs. Big mon Trump’s recent declaration of support for the occupying forces is just the latest embodiment of this, and indeed a rare case of someone being up front about reality. A two-state solution is a nice sound bite to be throwing around, the ‘peace process’ a wonderful phrase to pay lip-service to, but Palestine will presumably remain a problem zone until it is eventually eradicated, almost like Kosovo in reverse.\nThe more interesting chapters are also the less clear cut, more contestable issues, where Pilger investigates the lot of people left behind by political and economic change in South Africa and India. He points blame at the ANC for selling out the anti-apartheid movement and abandoning some of its core principles in cosying up to vested interests. However it’s hard to imagine how his occasional purported alternatives would have brought about more prosperity than the current situation. Similarly his chapter on India shines a beam to highlight the transparency of India’s booming economy, though the overall picture here is murkier than elsewhere, and there’s certainly been more positive change in this part of the world in the past decade than elsewhere, even if the problem of poverty remains a massively significant burden.\nObviously the style of this collection is journalistic and as such suffers from those usual pitfalls. Chapters are padded with random exemplary introductions, events highlighted which don’t necessarily have any bearing on the case at hand and indeed over time start to lose relevance and punch. But in particular, as Pilger has his agenda to pursue, the narrative isn’t drawn as broadly as it could be. Whilst happy interviewing the politicians and the victims of their policies, he does little to examine the opinions of the pillocks who put those politicians in power, which would have been of particular interest for example in the Palestinian conflict or the missed chances of the ANC.\nDespite its advancing age, Freedom Next Time remains a worthwhile read since the political situation in many of these regions has barely evolved. The basic working principle which Pilger highlights time and again is that simple human trait, where political representation fails to defend the rights and interests of the downtrodden, whether it be through ignorance, apathy or occasional sheer malice. The book greatly attests to the prevalence of dickness in human nature.\n[Photo by Ahmed Abu Hameeda on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2018/01/07/freedom-next-time/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Afghanistan","RelPermalink":"/tags/afghanistan/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Chagos-Islands","RelPermalink":"/tags/chagos-islands/"},{"LinkTitle":"India","RelPermalink":"/tags/india/"},{"LinkTitle":"Palestine","RelPermalink":"/tags/palestine/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reading","RelPermalink":"/tags/reading/"},{"LinkTitle":"South-Africa","RelPermalink":"/tags/south-africa/"}],"title":"Freedom Next Time"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was","RelPermalink":"/categories/that-was/"}],"content":"Why not make a habit? The forum hasn’t exactly seen much use over the past twelve months, but as there’s nowhere else I’d post this, following on from 2015 and 2016 , here’s a short wrap up of the past twelve months, of no particular interest to anyone!\nSummary Words translated: unknown\nPC games played: lots\nBest PC games: Mini Metro, Turmoil, Tropico 4, Tomb Raider, Call of Juarez: Gunslinger, Her Story\nWorst PC games: Cities: Skylines, Dustforce, Far Cry 2\nBoard games played: 91 plays (36 games)\nBest board games: Exit (series), Kneipenquiz, Saboteur\nWorst board games: The Resistance, 7 Wonders\nFilms watched: 16\nBest films: The African Doctor, Dune, Love Actually\nWorst films: Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Leaves of Grass, The Inbetweeners 2\nBooks read: 40\nBest books: A Walk in the Woods, The Gods Themselves, Freedom Next Time, Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?, The Great Dune Trilogy, There Was a Country\nWorst books: The Tipping Point, Me Talk Pretty One Day, How to be German in 50 Easy Steps\nCountries visited: UK\nA Year in Gaming It’s strange really that I feel like I didn’t play many games this year, yet I’m sure my hours wouldn’t bear that out. Aside from our usual Thursday night bashes, I’ve put what feels like hundreds of hours into Heroes of the Storm with Steffi, some weeks literally playing a few rounds every night, though maybe averaged out over the year it’s not that much. Still, in terms of trying to whittle through my backlog on Steam I haven’t been particularly successful.\nHaving said that, my Steam list suggests I’ve hopped around quite a bit over these past twelve months. Certainly I played a fair few relaxing solo-player adventures. Mini Metro is one of those simple yet slick titles which is ostensibly easy but quickly ramps up the difficulty. All you need to do is build an underground network and get passengers to stations where they want to go. It doesn’t even matter which station per se, as long as the round peg goes in the round hole. It doesn’t quite satisfy me as a solid game of OpenTTD would, but for a quick ten minutes it’s fun trying the challenges.\nIn a similar vein I really enjoyed playing through Turmoil , which has a bit more scope in that there’s a campaign and more strategic planning about how you build up your oil business. More of a medium-weight title, there’s enough depth to sink several hours into, but after one playthrough I couldn’t really be faffed starting again on the harder difficulty.\nIt seems I did a fair bit of building this year, with Cities: Skylines and Tropico 4 also on the list. Skylines was a bit disappointing, at least with the base game I was playing with. It felt like I’d pretty much done everything there was to do after a few hours, and aside from setting up a new district and repeating the whole thing, there wasn’t much incentive to continue. Tropico on the other hand is nicely packaged up into specific scenarios which force you to play a certain way. Of course it’s just as repetitive in its own way, but having to tune your island paradise towards fat American tourists or greedy industrialists at least offers a different tack.\nWhen not building, I’ve tried to run through a few of the solo-player games on my list. Tomb Raider turned out to be an enjoyable surprise, just the right blend of action and puzzle elements, the feeling of open adventure without having too much space to get lost in, a wonderfully weird storyline, and about the right length to enjoy playing it through without getting bored.\nSurprise hits of the year? Call of Juarez Gunslinger doesn’t really count as a surprise, given as I’d really enjoyed Bound in Blood, but it’s a counterfactual pure action Wild Western romp, with barely a moment’s rest between gun fights, showdowns, wild chases and the like. I think it only took 6 hours but I ended up sticking around for the achievements, it was that much fun! Antichamber is a fantastic puzzle game, and one which I’d probably play more of if Steffi were interested as well. Unfortunately the puzzles are a bit too abstract for my meagre mind and I either got stuck or lost and ended up leaving it. But I’d recommend it nevertheless! Another neat surprise was Her Story , which is almost better described as an art project rather than a game. There’s nothing I can say about it without really spoiling the surprise, but the game will take probably only 3 hours to play, which is definitely worth the few pounds it costs if you enjoy adventure games or mysteries. (Side note: the recommendation came from watching Mark Brown, see below.) The final oddball I’ll mention was Party Hard , an ultraviolent 8-bit title in the vein of Hotline Miami, where the premise is essentially that you’re fed up of the kids making noise at the party, so you go in and MURDER EVERYONE! I played it as a two-player coop with Steffi and had an absolute riot, often just trying to work out what the hell we were doing.\nWorst games of the year? There wasn’t really anything which stuck out as being ‘bad’, though there were a few I gave up on quite quickly. Far Cry 2 just felt way too open, a game you could sink hours into without getting anywhere, and which didn’t grab me sufficiently from the start. I played a few missions and forgot about it. Dustforce I probably picked up for free somewhere or had in some bundle. A weird premise, it’s like a race platformer which you could probably sink hours into mastering the moves, but I really could not be fussed!\nA Year in Boardgaming Didn’t play quite as much this year as usual, a lot of those 100 plays including smaller lightweight titles. Probably the Exit games are the ones which stand out. We’ve played three now – The Secret Lab , The Pharaoh’s Tomb and Murder on the Orient Express – and each is an enjoyable few hours deciphering clues and working your way through the puzzles to the end. We messed up the first game a bit because we were unsure how we were supposed to approach the materials in the box and ended up being too cautious (not looking at things when we were allowed to), but the second was a real blast. The puzzles are nice and varied, some quite tricky and abstract, others you look at and can solve without really needing to think about them, but overall the difficulty was about right to keep you guessing and not frustrate anyone. There are clues for if you get stuck, and normally we only needed one hint to put us back on the right track, since sometimes you end up convinced you need to combine two elements in the box which have nothing to do with one another. I imagine we’ll pick up a couple more of these in the year to come, and even though you can only play them once, at about €10 a pop it’s a decent price for the fun you get out of it.\nAnother game we’ve played a fair few times with different people is a pub quiz coop called Kneipenquiz . Essentially you form one team and play against three other imaginary teams through 5 rounds of 5 general knowledge questions. Aside from answering questions, you have to judge which ones you’ve answered correctly and make sure you earn the most points from them (or alternatively, that your opponents earn the least), meaning that even if you only get about half of them right, you can still sneak victory. Makes a nice alternative to the standard every-man-for-himself trivia games, though I don’t know if they’ll make an English version.\nWe didn’t play much in the way of standard Eurogames/strategy games this year, at least nothing new. I’d picked up a cheap copy of Caverna and got that to the table a couple of times, and Space Alert remains a regular favourite with our group. We managed to get a 6-player game of Battlestar Galactica going at long last, and although it was a fun evening, it again didn’t really deliver as it should’ve. One of the players deliberately half-pretended to be a Cylon just to keep the tension going, but otherwise it was completely obvious to him that there was only one Cylon in the game and that person had 0 chance of winning. Luck of the cards again, but I think the game sadly lacks a bit of depth to make it interesting enough beyond the traitor element (though theme and mechanics meld really well).\nBut the biggest disappointment of the year for me was our weekend in Scotland, when we seemed to be on one long treachery trip. One Night Ultimate Werewolf is a fun enough game, the rounds are short enough that it doesn’t drag, there are enough roles that it doesn’t get stale, but I quite often found that with so many players, the villagers or werewolves had more chance of winning/losing through random luck than through clever deduction. The werewolf would argue themselves into a hole and get lynched, only for someone to have swapped their card at random and the new werewolves to surprisingly find they’d won. Enjoyable, but just a bit dissatisfying to vote to kill the werewolf as a villager, and discover you’re actually a werewolf who’d got away with it.\nStill, that game was 100 times better than The Resistance . I’ve been itching to play that game for a few years (and even own an unplayed copy here!) having read the reviews, but the actual experience, at least with those rules and that number of people, just felt like an exercise in frustrating pointlessness. I imagined it would be a cross between Werewolf and Mastermind, with traitors waiting to be unmasked by the voting, but in the end it felt as random as hell and way more about talking trash than really finding spies.\nSaboteur on the other hand was a positive surprise and one where the mechanic worked really well. Certainly there was a decent amount of luck involved with the way the cards fell, but there was usually chance for the Saboteurs to do a bit of damage or at least keep people guessing without it being too obvious. Even when revealed, there’s still some tactics in how to use up the remaining cards. I think the game is perfect with five players, which helped with my first impressions, since it keeps open the number of Saboteurs present in the round. With four players it’s far too easy to lock the one Saboteur down once they’ve been revealed.\nA Year in Cinema My film list looks even bleaker than usual this year, with just 16 films (and most of them watched in Scotland!) Probably the favourite on the list was The African Doctor , a fairly touching story of a black doctor trying to integrate himself and his family in a rural French village. Comedic ups and downs, its also quite poignant without being overtly depressing.\nAnother was probably Dune , which I only watched because I was reading the trilogy. I’d watched some or maybe all of it once before as a child, but too young at the time to understand any of it. It’s a crazy story, and Lynch’s film version is a fantastic rendition, even if it can’t quite capture the sheer epic drama and depth of the novels and made a few strange choices in what was changed for the film (the ending in particular is really off the wall).\nThe two worst films on the list are at different ends of the spectrum. The Inbetweeners 2 was one I caught while in Scotland and frankly as puerile as they come. Reminded me of that dreadful Kevin and Perry Go Large for pure/poor toilet humour. At the other end of the spectrum was Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi , which again just took away from the amazement I held for the original trilogy. To my mind, it’s as if they took a recipe book for making a successful film and followed it step by step. I’ve no doubt it will rake in millions at the box office, but in my eyes it was a soulless slog which added nothing to the Star Wars saga (and rather took more away) and only continued where the previous films left off on their quest to hoover up the dollars.\nPerhaps the last film worth mentioning though is one of those annual favourites: Love Actually . We watched it in German this time for Steffi’s parents’ benefit, but it was a reminder of what you can do with a decent story. Yeah, a cheap and cheesy feel-good film, but the screenplay is nicely interwoven. Just quality.\nOne of the reasons we haven’t watched many films this year is probably for watching more telly. Nothing particularly exciting, aside from Steffi becoming a Doctor Who addict the only notable series we’ve watched was Broadchurch . I’m not normally a fan of series as they usually drag their plots out too thin, but the saving grace here is that it isn’t too long. The acting is great, they pack a lot of drama into a small space, and the biggest disappointment is probably when it’s over. We gobbled up the first series which I’d heartily recommend, the second isn’t too bad though I probably wouldn’t go out of my way to watch it. Steffi got the third for Christmas, so I guess that’s our televisual viewing for January covered!\nA Year in Books What I haven’t been consuming through flickering images I made up for through the written word this year, again reading over 11,000 pages. Since we’d been walking a fair bit this summer, I decided to re-read A Walk in the Woods . I love Bryson’s writing style, and this is one of his finest, laugh-out-loud funny, occasionally informative, even slightly inspiring given the epic undertaking he sets out on, recounting his efforts to walk the Appalachian Trail with an old school friend. I’d like to think I might achieve something similar one day!\nSticking with non-fiction but a rather more depressing read was Chinua Achebe’s memoir of the Biafran War, There Was a Country , an intelligent look back at one of those gruelling episodes of history so sadly invisible in the western conscience.\nMore recently I finally got around to reading Freedom Next Time by John Pilger. Published back in 2007 and looking at injustices in places like Palestine, the Chagos Islands and post-Apartheid South Africa, it’s amazing how relevant it remains a decade down the road. So much obviously broken while the wheels of change grind on the gears of conservatism. The chapter on Palestine seems almost prescient in light of big yin Trump’s decision to recognise Israel’s occupation of Jerusalem.\nIn a less political vein, I read Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? by Frans de Waal. Basically a summary of the previous decades’ study of animal cognition, it’s also fascinating as an anthropological study of the hubris of humankind, the constant battle against the raw egocentrical arrogance of the human condition. Highly recommended.\nIn fiction it seems that my favourites of the year were all science fiction. The aforementioned Dune is a stonking work which well deserves its place at the top of many people’s lists. I didn’t care much for the first sequel, the second was fairly interesting again, but the sheer scale and attention to detail well warrants this universe’s comparison to the likes of Lord of the Rings. I wouldn’t say it was a favourite, but I’ve got nothing but respect for it.\nMore of a guilty pleasure perhaps, but the other 5-star sci-fi romp this year was The Gods Themselves . Asimov had such a fertile mind and such prodigious output, even if his writing style wouldn’t win any beauty awards. The background in this case is an exploration of interactions between parallel universes simply sparked by someone mentioning an isotope that couldn’t physically exist in our universe. From that he managed to extrapolate an exciting little novel which contains more interesting ideas than some writers manage in a lifetime. It’s almost the antithesis of Herbert’s writing, but it scratches entirely different neurons for me.\nThere weren’t any serious stinkers on my reading list this year, but a few disappointments. The Tipping Point is one of those popular sociology books which hits the top of the bestsellers lists for its entirely unwarranted buzz. I hate the journalistic style which pads out a simple idea into a book, a book which is nevertheless brief and devoid of serious content. There are a few interesting titbits here, but all in all I’d prefer to read the brief summary (or just the blurb!) and have done with it. Nor has it particularly aged well, being published in 2001 before the virality of the internet really fledged.\nAnother book which didn’t meet expectations was Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris. I’ve no idea how this ended up on my Amazon wishlist (I should really add notes as to where they come from!) but after probably a decade I finally got around to getting a copy and reading it. And it’s… meh. Allegedly humorous, I found the author to be fairly obnoxious and decidedly unfunny in the vast majority of the essays in this little collection. Only at the end does it pick up a bit, when he moves to France and starts trying to find his feet in a new country with a new language, probably because it’s something I can somewhat relate to.\nThe final book in the “non-recommendation” pile isn’t so much there because it’s bad but because I could probably do better if I weren’t such a lazy bastard! How to be German in 50 Easy Steps is one of those light-hearted Michael-takers, a bit like the Xenophobes’ guides but nowhere near as polished. Seriously nowhere near. There’s plenty to giggle about, particularly as someone living here, or even for someone just interesting in different cultures, but the episodes in each chapter are way too short and leave a permanent sense of missed potential. I’m sure I couldn’t do better really, but the overall effect is poor enough that it gives me the feeling I could.\n*A Year in casts A new rubric for this year, though it isn’t new to my schedule, and those are just a few of those ‘subscriptions’ that have kept me going over the year. Podcasts, YouTube feeds, bloggers and whathaveyou.\nI’ve started actually subscribing to channels on YouTube rather than always searching for stuff I want to watch manually, which means I actually end up watching a fair amount of trash while making pancakes on a Sunday morning. CinemaSins is always a blast when covering films I’ve seen, I dunno how long it takes them to produce an episode but it’s beautifully condensed into about 15 minutes of succinct critique. He’s totally on my wavelength about so many things. For gaming I have a few feeds, but one which I really enjoy is a series by Mark Brown on game design. His Game Maker’s Toolkit takes apart game mechanics and looks at how intelligent design can really make or break a game, from the tiny annoyances that interrupt the immersion, to the subtle and cunning tactics designers employ to get players to play the game the ‘right’ way. Seriously well worth watching if that at all interests you.\nIn terms of audio, I’ve been devouring two podcasts in particular. One going under the curious title No Such Thing As A Fish is related to the QI TV series. It’s basically a show run by the ‘elves’ who find out all those crazy facts that are covered on the show. The main crew are a delightful bunch and both their banter and the mad things they discover make it a seriously entertaining listen. The other podcast I’ve been listening to is Revolutions by Mike Duncan. I listened to his History of Rome series last year on my walks to the tram, and although I’m not quite as gripped by the subject of his new series, I enjoy his narrative style (and am so used to his voice by now!) that it fills a nice gap in my listening schedule! Only history buffs need apply here though.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/12/31/2017-in-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was-the-Year","RelPermalink":"/tags/that-was-the-year/"}],"title":"2017 in Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Films","RelPermalink":"/categories/films/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" I’m clearly getting too old for blockbusters. Seriously, I walk out the cinema wondering what it was the scriptwriters wanted to show me in their cobbled together action flick, and search in vain among the sea of beaming faces for someone who shares my lack of enthusiasm. ‘It was entertaining,’ is what most of them defensively tell me, usually suffixed with ‘but I’m not a Star Wars fan,’ presumably when I don’t respond the same way, as if fearing I’ll proceed to bombard them under a geeky tirade of lore and canon.\nGranted, I was a fan of the original trilogy which I devoured in my youth, but I wouldn’t rank myself among the Empire’s legions of loyal nerds. And while some of my annoyance with The Last Jedi certainly based around how it interacted with what we know of the existing universe, mostly I was disappointed with the film in and of itself. Just because you’re not a fan of the series, does that mean you don’t care about watching a flimsy script? Can you enjoy this flick more if you don’t watch any of the previous outings? Or do I just need to learn to disengage my brain before entering the cinema?\nWarning: spoilers ahead!\nI wasn’t a fan of the previous episode. Far too many parallels with A New Hope, far too many far-fetched plot points and chance encounters, far too many overt crowd-pleasers. In my eyes, The Force Awakens was like the original trilogy on steroids, everything was bigger, better and ultimately faster than everything which went before it, all wrapped up in a storyline that didn’t only seem unnecessary, but entirely inexplicable. Despite the obligatory rolling credit introduction, I was left as clueless after walking out of that film as when I walked in. To all intents and purposes, The Force Awakens was like a series reboot with everything set to hard mode. Aside from the few interesting new characters introduced, the whole the film fell flat with me.\nFast forward a few years and the next episode is out of the stable doors. The overarching story remains as illogical as ever, but the problems with The Last Jedi are even greater in that the film doesn’t seem to have anything to tell us. That’s largely embodied in the opening volley of scenes which sets up the backdrop for the film. The rebels or resistance or whatever it is they’re calling themselves now – I gave up trying to follow any semblance of logical politics in the previous film – escape from yet another base just in the nick of time, with almost certain annihilation waiting in the skies above them. Apparently the ability to bombard the planet falls on a special Dreadnought ship, which is conveniently destroyed in the ensuing conflict (we’ll need this later!). Its destruction comes down to a bit of insubordination from rising star Poe (we’ll need this later!) who orders an attack using, err, bombers.((Seemingly defenceless lumbering hulks which issue explosives from a bombing bay which wouldn’t look all too out of place in a WWII drama and seem to have no problems ‘dropping’ things in space.)) Fortunately, to keep us on the edge of our seats, the mission almost goes belly up were it not for some last-minute self-sacrificial heroics from the final survivor of the bomber wing (we’ll need this later!).\nSo much of what follows seems like an exercise in pointlessness except when viewed through the prism of the scriptwriters’ checklist. The rebel fleet is pursued through hyperspace only to find itself running out of fuel and unwilling to jump again (previously on Battlestar Galactica…). Fortunately, Finn bumps into the dead bomber pilot’s sister who works out in a flash what secret technology is in play and how to stop it (deus ex machine room). Meanwhile Vice Admiral Holdo gives Poe good reason to continue his insubordinate streak by deliberately pretending to be doing nothing about the dire situation, allowing him to send the other two off on a wild goose chase. And the destruction of that Dreadnought in the opener forces the First Order to repeat the Hoth landing in the finale, launching a land assault against a knock-off Helm’s Deep in a salt crystal desert. Poe’s earlier insubordination gives him room for some character development when he later calls off the suicidal attack against said landing party.\nThe scriptwriters have littered enough of Chekov’s pistols throughout this script to fill a small arsenal. Knowledge about technology which shouldn’t exist gives Finn and Rose a random mission to accomplish and occupy a bit of screen time. Their docile mission is only pepped up by them getting a parking ticket, which apparently is sufficient offence to lock them up and bother initiating some hare-brained helicopter chase when they break out of prison. Although it comes to naught, the situation is sufficiently contrived to allow Rose to show her dedication to the cause and give up her medallion, and Finn has an opportunity to take on Captain Phasma for a little grudge match. Those scenes could’ve wound up on the cutting room floor just as easily, and the film wouldn’t have been any the poorer for it.\nUnfortunately the absence of meaning to the film leaves the characters treading water for lack of purpose. General Hux is relegated to comic relief as the very angry henchman™, who wouldn’t look out of place in an Austin Powers film. Supreme Leader Snoke fulfils his mission of bringing Rey and emolord Kylo together before snuffing it in a scene which suggests the authors don’t even care about the characters they’re creating. Meanwhile the scriptwriters missed a trick for killing off Princess Leia after jettisoning her into space, only to have her finally use the Force and rescue herself. Presumably she’ll have to succumb to her ordeal before the next episode, unless the CGI lobby is particularly vocal.\nOr how about Holdo? What purpose does she serve apart from being a foil for Poe’s character development? Her saying nothing provides the excuse for half of the action in the film. Even her demise is one of the most heavily regurgitated tropes, straight from the recipe book. When all others evacuate the ship, she stays behind on the bridge to ‘pilot’ the cruiser. Which makes bugger all sense, but, you know, drama. Unsurprisingly, when the time comes for her big sacrificial moment, we see her stood on the bridge twiddling her thumbs before she turns the cruiser around and hyperspaces it through the pursuing enemy fleet. How convenient! It’s a dramatic scene, a great idea, but surely if that were possible it would’ve been weaponised decades ago?\nWhich brings me to a personal peev, but just what’s going on with the physics? Dropping bombs in space? Laser beams which dip like artillery? Massive steel doors protecting a base built into a brittle salt mine? Even the entire fleet chase around which this film is built doesn’t stand up to any kind of logical scrutiny. Why is the fleet running out of fuel when it isn’t doing anything? Why can’t the Imperial First Order’s fleet catch up to inert objects in space? But who needs Newtonian physics when you can have ships dramatically tilt after running out of fuel? And what’s surprising about tracking a ship through hyperspace? Isn’t that what happens in A New Hope? Aren’t they holding a tracking beacon for Rey? That would surely be their first suspicion when followed, rather than assuming some newfangled technology has been developed.\nSure, there’s nostalgia and pink goggles clouding my judgement of the original trilogy. There’s plenty to detract from the fantastic reputation those films earned, including clunky dialogue, nonsense science, cheesy plot devices and Ewoks. But the story Lucas told in those films was tightly constructed and worthy of telling. The latest incarnations don’t seem to know where they’re heading or what to do with the passengers on board. Kill ’em off, send ’em round in circles, does anyone really care? The whole situation portrayed begs far more questions than it can ever answer. By now I’ve given up trying to find any answers. But no doubt I’ll be here again in twelve months complaining about the next encounter, because of the few things we can be certain about, The Last Jedi won’t be The Last Star Wars Film.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/12/31/star-wars-viii-the-last-jedi/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Star-Wars","RelPermalink":"/tags/star-wars/"}],"title":"Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" Steve Jobs is not a monster. He is an all-American maverick and a world-class marketing genius. But until a man or woman as powerful as he is arrives at Apple (over his dead body), who is determined to break the cycle he has indulged in for so many years, Apple will remain merely an icon of awe. It will not become a company of the size that truly could (and should) “bury” monsters like IBM.\nFelix Dennis, How to Get Rich\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/09/21/the-jobs-effect/","tags":[],"title":"The Jobs Effect"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/categories/photography/"}],"content":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQ _IQS3VKjA\nGorgeous short video of an inspiring ride in a beautiful part of the world, backed with the delicious sounds of Martyn Bennett’s Blackbird.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/08/21/the-ridge/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Isle-of-Skye","RelPermalink":"/tags/isle-of-skye/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Scotland","RelPermalink":"/tags/scotland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"The Ridge"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":"Some years ago (last decade! ) I decided to do a brief round-up of some recent reads. Sadly I don’t find make the time to gather my thoughts and sum up my opinions, so in no particular order, I thought I’d write a few words on some of the books that have graced my bedside table over the past few weeks.\nRound Ireland with a Fridge by Tony Hawks In essence, this is the story of what happens when you put your money where your mouth is, even when your mouth is currently being fuelled by the wrong kind of babble-juice. Tony Hawks found himself challenged at a party that his oft-regaled anecdote of seeing someone hitchhiking with a fridge in Ireland was pigswill. In the morning, a note beside his bed seemed evidence that he’d taken up a £100 bet that he could do the same, circumnavigating the emerald isle with a home appliance.\nWhat follows is a quirky adventure blending English stoicism and the Irish devotion to the craic, replete with fridge surfing, radio DJs, island kings and a night in the doghouse, all culminating in a triumphal march through the capital celebrating the pointlessness of it all. For anyone enjoying Irish sensibilities, there are plenty of amusing moments along the way. Ultimately a very pointless little book, but entertaining nonetheless.\nThe Great Dune Trilogy by Frank Herbert A handful of words aren’t enough to do justice to Dune, let alone its two sequels Dune Messiah and Children of Dune. The first novel in particular is something of an operatic masterpiece, which despite such a depth and richness of ideas never bogs down as something like the oft-compared Lord of the Rings clearly does. Where other series focus on the science or the fiction, Dune creates an entire mythology, replete with political system, religion and technology.\nI’ll be honest, reading all three novels back-to-back was something of a stretch, particularly as the second doesn’t live up anywhere near the expectations harboured following the operatic majesty of the first. Dune M__essiah has something of a marmite effect on the fans. Fortunately the final volume in the original trilogy returns to better form, adding more sweeping strokes to Herbert’s epic canvas, without dawdling too much on the details. Definitely well worth reading the first if you’re a fan of (science) fiction in depth. Despite the few tweaks, David Lynch’s film captures the general tenor of this vision beautifully.\nThe Lady Vanishes \u0026amp; The Spiral Staircase by Ethel Lina White A pleasant surprise with two short novels in one slender volume. It’s something of a shame that they are both published here under the names of the films they inspired rather than the books as they were written (The Lady Vanishes was originally entitled The Wheel Spins; The Spiral Staircase as Some Must Watch). The Lady Vanishes is rather overshadowed by the films and has a somewhat slow pace, which probably isn’t helped by knowing the story in advance. It’s almost a pity that this novel gets first billing, since the lesser-known The Spiral Staircase is the stronger of the two in my view. An atmospheric setting, strong characterisation, the gradually building suspense – the comparisons with Agatha Christie are unsurprising and genuinely well deserved.\nBoth of these thrillers deliver some classic 1930s suspense and mystery, and while the films probably outshine the novels on which they are based, as a light diversion for fans of mystery and skulduggery, you could do far worse.\nAre We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? by Frans de Waal ‘They’re very intelligent animals.’ There’s a platitude I’ll never tire of hearing.\nIn this relatively short but accessible volume, primatologist Frans de Waal takes us on a tour through the world of animal intelligence, or at least the study of it. He points out how human beings, so obsessed with their own navels, are wont to move the goalposts any time some semblance of anthropomorphic intelligence is found in animal test subjects. ‘Animals aren’t intelligent because they can’t something’ is always true as long as something remains. They can’t use tools, talk, empathise, plan ahead, show regret, recognise their reflections, deceive. Each time some evidence appears which suggests the contrary, human exceptionalism comes up with the next new something to define the experience of the human condition.\nAside from the proselytising, de Waal rightly highlights the difficulties of any kind of study in this area. Human beings have an extremely difficult challenge in designing tests for non-human subjects to measure non-human capacities. That is the real question written on the cover, though it sometimes gets lost amidst the examples and de Waal’s broadsides against those in the behaviourist camp. Nevertheless, at its core it presents an interesting conundrum. The book could’ve done with some streamlining, but as a piece of popular science it offers an excellent introduction to the subject.\n[Photo by Karim Ghantous on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/08/19/reading-roundup/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ethel-Lina-White","RelPermalink":"/tags/ethel-lina-white/"},{"LinkTitle":"Frank-Herbert","RelPermalink":"/tags/frank-herbert/"},{"LinkTitle":"Frans-De-Waal","RelPermalink":"/tags/frans-de-waal/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reading","RelPermalink":"/tags/reading/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Tony-Hawks","RelPermalink":"/tags/tony-hawks/"}],"title":"Reading Roundup"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nThe UK’s Brexit Options – Where’s Brexit heading? Always slightly on the periphery, there are plenty of options, neatly summed up in this infographic.\nA Million Squandered – One of those simplest of ideas you wish you’d came up with: take a simple website and make a million with it. The MillionDollarHomepage.com was a roaring success in 2005, but as link rot gradually sets in, what will remain of this snapshot of internet history? How long does ‘content’ really last?\nRoman Roads – Beautiful poster of the major Roman thoroughfares of circa 125 AD done in the style of a tube map.\nAstronaut.io – Unnamed, unedited, unseen. Spin YouTube’s wheel of fortune and take a random look at what the world is uploading. A simple idea but so very effective. Watch a little happiness.\n[Photo by Henry Be on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/08/13/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Brexit","RelPermalink":"/tags/brexit/"},{"LinkTitle":"Infographic","RelPermalink":"/tags/infographic/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/categories/translation/"}],"content":"Using memoQ to translate standard XLIFF (XML Localisation Interchange File Format) files can be made that bit more user friendly when you take advantage of the built-in feature to use XSLT transformations . Since I can’t get my head around namespaces, my simple transformation ended up strewn with unreadable references to local-name() nodes. As ever, there is an easier way.\nTake a standard XLIFF file along the lines of:\n\u0026lt;?xml version=\u0026#34;1.0\u0026#34; encoding=\u0026#34;UTF-8\u0026#34;?\u0026gt; \u0026lt;xliff version=\u0026#34;1.0\u0026#34; xmlns=\u0026#34;urn:oasis:names:tc:xliff:document:1.2\u0026#34;\u0026gt; \u0026lt;file source-language=\u0026#34;en\u0026#34; datatype=\u0026#34;plaintext\u0026#34; original=\u0026#34;Project\u0026#34;\u0026gt; \u0026lt;header/\u0026gt; \u0026lt;body\u0026gt; \u0026lt;trans-unit id=\u0026#34;string\u0026#34;\u0026gt; \u0026lt;source\u0026gt;This is the source content.\u0026lt;/source\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/trans-unit\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/body\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/file\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/xliff\u0026gt; We can identify the nodes in the source using standard XPath syntax having defined the namespaces in the header:\n\u0026lt;?xml version=\u0026#34;1.0\u0026#34; encoding=\u0026#34;UTF-8\u0026#34;?\u0026gt; \u0026lt;xsl:stylesheet version=\u0026#34;1.0\u0026#34; xmlns:xsl=\u0026#34;http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform\u0026#34; xmlns:xlf=\u0026#34;urn:oasis:names:tc:xliff:document:1.2\u0026#34; xmlns:xsi=\u0026#34;http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance\u0026#34; exclude-result-prefixes=\u0026#34;xsl xlf xsi\u0026#34; \u0026gt; \u0026lt;xsl:output method=\u0026#34;html\u0026#34; omit-xml-declaration=\u0026#34;yes\u0026#34; /\u0026gt; \u0026lt;xsl:template match=\u0026#34;/\u0026#34;\u0026gt; \u0026lt;xsl:text disable-output-escaping=\u0026#39;yes\u0026#39;\u0026gt;\u0026lt;!DOCTYPE html\u0026gt;\u0026lt;/xsl:text\u0026gt; \u0026lt;html xmlns=\u0026#34;http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml\u0026#34; xml:lang=\u0026#34;en\u0026#34;\u0026gt; \u0026lt;head\u0026gt; \u0026lt;link rel=\u0026#34;stylesheet\u0026#34; type=\u0026#34;text/css\u0026#34; href=\u0026#34;yourStyles.css\u0026#34; /\u0026gt; \u0026lt;title\u0026gt;XML Preview\u0026lt;/title\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/head\u0026gt; \u0026lt;body\u0026gt; \u0026lt;h1\u0026gt;\u0026lt;xsl:value-of select=\u0026#34;xlf:xliff/xlf:file/@original\u0026#34;/\u0026gt;\u0026lt;/h1\u0026gt; \u0026lt;xsl:for-each select=\u0026#34;xlf:xliff/xlf:file/xlf:body/xlf:trans-unit\u0026#34;\u0026gt; \u0026lt;div class=\u0026#34;id\u0026#34;\u0026gt;\u0026lt;xsl:value-of select=\u0026#34;@id\u0026#34;/\u0026gt;\u0026lt;/div\u0026gt; \u0026lt;div class=\u0026#34;content\u0026#34;\u0026gt;\u0026lt;xsl:value-of select=\u0026#34;xlf:source\u0026#34;/\u0026gt;\u0026lt;/div\u0026gt;\u0026lt;br\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/xsl:for-each\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/body\u0026gt;\u0026lt;br\u0026gt;\u0026lt;/html\u0026gt;\u0026lt;br\u0026gt;\u0026lt;/xsl:template\u0026gt;\u0026lt;br\u0026gt;\u0026lt;/xsl:stylesheet\u0026gt; This produces a basic, ugly but ultimately workable HTML file which memoQ can display in its preview pane:\n\u0026lt;!DOCTYPE html\u0026gt; \u0026lt;html xmlns=\u0026#34;http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml\u0026#34; xml:lang=\u0026#34;en\u0026#34;\u0026gt; \u0026lt;head\u0026gt; \u0026lt;link rel=\u0026#34;stylesheet\u0026#34; type=\u0026#34;text/css\u0026#34; href=\u0026#34;yourStyles.css\u0026#34;/\u0026gt; \u0026lt;title\u0026gt;XML Preview\u0026lt;/title\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/head\u0026gt; \u0026lt;body\u0026gt; \u0026lt;h1\u0026gt;messages\u0026lt;/h1\u0026gt; \u0026lt;div class=\u0026#34;id\u0026#34;\u0026gt;string\u0026lt;/div\u0026gt; \u0026lt;div class=\u0026#34;content\u0026#34;\u0026gt;This is the source content.\u0026lt;/div\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/body\u0026gt; \u0026lt;/html\u0026gt; Obviously you can add references to any other information available in your XLIFF files, and then serve and style up the resulting HTML in any desired shape or form, but this basic scaffolding might help someone out there avoid the namespace minefield I ran into!\n[Image courtesy of @emilep ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/05/03/memoq-and-xslt-fun-with-namespaces/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Memoq","RelPermalink":"/tags/memoq/"},{"LinkTitle":"Xliff","RelPermalink":"/tags/xliff/"},{"LinkTitle":"Xml","RelPermalink":"/tags/xml/"},{"LinkTitle":"Xpath","RelPermalink":"/tags/xpath/"},{"LinkTitle":"Xslt","RelPermalink":"/tags/xslt/"}],"title":"memoQ and XSLT: Fun with Namespaces"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/categories/translation/"}],"content":"memoQ has a handy little feature as part of its QA check which warns you whenever you double up a word in the target language. I’ve had it catch numerous little and ands and to tos which slip into my work on occasion. However certain combinations of doubled up words are fairly commonplace, which can lead to this feature producing lots of unnecessary false errors. A classic example in English might be two hads in a sentence like ‘I had had enough,’ but that pales in comparison to a language like French, which sees plenty of doubled up words in pronominal verbs (nous nous lavons, vous vous souvenez etc.)\nOne way to fix this is to make use of the relatively new regex feature built into the QA check . Untick the option to check for duplicate words in the target under the Consistency tab. Then under the Regex tab we can replicate this functionality, while including our own exception to the rule. Add a new rule of the type Forbidden regex match in target, give it a relevant description, and then add this target regex:\n(?i)(?![nv]ous\\b)(\\b\\S+\\b)\\s+\\b\\1\\b When active, this rule will continue to highlight any duplicate words in the translation, including all the usual punctuation marks, but ignores any occurrences of nous nous or vous vous. Obviously these exceptions at the front can be replaced with whatever is required in the target language. The rule isn’t by any means flawless, and will for example also complain about repeated sequences of numbers, but it can help to reduce the number of false positives without having to abandon the check altogether.\n[Photo by Ilya Pavlov on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/02/18/memoq-qa-check-tweak/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Memoq","RelPermalink":"/tags/memoq/"},{"LinkTitle":"Regex","RelPermalink":"/tags/regex/"},{"LinkTitle":"Software","RelPermalink":"/tags/software/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/tags/translation/"}],"title":"memoQ QA Check Tweak"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/categories/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Imperfection is part and parcel of how we communicate, and one of the beautiful things about the evolution of language is how little imperfections can create entirely new constructs, as words and phrases are misheard, misunderstood, misinterpreted and misstated. One of my favourite examples in this regard is the ‘mondegreen’, a term normally used to denote a misheard song lyric, although it originated with a line of poetry:\nYe Highlands and ye Lowlands, Oh, where hae ye been? They hae slain the Earl o’ Moray, And Lady Mondegreen.Percy’s Reliques of Ancient English Poetry The poor victim Lady Mondegreen was in fact Sylvia Wright’s interpretation of hearing the true line: And laid him on the green.\nHowever, aside from causing amusement and consternation , there’s only so much a misheard lyric can contribute to the language. But a word I came across today covers a much broader spectrum for when people mishear words and parse them through their own filters to make sense of the noise: eggcorns. The word itself has a cute origin: when you’re told for the first time that the egg-shaped seed in your hand is an ‘acorn’, thinking you heard ‘eggcorn’ seems a natural enough assumption.\nHere’s a great list of some of the more common eggcorns around. It’s particularly interesting when more archaic words end up being given a new lease of life, such as when talking about testing your metal, or transforming the Spanish cucaracha into the more familiar cockroach.\n[Image courtesy of Tamara Menzi @ unsplash.com ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/01/23/on-lady-mondegreens-eggcorns/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/tags/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/language/"}],"title":"On Lady Mondegreen’s Eggcorns"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"In the weird and wonderful world of words, which world of words is the weirdest? And if we replace ‘weird’ with ‘hard’, we find one of those eternal questions facing language learners: which language is more difficult?\nThe question usually ends up in a battle between disparate but well-known languages, compared on the basis of their obscure writing systems, difficult pronunciation, complicated grammar or unfamiliar structure. Tones, clicks and ideograms all play their part. Yet if reason prevails and alcohol levels don’t get too high, most arguments are settled on the reasonable assumption that the most difficult or weirdest language to learn is always that one which is most different from the one(s) you already speak. Knowing English, for instance, means you should have a much easier time of picking up a language of Germanic or Romance origin. Range a little further in the Indo-European family and things get a little trickier, but still far easier than tackling a language from a different group altogether.\nYet when considering which languages are weird, we are liable to approach the topic from an Anglophone and Western-centric standpoint. Riding the chargers of history into every corner of the globe, Indo-European languages exhibiting similar characteristics can be found on every continent in every hemisphere, spoken by billions of people, plus many more who can speak one as a second language. It’s on the basis of these pillars that many of us consider ‘normal’ the features found in these languages: they appear to be commonly held principles across a large number of different tongues spoken by huge swathes of the population.\nSo how does this all weigh up if we recalibrate the scales? The people at Idibon produced an interesting little study ((Since originally starting this post, the website has unfortunately died. I should probably learn to finish my draught posts a little sooner than two years.)) using the data stored in the World Atlas of Language Structures , which tracks 2,679 different languages according to an assortment of lingual features, including sound types and syntactical/grammatical structures. In total 192 topics are covered, ranging from the use of genders through to the order of words in a sentence, with many technical offerings in between. The group limited themselves to 21 features for which data was available for at least 100 languages, and eliminated correlative features which would have given undue weighting to particular features. Since the data in the WALS is relatively sparse, they limited their little report to 239 languages which could be compared using at least two-thirds of the selected features.\nThe interesting thing is just how far those common languages we take as being regular stand out from the crowd. German, Czech and Spanish all crop up in the 25 weirdest languages, with English appearing at number 33. What makes them so extraordinary? Two example features are used to highlight how unique many Indo-European languages are. Inverting subject and verb to form a question – ‘You are happy’ vs. ‘Are you happy?’ – is in fact a rarity, occurring in only 1.4% of languages surveyed (of the 955 languages covered , the vast majority use a form of question particle and only 13 use an altered word order. Similarly, having special subject pronouns present most of the time, as found in the Germanic languages, appears in only 82 of the 711 languages with data. At the opposite end of the scale, languages such as Basque, Cantonese, Turkish and Hindi all tally up as rather average, with Hindi being the most normal of the all (just one weird characteristic ).\nOf course, the survey has its limits, given the paucity of data in many areas, the fact that a majority of languages aren’t documented or covered by the survey, and even the very issue that the database chosen by its very nature reflects the interests and observations of speakers of Western languages. Nevertheless, it remains an interesting conclusion that English, despite its wide geographic spread and seeming ubiquity, is actually one of the weirder languages out there.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2017/01/11/language-weirdness/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/linguistics/"}],"title":"Language Weirdness"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was","RelPermalink":"/categories/that-was/"}],"content":"Twelve months down the line, I thought I’d post another year in review . Again, this post won’t be of any interest to anyone, but here’s a summary of some of the media I’ve consumed over the past year.\nSummary Words translated: 479,763 (plus 70,563 proofread)\nPC games played: lots\nBest PC games: Broforce, Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor, Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime, Door Kickers, SpeedRunners, Broken Sword 5\nWorst PC games: Lovely Planet, Evolve Stage 2\nBoard games played: 98 plays (45 games)\nBest board games: Splendor, One Night Ultimate Werewolf\nWorst board games: Nightfall, Isle of Skye: From Chieftain to King\nFilms watched: 44\nBest films: Calvary, Chef, The Artist, The Wrestler, Doom\nWorst films: RockNRolla, Iron Sky, Catch .44\nBooks read: 34\nBest books: The Blind Watchmaker, The Woman Who Walked Into Doors, Regeneration, Die vierzig Tage des Musa Dagh, The Martian, Keeper of the Nuclear Conscience: The Life and Work of Joseph Rotblat\nWorst books: Er ist wieder da, The Spire, Das Wetter vor 15 Jahren\nCountries visited: Austria, UK\nPhotos taken: 1373\nA Year in Gaming Another fairly docile year, at least as far as single-player gaming was concerned. I managed to play through Shadow of Mordor in spring, which had a really nice storyline and decent mechanics, even if I got a bit bored of running around towards the end. We also played through Broken Sword 5 which was a great return to form for the series, excellent story and interesting puzzles, without any pointless 3D models and awkward handling. More recently I’ve been running through Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime with Steffi, a cute little couch coop which has you piloting a ship through colourful space/underwater scenes to rescue bunnies… it’s a weird old setting alright, but it reminds me a teensie bit of FTL, just with two players. Hotseat the shields, engines and weapons to make it through safely!\nApart from that, most of my gaming action this year was reserved for our Thursday night sessions. Pretty amazing that we’ve kept it up for more than a year now, and I look forward to it every week just as ever. I’m also happy we’ve managed to try a nice range of titles. I think Broforce was probably the surprise highlight for me, suitably madcap, all the while challenging but without ever really being impossibly so.\nWorst games of the year then? As ever I picked up plenty of cheapos or got free copies of titles for various things. I sometimes try them out at the weekends and screen them for ones which might be a laugh on Thursdays. Occasionally you find something cute, like that SpeedRunners game. Other times I find single-player titles which you can while away an afternoon on, such as Door Kickers , a cute tactical point-and-click which reminded me of Frozen Synapse without being anywhere near as serious in the planning aspect. But one truly painful half hour I put myself through was for Lovely Planet . I’m not even sure you can really call it a game! More like someone’s end-of-year project in a CS class, put together over a weekend fuelled by caffeine and bad cartoons.\nPerhaps unfair, but I think the worst game we tried on a Thursday was still Evolve Stage 2 . As much as you want to love the concept of that title, the game is fundamentally flawed because of the very nature of a game revolving around hide-and-seek with Godzilla. I’m sure it would be a bit more fun if you knew the person you were trying to hunt down, but essentially most of your time is spent trying to avoid combat, which makes for a rather dull game. I know they based the game off the way people enjoyed the interaction between the Tank and the survivors in L4D, but they needed to keep the story-driven elements or the environment interaction of that game to give the players something to do.\nA Year in Boardgaming So how about gaming of the analogue variety? Managed to play 45 different titles this year across nearly a hundred plays. I think that says it all for how much time you spend playing any one particular game. Remember when we were kids and you’d spend all your time playing Monopoly any chance you got, because it was one of only three games anyone ever had? Now we’re completely spoilt for choice and barely end up giving any of them any table time. Bit of a shame really, since that means there’s no opportunity to really get to learn them and understand strategies with any depth. On the other hand, maybe that helps to hide some of the fundamental flaws I’m sure many of them feature.\nAnyway, we didn’t really try out any new heavy titles this year, rather sticking to lightweights. One great starter game we discovered was Splendor . Explained in 2 minutes, it’s nevertheless one which requires a fair amount of planning and watching what your opponents are doing if you want to do well. Certainly a nice opener for an evening. One in a similar vein which I found somewhat disappointing was Isle of Skye , winner of the Kennerspiel des Jahres. It’s a bit of a mongrel game, with Carcassonne-style tile-laying, auctions and modular scoring, but I didn’t really like the overall package. You can spend a lot of time trying to work out your strategy, but ultimately if your opponents want to drag you through the mud, there’s nothing you can do about it, and the four-player game to me seems rather broken. Maybe it works with 2 players, I can’t say.\nAnother game I wasn’t overly enamoured with, though I can see why it’s popular, is 7 Wonders . For me it offers strategy with a nice ramping effect, all wrapped in a quick quality package… and that’s exactly why I dislike it! We own one called Glory to Rome which to me is very similar, but actually genuinely allows you to plan ahead, rather than dangling on the end of an unknown hand of cards. 7 Wonders pretends to offer a lot in a quick burst, but it’s superficial in my eyes, and I’d rather have a serious game to ponder over, or a quick and quirky fun game rather than a mishmash of the two.\nThe last game I’ll mention is one I bought a number of years ago but which we only just got around to trying called Nightfall . It was sold to me as a kind of interactive Dominion with vampires and werewolves, but I found it to be dreadful, even worse than Dominion! The rules were fairly complex, although the gameplay was straightforward; there was potential for them to really use the theme, but it was entirely wasted and you ended up completely ignoring what was on the cards and just looking at the numbers; finally the sheer variety of cards meant we didn’t really have a clue what was going on half the time and just bought and played any old random thing. We gave it two strikes and I was frankly happy when it was back in the box!\nA Year in Cinema Didn’t get to the cinema much this year, only a few outdoor excursions and the company’s annual Christmas treat (for Rogue One ). But we currently have a Netflix account we’ve watched a few things over, and there are plenty of DVDs still waiting to be watched. Following on from last year’s The Guard , which I watched last year, Calvary was high up on the list of top films. Far grittier, meatier, and with some more surprising roles for certain actors, it was an oh-so-very Irish film, but highly recommendable.\nAnother great drama I can heartily recommend is The Wrestler with Mickey Rourke. There’s not much of a plot per se, just the story of an entertainer at the end of his career, but a really poignant tale extremely well told. It’s documentary style, without going as far as to be annoying, and well worth a watch. In a similar vein I thought Chef with/by/from Jon Favreau was really good, if slightly more pointless than The Wrestler.\nIn terms of more action-filled movies, I didn’t see much I would recommend. In fact I saw some real stinkers and most of the rest disappointed me in one way or another. Since Steffi’d never seen any Guy Ritchie, we tried out RockNRolla and were frankly bored to tears by the end of it. It just doesn’t hold a candle to Lock Stock and Snatch . I also got a chance to watch Iron Sky and was honestly underwhelmed by the film. The idea in and of itself wasn’t bad, but it ended up falling flat even as a farce in my eyes, with very few laughs to be had. But taking the biscuit for worst film was far and away Catch .44 . I’m still at a loss to explain how Forest Whittaker would take up a role for that script – although he gave a very good performance having said that! But otherwise the film had absolutely no redeeming features. It was like someone watched an early Tarrantino and thought it would be easy to copy. Inane storyline, terrible dialogue, pointless characters; it mostly came down to a bunch of criminals pointing guns at one another and using the eff word repeatedly. Yay.\nAs said, I managed to hit the cinema for the latest Star Wars instalment, and the Star Trek before that. Star Trek was a reasonable popcorn flick, but I was really disappointed with the story. It felt like the entire film was just an excuse to string together a few action sequences. Major kudos to Karl Urban though, his McCoy is almost as good as the real thing. Rogue One wasn’t quite as bad, probably better than Episode VII (which I watched again beforehand and thought even less about the second time round). There were a few decisions I felt were pretty stupid in terms of the overarching story, a fair number of cheesy crowdpleasers for the fans, but otherwise it was alright. Might write a post on that later if I can be bothered.\nMy surprise ‘hit’ of the year (despite it being a decade old) was probably Doom . I spotted it on Netflix and since I couldn’t find anything better, thought what the hell. I can honestly say I had zero expectations for this film, and it fulfilled all of them! The first hour or so they make up some fairly standard storyline about genetic manipulation, ancient alien civilisations and zombies. Then they just give up and admit they were only having a laugh, converting the film into a first-person shooter for the last quarter of an hour. Brilliant!\nA Year in Books I managed to trump this year’s target with over 11,000 pages read. A few highlights include: The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins, a classic exposition of evolution theory; The Woman Who Walked Into Doors by Roddy Doyle, a novel about domestic violence; Regeneration by Pat Barker, a brilliant story about the Great War poets, particularly Siegfried Sassoon; and The Martian , the self-published novel by Andy Weir that got turned into a Hollywood film. The story might be mundane, like Robinson Crusoe on Mars, but it’s definitely worth the read just for the amount of loving detail that went into writing it.\nOn the German side, I read through Die vierzig Tage des Musa Dagh , which quite frankly deserves way more attention than it gets. An epic tale of roughly historical events during the Armenian genocide, it was banned shortly after publication (by everyone’s favourite bogeymen) and is probably too long to enjoy widespread appeal, but in my eyes it deserves a place up there as one of the greatest novels in the German language.\nDas Wetter vor 15 Jahren gets a thumbs down from me, even if I found the concept itself pretty interesting. The whole book is written in the style of a journalistic interview with the author, just questions and answers as to the story’s motivations, developments and meanings over pages and pages. The amazing thing is that he still manages to make it a page-turner, despite there not actually being a novel to go with the interview! Nevertheless I find that kind of interview tedious and annoying to read at the best of times, so it was something of a chore to read through 200 odd pages of one. Far worse was Er is wieder da , a story about Hitler waking up alive and kicking in the present day and becoming a media celebrity. Apart from a few pages where we read Hitler’s views of the politicians who followed him, the satire in this book is mostly cheap, often tasteless, and quite frankly boring. German humour at its finest, sadly. Nevertheless it sold in droves and got turned into a film.\nFinally, one book I almost ended up abandoning despite being so short was William Golding’s The Spire . I remember someone having to study that for A-level and complaining how dull it was, but based on the other stuff I’ve read by him, I figured it couldn’t be all that bad, surely! No, it really is like pouring sticky treacle in your ear. Maybe I’m just too thick to understand it, but it really didn’t grab me at all.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2016/12/31/2016-in-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was-the-Year","RelPermalink":"/tags/that-was-the-year/"}],"title":"2016 in Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" What is it about the theory of evolution which makes it so difficult to comprehend? Why does it require a leap of faith for many people to understand? And why do they feel they need to believe in evolution in a way they never would with, say, gravity?\nHaving finally got around to reading The Blind Watchmaker this year, one remark really stuck in my mind, when Dawkins turned to describing the human experience in terms of units. The way we perceive the world around us is intrinsically bound to the way we encounter it. We consider time, for instance, within a fairly specific range. Once we go beyond that range, our natural, indeed evolutionary faculties are incapable of perceiving the world outside those bounds with any degree of accuracy. That’s not to say we hit a brick wall when we step beyond that range. We’re still perfectly capable of contemplating the meaning of extremely long or short timescales, for example. We can measure them, compare them, calculate them; we can analogise and use metaphors. But we are far from being able to really grok what they mean.\nTake things on the shorter end of the scale. Seconds are easily counted. We’re capable of working out how long a particular journey will take us, able to estimate how much faster it will be if we’re travelling by bicycle or car. But break the second down and it soon stretches into the theoretical. The speeding bullet or the flash of lightning travel far faster than our perception allows. Sometimes we can physically sense the difference, such as when a crack of lightning reaches our eyes before our ears, but beyond that, these events exist beyond our realm of experience.\nAt the other end of the spectrum, most of us find it difficult to measure things even in years. When did we move house? Was it three years ago, or four? When was that holiday to Cyprus? Five years ago? Six? We usually find little memory tricks to work out the answer, supporting our assumptions with unrelated facts (‘it was the year Jane started going to school… the Olympics were on in Beijing…’) Or we end up relying on physical evidence to corroborate the facts.\nWhere Dawkins really hits the nail is in how we view chance. With average lifespans under 100 years, we think relatively little of crossing roads, driving cars, climbing ladders or changing light bulbs. Accidents happen, people injure themselves and even lose their lives doing such mundane activities every day. But that only ever happens to other people. The risks are small; so small that we’re willing to take them on a daily basis. Experience teaches us the difference between perceptible and theoretical risk, the difference between the overt perils of grabbing a hot pan without oven gloves and the insidious hazards of an unhealthy diet.\nYet what would happen if we were to have natural lifespans in the hundreds of thousands or even millions of years? Those relatively slim chances of being fatally injured while crossing the road would suddenly have an entirely different dimension, given the number of times you do this in a lifetime. All of those otherwise hidden dangers, the risks we acknowledge without really understanding them, would become as clear to us as those overt dangers, since most people would come a cropper before reaching the natural limits of their lifespans.\nThe point is that our ability to contemplate unlikely events soon passes from the sensible to senseless. We grasp the chances of tossing heads, the likelihood of a rainy day in July. But beyond a certain limit, even the little sliver of rational thought in our minds gives way to thoughtless instinct. That one in a million chance becomes indistinguishable from impossible. A typical argument used against the theory of evolution runs along the lines that scientists have been trying to recreate the origins of life in the laboratory for decades. All their best efforts have been for nought, ergo that theory cannot possibly be true. Dozens of scientists in dozens of laboratories having been trying for dozens of years to reproduce an event that happened (at least) once across billions of planets in billions of solar systems over billions of years.\nThe numbers are staggeringly large, making them indistinguishable from impossible. And if not downright impossible, at least so perishingly unlikely that only with blind faith could you believe it to be true?\n[Photo by jesse orrico on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2016/12/25/the-blind-watchmaker/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Biology","RelPermalink":"/tags/biology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Evolution","RelPermalink":"/tags/evolution/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Richard-Dawkins","RelPermalink":"/tags/richard-dawkins/"}],"title":"The Blind Watchmaker"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/categories/photography/"}],"content":"Some pretty impressive stabilised photography at 300 knots.\nhttps://vimeo.com/162088181 ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2016/12/09/high-velocity-aerial-filming/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"}],"title":"High Velocity Aerial Filming"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"If only Europe had a magic shield… On second thoughts, perhaps it’s fortunate we can borrow the Americans’.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdFgd _Qyhdo\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2016/05/14/captain-europe/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Comedy","RelPermalink":"/tags/comedy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Parody","RelPermalink":"/tags/parody/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Captain Europe"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"A genius tune made all the more palatable with some fab animations. An anthem for the important things in life .\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2rfHYq2dSE ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2016/03/19/doc-brown-my-proper-tea/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Tea","RelPermalink":"/tags/tea/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Doc Brown – My Proper Tea"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"Nicely made video from an English comedian showing us just why can’t get on board with European greetings (and how to get around it!).\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-VWbV6TJxU ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2016/01/25/la-bise/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Comedy","RelPermalink":"/tags/comedy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Culture","RelPermalink":"/tags/culture/"},{"LinkTitle":"French","RelPermalink":"/tags/french/"},{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/language/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"La bise"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Over the past few weeks I’ve had a niggling suspicion that my machine was running slowly. Things felt a little sluggish, sites were less responsive, switching between applications took longer than usual. My machine was showing signs of ageing, despite its relative youth.\nThen I tried launching Heroes of the Storm , a game I hadn’t played for a few weeks and which had been updated in the meantime. After getting through the menus and starting a game, the performance gradually plummeted, with the frames per second dropping from around 20 at launch to just 1 when there were a few moving characters on screen at once.\nSince other games such as Counter-Strike: Global Offensive didn’t exhibit the same unplayable jerkiness, instead reacting rather more like the rest of my system in being generally lethargic, I assumed something in one of the patches had ruined my settings. After rooting around on the forums I found a variety of potential solutions, including running the 32-bit client, verifying the installation, reinstalling the game, reinstalling drivers, changing resolutions, running the game in windowed mode, forcing Nvidia’s hand in the control panel, and many more.\nIn reality, however, the problem had nothing to do with the game itself, but something had instead gone horribly wrong with my power management settings. Although I hadn’t touched them myself, somehow my CPU was stuck in first gear, being throttled down to 5% instead of dynamically altering to cope with the demands of the system at any particular time.\nThe solution on Windows 10, in case anyone should have the same problems, was simple:\nNavigate to the power options in the Control Panel (or for a shortcut, hit WIN + R and type powercfg.cpl). Verify that you’re using the default Balanced power plan. Click Change plan settings then Change advanced power settings. Scroll down the list to Processor power management and check the entry for Maximum processor state. Normally this should be set to 100%. If it isn’t, either do so manually, or if you haven’t otherwise changed anything about your power management settings, click Restore plan defaults. ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2016/01/24/cpu-throttling/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Troubleshooting","RelPermalink":"/tags/troubleshooting/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows-10","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows-10/"}],"title":"CPU Throttling"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was","RelPermalink":"/categories/that-was/"}],"content":"Statistics! They’re everywhere… and I seem to have collected a lot of my own. This post isn’t of any interest to anyone, but I just thought I’d write up what media I’ve been consuming over the past twelve months.\nSummary Words translated: 583,472 (plus over 122,017 proofread)\nPC games played: lots\nBest PC games: This War of Mine, Resonance, Sang-Froid, Heroes of the Storm\nWorst PC games: Kane \u0026amp; Lynch 2\nBoard games played: 92 plays (33 games)\nBest board games: Space Alert, Colt Express\nWorst board games: 100 Unique Places\nFilms watched: 38\nBest films: There Will Be Blood, The Guard, Up\nWorst films: Fantastic Four\nBooks read: 27\nBest books: The Better Angels of Our Nature, The God Delusion, The Inheritors\nWorst books: Billard um halb zehn, The Numerati: How They’ll Get My Number and Yours\nCountries visited: Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, Czech Republic, UK\nPhotos taken: 2614\nA Year in Gaming This year wasn’t particularly exciting for me in terms of gaming. Though I did get through a few coop titles, I didn’t really play any big games through on my own.\nThe start of the year saw a few weeks/months of playing through those Christmassy coop bargains, some better than others. ORION: Prelude was a fun little dinosaur survival game, with short waves of increasingly difficult dinos to defend your base against. It was a bit clunky, and the design seemed a bit stupid when you could drive around in a tank pounding the pursuing stegosaurus without any danger unless your driver got lost. Meanwhile God Mode and FORCED kept us busy for a few evenings, the former essentially a standard coop shooter, battling through levels full of random enemies with various boosters and weapons unlocks, the latter an isometric puzzle-driven dungeon crawler. Otherwise Fox and I played through the few remaining coop missions of Company of Heroes 2 , really well designed in some cases and definitely one of my favourite RTS titles of recent years, though I can’t bring myself to play it ‘competitively’.\nSteffi hasn’t played as much this year, at least not with others, but there were a few games we went through together. One was quite possibly the worst game I’ve ever bothered to complete, being Kane \u0026amp; Lynch 2: Dog Days . Terrible plot, terrible characters, terrible gameplay, just multifariously and absolutely horrific, so glad I only paid a few quid for it.\nAnother coop I played through with Steffi was Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris , after enjoying the first one of the series so much. Isometric action adventure with plenty of puzzles, some nice interplay between the characters and some fun achievements to try to unlock meant we spent quite a bit of time on it. I also dug up Torchlight II and went on a mad quest with Steffi to finish all the achievements (including completing the game on hardcore-die-once-and-you-start-again-crying mode). Great fun, if rather grindy! We also started playing Magicka 2 with Fox, but somehow there just isn’t enough enjoyment there to warrant loading it up again. I think we had one session some time in mid-year and haven’t returned to it since.\nIn terms of solo gaming, as said, I didn’t really play anything that gripped me for long. There were a few smaller titles such as CastleStorm (a fairly enjoyable tower defence game), Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit (classic racing title, fast cars and dance music), or the simple does-what-it-says-on-the-tin Tower Wars (definitely one I’d like to try multiplayer). I never really bothered trying to get my teeth into any larger titles. Afterfall InSanity is probably the only FPS I tried to play, but soon got bored. I loaded up Sniper: Ghost Warrior and virtually fell asleep during the tutorial. As for strategy games, I had a few goes at Sid Meier’s Civilization: Beyond Earth after P bought it for me: fairly solid game, though not as feature complete as Civilization V. I also played a few missions of Supreme Commander 2 , and felt like I’d seen enough. Though I did play Planetary Annihilation a fair bit more, I just don’t like the concept of the round planet.\nSo down to my few nice discoveries of 2015: one came right at the start of the year, probably purchased in the winter sales, called Sang-Froid - Tales of Werewolves . Although I didn’t play it particularly far, I liked the design elements and general storyline, hunting werewolves in mid-nineteenth century Canada, with separate stages in which you buy traps and manage resources, set up a plan of action, and then actually carry it out. Maybe that was also what gripped me about This War of Mine , a game set based on the Yugoslav wars of the 90s and played from the perspective of the survivors rather than the soldiers. Scavenge goods, cook food, defend your survivors, and craft tools to make it all easier. Gripping game that I never actually played through to the end, but which impressed me nonetheless. One other title I should mention is an adventure game I played with Steffi called Resonance . A retro 1980s graphical style, with fairly straightforward point-and-click mechanics and elements, but with an absolutely awesome storyline, decent voice acting and logical puzzles. Definitely a surprise hit for me.\nWhat about the board games? Thirty-three different games this year, 92 plays. Ignoring the smaller card games, the top ranks are occupied by some old stalwart coop titles like Ghost Stories and Space Alert . We bought our friend the expansion to the latter for her birthday right before Christmas, so I guess that’ll be on the menu a fair bit in 2016 as well. A new title to the mix lately was Colt Express , Spiel des Jahres this year, neat game of train robbery in the Wild West with strategy, luck and a fair amount of laughs. Otherwise not too many new ‘big’ games played, apart from Caverna at Ric’s. Except for one other we added to the list just before Christmas: the game’s designer actually lives in Karlsruhe, so when I found out I sent him a random message and he invited us round to play his latest title Neanderthal . Definitely a geek’s game, perhaps more for curiosity/educational purposes than anything, but still funny to play a title with its designer.\nBad titles? Not really any worth mentioning. One small one I bought for Steffi at Christmas looks like it’ll bug me: Seven Dragons . I feel like it stole the victory conditions thing from Fluxx, so you can basically work towards winning and then have the whole game change with one play of a card. Otherwise it’s something of a kids’ filler game with laying tiles. Yawn. Another which I didn’t really expect much of, given as Steffi picked it up for a few quid in some pound shop, was 100 Unique Places . Basically a geography quiz board game on the rough premise of raising awareness about global warming yada yada, it just screwed up some of the basics. One thing was that five of us couldn’t work out the damn one-page rulebook, so we just ignored probably one of the main rules as it was self-contradictory and played a rather friendly race around the board. Other than that, the questions were as so often the case a bit dumb, some of them expecting you to know some really obscure facts without help, others giving you options for something fairly easy, or having statistical questions which essentially meant “choose one of these at random: A, B or C.” Best of all was that some of the questions had times set in the future which were already in the past… sure, the game’s five years old, but that put a weird spin on the questions: \u0026ldquo;What did scientists in 2010 think would have happened by 2013, irrespective of whether it in fact did or did not happen?\u0026rdquo; Bah!\nA Year in Cinema Apparently I watched 38 films this year, though a fair number of those were re-watches. Only went to the cinema a few times, so most of the new films were on DVD/TV, but there were a few that stayed in my mind. Up was one which caught me off guard, I’m not generally a fan of those kinda films, but it hit all the right notes and told a magically mental story really well. There Will Be Blood was another tremendous film, perhaps a bit on the long side, but it was the perfect vehicle for Daniel Day-Lewis’s acting skills. Highly recommended.\nBest comedy for me was definitely The Guard , a black comedy of drug dealing on the west coast of Ireland, though one notable mention has to be Tropic Thunder . I can’t normally stomach Ben Stiller, but somehow the film had me giggling all the way through.\nAnother couple of highlights of the year were Inception , which I finally got around to watching despite having had the DVD on the shelf for about 4 years. A very decent film with a cool premise, which in my opinion just failed to be amazing by having an uninteresting and flimsy plot (the sideplot is more important but taking the focus off the main plot left it feeling misdirected). Keeping with DiCrapio, I also saw The Wolf of Wall Street , which was purely entertaining for its sex, drugs and humour. Finally there was Big Fish , a sweet psychedelic voyage of discovery.\nAt the other end of the scale there were some real stinkers. Olympus Has Fallen , not the title of a news article on the camera company, takes the crown for crappy action film of the year, with an absolutely mental plot and so many holes you could sail the Titanic through it. The final Hobbit film, Battle of the Five Armies , was probably the worst big budget title of my year, such an overinflated snorefest. At least the same couldn’t quite be said of Sucker Punch , which was essentially a film designed around a few cool set-piece scenes which otherwise didn’t have any point to being there. It was like watching someone play a computer game, having to put up with the levels between enjoying a few boss fights. We’ve also been watching the Resident Evil series (only missing the latest one) but they’re much better entertainment value, classic popcorn action horrors.\nNo, the real mouldy potato at the bottom of this bag of refuse is definitely the new Fantastic Four film which we ended up seeing at an outdoor cinema in late summer. I dislike comic book films anyway, but this one managed to fail hard on so many different levels, it was even dull for one of those. Character development, love triangles, catharsis, even the pure action sequences were just terrible in the extreme, and I expect the witty one-liners would only be found funny by preteens.\nA Year in Books I missed my book target this year, but read about 9,000 pages. A few highlights: The Better Angels of Our Nature by Steven Pinker, a great study of the decline of violence in society of the past millennia, something that has largely gone ignored or at least hasn’t been given due consideration; The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, which I read expecting would annoy the hell out of me being written by the atheist pope, but ended up making me respect him for at least carrying his thoughts through to their logical conclusions and defending secularism properly.\nOn the German side of things, Lingua Tertii Imperii was a fascinating read on the language of the Third Reich. I’d been piqued by reading Klemperer’s diaries, and whilst LTI wasn’t a particularly standard arrangement, there were loads of interesting titbits and morsels for thought. Then there was Buddenbrooks , one of those classics that nobody reads. To be honest I found it disappointing, expecting more in the way of historical parallels beyond the family drama, and having said so to a few people, someone lent me Joseph Roth’s Radetzkymarsch which I found that much better for exactly that reason.\nDown there with the worst books of the year was one my dad recommended called The Numerati , vaguely about the new tech wizards and their realms of big data. An interesting topic, but it was basically written by a journalistic idiot who doesn’t know the subject and treats anyone who does know something about it as a magician. Basically the very epitome of Clarke’s third law . Not only that, but being written by a journalist it was full of the fluff you expect to find in a newspaper article in every single chapter, so the slim volume mostly consisted of padding. But my absolute worst choice of the year was Billard um halb zehn by Heinrich Böll. It’s not often that I actually stop reading a book, but I gave up after literally losing the plot. Written from 11 different perspectives, after about 100 pages I just got completely confused about who the hell was currently narrating and simply had no interest in muddling through!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/12/31/2015-in-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reading","RelPermalink":"/tags/reading/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"That-Was-the-Year","RelPermalink":"/tags/that-was-the-year/"}],"title":"2015 in Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Stirring story of Marie Wilcox, last surviving speaker of Wukchumni, who took it upon herself to document the language she spoke as a child and attempt to keep it alive for future generations. The short documentary film tells of her compiling a dictionary, including oral recordings of traditional parable tales to preserve the memory of the culture, and make it easier for new learners.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRDmRXCizEM https://soundcloud.com/nationalgeographicradio/preserving-a-dying-language [via NYT ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/12/22/maries-dictionary/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wukchumni","RelPermalink":"/tags/wukchumni/"}],"title":"Marie’s Dictionary"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"Meet Roberto Scousia.\nhttps://twitter.com/LaughingFooty/status/664066510265016320 ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/11/17/julio-geordio/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Football","RelPermalink":"/tags/football/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"}],"title":"Julio Geordio"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/categories/photography/"}],"content":"Fascinating images from NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tmbeLTHC _0\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/11/17/thermonuclear-art/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Astronomy","RelPermalink":"/tags/astronomy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nasa","RelPermalink":"/tags/nasa/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sun","RelPermalink":"/tags/sun/"}],"title":"Thermonuclear Art"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nDas geteilte Land – Looking at Germany after 25 years of union. Statistics show how much remains of the former East.\nSpearfishing Orang-utan – A beautiful image of an Orang-utan on Borneo using a stick to try to hunt passing fish, presumably learned from watching nearby villagers.\nLinguistic Ignorantisms – Nice list of words grammar nazis would find difficult to use with a straight face.\nFurther and Farther: A Theory – Go far and wide, go farrer and wider! Go forth and multiply, go further and multiplier!\nAlice in a World of Wonderlands – A look at one of the most widely translated (untranslatable) works of literature in the world.\nSome Rules of Language are Wired in the Brain – A Scientific American article shows how looking at synaesthesia might give some clues into our understanding of words.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/11/11/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Alice-in-Wonderland","RelPermalink":"/tags/alice-in-wonderland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Germany","RelPermalink":"/tags/germany/"},{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/language/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/linguistics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Orang-Utan","RelPermalink":"/tags/orang-utan/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/tags/translation/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/categories/photography/"}],"content":"Gorgeous time-lapse movie from across North America.\nhttps://vimeo.com/138465520 ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/09/29/north-america-4k/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Time-Lapse-Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/time-lapse-photography/"}],"title":"North America 4K"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\n20 Signs You’re Doing Better Than You Think You Are – An asinine list, as described by one commenter, but a welcome reminder of how good most of us have it.\nTranslating Seinfeld – Or why Rowan Atkinson will always be Mr Bean rather than Mr Blackadder abroad.\nThe Internet in Real-Time – Watch the internet grow (and the giants skim off the cream).\nHemingway Editor – Write like Hemingway. Or gradually be nudged into being written like Hemingway?\nThe Colors We Eat – Tasting colours is for more than just synaesthetes.\nThe Mysterious Origins of Punctuation – An often overlooked side-effect of Gutenberg’s moveable type: stagnation in writing systems.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/09/14/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Comedy","RelPermalink":"/tags/comedy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Hemingway","RelPermalink":"/tags/hemingway/"},{"LinkTitle":"Punctuation","RelPermalink":"/tags/punctuation/"},{"LinkTitle":"Synaesthesia","RelPermalink":"/tags/synaesthesia/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/tags/translation/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"}],"content":" Back during my school years, one popular run of jokes revolved around the failed inventions that Ireland had attempted to contribute to modern society, things like concrete dinghies, chocolate teapots, fluorescent black paint. Architect Katerina Kamprani has produced a wonderful selection of objects reminding me of those old jokes, the kind of objects which immediately invoke the kind of frustration experienced by anyone trying to use a wrong-handed tin opener. Listed together in a collection which she calls The Uncomf ortable, I can definitely see there being a market for these as a kind of novelty gift.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/09/09/making-the-world-a-more-meaningless-place/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Art","RelPermalink":"/tags/art/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Novelty","RelPermalink":"/tags/novelty/"}],"title":"Making the World a More Meaningless Place"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"„Nein!“ sagte sie, die leicht ironische Empörung in ihrer Stimme unverkennbar. „Verschieben Sie nichts!“\nSo wollte uns die Frau davon abbringen, unsere Urlaubspläne auf die lange Bank zu schieben. Denn sie hätte zusammen mit ihrem Mann allzu oft solche Worte von sich gegeben. „Das machen wir später, wenn die Kinder älter sind. Wenn wir mehr Zeit haben, mehr Geld. Wenn wir in Rente gehen.“\nDoch später wurde immer später. Die Kinder wurden erwachsen und zogen aus. Ihr Mann arbeitete sehr gerne und weit nach dem üblichen Renteneintrittsalter. In ihrem Lebensabend hatten sie noch viel vor. Aber sie taten es. Alle paar Wochen, alle paar Monate, zogen sie durch die Landschaft auf ein neues Abenteuer. Ein Wochenende in dieser Stadt, ein kurzer Ausflug in jene. Nach all den Jahren hatten sie es sich verdient, und trotzdem sie nicht mehr die jüngsten waren, ließen sie sich nicht abschrecken.\nUnd so war das Ende vielleicht nur passend. Wartend auf den Zug, der sie zu ihrem nächsten Ausflugsziel nehmen sollte, schaute sie ihren Mann an und sagte ihm, wie sehr sie sich auf die Reise nach Bielefeld freue. Leider durfte sie dieses Abenteuer nie genießen. Auf dem Bahnsteig brach sie nach einem Schlaganfall zusammen und ist uns trotz Bemühungen der Ärzte nach einer Woche verschieden. Sie hatte das Geheimnis gelernt, ihr Leben in vollen Zügen zu genießen, lebte dies bis zum Ende aus. Nichts verschieben.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/07/08/nichts-verschieben/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"}],"title":"Nichts verschieben"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"You soldiered on when the others were gradually taken from us, you persevered after an accident left you crippled. Now it was your turn to leave us. Farewell Ozzy.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/07/08/rip-ozzy/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Bengal","RelPermalink":"/tags/bengal/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cat","RelPermalink":"/tags/cat/"},{"LinkTitle":"Pet","RelPermalink":"/tags/pet/"}],"title":"RIP Ozzy"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"https://twitter.com/sarahoconnor _/status/616282747200479232\nAnd so it begins.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/07/03/the-cameron-prophecy/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Terminator","RelPermalink":"/tags/terminator/"}],"title":"The Cameron Prophecy"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"}],"content":"An interesting segment in Private Eye recently about a Tory councillor whose list of apparent ‘gaffes’ included a remark favourable of Hitler. Heaven forbid! We’re all for freedom of speech, but be sure to stay away from espousing any opinions on the blacklist. I can’t help imagining he’d have any easier run of things as a devil worshipper, than as someone who once had the gall to cast a positive light on anything of the Führer’s beyond his death.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/06/30/freedom-of-speech-for-dickheads/","tags":[],"title":"Freedom of Speech for Dickheads"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/categories/photography/"}],"content":"One fairly staggering piece of time-lapse photographic work by Rob Whitworth .\nhttps://vimeo.com/117770305 ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/06/18/dubai-flow-motion/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Dubai","RelPermalink":"/tags/dubai/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Time-Lapse-Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/time-lapse-photography/"}],"title":"Dubai Flow Motion"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nMrs, Ms, Mx – Oxford dictionary adopting the gender-neutral Mx as an alternative honorific.\nSay What Yo – The Urban Dictionary takes on a video form.\nIs the writing on the wall for the paragraph? – Writing for the Guardian, Andy Bodle considers whether paragraphs are on the way out.\nThe digital language divide – Another Guardian article, covering the growing disparity between languages which have gained traction online, and those which perhaps never will.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/06/15/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Dictionary","RelPermalink":"/tags/dictionary/"},{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/language/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/linguistics/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Travels","RelPermalink":"/categories/travels/"}],"content":"Gathered in the departure lounge, with the noise of the bustling airport drowning out the sound of their jitters, the passengers wait. Each of them attempts to show their strength of character, but underneath that calm veneer, the majority of them are unmistakably nervous. Unable to find anywhere comfortable to keep them, a woman at the front leafs through the documents in her hands. Passports, check. Boarding cards, check. Departure gate and boarding time, all as they should be. She fidgets in her seat, making sure her children are still fully dressed and haven’t in the meantime wandered off to see if there’s another plane they can board. Over by the windows, a man looks at his watch for the third time in as many minutes; he’s confused by the fact that the plane seems to be ready to board, but there’s no sign of activity around the gate.\nThe clocks tick down.\nThe most apprehensive members gathered are also the most perseverant. Some have been waiting (im)patiently at the gate for several days, planning their travel itineraries to ensure that even a two-week rail strike won’t prevent them arriving at the airport in time for their bargain-basement flight. Now here they sit, studying flight and gate numbers, checking the departure time just one more time, waiting like sprinters on the line for the starter bullet to signal the moment to board.\nThe clocks tick down.\nSuddenly there’s some movement. Are they here? Is it time? From somewhere near the back, a business traveller saunters nonchalantly to the desks, dragging his small case behind him. The light crunching sound of the case’s wheels over the dusty concourse floor sends ripples through the seated masses. In the wake of this blasé stroll to the front, the man has drawn a mighty queue of nervous waiters, and within seconds there are two dozen people standing in line to board the plane.\nThe clocks tick down.\nThis flurry of motion causes great disquiet among the remaining sitters. Solo travellers check their itineraries again, comparing watches, screens and mobiles. Protective males stand up and take a few steps from their partners and offspring, trying to see the source of the commotion. Are they boarding? Have they opened the gate? Satisfied the line isn’t moving, content that it isn’t yet too long, they give their loved ones a reassuring pat on the knee and retake their seats. But deep down they are as nervously unsure of themselves as the other passengers, who are now swivelling around in their seats, craning their necks at awkward angles to catch a glimpse of what’s happening at the front.\nThe clocks tick down.\nGradually the queue is starting to build, latecomers automatically adding themselves to it, more skittish sitters abandoning their places to go and join the masses of the standing. Even the more experienced fliers – recognisable from their fancy travelling cases and swish solutions to the passport/boarding pass problem – are starting to become a little twitchy. Is it… are they?\nSome of the people waiting in this hall are the same ones who casually hop aboard their commuter trains in the mornings only thirty seconds before they depart. Now here they are trying to outwit their fellow man and strategically place themselves in the queue to board a plane before the horde, on a flight where every last one of them has a reserved seat.\nThe clocks tick down.\nThen someone in uniform appears. Like the red rag to the colour-blind bull, there’s a stampede as the remaining passengers rush to claim their place at the rear of the ever lengthening queue.((In flights to and from the UK, this queue will have taken on the form of a serpent, twisting and winding around the available space in the waiting area, incorporating furniture and stationary objects, splitting to allow others to pass, occasionally overlapping itself like some kind of time-lapse choreographic display. In other countries, the same queue resembles more of a ball.)) Then that tentative voice over the tannoy. All passengers on flight FL29486\u0026hellip; The incongruous series of letters and numbers that form the flight number everyone’s being trying so desperately to memorise. Is that my flight? Flying to London Stansted\u0026hellip; Thank goodness, that’s the one! \u0026hellip;has been delayed by approximately 40 minutes.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/06/02/airport-syndrome/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Airport","RelPermalink":"/tags/airport/"},{"LinkTitle":"Travelling","RelPermalink":"/tags/travelling/"}],"title":"Airport Syndrome"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"Bolton’s finest breadmakers with a tongue-in-cheek take for the smartphone generation.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2N _TVdrhTI\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/04/24/ave-it-ovis/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Advertising","RelPermalink":"/tags/advertising/"},{"LinkTitle":"Bread","RelPermalink":"/tags/bread/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"’ave it ’ovis"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"I’m sitting at the table one morning, hands cradling a warm mug, that rich smell of coffee hanging in the air. The sun is shining down on a brand new day, only the chittering of birds offering their choral backdrop to an otherwise blank canvas. Then a vibration on the windowsill accompanied by a tinny melody. Dad’s calling.\n‘The battery in my car key’s dead,’ he tells me, apparently standing in front of his locked car on the car park, desperately pressing the transponder. ‘Can you find the number to call the AA? I can’t get in the car.’\n‘Why don’t you just use the key?’\n‘How?’\n‘Put the key in the lock and turn it.’\n‘Oh, does that work?’\nI was reminded of this little exchange, which already happened many months ago, by a similar but rather less amusing news report from New Zealand . A couple found themselves ‘locked’ in their car without the key, and believing there to be no way out, resorted to pomping the horn to attract attention, and attempting to smash through the window with a car jack. They didn’t think of unlocking the door in the regular manner.\nEventually the couple were rescued by neighbours after over 12 hours in the vehicle, with the women already unconscious and the man having difficulties breathing. According to the emergency services, doubtless a touch on the dramatic side, their little misadventure could have proven fatal.\nHow is it that we can so easily forget some of our most rudimentary tools when they are superceded? What makes us forget things we otherwise take for granted in our day to day lives so readily? These two stories may occupy two extremes in terms of their potential consequences – from the mildly humorous to the near fatal – yet whilst most of us are liable to shake our heads or brazenly laugh at others’ apparent ignorance and stupidity, it’s a situation we readily find ourselves in as we become increasingly reliant on life’s many little technological gizmos to get us through the day. As the mechanical is replaced by the digital, will any of us remember how to fix things when the machine stops?\nWe compare many things in life to riding a bicycle: you never forget. At least, that is, as long as it isn’t chained up, in which case you’d better hope you can remember how the key works.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/04/12/key-literacy/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Car","RelPermalink":"/tags/car/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/tags/technology/"}],"title":"Key Literacy"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" Cartoon by Manu Cornet .\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/03/27/american-contrast/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cartoon","RelPermalink":"/tags/cartoon/"},{"LinkTitle":"Comic","RelPermalink":"/tags/comic/"},{"LinkTitle":"Usa","RelPermalink":"/tags/usa/"}],"title":"American Contrast"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nLanguage anxieties: A long decline – A cute article over at the Economist, detailing the eternal fear of the decline of language.\n21 Photographers Doing Whatever It Takes to Get the Perfect Shot – Cute collection of some daredevils and proud-free hobbyists pursuing their passion.\nInternet slang meets American Sign Language – Looking at the spread of new signs to meet the needs of modern language.\n24 Food Puns for the United States – Cute photography project playing wordy puns on the USA.\n25 maps that explain the English language – Fascinating little collection of maps in some way detailing the growth, development and spread of the English language, including familial relations and modern day imports. One even offers a comparison of the vocabulary found in rappers’ lyrics alongside the works of Shakespeare or Moby Dick.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/03/21/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/tags/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/language/"},{"LinkTitle":"Maps","RelPermalink":"/tags/maps/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sign-Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/sign-language/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nIf the moon were a pixel – A scale depiction of the galaxy, highlighting why you’ll never see a wall poster of the galaxy that’s to scale.\n25 Biggest Turning Points – Short summaries of twenty-five important historical events from the BBC.\n28 Surreal Interior Design Ideas – There’s something certainly fascinating about the idea of walking over the ocean to your kitchen. Not sure I’m enamoured by the idea of cleaning it.\nZoo Portraits – Barcelona photographer Yago Partal gives zoo animals a unique human face.\n141 Boxers – Danish photographer Nicolai Howalt documenting the damage boxing causes in before-and-after portraits of young amateurs.\n40 Idioms That Can’t Be Translated Literally – Great little list of idioms from around the world which make you sound like you’re tripping if you translate them literally.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/03/09/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Boxing","RelPermalink":"/tags/boxing/"},{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"Idioms","RelPermalink":"/tags/idioms/"},{"LinkTitle":"Interior-Design","RelPermalink":"/tags/interior-design/"},{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/language/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science","RelPermalink":"/tags/science/"},{"LinkTitle":"Space","RelPermalink":"/tags/space/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"The only thing that gives the Jerries the willies these days is apparently the Greek Minister of Finance Yanis Varoufakis (who appears to have done a bit of consultancy work for Valve on the side).\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Afl9WFGJE0M ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/03/04/v-for-varoufakis/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Euro","RelPermalink":"/tags/euro/"},{"LinkTitle":"Germany","RelPermalink":"/tags/germany/"},{"LinkTitle":"Greece","RelPermalink":"/tags/greece/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"},{"LinkTitle":"Zdf","RelPermalink":"/tags/zdf/"}],"title":"V for Varoufakis"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"German","RelPermalink":"/categories/german/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"What do you call Barbs who works at the beer bar where the beard barber for the barbarians who eat rhubarb pie at Barbara’s bar drinks beer? Why Rhabarberbarbarabarbarbarenbartbarbierbierbarbärbel of course!\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gG62zay3kck ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/02/28/rhubarb-barbara/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Rhubarb Barbara"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Lazarus may be risen from the dead, but it looks like he’s now been lain to rest again once and for all. This handy plug-in for Firefox , which stores what you write in input fields and staves off the frustrations of having your work lost should your browser crash, seems to have been abandoned by its author and hasn’t been updated for some time. Each progressive new version of Firefox leaves it a little more broken, to the point where I’ve sadly been left with a button that does nothing more than say \u0026lsquo;Loading\u0026hellip;\u0026rsquo; in the latest version.\nFortunately there are some other alternatives out there, including the all-singing and dancing Form History Control .\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/02/26/lazarus-on-firefox/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Firefox","RelPermalink":"/tags/firefox/"},{"LinkTitle":"Firefox-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/firefox-plugins/"},{"LinkTitle":"Lazarus","RelPermalink":"/tags/lazarus/"}],"title":"Lazarus on Firefox"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Music","RelPermalink":"/categories/music/"}],"content":"We live in an age where being a slave to our impatience and short attention spans is almost a virtue, where watching television has made room for channel hopping, where listening to music involves skipping to choruses and jumping between tracks, where our attentions are constantly being pulled in a thousand different directions by our internetworked world.\nIt comes then as little surprise that one road to success is to cash in on our restlessness. Take a year’s worth of successful tunes, juice them, dissect them, distil their catchiness, then splice, blend and sew together a Frankenstein of audial goodies. That’s what you get with Daniel Kim’s Pop Danthologies: a highly concentrated concoction of successful pop anthems, a luxurious blend of first flush leaves, condensed and refined, the scion of sonic addiction grafted onto the stock of all that is pop.\nThis isn’t a danthology. This is hardcore popnography.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOHYCZLmbyc ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/02/14/popnography/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Music","RelPermalink":"/tags/music/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Popnography"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"Just a couple of funny tweets I thought I’d share.\nhttps://twitter.com/sazza _jay/status/554404341743099904\nhttps://twitter.com/TheRedRag/status/554425541529702401 ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/01/29/fox-news-a-little-funny-business/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fox-News","RelPermalink":"/tags/fox-news/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Twitter","RelPermalink":"/tags/twitter/"}],"title":"Fox News: A little funny business"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Recent springs and bounds in technology have opened the floodgates to a wealth of information that once required millions of man-hours to collect, collate, evaluate and assess, if indeed it ever happened at all. Now all of that can be handled, stored and processed by computers, constantly being fed by millions of users who are often happy to give up snippets of their information for the tiniest of benefits. But what hidden potentials lie waiting among those mountains of bits and bytes? And who are the people forging the algorithms to find those golden nuggets?\nThat’s what Stephen L. Baker attempts to sort out in The Numerati, a neologism he has coined for the computer scientists and mathematicians getting their hands dirty with our data. The book takes an admirably thematic approach and looks at developments across a broad spectrum of society, covering ways in which advancements have and will affect the worlds of work, commerce, politics, medicine and romance. As we increasingly rely on modern digital technology in every facet of our lives, using websites and mobile phone apps to shop, watch films, hire services, chat with friends and find romantic partners, the ways in which our data is gathered and used should become of paramount importance to us, issues which Baker repeatedly attempts to underline throughout this book.\nUnfortunately there are two major problems with the way in which it is put together. The first is the nature of Baker’s writing. The journalistic style which works well for a five-page article – leaving a trail of breadcrumbs for the reader to follow as he explores a specific thread – soon becomes tiresome when padded out into the length of a book. Each chapter feels like a separate article treating the same subject from a different angle, covering the same issues in another light, and bound together for this collection. As a result, it feels like the author is often repeating himself, hammering on about the same points, whilst spinning out his yarn with frivolous descriptions of what colour tie his interviewee is wearing or what flavour coffee he’s sipping whilst waiting for his next meeting. There is an inordinate amount of filler here in what is only a slender volume.\nYet the far greater criticism of this book is the fact that Baker doesn’t really understand what he’s writing about. This may sound like harsh criticism, but it’s all part of the disarmingly honest style which is supposed to appeal to the casual reader. Baker is certainly up front about this, and I was in no way expecting the pages to be decorated with mathematical formulae. However, the author has a genuine admiration for the work his Numerati do that borders on an almost medieval fear: he treats them as if they were dabbling with arcane black magic that regular mortals would never be able to comprehend. The description of these wizards and their work thus comes across as being very superficial, and fails to deliver any meaningful content to readers who might be even vaguely familiar with the topic.\nTo give the author his due, his treatment of the subject is sober and balanced, pointing out the need for caution and vigilance when it comes to privacy issues and the anonymisation of data. At the same time, Baker points out the limitations of mathematical models, and the potential for mistakes in the statistical handling of large data sets. Yet he also emphasises the untapped benefits behind the collection of medical data, or for companies and employees alike in being able to combining the skills and traits of the workforce intelligently, and shows how each of us is willing to give up our as much of our personal information as necessary when it comes to finding romance.\nOverall, Numerati is a somewhat wordy summary of the direction big data is changing the world in many areas. It touches on the hidden benefits that may be tapped in the future, as well as the dangers of indifference when it comes to issues of privacy and limitation. However, the chatty, journalistic style leaves this already slim work rather thin on the ground in terms of delivering information, and many people with a vague interest in the subject will learn nothing of novelty. Finally, the author’s reverential treatment of his genius Numerati, and perhaps ingenuine lack of understanding for what they do, leaves the book feeling like a case of the blind trying to lead the blind.\n[Photo by Paul Bergmeir on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2015/01/08/the-numerati-how-theyll-get-my-number-and-yours/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Big-Data","RelPermalink":"/tags/big-data/"},{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Numerati: How they’ll get my number and yours"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Cookery","RelPermalink":"/categories/cookery/"}],"content":" “A Merry Christmas, Bob!” said Scrooge with an earnestness that could not be mistaken, as he clapped him on the back. “A merrier Christmas, Bob, my good fellow, than I have given you for many a year! I’ll raise your salary, and endeavour to assist your struggling family, and we will discuss your affairs this very afternoon over a bowl of Smoking Bishop, Bob!”\nA Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens\nEvery year it seems I come to searching for a recipe for this Christmas treat, the website dies within 12 months and I have to go searching for another or rely on the scribblings stashed away in the cupboard. For a change, I thought I might write up my jottings so that next year I\u0026rsquo;ll have a reliable place to turn!\nThe recipe is enough to make about 10 glasses, and can be bottled and re-heated to drink over a number of days.\nIngredients 6 large oranges 2 large lemons 120g brown sugar 1 bottle (700ml) red wine 1 bottle (700ml) ruby port 8 cloves 3 cinnamon sticks 1/4 tsp ginger 1/4 tsp cinnamon 1/4 tsp all spice 1/4 tsp mace For serving:\n2 lemons \u0026amp; 2 oranges cut into wedges Method Place the oranges and lemons in the oven on a baking tray at low heat (around 100-120°C) until they are pale brown (around 1 hour). Stud the warmed fruits with the cloves, and place them into a large bowl. Add the spices – ginger, cinnamon, all spice and mace – and the sugar, and pour over the wine. Stir gently and then cover leave overnight. Halve and juice the fruits into the bowl. Sieve the resulting mixture into a saucepan to remove any pips and pulp, and add the cinnamon sticks. Heat to a simmer for a few minutes, then reduce the heat, add the port, and warm the mixture for around 15-20 minutes (without boiling off the alcohol). Optional: Serve with ground nutmeg and fresh wedges of lemon and orange. [Photo by Clem Onojeghuo on Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2014/12/24/smoking-bishop/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Christmas","RelPermalink":"/tags/christmas/"},{"LinkTitle":"Drink","RelPermalink":"/tags/drink/"},{"LinkTitle":"Recipe","RelPermalink":"/tags/recipe/"}],"title":"Smoking Bishop"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOYsI1cqUrw Obviously the technology is making leaps and bounds, but it’ll probably still be some time before the wheels of bureaucracy allow self-driving cars on our roads.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2014/10/24/youre-in-a-johnny-cab/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Audi","RelPermalink":"/tags/audi/"},{"LinkTitle":"Car","RelPermalink":"/tags/car/"},{"LinkTitle":"Self-Driving","RelPermalink":"/tags/self-driving/"}],"title":"You’re in a Johnny Cab!"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"Yet another victim, killed on the roads yesterday.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2014/09/28/rip-phantom/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Bengal","RelPermalink":"/tags/bengal/"},{"LinkTitle":"Pet","RelPermalink":"/tags/pet/"}],"title":"RIP Phantom"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Just had a maddening time trying to work out why a Kindle 4 , which was to replace a Kindle 3, refused to connect to the family wireless. After trying all of the obvious – resetting devices, checking passwords – it was off to scour the web for a solution. All kinds of suggestions cropped up, relating to passwords or SSIDs with special characters, or wireless networks using channel 13, but none of them applied to our situation. Finally I hit upon a post which hinted that the Kindle 4, unlike its predecessor, doesn\u0026rsquo;t support WPA2 with AES encryption. Switching the router over to accept WPA/TKIP and WPA2/AES together didn\u0026rsquo;t make a difference, but the device finally logged in when I turned AES connections off altogether!\nJust to paraphrase the post, Kindle 4s won\u0026rsquo;t connect to a wireless network if it:\nuses WPA-Enterprise or WPA2-Enterprise is an ad-hoc network has data encryption set to AES only is set to 802.11n only Further settings that might cause problems include if the network:\nhas data encryption set to TKIP+AES (even though TKIP is available, it might not connect) is set to broadcast on channels 12, 13 or 14, or it is set to automatically choose a channel and lands on one of these (USA only uses channels 1-11) has a pre-shared key containing special characters Quite why Amazon release an upgraded device with downgraded hardware is beyond me. WPA2 is hardly a recent development, and is pretty much a requirement to be fully compliant. I\u0026rsquo;m only surprised that there weren\u0026rsquo;t more users having problems and complaining. Worse is that it isn\u0026rsquo;t detailed anywhere, nor do Amazon employees themselves seem to have much clue about what their device does and does not support, judging by the number of flummoxed users on the forums. Just one more reason I\u0026rsquo;ll be sticking with paper.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2014/09/23/kindle-4-wifi-frustrations/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Ereader","RelPermalink":"/tags/ereader/"},{"LinkTitle":"Kindle","RelPermalink":"/tags/kindle/"},{"LinkTitle":"Troubleshooting","RelPermalink":"/tags/troubleshooting/"}],"title":"Kindle 4 WiFi Frustrations"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/categories/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science","RelPermalink":"/categories/science/"}],"content":"In recent years the media enjoyed regaling us with the search for the Higgs boson, but I\u0026rsquo;m sure many people wondered what was so special about Mr Higg\u0026rsquo;s boson that we should all be so interested in him finding it again, let alone curious about how he lost it in the first place. Postulate a new thesis or make a new discovery and you\u0026rsquo;re liable to have your name enter the vernacular. Found a company associated with a new invention, and the name may even become standard for the innovation. Yet at what point does it all stop being yours? We all learn about Newton\u0026rsquo;s laws of gravitation in the classroom, whilst some go on to read up on Einstein\u0026rsquo;s theory of general relativity. Archimedes\u0026rsquo; buoyancy principle, Kepler\u0026rsquo;s laws of planetary motion – it all seems so predictable, until it comes unstuck with the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Not the laws of physics, the laws of English.\nWhy do we learn about Schrödinger\u0026rsquo;s cat but the Schrödinger equation? Do we need to use Planck\u0026rsquo;s constant or the Planck constant? I became curious when reading an article recently about someone with Asperger\u0026rsquo;s. Whether it\u0026rsquo;s a disease, a disorder or a syndrome, there seems to be little consensus about whether we need the possessive \u0026rsquo;s'.\nThe ICD-10 calls it Asperger\u0026rsquo;s syndrome, but the DSM-IV-TR refers to it as Asperger\u0026rsquo;s Disorder; only Wikipedia, in its infinite wisdom, calls it Asperger syndrome without the apostrophe (and yes, they had a long debate about the apostrophe but decided to go against the nomenclature of the official sources).\nWrong Planet The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) along with the American Medical Association style manual prefer the non-possessive form since the person it was named after never \u0026lsquo;owned\u0026rsquo; the disease.\nA Walk in the WoRds I\u0026rsquo;m not sure you could argue that Newton ever really \u0026lsquo;owned\u0026rsquo; the laws of gravitation either, but the apostrophe\u0026rsquo;s stuck. Are there any rules? I made some unscientific comparisons on Google\u0026rsquo;s ngram with a few common named diseases and laws, simply comparing the forms with apostrophes and otherwise in each case:\nCertainly it’s a small sample, and I haven’t taken into account that many illnesses aren\u0026rsquo;t universally termed diseases, syndromes etc. Still one thing that seems clear is that there\u0026rsquo;s most confusion when there\u0026rsquo;s elision going on. Alzheimer\u0026rsquo;s disease is widely favoured over Alzheimer disease: there\u0026rsquo;s a clear \u0026rsquo;s\u0026rsquo; sound in the term, and in my experience it\u0026rsquo;s very often shortened to merely Alzheimer\u0026rsquo;s. The \u0026rsquo;s\u0026rsquo; in Down\u0026rsquo;s syndrome, on the other hand, goes unheard and as a result has lost ground over the years to the now more common Down syndrome. I\u0026rsquo;ve never heard anyone say that someone simply had Down\u0026rsquo;s.\nThe other conclusion you might draw is that if two names are involved, the apostrophe is quickly dropped if it is used at all. It\u0026rsquo;s only a small sample, but Paget-Schroeter\u0026rsquo;s disease seems to have been the favoured term only for a short initial period, whilst Creutzfeldt-Jakob\u0026rsquo;s disease doesn\u0026rsquo;t even get a look in with the apostrophe.\nSo on the back of that little unscientific method, if you want to keep your diseases, there are two rules you need to follow: firstly, make sure it\u0026rsquo;s a disease or a condition – syndromes are thieves – and secondly, if you end up making the discovery with a colleague, make sure you stop their name cropping up in citations. In the rock, paper, scissors of orthography, hyphens rule over apostrophes!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2014/09/10/whose-syndrome-is-it-anyway-apostrophes-in-disease-names/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Disease","RelPermalink":"/tags/disease/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nomenclature","RelPermalink":"/tags/nomenclature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science","RelPermalink":"/tags/science/"}],"title":"Whose Syndrome is it Anyway? Apostrophes in Disease Names"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Argh, you\u0026rsquo;re kidding me. Did the Realtek HD Audio Drivers 6.0.1.7245 really just copy everything it found in the folder with the setup file over to the Program Files directory? Not the files in the executable .zip file, not the files in a list, no, everything it could get its grubby digital hands on. So a quick driver update ended up copying 40 GB of crud between two hard drives. Reminder to self: clean out the TEMP folder more often!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2014/07/16/really-tacky-tek-driver-update/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Audio","RelPermalink":"/tags/audio/"},{"LinkTitle":"Drivers","RelPermalink":"/tags/drivers/"},{"LinkTitle":"Realtek","RelPermalink":"/tags/realtek/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows/"}],"title":"Real(ly Tacky) Tek Driver Update"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"Sometimes a little punctuation goes a long way.\nhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5108erygkM ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2014/07/07/autocue-my-life/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Bbc-News","RelPermalink":"/tags/bbc-news/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Autocue My Life"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Personal","RelPermalink":"/categories/personal/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"I am a child, and the world is my crib, and everything within it is a toy, to be twisted and pulled, played with and tasted, and bitten, before finally being thrown out of the cot.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/09/25/on-self-reflection/","tags":[],"title":"On Self-Reflection"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"I\u0026rsquo;ve been translating on the side for some time, but have only recently decided to make this a steadier form of income. As part of that, I wanted to investigate some of the CAT tools currently on the market. Aside from tinkering with the open source offering OmegaT some years ago, until now I hadn\u0026rsquo;t tried any of the tools listed.\nAs with many software niches there are a lot of options in this market, and not many straightforward answers. It sometimes seems that the smaller the niche, the more choices there are. On my list to try out were SDL Trados Studio 2011, memoQ 2013, Wordfast Anywhere, OmegaT, Déjà Vu X2 Professional and Across Personal Edition ((I didn\u0026rsquo;t actually get to try out Across\u0026rsquo; free software option, as it immediately complained that it couldn\u0026rsquo;t open my documents as I don\u0026rsquo;t own Microsoft Word, but rather use OpenOffice. Nevertheless most reviews suggest it is software to be avoided.)). In this post I look at the market leader\u0026rsquo;s offering SDL Trados Studio 2011.\nSDL Trados So then Trados. A clear market leader, if there\u0026rsquo;s such a thing as a standard choice in this field, Trados is the one most people have heard of, and the one many jobs allegedly depend upon.\nFirst impressions were not good. The firm\u0026rsquo;s start page looks like a typical mid-90s construction pageholder, apparently catering to four separate types of customer. Not that it particularly interests me, but Corporate Language Departments and Enterprise Customers are advised to visit their corporate website. Link not included. And Translation Agencies are directed to a special dedicated agency website, again, not directly linked, but in the top right there is a link , to this:\nThe resource you are looking for has been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable.\nAmazing. Fortunately, as a newcomer I could be satisfied that my corner of their market is the only one they can be bothered actually catering to, and they send me to\u0026hellip; the Translation Zone ! I presume this is a deliberate cognate of the American term , since trying to sort out the different versions of the program seems like an exercise in applied madness. Aside from the fact that the basic program is called SDL Trados Studio 2011, this comes in all sorts of flavours: Starter, Freelance, Freelance Silver, Freelance Gold, Freelance Plus, Freelance + 2007, Freelance Plus + 2007, Starter Freelance Gold 2011 Plus 2007 Minus 2005\u0026hellip; alright, so there is no Freelance Silver, but honestly, what are they selling? Do they even know? And there are even more editions once you get outside of the Freelance mode. One of the big selling points of their 2011 Studio package is that there is no need for the 2007 Suite (Suite? Studio? Bedsit in Winslow?), apparently because the compatibility issues which plagued earlier version changes doesn\u0026rsquo;t apply here, yet there are still two versions of the program being sold with the old version included. The Trados ecosystem seems to be the working definition of crippleware, with the Starter version in particular looking like just the rump of a tree, but for the price difference it\u0026rsquo;s also understandable.\nDownloading a trial was no problem—as is often the case, it\u0026rsquo;s quicker to find a link to a downloadable file than to find a price—and I was soon able to install a 30-day trial. Although not before I had to unpack a compressed version of the installation file, with its net saving of around 0 bytes. The installation procedure was evidence enough of what a hydra-like beast Trados really is, with enough components being installed to make you dizzy, and various other prerequisite software like XML SDKs, Microsoft\u0026rsquo;s Visual C++ Redistributable, and a version of Java old enough to be a grandmother. Granted, the latest version of the program was released a year ago, but could they not at least include a Java version that doesn\u0026rsquo;t contain a few hundred security bugs? The demo also includes a version of SDL Passolo Essential 2011 SP6 for software localisation.\nStarting up the program leads to the next bit of confusion. Apparently, despite having the program installed in English on a PC with English as the system language, the update announcement is displayed in German. Perhaps they want to test their userbase? Maybe that\u0026rsquo;s what the Passolo software is for, so you can localise the message yourself? A minor slip up perhaps, but that also doesn\u0026rsquo;t account for the fact that the patch, a service pack nonetheless, isn\u0026rsquo;t directly available. The program doesn\u0026rsquo;t automatically update itself, it doesn\u0026rsquo;t offer to download it for you, it doesn\u0026rsquo;t give you a link to download the file yourself. No, apparently any fool can download the full trial program, but only paying members can gain access to the hidden patches in their members\u0026rsquo; lair.\nHowever you swing it, once I got this far, the program itself did the job. The interface is a little goofy—like a poor imitation of the XP look, a decade after it went out of fashion—but generally getting down to work is straightforward with no major hiccoughs. I did, however, find it galling that Trados uses a proprietary standard for its localisation files, SDLXLIFF, despite so boldly proclaiming their love of standards as to post the same list in their FAQ twice (emphasis mine):\nFaster project management setup and real-time quality assurance checks increase accuracy and save time SDL is committed to open standards.\nStudio 2011 makes extensive use of industry standards which enable easier sharing of files, TMs and termbases between tools that also support XLIFF (a file format for translation), TMX (for translation memories) and now even TBX (for terminology databases)\nIt strikes me as particularly cynical on their part. I\u0026rsquo;m no programmer, perhaps there\u0026rsquo;s a valid failing in the XLIFF format that SDL felt it necessary to improve upon, but judging by the overall feel of the program, I\u0026rsquo;d doubt it. I only used the software for a couple of projects, but already had some headaches trying to import/export documents between SDL and another CAT tool (to the extent that the lovingly standardised SDLXLIFF files were unreadable, and a new translation had to be built in the other second client using the fortunately importable Translation Memory (in TMX format).\nAs this was one of the first CAT tools I tried out, it\u0026rsquo;s a little difficult to compare with the ones I used later, given as I was getting to grips with both Trados and CAT tools in general. Nevertheless one of the first largest disappointments I had was that in order to create a TermBase for Trados, the user needs to find the end of a second rainbow to be able to fork over another pot of gold for SDL MultiTerm 2011 (likewise available in crippled and non-crippled editions). Basically one of the key benefits of using a CAT tool in the first place is closed off to customers who\u0026rsquo;ve only paid €500 for their product.\nConclusion: It\u0026rsquo;s difficult to put my finger on it, but there\u0026rsquo;s something just not right with Trados. For the most part, the program does work, but for a market leader it feels incredibly rough around the edges. The whole look of the software seems turn-of-the-century; it feels lazy that the program doesn\u0026rsquo;t automatically come up to date (or update itself), and it\u0026rsquo;s rather saddening that they automatically install an antiquated version of Java with it. The fact that they claim to support standards but in fact obviously go about creating their own smacks of a group abusing their market position to keep their customers bound, and make up for the relative shoddiness of their program.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/08/09/cat-calls-searching-for-translation-software/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cat","RelPermalink":"/tags/cat/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sdl-Trados","RelPermalink":"/tags/sdl-trados/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/tags/translation/"}],"title":"CAT Calls: Searching for Translation Software"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"German","RelPermalink":"/categories/german/"}],"content":"Neulich habe ich eine tolle Anekdote gehört, die ich mitteilen wollte. Sie stammt von einem britischen Komiker, einem Londoner, der mit seinem breiten „Cockney“ Akzent sehr deutlich seinen Arbeiterklassenhintergrund betont. Allerdings ist er laut dieser Geschichte mit einer Frau aus der Mittelschicht verheiratet, ein klassisches Beispiel dafür, wie man so schön sagt, dass der Schlüssel zu der Liebe im Humor liegt. Im Übrigen zeigt die Geschichte das reine Genie des Komikers, und verkörpert die typische gegenseitige Verspottung der Arbeiter- und Mittelschichten.\nZwar mag die leicht vornehme Frau diese Komikers mit ihm zusammen sein, aber sie genießt es immer wieder, einen Abend ganz ohne das gemeine Volk verbringen zu können, und schlägt deswegen oft vor, ins Restaurant zu gehen. Selbst wie sie das Wort Restaurant ausspricht, mit einem Hauch des Französischen, zeigt ihre leicht hochnässige Haltung den Normalos gegenüber. Dort kann sie an einem schönen Ambiente Gefallen finden. Unser Komiker verstand das Wort anfangs nicht, bis ihm einleuchtete, eine gute Ambience sei eine Atmosphäre ohne arme Leute.\nAlso saßen sie eines Abends in einem Restaurant und freuten sich über das Ambiente. Unser Erzähler bestellte den Risotto, vermutlich das einzige Gericht in der Speisekarte, das er erkennen konnte (was zum Geier soll Rosbif sein?) Jedoch fehlte auf dem Tisch das allerwichtigste Kondiment bei einem Risotto - das Ketschup! Ohne Ketschup ist Risotto doch zu trocken. Als die Speisen dann ankamen, fragte er die Bedienung höflich, ob es im Restaurant vielleicht ein bisschen rote Soße gäbe. Sie schaute ihn ganz irritiert, gar fast beleidigt an, als sei er der zuunterste Pleb der ganzen Welt gewesen, und ging davon. Vermutlich gab es überhaupt kein Ketschup im Laden, und sie musste nebenan eine Flasche besorgen, denn erst eine Zeitlang später kam sie wieder, mit einem ganz kleinen Schälchen Ketschup. Dies wollte sie ganz heimlich abliefern, als würde sie gerade einen Drogenhandel machen. Sie stellte das Schälchen auf den Tisch nieder, ohne ein Wort zu geben, und drehte sich sofort zu gehen. Über diese herablassende Art empörte sich unser Komiker, und so schlagfertig wie er ist, reagierte er direkt.\n„Warten Sie!“ rief er, vermutlich um die Aufmerksamkeit der umsitzenden Restaurantgäste zu erregen. Sodann nahm er das Schälchen, nippte daran, schmatzte und sagte „Angenehm. Ich nehme eine Flasche.“\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/06/25/eine-anekdote-%C3%BCber-das-britische-klassensystem/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Micky-Flanagan","RelPermalink":"/tags/micky-flanagan/"}],"title":"Eine Anekdote über das britische Klassensystem"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/categories/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"German","RelPermalink":"/categories/german/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"This post is also available in English .\nKleine Randbemerkung. In meiner Zeit als Sprachdozent habe ich oft den Fehler bei den Steigerungsformen gehört, wobei der Deutsche die Präposition \u0026lsquo;als\u0026rsquo; durch ein ähnlich klingendes englisches Wort ersetzt:\nDie Grünen sind beliebter als die SPD.\nThe Green Party is more popular as the SPD.\nJedoch wo man eine andere Komparativform verwendet, ob umgangsprachlich oder als Dialektform, führt dies zu anderen Fehlübersetzungen in dem Englischen:\nEs ist schneller mit dem Zug zu fahren wie mit dem Auto.\nIt\u0026rsquo;s faster to go by train like with the car.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/06/10/bigger-and-better-like/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Comparative","RelPermalink":"/tags/comparative/"},{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/tags/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Grammar","RelPermalink":"/tags/grammar/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"}],"title":"Bigger and better, like"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/06/07/the-artful-photographer/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"What-the-Duck","RelPermalink":"/tags/what-the-duck/"}],"title":"The Artful Photographer"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" Sir Humphrey Appleby : Minister, Britain has had the same foreign policy objective for at least the last 500 years: to create a disunited Europe. In that cause we have fought with the Dutch against the Spanish, with the Germans against the French, with the French and Italians against the Germans, and with the French against the Germans and Italians. Divide and rule, you see. Why should we change now, when it\u0026rsquo;s worked so well?\nJames Hacker : That\u0026rsquo;s all ancient history, surely.\nSir Humphrey Appleby : Yes, and current policy. We had to break the whole thing up, so we had to get inside. We tried to break it up from the outside, but that wouldn\u0026rsquo;t work. Now that we\u0026rsquo;re inside we can make a complete pig\u0026rsquo;s breakfast of the whole thing: set the Germans against the French, the French against the Italians, the Italians against the Dutch. The Foreign Office is terribly pleased; it\u0026rsquo;s just like old times.\nJames Hacker : Surely we\u0026rsquo;re all committed to the European ideal.\nSir Humphrey Appleby : Really, Minister.\n[laughs]\nJames Hacker : If not, why are we pushing for an increase in the membership?\nSir Humphrey Appleby : Well, for the same reason. It\u0026rsquo;s just like the United Nations, in fact. The more members it has, the more arguments it can stir up. The more futile and impotent it becomes.\nJames Hacker : What appalling cynicism.\nSir Humphrey Appleby : Yes. We call it diplomacy, Minister.\nYes, Minister: The Writing on the Wall (1980) ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/05/28/britains-european-policy/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Quotation","RelPermalink":"/tags/quotation/"},{"LinkTitle":"Yes-Minister","RelPermalink":"/tags/yes-minister/"}],"title":"Britain’s European Policy"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":" Do any of us really keep more than one basket these days?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/05/17/digital-eggs/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vista","RelPermalink":"/tags/vista/"},{"LinkTitle":"Xkcd","RelPermalink":"/tags/xkcd/"}],"title":"Digital Eggs"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"When learning foreign in earnest for the first time, I noticed that whilst making progress in the language itself, my brain also found ways of hemming in my thoughts. It was as if my mind’s vocabulary was labelled and categorised, such that I often instinctively knew before opening my mouth whether I knew how to say what I wanted to ‘in foreign’. Knowing the word for tree bark was as important as knowing that I know the word for tree bark. Interestingly, this made trying to use languages from school more difficult: when travelling in France, a language I’ve barely used in the past decade or so, I often found myself trying to say things my mind believed me capable of saying. It would have me starting sentences, confident in the knowledge that I knew the word or phrase ‘in foreign’, only which foreign wasn’t mentioned. It seems actually knowing what to say plays second fiddle to knowing what one is able to say.\nNow with the intention of learning a second foreign properly, I find my mind building a new ring fence around what can and can’t be said in the new foreign. I wonder what effect this might have on the old foreign – will my brain try to corral it into the smaller space, or might the fencing be removed altogether and treated like my native tongue? Will I find myself stumbling over my own thoughts as in French, or will I need to battle over my brains’ self-imposed hurdles to express myself?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/05/14/learning-a-second-foreign/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"}],"title":"Learning a Second Foreign"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"https://twitter.com/cryptopix/status/166513079880912896 So it\u0026rsquo;s come this far. After winning the dubious award of Anglizismus des Jahres 2011, der Shitstorm has become salonfähig everyday vocabulary. According to the jury:\nShitstorm füllt eine Lücke im deutschen Wortschatz, die sich durch Veränderungen in der öffentlichen Diskussionskultur aufgetan hat. Es hat sich im Laufe des letzten Jahres von der Netzgemeinde aus auf den allgemeinen Sprachgebrauch ausgebreitet und gut in die Struktur des Deutschen eingefügt.\nAnglizismus des Jahres 2011 The word\u0026rsquo;s childish irreverence in English hasn\u0026rsquo;t prevented its becoming so acceptable that German newsreaders on the tagesschau can use the word quite po-faced:\nhttps://twitter.com/sebastian _nell/status/326761134621331457\nDes Shitstorms oder des Shitstorm? And just to give it the Teutonic rubber stamp of officialdom, the use of an extra \u0026rsquo;s\u0026rsquo; in the genitive is apparently proof of the word\u0026rsquo;s acceptance into the German canon.\nHandelt es sich um englische Wörter, die (noch) nicht Teil des deutschen Wortschatzes sind bzw. nicht als solcher empfunden werden – also nicht im Duden zu finden sind –, wie etwa das Brainwashing (im Gegensatz zum o.g. Brainstorming), dann heißt es im Genitiv auch die schlimmen Folgen des Brainwashing, also kein eingedeutschter Genitiv mit „s“, sondern das Wort wird dann wie ein Eigenname aufgefasst, der ja im Genitiv auch kein „s“ erhält: die Kriege des Cäsar.\nKorrektur + Lektorat Hence here\u0026rsquo;s the Duden entry. Ach, you land of poets and thinkers\u0026hellip; where did they all go?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/05/13/in-schei%C3%9Fgewittern-a-shitstorm-in-the-dictionary/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Denglisch","RelPermalink":"/tags/denglisch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/linguistics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Loanword","RelPermalink":"/tags/loanword/"}],"title":"In Scheißgewittern: A shitstorm in the dictionary"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Uncommon People is a collection of Eric Hobsbawm\u0026rsquo;s essays spanning the majority of his long career, from the 1950s to the mid-1990s. It brings together a wide range of topics, collected under four headings: The Radical Tradition, Country People, Contemporary History and Jazz.\nUnder \u0026ldquo;The Radical Tradition\u0026rdquo;, there are essays addressing Thomas Paine, the Luddites, the radicalism of shoemakers, the difference between labour traditions in France and Britain, the development of a distinctive working class culture, the skilled manual wage worker in Victorian moral frameworks, the iconography of male and female representations in labour movements, the origins and history of May Day as a working class celebration, the relationship between socialism and the avant-garde, and Labour Party stalwart Harold Laski.\n\u0026ldquo;Country People\u0026rdquo; includes two longer essays, one providing a general overview of peasant politics, and a second study of land occupations, as well as an essay on the Sicilian Mafia.\nThe rubric \u0026ldquo;Contemporary History\u0026rdquo; features pieces Hobsbawm wrote while the embers were still hot, with pieces on Vietnam and guerilla warfare, May 1968, and sexual liberation. As a result they tend to feel dated, though as contemporary reports are still of interest for this very reason.\nFinally, the \u0026ldquo;Jazz\u0026rdquo; section contains half a dozen reviews and short writings on Sidney Bechet, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, jazz in Europe, jazz after 1960, and jazz\u0026rsquo;s relationship with blues and rock. A final essay, slotted under this Jazz heading, was written on the 500th anniversary of Columbus\u0026rsquo; landing in America, and highlights the oft forgotten benefits and advances this event brought about, from the notion of a Utopia, to the development of a theory of evolution, and the spread of staple foodstuffs like potatoes and maize.\nThe problem with this collection is that being of such a broad spectrum, only a handful of the essays are likely to appeal to the reader. Some of the pieces, particularly the shorter jazz reviews and essays, are written in an easy, affable manner, whilst many of the essays on peasant and working class movements are far more technical and heavily footnoted, and really require a background understanding to get anything from them. Nevertheless there are plenty of gems here: the essay on the Luddites amongst other machine-breaking groups highlights how the word inherited has little to do with the motivations of those people; his coverage of the development of a distinctive working class culture highlights the symbolism of something as mundane as the flat cap; whilst the essay on the Vietnam war and guerilla warfare has interesting implications for modern day conflicts such as in Afghanistan.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/04/10/uncommon-people-resistance-rebellion-and-jazz/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Essays","RelPermalink":"/tags/essays/"},{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"Jazz","RelPermalink":"/tags/jazz/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Uncommon People: Resistance, Rebellion and Jazz"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"Sparks of a move to label products according to their expected life spans It\u0026rsquo;s a situation many of us are familiar with. The milk turns sour, the yoghurt has curdled, and there are patches of water on the kitchen tiles. At fault in this tale is the refrigerator, which, barely three years old, has started to gurgle and appears to be reaching the end of its useful life. And like the DVD player, vacuum cleaner and coffee machine before it, the warranty has expired and the costs of repair far outweigh those of buying afresh. Yet according to a new survey, these failures might just be deliberate.\nThe study put before the German Bundestag by the Green Party claims to have found evidence of what it calls ‘planned obsolescence’ in a survey of over 2,000 products. Citing numerous examples, the report claims that manufacturers deliberately choose low quality components known to fail, or employ technical tricks to prevent their being repaired and encourage consumers to discard and buy new. This includes what in German are called Sollbruchstellen, ((A word otherwise used to describe the ability of certain animals to amputate a limb at a certain point as a self-defence mechanism.)) weak points designed to fail. In this way a device can be crippled by the failure of an otherwise fairly insignificant component. Another trick cited used the example of an electric toothbrush, where the regular rechargeable batteries were rendered inaccessible by design, meaning the appliance would need replacing as soon as the batteries failed. According to the report, the costs of this subterfuge weigh on the consumer, who spends billions of euros annually replacing broken goods, and the environment, through the tons of electronic goods which end up on the scrap heap because of miniscule failures.\nThis issue is by no means new. Suspicious consumers have long claimed that manufacturers deliberately produce goods with such built­in faults to ensure a steady stream of customers. Certain episodes from history highlight the possibilities. The infamous Phoebus cartel, formed by companies including Osram, Philips and General Electric in the 1920s to control the sale of lightbulbs, agreed to deliberately limit their lifespan to 1,000 hours, although technically much more durable bulbs had already been produced. A lightbulb in the Livermore Pleasanton Fire Department in California has been shining non­stop since 1902, and indeed has its own webcam feed. It is perhaps indicative of the lack of durability among electronic goods that the bulb has already outlived two webcams.\nThe hard evidence presented in this report is nevertheless relatively thin, and critics admit that much of the problem lies with the consumer buying cheap goods, made by necessity of lower quality components. Under German law it is up to consumers to provide evidence of deliberate mismanufacture, and producers can always call on the defence of regular wear and tear. Instead, Nicole Maisch, the Green Party’s consumer policy speaker, has demanded a swift overhaul of guarantee and warranty rights, a move which might promote a shift towards the production of more durable products. She also called for products to carry clear declarations of their reparability and expected lifespans. White goods in the EU are already distinguished by an energy efficiency label, rating them according to current standards: certain consumer groups would like to see similar gradings to highlight product durability. Whether this will stop teenagers needlessly throwing away their fully functioning mobile phones when the next generation smartphone comes on the market, however, is another question entirely.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/03/21/dont-make-em-like-they-used-to/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Germany","RelPermalink":"/tags/germany/"},{"LinkTitle":"Green-Party","RelPermalink":"/tags/green-party/"}],"title":"Don’t make ‘em like they used to"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Continuing the Shadows of Mirkwood saga, The Dead Marshes adventure pack is the fifth in the cycle, and finds the heroes trying to corner and capture the creature Gollum in the treacherous mires, before he escapes for good. It has a difficulty rating of 5, putting it roughly in the middle of all of the scenarios thus far in the series.\nFor this adventure the developers have again devised a new mechanic: the escape test. At the start of the game, the Gollum card is placed in the staging area, and at various times (including the end of each round) the players are required to pass a test, similar to the standard questing: if they pass, nothing happens, should they fail, some tokens get placed on Gollum (and depending on situation, their threat level might rise). Enough tokens on Gollum, and he disappears into the deck.\nWhilst this is thematically quite pleasing, the challenge being to prevent Gollum from escaping your clutches, there are enough of these tests in the game to make it fairly likely that Gollum will disappear. Which makes the rest of the game a potentially very long slog to try to find the card again, and doesn\u0026rsquo;t preclude the card appearing only to be discarded again (for example as a shadow card). In one of our games we managed to cycle through the full deck three or four times, and still didn\u0026rsquo;t get a chance to complete the mission before losing to a high threat value.\nSome players consider this a thematically very fitting mechanic and far more exciting than the variations included in The Hills of Emyn Muil or even A Journey to Rhosgobel . Perhaps I\u0026rsquo;ve just been unlucky, but I found this scenario simply dull. There is only one new enemy in the set, although some of the larger ones from the core game reappear (Wilderlands encounter set), which at least give your characters something to do once you\u0026rsquo;ve lost Gollum. The expansion probably gets harder the more players are present, at least in as far as some of the Treachery cards require each player to perform an escape test, although this would also allow the deck to be cycled much quicker and might make losing Gollum less of a fiasco.\nThe player cards in this pack are similar to what we\u0026rsquo;ve come to expect from the previous ones. The hero here is Boromir for the Tactics sphere, whose dual abilities allow him to ready himself at any time for an increase in threat, as well as go down in a blaze of glory, dealing damage to all enemies engaging one player before being discarded. Definitely a worthwhile hero, with a second ability that is quite situational, but could at the same time be a life saver. Apart from that, Tactics gains another eagle ally, and their song card; the Spirit sphere gains two more Rohan related cards; Leadership features an ally with a one-off chance to negate shadow card effects, and another stat-enhancing attachment, this time giving a hero the \u0026lsquo;ranged\u0026rsquo; attribute; Lore have a Silvan ally useful for questing, and a hobbit attachment, probably the weakest card in this set.\nOverall, I found this to be the weakest adventure pack in the series, the solid player cards aside. Whilst I appreciate the new mechanic and enjoy the added variety, I felt that the scenario was very repetitive and potentially unbeatable should Gollum disappear, and this unduly dragging the game out to an eventual fizzle rather than an exciting climax. Of course, it may be possible to have a lucky turn of cards, but then the scenario would also likely finish in a few turns.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/03/15/lord-of-the-rings-the-dead-marshes/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Living-Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/living-card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Lord-of-the-Rings","RelPermalink":"/tags/lord-of-the-rings/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Lord of the Rings: The Dead Marshes"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" The Hills of Emyn Muil is the fourth adventure in the Shadows of Mirkwood series of adventure packs which expand The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game . The story pits the heroes exploring these barren and dangerous hills, avoiding pitfalls, and continuing their quest to track down the creature Gollum.\nThis expansion is unique in many ways. In terms of the number of players, it is probably more difficult, the more players are present, which is something of a rarity. The quest features only one card, and this requiring only one progress token to complete, with the adventure rather based around exploring locations and collecting a certain number of victory points. It has a difficulty rating of 4, putting it on a par with \u0026ldquo;Journey Down The Anduin\u0026rdquo; from the original set, and the first expansion The Hunt for Gollum . However, if players have been playing the adventure packs in sequence, with the extra cards they should much more easily be able to tailor their hands to suit the job in hand, and as such I found this quest much easier than \u0026ldquo;Journey Down The Anduin\u0026rdquo;, for example. Nevertheless, that alone can\u0026rsquo;t be used as criticism, and indeed the lighter difficulty comes as a pleasant refrain from the challenges of the previous adventures.\nStill, the most common complaint about this adventure is that it is seemingly monotone. Depending on what sort of player you are, this scenario might feel extremely barren and uninteresting, but on the other hand if you managed to read The Lord of the Rings without skipping over the endless songs and descriptions of walking through the landscape, it might be far more up your alley. Despite being location-heavy, some of the larger enemies from the core set are present, as is a new enemy whose attack strength increases according to the number of locations present, and in particular there are some extremely exasperating Treachery cards to keep you on your toes and prevent this adventure being a walkover. Yet by way of design the adventure throws its \u0026lsquo;big guns\u0026rsquo; at you in the opening volley, and if you survive the first few rounds you might find yourself having an army of allies standing around with little to do by the eventual end.\nOne of my biggest criticisms of the adventure packs thus far has focused on the player cards, which were often released in an entirely pointless order. By this stage, however, if you\u0026rsquo;ve been buying the packs in order, most of the cards start to come into their own, and the ones in this set offer a pretty good selection, including a few which are obviously useful to this scenario. The hero in this pack is \u0026ldquo;Brand, son of Bain\u0026rdquo;, a character similar in stats to Legolas, but whose ability is very coop oriented, a nice addition for people not playing the game solo. The Tactics sphere gets another pair of eagle cards, Spirit continues in a Rohan vein and gets their song card (resource generator), Lore has an extremely powerful ally, whilst Leadership gets\u0026hellip; well, arguably the most useless card in the game so far. By and large though, the cards make excellent additions and can prove very useful for this scenario in particular.\nAs one of the easier expansions, it\u0026rsquo;s somehow a shame that this adventure wasn\u0026rsquo;t earlier on the list. Whilst some might find it dull, if it doesn\u0026rsquo;t bother you that the enemies are very sparse, it offers a nice break and a bit of variety, without being a complete walk in the woods. The design is a little flawed in that it tends to start off hard and gradually get easier, and the lack of any progression in the storyline leaves exploring the locations relatively monotonous, but these factors are arguably made up for by the usefulness of the included player cards.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/03/14/lord-of-the-rings-the-hills-of-emyn-muil/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Living-Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/living-card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Lord-of-the-Rings","RelPermalink":"/tags/lord-of-the-rings/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Lord of the Rings: The Hills of Emyn Muil"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" If you\u0026rsquo;re playing the Shadows of Mirkwood series of adventure packs in order, A Journey to Rhosgobel is the third stage, coming after the brutal Conflict at the Carrock . The story has our heroes encounter a wounded eagle, which needs taking to see Radagast at Rhosgobel to be treated with the medicinal herb Athelas before it is too late.\nThe second adventure pack to feature an ally in the enemy deck, A Journey to Rhosgobel revolves around the eagle character Wilyador, who unlike Grimbeorn from Conflict at the Carrock, joins the players immediately and swaps ownership each turn. With 20 hit points he certainly seems a tough cookie, but he also weakens at the end of every round, a nice mechanic which puts pressure on the players and forces them to attempt to complete the quest quickly, rather than hanging back and building up their forces. There are relatively few new enemies in this set, but a handful of dangerous Treachery cards which can have devastating effects.\nThis scenario is definitely a breath of fresh air, with a very specific mission which thematically fits rather nicely. Nevertheless it is still a bit of a mixed bag. The most common complaint is that this mission is, moreso than normal, extremely dependent on the luck of the draw. Healing Wilyador essentially relies on finding Athelas cards mixed in the enemy deck. Whilst there are a few locations which can help, the proportion of these cards is still very small. I haven\u0026rsquo;t played it solo, but I can imagine that only drawing one card from the deck would make it even more difficult. The scenario has a difficulty rating of 6, which puts it marginally easier than Dol Guldur and Conflict at the Carrock, but I would argue that the rating depends entirely on how the cards fall. A good shuffle, and you can find all the healing cards you need for Wilyador in the first few rounds; a bad shuffle, and he\u0026rsquo;ll die long before you find a single one, and there\u0026rsquo;s virtually nothing you can do about it.\nIn terms of the player cards, this set offers a fairly decent selection. The hero in this pack is Prince Imharil (Leadership), a character very similar to Aragon both in terms of stats and ability, and overall a useful alternative, if perhaps fairly bland. There\u0026rsquo;s no song in this pack, rather a neutral ally, Radagast, who collects his own resources which can be spent on bringing creature allies into the game, or healing ones already there. If you\u0026rsquo;ve been playing these adventures in sequence, there are also a few more cards here which will make some of the earlier inclusions more useful, such as the two cards which allow you to look through the top X cards in your deck for an eagle or Rohan card from The Hunt for Gollum adventure pack.\nOverall this is a decent expansion pack, which adds some useful cards to the player decks, and offers a unique adventure with some nice mechanics that add tension, and force the players to consider their moves carefully. Unfortunately, it\u0026rsquo;s rather more luck-dependent than previous adventures, and could probably have had more playtesting and a little tweaking to hit the note. This is one of those adventures where players will find themselves honing a deck specifically to the case in hand, and may even then still fail because they cannot find an Athelas card, or too many Treachery cards appear in a bunch. If the luck of the draw is one of the things that put you off this Lord of the Rings card game, it might be worth skipping over this particular pack.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/03/12/lord-of-the-rings-a-journey-to-rhosgobel/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Living-Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/living-card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Lord-of-the-Rings","RelPermalink":"/tags/lord-of-the-rings/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Lord of the Rings: A Journey to Rhosgobel"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"In Language as a Window into Human Nature, Steven Pinker explains how the mind turns the finite building blocks of language into infinite meanings, looking at cursing, metaphors and the issue of common knowledge. This video is only part of the full talk, brilliantly animated by RSA.1\nhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-son3EJTrU Video of the complete talk available is on YouTube here .\u0026#160;\u0026#x21a9;\u0026#xfe0e;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/03/11/language-as-a-window/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Steven-Pinker","RelPermalink":"/tags/steven-pinker/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Language as a Window"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Every man is a poet. At least he would be, if you were to judge him by his knowledge of idioms. Our languages are riddled with examples of metaphors and similes, word combinations that take on a meaning beyond the sum of their parts. Interestingly, however, the origins of these phrases are often mysterious or disputed. Inspired by this short post series over on the World Text blog, I thought I\u0026rsquo;d take a look at a handful of German idioms relating to food.\n«Es zieht wie Hechtsuppe» Example:\nDas nasskalte Wetter ist bestimmt nicht geeignet, die Stimmung in höchste Höhen schnellen zu lassen. Zumal es auf dem Markt an vielen Ecken zieht wie Hechtsuppe.\nAachener Nachrichten Terrible draughts in Germany are apparently comparable to pike soup. Why that should be the case isn\u0026rsquo;t quite clear, but there are a few theories. The favourite has it that Hechtsuppe is actually a corrupted form of the Yiddish phrase hech soppa / supha, meaning \u0026rsquo;like a (strong) storm'.\nAn alternative theory is that it\u0026rsquo;s actually a play on the verb ziehen. To get the full flavour out of the fish, especially pike, the soup is left for a long time to simmer and the flavours to effuse. ((Sprichwörter \u0026amp; Redewendungen - Es zieht wie Hechtsuppe .))\n«Dreikäsehoch» Example:\nMit Wintersport hatte Ronny Häring schon als Dreikäsehoch begonnen, als er jahrelang Junioren-Eishockey spielte.\nSPEEDWEEK Nipper, squirt, tiny tot, sprog, tyke—I\u0026rsquo;m sure there\u0026rsquo;s a hundred odd slang words in English, though I\u0026rsquo;m not sure any refer to cheese. Quite how high three cheeses are probably provokes some regional arguments, but this phrase, appearing in the 18th century to denote a cheeky little youngster, quite literally refers to the height of three cheese wheels stacked on top of one another. Or quite possibly it\u0026rsquo;s a French phrase perverted to suit the German ear, that originally referred to caisses (cases/crates) not Käse. ((ARD - Wissen macht Ah! ))\n«Tomaten auf den Augen» Example:\nKokain im Blut aber Tomaten auf den Augen: Ein Porschefahrer bemerkt zu spät, dass der Passat vor ihm wegen eines Rettuungswagens bremsen muss und kracht ins Heck.\nAbendzeitung München If you miss the blindingly obvious, it might be because you have tomatoes on your eyes. The origins of this phrase are fairly unclear, though a common interpretation is that it\u0026rsquo;s a comparison to the bloody-eyed look of someone who has been up all night. ((Planet Wissen .)) Another suggestion is that it comes from times when traffic lights were accompanied by traffic police, and the remark refers to drivers not setting off when the light turned green. ((Redensarten-Index .)) Though surely they\u0026rsquo;d be more likely to flag down drivers who have limes on their eyes.\n«Die beleidigte Leberwurst» Example:\nSchweinsteiger hat es überhaupt nicht nötig, die beleidigte Leberwurst zu spielen.\nAbendzeitung München When you pout, go off in a huff or sulk, you might just be playing the insulted liver sausage. This rather older saying relates to the belief that ascribed organs in the body various roles, and in which the liver became the origin of your temperament and the centre of feelings such as anger, love and sorrow. Other phrases such as \u0026ldquo;die Laus, die einem über die Leber läuft\u0026rdquo; or \u0026ldquo;die Galle überlaufen/hochkommen\u0026rdquo; refer to the same idea. Hurt my feelings and you insult my liver.\nLater, as the belief in the liver as the centre of a person\u0026rsquo;s feelings began to wane, the phrase was adapted to beleidigte Leberwurst. A popular apocryphal etymology explains the story of the various sausages cooking in a pot, in which all of the other sausages are taken out, and the Leberwurst, insulted at being last, bursts with anger. ((Duden - Leberwurst .))\n«Alles in Butter» Example:\nGemessen an dem Kriterium der durchschnittlichen Dauer von Stromausfällen in Deutschland ist hier nach wie vor alles in Butter: Mit 15 Minuten bleibt dieser Wert sogar noch unter dem des Ausgangsjahres 2008.\nHamburger Abendblatt Everything\u0026rsquo;s hunky-dory, everything\u0026rsquo;s in butter. In comparison to the majority on this list, this phrase has very practical origins. In the Middle Ages, when expensive glass was transported over the Alps to Germany from places like Venice, there was a very real risk of the expensive goods being broken by being rattled around or falling off the coach over the long and difficult journey. A simple solution was found, in which the brittle goods were placed in barrels and the latter then filled with hot butter, whereby the glass was secured against most of the knocks and bumps they might get on the voyage. With everything in butter, it was secure, and the phrase has stayed with us today. ((Sprichwörter \u0026amp; Redewendungen - Alles in Butter .))\n«Honig ums Maul schmieren» Example:\nIm Grunde unterstützte Şükür die vorherrschende Meinung, die Regierung sei drauf und dran, die Türkei in einen Abgrund zu stürzen, in dem sie die türkische Bevölkerung völlig übergehe, um den ethnischen Minderheiten weiterhin Honig ums Maul zu schmieren.\nTurkishpress If you want to ingratiate yourself with someone, smearing honey around their mouth (or beard) is a useful tactic. The most common explanation for the origins of this saying root in the training of bears, where honey smeared around the mouth was used as a form of reward, just as fish might be used for seals and dolphins. ((GEOlino.de - Jemandem Honig ums Maul schmieren .))\nAnother possible source for this phrase goes back to a Chinese tradition. The Kitchen God, sent by Yu Huang, the Emperor of Heaven, to watch over each household, reports back on their doings during the Chinese New Year celebrations. As a way of placating the Gods, an effigy of the god in paper or statue form is fed sticky rice or honey, and is either unable to report on the family, having his mouth too full to speak, or else is persuaded to only say \u0026lsquo;sweet\u0026rsquo; things to the Emperor. ((About.com - The Kitchen God .))\n«Nicht mein Bier» Example:\n«Schrebergarten ist nicht mein Bier \u0026hellip; So lange es einen nicht quält und die Leute einen lassen, sollte man das ruhig noch machen. Es macht mir noch Spaß.»\nJaecki Schwarz, Mitteldeutsche Zeitung Only to be expected in the land of the Reinheitsgebot, if something isn\u0026rsquo;t your beer, it isn\u0026rsquo;t your problem/has nothing to do with you. Except curiously, the phrase seems to have its origins in a rather more innocuous phrase, with the word Bier actually being a perversion of the regional pronunciation of the word Birne. Depending on the region, this might be pronounced Bürne (Bremen), d\u0026rsquo;Bian (Bavaria) or perhaps \u0026rsquo;n Beär (Cologne), which is often used in place of the word Sache in such phrases as „Das ist nicht meine Sache“ i.e. \u0026ldquo;That\u0026rsquo;s none of my business\u0026rdquo;. ((Duden ; Wiktionary .))\n«Senf dazugeben» Example:\nDie Vorschläge kommen aus dem Publikum und jeder darf seinen Senf dazugeben.\nBadische Zeitung Not quite as neutral as adding your tuppence to a conversation, adding mustard is usually reserved for butting in with an unsolicited opinion. Most sources seem to agree that this saying has its origins in the 17th century. At that time, mustard was somehow seen as a condiment that might improve the flavour of any dish, leading to its liberal use in taverns and inns with nearly every meal, requested or not. This little addition, as unwelcome as it was untoward, was later applied to those (normally unwanted) comments from a third party to a conversation. ((Redewendung: Seinen Senf dazugeben .))\nAlso, gebt gerne hierunter euren Senf dazu!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/03/10/talking-with-your-mouth-full-german-food-idioms/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Idioms","RelPermalink":"/tags/idioms/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"}],"title":"Talking with Your Mouth Full: German food idioms"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Second in the Shadows of Mirkwood series of adventure packs, Conflict at the Carrock packs a serious punch, with a difficulty rating of 7 (the same as the final adventure in the original set). Where The Hunt for Gollum sees players dealing with a very location-heavy deck, this time round the focus is very much on the fighting, culminating in a tense battle, as four trolls challenge the heroes.\nFirstly, the scenario itself while certainly hard is by no means impossible, and lends itself to multiple strategies. Given the prominent role fighting the trolls plays, there\u0026rsquo;s a lot of tension here. Aside from the trolls in the new deck, the hill trolls from the original game can also play an ominous cameo role. This quest can see heroes being captured, very similar to the prisoner in the \u0026ldquo;Escape from Dol Guldur\u0026rdquo; adventure in the core set, which only adds to the difficulty should a hero get \u0026lsquo;knocked out\u0026rsquo; at a critical stage. An interesting addition, this is also the first adventure to feature a player ally in the enemy deck itself, who whilst very expensive, lends himself to fighting the trolls, and can be all that is needed to draw victory from the jaws of defeat.\nIn comparison to the quest, the player cards are more of a mixed bag, though are still a better selection than in The Hunt for Gollum. The hero in this pack is Frodo Baggins, who is a decent addition to the game, with a relatively cheap starting cost and an ability that makes him virtually invincible (converting damage to threat). There are then two cards per sphere, usually an ally and an event/attachment, plus a song which generates one lore resource per turn. All but one of the cards here can find their uses even without extra cards from other adventure packs.\nAside from the usual gripes which are inherent to the nature of this card game, there are a couple of minor problems with this adventure. First, it doesn\u0026rsquo;t scale quite as well as the previous one, which although it doesn\u0026rsquo;t make it unplayable, shows it was clearly designed with two players in mind. The second issue is simply a question of paying attention, but there are quite a few cards which alter the values of other ones in the game, particularly when the four trolls come into play, and it\u0026rsquo;s easy to overlook these extras. The first time we defeated this adventure, we\u0026rsquo;d actually missed the fact that our threat level should have risen and killed us, so it pays to be vigilant when reading the card text!\nUltimately, Conflict at the Carrock is a very worthwhile expansion to the core game, offering a challenging and exciting new adventure, very action packed, with a selection of decent player cards. The hero, Frodo Baggins, adds some versatility to the way you play the game, whilst the addition of a player ally hidden in the enemy deck is an interesting twist, and thematically in keeping. If you like the core game and don\u0026rsquo;t insist on playing the adventure packs in order, this is one of the better ones in the Shadows of Mirkwood series.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/03/07/lord-of-the-rings-conflict-at-the-carrock/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Card-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/card-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Living-Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/living-card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Lord-of-the-Rings","RelPermalink":"/tags/lord-of-the-rings/"}],"title":"Lord of the Rings: Conflict at the Carrock"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" The Hunt for Gollum is the first adventure pack in the Shadows of Mirkwood series for the base game The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game . As with all of these adventure packs, it includes a new hero, extra player cards and a new scenario replete with enemies, locations and treachery cards for the players to face.\nThe scenario is a fairly decent one, albeit not one of the best. Rated difficulty 4, it\u0026rsquo;s comparable to the \u0026ldquo;Journey Down The Anduin\u0026rdquo; scenario from the core set. Where this adventure improves on those in the core set, is that it does a decent job of adjusting itself to the number of players, with a lot of cards relying on the number of players or allies in the game. In general, the enemy deck is fairly location heavy, which means there is relatively little fighting here, and no particularly large enemies to face.\nAs to the player cards, unfortunately this aspect of this adventure pack is fairly weak. The hero card, Bilbo Baggins, is fairly \u0026rsquo;expensive\u0026rsquo; for his ability, although he suits players who like to play the game solo. There is the first of many \u0026lsquo;song\u0026rsquo; cards here, which allow players to cheaply earn specific resources, as well as the first of a number of \u0026lsquo;mark\u0026rsquo; cards, which adjust heroes\u0026rsquo; stats. However, there are also a couple of cards here which only show their true worth once you\u0026rsquo;ve bought some more of the adventure packs. If you aren\u0026rsquo;t set on playing these adventures in the order in which they were released, it might make sense to take one of the later releases first, or at least to buy more than one at once.\nOverall if you enjoyed the main game and want to breath some new life into it, this is a reasonable little adventure, not too challenging, yet satisfying at the same time. It\u0026rsquo;s not one of the most exciting scenarios, but it scales well, so makes playing solo or with 4 players equally challenging. Unfortunately, some of the player cards only prove their worth later, so if it doesn\u0026rsquo;t bother you to play out of order, and you only want to buy one, it would be worth picking up one of the later adventure packs first.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/02/28/lord-of-the-rings-the-hunt-for-gollum/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Living-Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/living-card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Lord-of-the-Rings","RelPermalink":"/tags/lord-of-the-rings/"}],"title":"Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" If you\u0026rsquo;re interested in cooperative games, Lord of the Rings: LCG is an involving card-based game designed for 2 players, but also playable solo or with up to four. This core set includes all you need for two players to get started, with three adventures of increasing difficulty for the players to overcome. The term \u0026rsquo;living card game\u0026rsquo; basically means that the story continues in various expansion sets, so this game has plenty of longevity if you enjoy it.\nFor those not familiar with this type of game, the fundamentals are fairly simple. Each player chooses up to 3 heroes to play with from a selection, and builds themselves a deck out of the appropriate cards (preset decks are suggested for the first time out). During the game, the heroes generate \u0026lsquo;resources\u0026rsquo; with which to pay for bringing cards from their decks into the game, such as extra allies to fight with, weapons and armour for their heroes, or beneficial event cards. Meanwhile, the adventure also comprises a deck of cards, which contains enemies for the heroes to fight, locations for them to explore, and nasty events which can bring tears to their eyes. In each round, players may gain resources, pay for cards from their hands, tackle the adventure, travel to a new location, parry attacks from enemies, and retaliate.\nDeciding the who/when/where/what of all of this leads to plenty of decision-making for the players, and is where this cooperative element really shines. One of the biggest pitfalls of a lot of cooperative games is that one person becomes the conductor and the others follow his baton: perhaps that person is the most experienced or simply the most vociferous, but either way the other players end up feeling they\u0026rsquo;re simply watching him play the game solitaire. With Lord of the Rings, each player should keep their hand of cards secret, and although they can discuss strategy, there shouldn\u0026rsquo;t be any opportunity for one player to dominate proceedings, leaving for a far more satisfying cooperative experience.\nWhilst definitely a step up in difficulty from other more famous cooperative games like Pandemic, the rulebook is well written, with plenty of examples, and once you\u0026rsquo;ve played a few rounds and got used to the different phases, it\u0026rsquo;s not overtly complicated. Nevertheless, this game is extremely versatile, with many cards having special powers which bend or even negate the basic rules. The advantage of this is that no two games play out the same way, and the adventure packs introduce interesting mechanics that inject some freshness into the game each time. Sometimes you\u0026rsquo;ll be out to kill a dangerous creature, other times you need to free a prisoner, or perhaps escort yet another to safety. However, this versatility can be as much a blessing as a curse, and poses some problems of its own. Firstly, as a lot of the cards alter the rules slightly, it can sometimes be hard to keep track of them all, and you may find yourselves like us having to retrace your steps a little when you notice you\u0026rsquo;ve skipped a special rule. Secondly, it often happens that players come across a situation in which the rule can have a number of interpretations and they aren\u0026rsquo;t sure what to do. We\u0026rsquo;ve found that in these situations its best to simply make up a house rule on the spot, and if it\u0026rsquo;s really important, check on the internet in places like BoardGameGeek.com or in the official FAQ , where you will find definitive rulings to most of those odd cases.\nAside from the odd rules question, there are a few problems with this game which will mean it\u0026rsquo;s not for everyone. For starters, this core set feels a little incomplete for what you get for your money. That\u0026rsquo;s not to say it\u0026rsquo;s overly expensive, but it is fairly limited in scope unless you\u0026rsquo;re willing to buy some of the adventure packs and expand the game. There are (only) three adventures in the box, and the difficulty curve is steep; the first adventure (difficulty rating 1) only took us a few goes to defeat, the second (rated 4) however had us scratching our heads for a long time, whilst the third (rated 7) we found nigh-on impossible and only managed with a lot of luck.\nThis is obviously a deliberate ploy on the part of the publishers to try to encourage players to buy some expansion packs to strengthen their decks and get more playtime out of the game. Whilst you might be annoyed at their perfidy for forcing you to buy more, I think the expansions are in general very good value for money: for around £10 you get a scenario which, if it takes you 2-3 attempts to complete, could provide 5 hours of entertainment, and doesn\u0026rsquo;t preclude you trying it again with different cards or different people.\nA more minor point, but the way the contents are presented leaves a lot to be desired. Whilst the box is adequate for holding the starter set, once you start buying adventure packs the number of cards soon becomes unwieldy and the box is pretty inept. Many players have posted their self-made solutions on the internet. Aside from that, given that you end up shuffling the cards a lot and sliding them across the table, you might find it worthwhile to invest in protective sleeves for the cards: for example those from Fantasy Flight Games , or the rather cheaper alternatives from Mayday Games.\nWho this game is for:\nPlayers after a rich, detailed cooperative experience. Players who don\u0026rsquo;t mind spending extra money to extend the lifespan of the game. Two players (especially couples). Solo is also fun, but much more challenging. Who this game is not for:\nPlayers who don\u0026rsquo;t like losing. The game is very challenging, so expect to lose most scenarios at least a few times before you succeed. Players who hate games with luck. Even if you\u0026rsquo;re well prepared, sometimes a bad card combination will appear which ruins even the best-laid schemes. Players who hate the deck-building aspect. This is a key element to the game and part of the fun, which you could skip entirely, but it would only make the game even more difficult to play. In summary, this is a great card game for two set in the Middle Earth universe. The rules can get a little sticky but are on the whole fairly easy once you\u0026rsquo;ve played a round or two, and the adventures are challenging enough that they will take some good planning on the part of the players, and a soupçon of luck, to defeat them. If you enjoy this base game, you can easily expand it with the well priced adventure packs, which each add their own flavours and nuances to the experience.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/02/26/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-card-game/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Living-Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/tags/living-card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Lord-of-the-Rings","RelPermalink":"/tags/lord-of-the-rings/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"Hmm\u0026hellip; it\u0026rsquo;s been some time since I posted with any regularity here. In fact, it was something of a resolution of mine for 2012 that went rather pear-shaped, but better late than never.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/02/22/spring-cleaning/","tags":[],"title":"Spring Cleaning"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" The period in German history following the Second World War is probably one of the most neglected in terms of popular history, far overshadowed by the war itself and frequently overlooked as a mere footnote to the origins of the Cold War. Yet the fascinating question remains as to why the peace following the First World War contributed to the beginnings of the Second, whilst the policies following the latter led to one of the longest periods of peace on the continent.\nHow the victors handled their policy of \u0026lsquo;unconditional surrender\u0026rsquo;, and what this entailed for occupied Germany, is the subject of Frederick Taylor\u0026rsquo;s book. His book covers the final stages of the war, as the Allied and Soviet forces prepared to attack and occupy Germany proper. Military actions only play a background role in the narrative, Taylor focussing only on interactions with the civilians, including the atrocities most severely carried out on the Eastern Front, as well as retaliatory attacks by Nazi fanatics and so called \u0026lsquo;Werwolf\u0026rsquo; units.\nWhere this book shines is in Taylor\u0026rsquo;s ability to compare and contrast the widely differing policies and practices of the occupying forces. Despite the complexity of the subject, the book highlights the differences between those directing policy and those governing forces on the ground, between those espousing punitive policies and those wishing to see a rapidly rehabilitated Germany, and between the Soviet, American, British and French zones. It becomes clear just how much of a challenge the question of denazification posed to the victors, which ostensibly remained an inflexible goal of all parties. The totalitarian nature of the Nazi Party meant that virtually no one had remained completely aloof of the system, leaving policy planners the major task of separating hardline Nazis from \u0026lsquo;career Nazis\u0026rsquo;, \u0026lsquo;muss Nazis\u0026rsquo; or fellow travellers. Taylor treats each of the occupying zones separately, and looks at the systems put in place and measures their successes and failures, not just in terms of raw numbers weeding out devout Nazis, but also the impact of these policies on the German population, and to what extent these changes were lasting.\nUnfortunately, this book has one major failing, and that lies in its title. Subtitled \u0026ldquo;The Occupation and Denazification of Germany\u0026rdquo;, there feels to be rather too much of the former and not enough of the latter to justify the name. Taylor does spend a lot of time dealing with the occupiers\u0026rsquo; attempts to remove Nazis themselves from positions of influence in German society, but there is little to nothing on their own and subsequent German policies as regards dealing with Nazism as an ideology. There is surprisingly little on areas such as education, the media and law, or even such mundane things as the renaming of streets or the treatment of the swastika are left out. Even the Psychological Warfare Division responsible for Allied propaganda goes unmentioned in the index (albeit some of their actions are covered). Aside from this, it is also disappointing that there are virtually no comparisons to occupation and denazification policies in other countries after the Second World War, e.g. Austria or France, or similar \u0026lsquo;purification\u0026rsquo; actions during other periods (Taylor mentions the de-Ba\u0026rsquo;athification policy of the Iraq War a few times, without making any direct allusions). However given the scope of the book, the omission can be understood. Finally as another commenter pointed out, it seems that someone working for the publisher decided that the book would sell better with HITLER written in large letters across the front, which is at once no doubt true, but all the same bitterly depressing.\nFor all this, Exorcising Hitler is an extremely well-written and well-researched account of immediate post-war Germany. No apologist, Taylor points out appalling conditions in Western POW camps, engineered through pure legal sophistry, the mass rapes and atrocities in the East, and the sufferings of refugees and \u0026lsquo;displaced persons\u0026rsquo; driven from their territories and turned back from others. A potentially bewildering subject, Taylor takes the issue of denazification apart and analyses each policy and practical element in turn, comparing and contrasting the different approaches, and examining the successes and failures of the post-war occupation. The book\u0026rsquo;s epilogue ties the whole together with an excellent summary of the reactions to and effects of these policies in post-war Germany right through to the present day.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/02/13/exorcising-hitler-the-occupation-and-denazification-of-germany/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Second-World-War","RelPermalink":"/tags/second-world-war/"}],"title":"Exorcising Hitler: The Occupation and Denazification of Germany"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" In Selling Hitler Robert Harris has provided an enthralling, blow-by-blow account of one of the most infamous hoaxes in history, the alleged discovery of the Hitler diaries. A potentially convoluted plot with many actors, Harris has done a remarkable job in organising the story in a comprehensible manner, and in so doing has simultaneously written a turn-paging piece of investigative journalism, full of interesting nuggets and occasionally humourous asides.\nHistory is always a work in progress. Sewing together the past from the scanty pieces left to posterity is a difficult task, and one which can never hope to fill all of the gaps and answer all of the questions. Hence when a new source comes to light, the potential to fill in a few holes in the jigsaw, to provide answers to some of the glaring question\u0026ndash;even to essentially rewriting history\u0026ndash;can be staggering. In the case of the Hitler diaries, of course, the potential was immense, not only in terms of offering a personal and uncensored glimpse into the world through his eyes, but for providing further information and evidence to solve mysteries like the \u0026lsquo;miracle\u0026rsquo; of Dunkirk, Hess\u0026rsquo; flight to Scotland, or Hitler\u0026rsquo;s role in the Holocaust.\nYet the diaries were fakes, and obvious ones. Written on post-war paper, with post-war ink, the content largely consisted of dull and banal headlines from the Völkischer Beobachter, or speeches sometimes copied verbatim, i.e. including errors, from Max Domarus\u0026rsquo; compilation Hitler: Speeches and Proclamations. So just how did such a media farce result from what ultimately proved to be such crude and unconvincing forgeries? What drove a respected magazine like Stern to spend 9 million DM on the diaries without once thoroughly checking the evidence? And how did other reputable newspapers like The Times and Newsweek similarly come to swallow the story?\nAside from being a report into this particular hoax, \u0026ldquo;Selling Hitler\u0026rdquo; tells a sobering tale of greed and ambition over rationality that could apply anywhere. The atmosphere of secrecy and conspiracy, combined with the promise of acknowledgement and riches, allowed a poor quality forgery to hoodwink a media corporation and ultimately tarnish or even destroy the reputations of the journalists and experts associated with the find. A surprisingly large number of people who heard of or came into contact with the diaries soon suspended their disbelief on hearing the most rudimentary supporting evidence. Even excluding the evidence of flawed handwriting tests, to most of the people asked to check the diaries\u0026rsquo; authenticity it simply didn\u0026rsquo;t seem plausible that someone would go to the trouble of forging over 60 volumes of diaries and sundry other papers. Ironically enough, the whole episode rings like a quote from Hitler\u0026rsquo;s Mein Kampf, often attributed to Joseph Goebbels, that the more colossal the lie, the more likely people are to believe it.\nHarris\u0026rsquo; book is a superb summary of the whole affair, covering every angle and explaining each step as the fiasco house of cards was gradually built up, before being dashed to the ground. The lives of the chief culprits are portrayed, along with the roles played by people such as historians Hugh Trevor-Roper, David Irving and Gerhard Weinberg, as well as people like Rupert Murdoch (who has some amusing quotes). Whilst not totally devoid of personal opinion, Harris clearly showing sympathy for the Stern editors who were in his view forced to take the fall for the scandal, none of the characters are openly demonised, and the facts are objectively presented. The only small complaint to make would be that the book, first published in 1986, now feels incomplete and a little dated. My copy was printed in 2009, and it would have been nicer if a revised edition had been produced, if only with an extra chapter on what happened to such characters as the forger Konrad Kujau, the gullible and corrupt journalist Gerd Heidemann, or historians such as Irving, whose reputation gained a temporary boost by being one of the first to publicly denounce the diaries as forgeries.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2013/01/28/selling-hitler-the-story-of-the-hitler-diaries/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Selling Hitler: The Story of the Hitler Diaries"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" As one of the world\u0026rsquo;s most prolific authors, and one of the true giants of science fiction, it can be difficult to know where to start with Asimov. As a child I read a few stories and was soon hooked, but perusing his oeuvre takes some time. For anyone interested in wetting their fingers with this master of science fiction, however, the Nightfall anthology is a great place to start.\nPut together by Asimov in the late sixties, it was his attempt to address what he felt was an undue amount of attention to the short story which gives the collection its name. Nightfall was published in 1941 when Asimov was just 21 years old, but was immediately recognised by the magazine editor as being worthy of a bonus rate. Unwilling to accept that his best work was written basically at the beginning of his career, this collection is an opportunity for readers to judge for themselves, whether Nightfall deserves such high praise, and whether or not Asimov\u0026rsquo;s writing style had improved in the intervening period.\nThis first volume contains five stories published between 1941 and 1951 (\u0026ldquo;Nightfall\u0026rdquo; (1941), \u0026ldquo;Green Patches\u0026rdquo; (1950), \u0026ldquo;Hostess\u0026rdquo; (1951), \u0026ldquo;Breeds There A Man\u0026hellip;?\u0026rdquo; (1951), and \u0026ldquo;C-Chute\u0026rdquo; (1951)). The eponymous Nightfall certainly deserves credit for being an extremely tight and thought-provoking story, to the extent that some write of a \u0026lsquo;Nightfall event\u0026rsquo; as synonymous with the end of a civilisation. The other stories cover a range of topics, including extraterrestrials in search of a disease, and at that time very topical story dealing with the invention of shield against atomic weapons. All in all a wonderful little collection.\nAside from the stories themselves, each is prefaced by a small introduction by the author featuring some interesting background information as to how he got his inspiration or how the story was received. Asimov is very self-deprecating, often denying that he is much of a writer. Whilst he perhaps wouldn\u0026rsquo;t win any prizes for style, this volume shows how brilliantly fertile his mind was, and aside from entertainment value, might spark an idea or two in its readers\u0026rsquo; minds. Sadly, Nightfall Two does not live up to the standards set by these stories.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/12/18/nightfall-one/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science-Fiction","RelPermalink":"/tags/science-fiction/"},{"LinkTitle":"Short-Stories","RelPermalink":"/tags/short-stories/"}],"title":"Nightfall One"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" As one of the world\u0026rsquo;s most prolific authors, and one of the true giants of science fiction, it can be difficult to know where to start with Asimov. As a child I read a few stories and was soon hooked, but perusing his oeuvre takes some time. For anyone interested in wetting their fingers with this master of science fiction, however, the Nightfall anthology is a great place to start.\nPut together by Asimov in the late sixties, it was his attempt to address what he felt was an undue amount of attention to the short story which gives the collection its name. Nightfall was published in 1941 when Asimov was just 21 years old, but was immediately recognised by the magazine editor as being worthy of a bonus rate. Unwilling to accept that his best work was written basically at the beginning of his career, this collection is an opportunity for readers to judge for themselves, whether Nightfall deserves such high praise, and whether or not Asimov\u0026rsquo;s writing style had improved in the intervening period.\nThis second volume contains fifteen short stories published between 1951 and 1967 (\u0026ldquo;In a Good Cause\u0026ndash;\u0026rdquo; (1951), \u0026ldquo;What If\u0026ndash;\u0026rdquo; (1952), \u0026ldquo;Sally\u0026rdquo; (1953), \u0026ldquo;Flies\u0026rdquo; (1953), \u0026ldquo;Nobody Here But\u0026ndash;\u0026rdquo; (1953), \u0026ldquo;It\u0026rsquo;s Such a Beautiful Day\u0026rdquo; (1954), \u0026ldquo;Strikebreaker\u0026rdquo; (1957), \u0026ldquo;Insert Knob A In Hole B\u0026rdquo; (1957), \u0026ldquo;The Up-To-Date Sorcerer\u0026rdquo; (1958), \u0026ldquo;Unto the Fourth Generation\u0026rdquo; (1959), \u0026ldquo;What is This Thing Called Love?\u0026rdquo; (1961), \u0026ldquo;The Machine that Won the War\u0026rdquo; (1961), \u0026ldquo;My Son, the Physicist\u0026rdquo; (1962), \u0026ldquo;Eyes Do More Than See\u0026rdquo; (1965), and \u0026ldquo;Segregationist\u0026rdquo; (1967)). In comparison to the first volume, this is much more of a mixed bag in terms of quality. Given that Asimov set out to prove that Nightfall wasn\u0026rsquo;t his only decent short story, a lot of the choices contained in this volume seem to have more in the way of anecdotal value. For instance, \u0026ldquo;What If-\u0026rdquo; was written as a bet between Asimov and his wife as to whether he could base a story around something as simple as their train journey; the two-page \u0026ldquo;Insert Knob A In Hole B\u0026rdquo; was written during a television panel discussion, when he was challenged to write a story on the spot (he admits in the preface that he had expected the challenge to come up and prepared accordingly). Similarly other stories were written at the behest of editors seeking to fulfil a particular niche, including one for Playboy.\nAs with the first volume, each story is prefaced by a small introduction, which partly makes up for the lower quality of the stories. The stories are obviously a lot shorter in this volume, and as a result have a much broader range of backgrounds, so there is certainly a chance that at least something will appeal to every reader. Nevertheless, there\u0026rsquo;s little denying that this volume can\u0026rsquo;t live up to the standards set by Nightfall One .\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/12/18/nightfall-two/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science-Fiction","RelPermalink":"/tags/science-fiction/"},{"LinkTitle":"Short-Stories","RelPermalink":"/tags/short-stories/"}],"title":"Nightfall Two"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Reading The Female Eunuch now feels to a certain extent like reading a pamphlet from the Suffragist movement; the arguments are clear, but the backdrop is somehow distant and faded. How much that changed backdrop is a result of the efforts of people like Germaine Greer is for the historians to say, but this book clearly earns its place on the bookshelf as one of the most important works in the women\u0026rsquo;s liberation movement.\nDespite being written in 1970, there is nothing stale about this book. Greer\u0026rsquo;s writing can be very punchy, at times witty, and the threads of her argument are clearly and logically set out. For a book that has sold over a million copies, she is extremely eloquent, at times even a touch grandiloquent, and her choice of words sometimes had me reaching for a dictionary. That aside, the book is fairly easy to read for its subject matter.\nNevertheless, it is not Greer\u0026rsquo;s arguments or her choice of phrasing that are difficult to understand, but the context in which they were written. It is difficult for anyone born after that time to comprehend how much society has changed in that period, at the most fundamental, interpersonal level. In this light, Greer\u0026rsquo;s arguments can seem overdramatised, perhaps even alien to someone reading them today, but there is plenty which bears relevance to understanding how we got where we are today, and perhaps knowing what we have yet to go.\nGreer covers the whole gamut of the female experience, from birth and childhood, through sex and marriage, to the workplace and public sphere. In covering this massive range of subjects, from the most tangible in terms of jobs, wages and taxation, through to more esoteric notions of imagery in language and psychology, one gets a clear notion of Greer\u0026rsquo;s ideal vision. Although there are far more criticisms of the status quo than overt recommendations for change, in questioning some of the core units of society, it leads all of us to critically appraise our modes and ways of life.\nMany people who haven\u0026rsquo;t read this book, and men in particular, assume it must be written by a man-hater, an irrational and fiery-hearted misandrist nailing her theses to the church of patriarchy. In truth, the book is a deep and basic criticism of that day\u0026rsquo;s society, pointed as much at women as at men for perpetuating a system which essentially encouraged contempt for half of the population, in many ways treating them as second-class citizens. There is an important distinction here between sexual equality and women\u0026rsquo;s liberation, for Greer argues for fundamental changes as a way to improve the lives of everyone. This is not a call to gender war in a Marxian vein; in fact, although Greer has a clear leftist bent, it seems she did not put faith in the class revolution to put society on the correct footing.\nThere are just a couple of criticisms I have about this edition. The first is that there is no index, which I feel would have been a useful addition. Although Greer divided the book into well arranged and clearly labelled chapters, it is still difficult to find references without having to guess under which subheading you might find them. Secondly, as part of a Flamingo\u0026rsquo;s Seventies Classics Series, this really should have come with an introduction. Printed over thirty years after its initial publication, with so much having changed in the intervening period, a simple outline of the society in which this book was written, and an overview of its reception and responses, would have been an extremely welcome addition.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/11/26/the-female-eunuch/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Feminism","RelPermalink":"/tags/feminism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Female Eunuch"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" This was definitely a case of judging a book by its cover. Although I\u0026rsquo;ve devoured a number of Bryson’s other books, the title and topic of this one just didn\u0026rsquo;t appeal to me. But when a thumbed copy turned up in my household, I decided to have a read of the first couple of pages, and found myself only putting it down again half-way through.\nPart-memoir, part-history of a mid-western US state in the 1950s, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid is a humourous look at Bryson’s early life growing up in Des Moines, Iowa. There are dozens of amusing anecdotes about the vagaries of his family, his school and home life, his holidays, and his unending quest to catch a bit of ‘female epidermis’ in the flesh. The memories of his own life are interspersed with more general comments on the changes going on in America, with talk of economic growth, changing social mores, anti-Communist witchhunts, racism and the space race. Certainly, some of the things Bryson mentions happens before he was born, or the changes run on long in the 1960s, but it\u0026rsquo;s still interesting to see a take on life in this baby boomer generation. Whilst there\u0026rsquo;s a lot here that\u0026rsquo;s surely unique to the America of the 50s, there\u0026rsquo;s enough that is so simplistically human that I think most people will find passages reminiscent of their own trials and tribulations of youth. Ironically, despite being born a few decades later, I felt that a lot of the developments Bryson talks about in 1950s American society were the same ones I experienced as a child in rural England!\nAll of this is delivered in Bryson’s typical affable and humourous style, which if you\u0026rsquo;re a fan, you\u0026rsquo;re sure to lap up. Some readers have quite justifiably complained that Bryson’s reliance on hyperbole and silliness to sweeten his anecdotes is a bit tiring, and makes it at times difficult to separate truth from fiction, but that’s simply his style. I\u0026rsquo;ve always been inclined to link Bryson with Wodehouse in the way he wrote slapstick humour, and felt vindicated to read that he had readily gobbled up Wodehouse as a child. For me, this is classic Bryson. Some have pointed out that Bryson’s labelling as a travel writer is going to have change with the latest additions to his oeuvre. But for me, he was never a travel writer, but a writer who travelled. After all, anyone attempting to travel across a continent armed only with the appropriate Bryson volume was merely arming themselves for a few giggly embarrassing moments on public transportation, nothing more. There are certainly enough laugh-out-loud moments here, and plenty of smiles in between, that you wonder sometimes it doesn\u0026rsquo;t come with a warning sticker on the front.\nThat said, one criticism that I must agree with is the book\u0026rsquo;s design. There are quite a few pictures in the book, including some family photos, which are sadly captionless and only breezily explained in the footnotes at the back. The typeset is rather widely spaced, which whilst making it easier on the eyes, is just an excuse at padding. There\u0026rsquo;s also a preview chapter from Neither Here, Nor There: Travels in Europe taking up space at the back, which makes this book despite its heightened page count one of Bryson’s shorter volumes.\nUltimately, this is a book for established Bryson fans. It isn\u0026rsquo;t as well written as the best of his travelogues, and in terms of being informative, there isn\u0026rsquo;t much here that isn\u0026rsquo;t already widely known, but for a bit of light, nostalgic reading that is sure to put a smile on your face, it easily fits the bill.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/11/17/the-life-and-times-of-the-thunderbolt-kid/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Autobiography","RelPermalink":"/tags/autobiography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" The gimmick in this book is deliciously simple. The lives of two lovers, Henry and Clare, and bound together by destiny. They meet, fall in love, get married, have a child\u0026hellip; so far so normal. The interesting bit lies in the opening of the book describing their first meeting: she first meets him in her parents\u0026rsquo; garden when she is 6 years old; but he first meets her in a library when she is 20.\nWelcome to Audrey Niffenegger\u0026rsquo;s quirky science fiction romance. Henry suffers from a genetic disorder that causes him to move around in space-time, usually to the past, occasionally to the future. There\u0026rsquo;s no grandfather paradox here, but a very deterministic view of space-time that would probably irritate physicists and philosophers alike. When Henry meets Clare for the first time, she has already known him most of her life, essentially forming the basis for his future trips to her past.\nThere\u0026rsquo;s a lot of potential for confusion here, with sometimes multiple versions of Henry appearing in the same scene, and a fair amount of to-ing and fro-ing in time, but there\u0026rsquo;s nothing overtly complex about the storyline. The book is really well structured, to keep the little bits of information dripping, looking at events from different perspectives, and gradually driving the story to its inevitable conclusion. Because of its nature, I imagine the book would make a lot of fun to read a second time.\nMany other reviewers accuse the book of being dull and overhyped. Both charges are merited. On the first count, if you took out the time travelling and straightened out the storyline, there wouldn\u0026rsquo;t be very much to tell. This may seem like unjustified criticism - like suggesting that Jurassic Park without the dinosaurs would be a humdrum version of The Swiss Family Robinson - but the novel really doesn\u0026rsquo;t have very much substance. There are a couple of violent episodes, a few deaths, and lots of sex, but otherwise the plot can be summed up on the back of an envelope. The time travelling pretty much revolves around their love story, and the rest of the world turns in blissful silence. In fact, the one time our protagonists act to watch something from Henry\u0026rsquo;s future, it\u0026rsquo;s that gag-inducing must mention of the 11th of September attacks.\nNevertheless, for an \u0026rsquo;empty\u0026rsquo; novel of 500-odd pages, it is extremely entertaining. The author has delivered a touching, times heart-rending love story with an interesting twist, and presented it well. As long as you don\u0026rsquo;t open this book expecting mind-altering philosophy or sky-splintering fireworks, you should be pleasantly surprised.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/11/14/the-time-travelers-wife/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Time-Travel","RelPermalink":"/tags/time-travel/"}],"title":"The Time Traveler's Wife"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" In a world far removed from the one in which Forster was writing, is there any place for a novel like A Passage to India other than as an idle curiosity of a bygone era? Written based on first hand experience of the British Raj, this open critique of colonialism caricatures the Anglo-Indian in his element, questioning the morality and justification of the British presence in the subcontinent.\nA Passage to India is built upon its characters, who are the led through a fairly mundane plot, a jejune stage for the actors to perform upon. Yet through their actions, we discover this world of Empire, where Anglo-Indians hold themselves aloof from the population, where relationships are grounded on the basis of ruler and ruled. Forster challenges the British Raj as it was then. But he also poses questions relevant to our everyday lives: can the cultures of East and West ever truly understand one another? is it possible even for two individuals to truly understand one another? can anything good ever come from a relationship in which one party dominates the other? and what can we really understand about \u0026lsquo;identity\u0026rsquo; through the prism of nationhood?\nThere is no doubt much in this book which can be analysed and overanalysed to the nauseating degree that only a literature class can provoke, and I can imagine that many who studied this novel in a classroom environment learned only to hate it. Where the simplicity of the plot provides only a thread for the characters to follow, the imagery of India\u0026rsquo;s weather and terrain, her townships and cultural diversity, combine to provide symbolic tapestry lending itself to interpretation. Alone the echoes of the Marabar caves and its allegory in the evil of Empire doubtless provide enough discussion for a few hours of lessons. Yet there is no need to take a magnifying glass to this book to see its implications. Similarly, there has been plenty of criticism about using a work by an English author and mere traveller to the subcontinent as a lens through which to view the British Raj and colonialism in general. Whilst this may be for true scholarship a half-way justifiable charge, it retains its relevance as a novel and for providing insights into the British mindset of the time.\nFinally, a quick comment about the style. Some other reviewers have complained that the book hasn\u0026rsquo;t aged particularly well, and that the writing gets a bit muddled in conversation. On the former point, it would seem fair criticism, in as far as that this book clearly has more in common with books written in the half century prior to its publication than after it. That doesn\u0026rsquo;t make the book\u0026rsquo;s style particularly less readable today, but the content might need some occasional explanation.\nDespite his modest assertion that he was \u0026rsquo;not a great novelist\u0026rsquo;, A Passage to India lives up to its reputation as one of the more important works related to British colonialism. Alone for its historical portrayal, the book is worth a read, but the questions posed (and the answers Forster subtly implies) with regard to issues of cultural identity, acceptance and understanding, are still as relevant today as they were at the height of the Raj.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/11/03/a-passage-to-india/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"India","RelPermalink":"/tags/india/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"A Passage to India"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" There is something unerringly endearing about Forster\u0026rsquo;s way of expressing himself that makes this series of lectures on the makeup of the novel so easy to read. His disarming admission of his own unscholarly nature (\u0026ldquo;True scholarship is incommunicable, true scholars rare. There are a few scholars, actual or potential, in the audience today, but only a few, and there is certainly none on the platform.\u0026rdquo;) puts him firmly on a par with the reader, and his conversational, nay chatty style, opens this little book to anyone who appreciates a good read.\nThese series of lectures were not an investigation into the history of the novel, nor a prescription of how to write good prose, but an attempt to describe the novel as an art form. Starting from the rather open definition of the novel as \u0026ldquo;a fiction in prose of a certain extent\u0026rdquo;, Forster tackles a different component each lecture. The story, that satisfies our thirst to find out what happens next, is covered distinctly from the plot, which is the embodiment of our curiosity as to why things happen. He covers a novel\u0026rsquo;s characters, explaining how they can be \u0026lsquo;flat\u0026rsquo; or \u0026lsquo;round\u0026rsquo;, and how they differ from real human beings. The realm of \u0026lsquo;fantasy\u0026rsquo;, the author\u0026rsquo;s rights in his own universe, are considered, as are matters of pattern, rhythm and viewpoint, with one particularly interesting heading of \u0026lsquo;prophecy\u0026rsquo;.\nIn terms of whether the book is still relevant, Forster ended his lecture series with some conjecture on what the future may hold for the novel form, whether television would eventually make it even disappear altogether (thank goodness for Riepl\u0026rsquo;s Law). His conjecture that whilst history and society move on, art remains static, is extremely interesting in light of the fact that these lectures were being given at the height of the modernist period, and pertinent works are only lightly touched upon. Furthermore, whilst he provides plenty of written examples, there are of course many references to classic works, which it probably helps to have read, but also references to authors who have been buried by posterity or are no longer so accessible.\nOn the whole, however, Aspects of the Novel remains fundamentally readable today. It is not a high-brow scholarly affair; rather a well-thought out observational piece, taking a broad look at that vast field of literature we call the \u0026rsquo;novel\u0026rsquo;. Forster makes some extremely astute remarks, and his witty and conversational style bring these across in an easy and comfortable way, that makes you feel his observations are frankly obvious. He does not encompass the full gamut of literary inquiry, but instead picks and chooses to highlight his points and support his argument that there are no fast and steady rules for what defines \u0026rsquo;the novel\u0026rsquo;. This is probably required reading for students of English literature, but it\u0026rsquo;s easy accessibility and thought-provoking titbits should appeal to just about all keen readers with a fascination for the novel form.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/11/03/aspects-of-the-novel/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Writing","RelPermalink":"/tags/writing/"}],"title":"Aspects of the Novel"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Told through the eyes of a decidedly unreliable narrator, The Dinner is an elegantly simple novel served up over five courses. From the casual opening aperitif to the grittier, questionable digestif, the book layers on the story over a meal in a swanky restaurant.\nThe story revolves around two families who meet to discuss a problem with their children. The two men are brothers: the one being our narrator, who seems to have little time for the second, who we soon learn is a high-flying politician likely to become the next prime minister. During the course of the meal, details are filtered in, largely via flashbacks, as we learn the nature of the \u0026lsquo;problem\u0026rsquo; the couples are having with their children, as well as becoming increasingly suspicious about the motives of our initially amiable narrator. There are plenty of shocks and twists to get the book through to its conclusion, and leaves the reader posed with the question on the book\u0026rsquo;s cover: just how far would you go to protect the ones you love?\nThe writing style is very colloquial, each course easily digested, with the whole meal edible in one sitting. At times humourous, occasionally shocking, there is an interesting moral question being posed, but I think the book would like to be taken more seriously than it deserves. For me, it was an enjoyable read, but nothing more than entertainment.\nStill, it remains a great little tale, light bite size portions gradually building up a satisfying meal, which depending on your palate might leave you feeling a little queasy - and nevertheless thanking the chef for it.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/11/01/the-dinner/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Dinner"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Graham Greene originally divided his works into novels and \u0026rsquo;entertainments\u0026rsquo;, separating his popular work from those he wished his literary career to be remembered for. In later life, this distinction would be blurred until it was dropped entirely. The Ministry of Fear is one of these earlier works labelled an entertainment. Made a year later into a film directed by Fritz Lang, it was written in the middle of wartime, and on the surface is a typical espionage thriller in the tradition of John Buchan\u0026rsquo;s The Thirty-Nine Steps , dealing with a Nazi spy ring operating in London during the blitz. On its own, the plot is gripping enough to carry the book through to the end, and those bits we can regard as \u0026rsquo;entertainment\u0026rsquo; made their way into the film.\nBut as with many of Greene\u0026rsquo;s works, it\u0026rsquo;s the inner conflict which is missing from the silver screen translation. We learn early on that the main protagonist is racked by guilt over the murder\u0026ndash;what we would today most likely see only as a mercy killing\u0026ndash;of his wife. This concentration on the individual, amid the scaled chaos of the blitz, makes this short novel so interesting. Much of it seems quite dated now, but there is still plenty of relevance in a society trying to come to terms with the issue of euthanasia.\nAside from the juxtaposition of a thrilling little spy plot and the psychological reflections, this short book is also an advert for Greene\u0026rsquo;s art. The writing is simply superb, an absolute pleasure to read, full of inventiveness without the overt self-conceit of trying too hard. Another reviewer pointed out that this short novel took longer to read than he had imagined. I\u0026rsquo;d suggest that comes as a result of needing to read every word and understand it, not skim over lines of trite, repetitive text as in many other novels. To skim would be to rob oneself of most of the pleasure.\nFor me, Graham Greene remains the greatest English language novelist never to have won the Nobel Prize. As an entertainment, rather than a novel, The Ministry of Fear lends itself as an excellent introduction to his greater literature.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/10/23/the-ministry-of-fear-an-entertainment/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Espionage","RelPermalink":"/tags/espionage/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Ministry of Fear: An Entertainment"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Perhaps the most significant book in post-war American literature, one which has regained popularity since the start of the economic crisis, Altas Shrugged is the embodiment of an ideal society, the ultimate vehicle for Ayn Rand\u0026rsquo;s philosophy of objectivism. Weighing in at over 1,000 pages of tightly-packed print, it\u0026rsquo;s also one of the longest novels in English literature. Is it any good?\nWell, as a novel, Atlas Shrugged unfortunately falls flat, in ways that Rand\u0026rsquo;s first novel, We the Living , didn\u0026rsquo;t. There is foremost no humanity in the novel, the characters are dismembered, dessicated mouthpieces to Rand\u0026rsquo;s philosophical diatribes, with everyone fitting neatly into \u0026lsquo;good\u0026rsquo; and \u0026lsquo;bad\u0026rsquo; camps. Rand herself claimed that using characters as symbols was never her intention: \u0026ldquo;My characters are persons in whom certain human attributes are focused more sharply and consistently than in average human beings.\u0026rdquo; But what we are left with are flimsy apparitions, lobotomised automatons fulfilling the roles required of them to extol the virtues of her philosophy. Even this is taken to extremes, with one of the proponents delivering a 60-page long theoretical speech around which the rest of the novel might well be seen as scaffolding.\nTo complement this set of lifeless characters is a plot which similarly confounds understanding. In an America which technologically resembles the period in which Rand was writing, yet industrially feels set in an earlier period, and borrows heavily from the Great Depression, the main events and the decisions of the characters jar heavily with what the reader knows and expects from society. As another reviewer pointed out, what\u0026rsquo;s missing is the overt understanding that the story takes place in a parallel world or a different timeframe, to create a genuine sense of credibility. True, there are some hints that push this novel into the realms of science fiction\u0026ndash;a super metal alloy, power derived from static electricity, weapons based on sound waves etc.\u0026ndash;but the world is definitely our own, even if the people and their decisions are alien. Key to the story is the gradual collapse of the economic system, and the disappearance of the champions of industry. What happens in Rand\u0026rsquo;s universe when the creative minds of the world go on strike? Apparently, they settle down on the frontier and, working one month a year, create a fully-fledged miniature utopia. Personally, I imagine they\u0026rsquo;d starve.\nA bad book can still be a good delivery vehicle for an interesting message. Yet this unwieldy book fails even to achieve the latter. For its mammoth length, Rand\u0026rsquo;s message could have been relatively concise, but for the plot\u0026rsquo;s repetitiveness. If you are interested in Rand\u0026rsquo;s philosophy, there are plenty of other places to turn which will provide a far more succinct and detailed explanation, without the repetition or padding necessary for its delivery in novel form. Whether you find place for Rand\u0026rsquo;s philosophy in your own, or like Gore Vidal consider it \u0026ldquo;nearly perfect in its immorality\u0026rdquo;, there are simply better summaries available. For the converted, this is probably a wonderful book, but for anyone else it simply isn\u0026rsquo;t worth risking the investment of time and energy.\nNo one can deny this book\u0026rsquo;s enduring popularity. That alone gives rise to curiosity strong enough to keep it fresh in the public consciousness. But it is a far cry from a great piece of literature, and as an allegory, a philosophical harbinger, its ponderous and verbose nature should have the curious turn elsewhere. The novel opens with the question: \u0026ldquo;Who is John Galt?\u0026rdquo; A thousand pages of largely disappointing text will reveal the answer, but you\u0026rsquo;d be better served just reading the appendix.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/10/17/atlas-shrugged/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Philosophy","RelPermalink":"/tags/philosophy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Atlas Shrugged"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Dieser Eintrag ist auch auf Englisch verfügbar.\nAuf irgendeiner Ebene sind uns die Eigenschaften der menschlichen Natur, die „Thinking, fast and slow“ erläutert, schon bekannt. In unserer Gesellschaft wird die Vernunft und die rationalen Handlungen der Menschen gerne hervorgehoben, Attribute, durch die wir uns sehr gerne gegenüber unseren sonstigen Verwandten im Tierreich einen besonderen Standesdünkel gönnen. Doch wie in diesem Buch so meisterhaft dargestellt, gibt es eine beträchtliche Menge an Faktoren, die unsere scheinbar so vernünftigen Entscheidungen verdrehen und beeinflussen können. Laut Kahneman kann man diese zwei so unvereinbaren Aspekte unseres Wesens als getrennte Systeme betrachten: Das erste System verkörpert unsere gedankenlosen, selbstständigen, unterbewussten und reflexartigen Reaktionen, wogegen das zweite System das logisch handelnde und vernünftige Dasein vertritt, wofür wir uns Menschen eigentlich halten. Viele der Forschungsarbeiten und Ergebnisse, die in diesem Buch behandelt werden, hat Kahneman zusammen mit seinem verstorbenen Kollegen Amos Tversky selbst durchgeführt. Ihm ist das Buch auch gewidmet.\nIm Kern, so Kahneman, lässt sich das Wechselspiel zwischen den beiden Systemen auf die Tatsache zurückführen, dass wir von Natur aus immer den Weg des geringsten Widerstandes wählen. Wir treffen nämlich lieber die Entscheidungen, die uns die wenigsten Mühen kosten. Natürlich soll das längst nicht bedeuten, dass wir (bzw. das uns vertretende System 2) die Entscheidungen überhaupt nicht treffen, doch laut Kahneman fungiert das zweite System lediglich als Kontrollkörper der Informationen, die vom ersten System weitergeleitet werden. Wenn diese Daten allem Anschein nach den Tatschen entsprechen, werden sie vom zweiten System ungeprüft und unverändert für bare Münze genommen. Daraus ergibt sich das im Titel erwähnte „schnelle Denken“, das zu Fehlern und Vorurteilen führt, ohne sie zu ahnen.\nIn dieser Zusammenfassung der Forschungsergebnissen mehrerer Jahrzehnten findet man viele interessante Einsichten in die Vorgänge des Hirns bezüglich der Entscheidungsfindung. Jeden Aspekt handelt Kahneman einzeln und alleine ab, auch wenn sie selbstverständlich nicht alleine agieren und in manchen Fällen sogar eine Verkörperung desselben Phänomens bildet. Zum Beispiel erörtert er die sogenannte Ankerheuristik, eine verblüffende Erscheinung, wodurch wir eine Entscheidung von einer völlig unzusammenhängenden und willkürlichen Anregung beeinflussen lassen, ohne sich derer bewusst zu sein. In dem gelieferten Beispiel zeigt sich, dass die Gerichtsurteile erfahrener Richter sich anscheinend durch einen vollkommen belanglosen Würfelwurf lenken ließen.\nIn diesen Seiten will Kahneman viele Themen abhandeln, doch seine Stärke liegt vor allem darin, dass er sonst ziemlich banale Versuchsergebnisse in eine sehr begreifliche Art und Weise präsentiert, damit jeder verstehen kann, wie aufschlussreich sie in Wirklichkeit sind, und welche große Schlussfolgerungen, sich daraus ziehen lassen. Vor allem die erste Hälfte des Buches lässt sich sehr leicht lesen, wo die rohen Daten den Experimenten und ihren Auswertungen nur eine unterstützende Rolle spielen. Während manche Themen rein theoretisch behandelt werden, hebt Kahneman andere wegen ihres Einflusses auf bestimmte Schichten der Gesellschaft hervor. Hier macht er auch keinen Hehl daraus, Börsenmakler, Geschäftsmänner oder seine eigenen Psychologiestudenten wegen ihrer absurden Entscheidungen aufzuziehen. Viele Kapitel werden durch einen kleinen Test eingeführt, dem sich der Leser selbst unterziehen kann, um selbst ein Teil des Experiments zu werden. So billig das auch klingen mag, eignen sich diese kleinen Tests hervorragend, die unvernünftigen Arbeitsweisen unseres Hirns zu beweisen und sie dem Leser handgreiflich vor Augen zu führen.\nFür mich besteht die große Ironie dieses Buches darin, das es anscheinend eine Theorie beweisen will, die die eigenen Seiten erläutern, nämlich den Unterschied zwischen dem „erfahrenden“ und dem „erinnernden“ Geist. Den experimentellen Ergebnissen zufolge hinterlässt ein mehrheitlich angenehmes Erlebnis eine schlechte Erinnerung, wenn es durch unschönen abschließenden Augenblick verdorben wird, denn in unserem Gedächtnis wird das positive Empfinden durch das ausgangs negative Erlebnis überschrieben. Nach meinem Empfinden leidet dieses Buch leider unter genau dieser Erscheinung. Zu Beginn weist es einen prosaischen und erhellenden Schreibstil auf, gewürzt durch gelegentliche Anekdoten und geistreiche Abschweifungen. Doch die zweite Hälfte kommt einem vor, als wäre sie von einem anderen Kahneman oder für einen anderen Leser verfasst. Besät mit akademischen Begrifflichkeiten ist der Stil plötzlich schwülstig und schwerfällig, und die menschlichen Einsichten sowie Testbeispiele fallen gänzlich weg.\nTrotz der zwei unterschiedlichen Hälften kann ich das Buch dennoch herzlich jedem empfehlen, der sich selbst nur flüchtig für die Psychologie oder die kognitiven Wissenschaften interessiert. Den erleuchtenden Erkenntnissen in diesem Buch muss man nichts entnehmen, doch ich schmeichele mir gern, dass ich die parteiischen Vorurteile und Anregungen meines ersten Systems durch die vernünftigen und nüchternen Eindrücke des zweiten überstimme, indem ich das Buch mit fünf Sternen bewerte. Oder lasse ich mich von einem mir noch schleierhaften Anker etwa lenken …\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/08/31/thinking-fast-and-slow/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/tags/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Psychology","RelPermalink":"/tags/psychology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Thinking, Fast and Slow"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" This post is also available in German .\nThe qualities of human nature described in \u0026ldquo;Thinking, fast and slow\u0026rdquo; are already known to all of us at some level. We are all taught in society to believe in the rational, thinking human being as distinct from his animal peers, yet at this book excellently details, there are plenty of ways in which our seemingly rational decisions can be bent and perverted by various forms of bias. Daniel Kahneman details these two seemingly incongruous facets of our nature as two \u0026lsquo;distinct\u0026rsquo; halves: System 1 represents our autonomous, unthinking, reflex and subconscious reactions, whereas System 2 is that logical, calculating being we consider ourselves to be. Much of the relevant research covered in this volume was pioneered and conducted by Kahneman and his late colleague Amos Tversky, to whom this volume is dedicated.\nAt root, the interplay between System 1 and System 2 rests upon the fact that we are naturally adapted to choose the path of least resistance, i.e. we make decisions which require the least amount of effort. Whilst this does not necessarily mean that we (or our System 2s) are not making the decisions, it does sometimes result in our System 2s acting merely as auditors of the information being passed on by System 1. If that information appears to fit the facts, it is taken at face value, unchanged and unedited. As a result, this \u0026lsquo;quick thinking\u0026rsquo; leads to errors and biases of which we are almost entirely unaware.\nAs a summary of decades of research, the book deals with a lot of extremely interesting aspects of these decision-making processes. Each of these is handled in turn and alone, although many of them are linked and could in some ways a different impressions of the same phenomenon. For example, an issue known as \u0026lsquo;anchoring\u0026rsquo; is investigated, a truly staggering anomaly in which a decision can be influenced by an entirely unrelated and random suggestion placed before us: Kahneman provides us with the example of a set of experienced judges whose sentence decisions were seen to be tilted by the results of a dice roll.\nThere is a lot of ground to summarise within these pages, and Kahneman does an excellent job of presenting some fairly mundane experimental data in a way in which it becomes clear to the layman, how insightful and potent the results truly are. The first half of the book in particular is an extremely fluid read, the experimental data plays second fiddle to clear evaluations of both experiments and their results. Whilst some aspects are dealt with purely theoretically, others are highlighted in terms of their effect on certain people in society, and Kahneman makes no bones about pointing out the absurd decisions of stock brokers, businessmen, or even his own psychology students. Another nice feature of the book is that many of the chapters start with a little test which readers themselves can do, becoming a part of the experiments, easily the best way to highlight precisely how \u0026lsquo;un-rational\u0026rsquo; our minds can truly function.\nThe overarching irony of this book is that it seems to want to prove one of the theories explored between its very covers, that of our \u0026rsquo;experiencing\u0026rsquo; and \u0026lsquo;remembering\u0026rsquo; selves. The evidence suggests that even if the vast majority of an experience was born with enjoyment, if the end was tainted, our memory of the positive experience will be overridden by the negative. Unfortunately, this book is guilty of the very same: it opens beautifully with some lucid and unhampered prose, plenty of example tests and real world extrapolations, occasional anecdotes and witty asides. Yet the latter half of the book feels like it was written by a different Kahneman or for a different reader; it is turgid, almost lethargic, sticky with academic language, no longer peppered with as many human insights, and devoid of example tests for the reader to take part in.\nDespite this impression of it being a book of two halves, it is nevertheless highly recommendable to anyone with even a passing interest in psychology or the human mind. One needn\u0026rsquo;t take away any lessons from the book\u0026rsquo;s insights, but it would still be nice to think that by giving this book five stars, I\u0026rsquo;m successfully overcoming the biassed suggestions of System 1 and my \u0026lsquo;remembering self\u0026rsquo;, and basing my judgement on the rational observations of System 2 and my \u0026rsquo;experiencing self\u0026rsquo;. Or perhaps I\u0026rsquo;m being swayed by some anchoring I\u0026rsquo;m still unaware of\u0026hellip;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/08/31/thinking-fast-and-slow/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/tags/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Psychology","RelPermalink":"/tags/psychology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Thinking, Fast and Slow"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Von Personalstelle zu unternehmerischer Gesellschaftsverantwortung: Verwaltungsstunden von den Drogenbaronen Mexikos Übersetzt aus dem Englischen (Narconomics) Juli 28. 2012 | The Economist\nNarconomics\nMEXIKO hat 11 Milliardäre, der Zeitschrift Forbes zufolge. Zehn werden oft bei Benefizdinners und anderen vornehmen Veranstaltungen lächelnd fotografiert. Der Elfte, Joaquín Guzmán Loera, hat ein ziemlich unähnliches Porträtfoto. Abgebildet in einem billigen Anorak sieht man ihn fröstelnd im Regen binnen der Betonmauer eines Hochsicherheitsgefängnises. Besser bekannt unter seinem Spitznamen El Chapo („der Kleine“) ist Herr Guzmán durch die vermutete $1 Milliarde, die er als Geschäftsführer des Sinaloa-Drogenkartells verdiente, ein von Lateinamerikas erfolgreichsten Exporteuren. Seitdem er 2001 versteckt in einem Wäschewagen aus dem Gefängnis ausbrach, gibt es wenige Fotos von El Chapo.\nAndere Milliardäre verachten Herrn Guzmán. Aber im Vergleich zu manch anderen Entrepreneuren auf Mexikos Verzeichnis der Reichen scheint er die amerikanische Rezession gut überstanden zu haben. Zwar mögen seine Verhältnisse in seinem Versteck in den Bergen der Sierra Madre nicht besonders üppig sein, aber sein Vermögen soll unversehrt geblieben sein, trotz der Bemühungen der Wall-Street-Imbéciles, die 2009 die mexikanische Wirtschaft in die Knie zwangen. Ausgerüstet mit wenig mehr als einem Sprachführer und ein bisschen Imodium akut wanderte Schumpeter durch die Wüste, um zu erkundigen, welche Weisheiten die mexikanischen Drogenhändler anderen Geschäften zu bieten haben.\nDank der in Amerika immer niedriger werdenden Nachfrage für Drogen waren die letzten Zeiten nicht immer einfach für die Kartelle. Zwar gibt es die (aus Herr Guzmáns Perspektive) ermunternde Nachricht, dass immer mehr amerikanische Jugendliche aus Mexiko importierten Cannabis rauchen, aber das wertvollere Produkt Kokain gerät aus der Mode. Laut der UNO habe Amerika seine üble Gewohnheit zwischen 2006 und 2012 um ein Viertel verringert, und die Anzahl von Angestellten, die durch Kokainproben an der Arbeitsstelle durchfallen, sei ebenso um zwei Drittel gefallen.\nSchwindende Verkäufe in el norte sind keine Einzigartigkeit des Drogengeschäftes. 2009 purzelten mehr als ein Viertel der amerikanische Einfuhr sämtlicher gesetzlich zulässigen Waren, wovon sowohl mexikanische Autofabriken als auch Drogenlabore betroffen waren. Aber verglichen mit den legitimen Geschäften sind die Kartelle viel geschickter in der Umstellung auf neue Märkte. Achtzig Prozent des legitimen Exports gehen an die Vereinigten Staaten, nur eine kleine Veränderung zu den 90% um die Jahrhundertwende. Demgegenüber schaltete der Kokainhandel auf Europa um, wo zweimal so viel Koks gebraucht wird als Ende der 90er. Der Durchschnittsbrite kauft jetzt mehr als der Durchschnittsamerikaner, obschon von niedriger Qualität. Mexikanische Händler kommen auch in Australian voran, noch ein aussichtsreiches Land.\nDie Flexibilität der Drogenindustrie ist teilweise auf ihre Freistellung von Einfuhrabgaben zurückzuführen. Legitime mexikanische Händler genießen das Recht des freien Zugangs zu den amerikanischen und kanadischen Märkten durch das Nordamerikanisches Freihandelabkommens (NAFTA). Dagegen wird Drogenschmugglern dank des Einheitsübereinkommens der Vereinten Nationen über Suchtstoffe, die die Regelsetzung und Besteuerung ihrer Produkte untersagt, zollfreier Zugang zu allen Ländern der Welt gewährt. Lästige Ursprungsregeln, die viele mexikanische Hersteller hindern, ihre Waren in Amerika zu verkaufen, gelten dem in Mexiko verarbeiteten kolumbianischen Kokain nicht.\nZugegeben, das Verbot zwingt Rauschgifthändler dazu, ab und zu einen Tunnel zu graben, aber sie bleiben von anderen Problemen verschont. Die Liberalen in Kalifornien schlugen neulich vor, Herrn Guzmán und seine Kollegen mit bis zu $1 Milliarde pro Jahr mit Steuern zu belasten, durch die Legalisierung von Cannabis. Zum Glück für die Industrie stimmten die Konservativen für die Erhaltung eines steuerfreien Marihuanageschäftes. Behördenkram ist auch geringfügig. Obwohl in Amerika der Drogenkonsum jährlich eine Million Notaufnahmen verursacht, sehen Hersteller darin keinen Anlass, in Qualitätskontrolle zu investieren, denn die Strafe bleibt für das Einschmuggeln von sowohl purem als auch verunreinigtem Kokain dieselbe.\nSeit 2007 töteten oder inhaftierten mexikanische Behörden viele der führenden Drogenentrepreneure. Im letzten Monat kündigten die Marinesoldaten die Verhaftung von Guzmáns Sohn, El Gordo („der Dicke“) genannt, an. Es stellte sich als eine Fehlmeldung heraus: der Inhaftierte war ein Autohändler namens Félix, wessen einziges Verbrechen es war, vollschlank zu sein. Solche Stümperei sieht man häufig. Wie in anderen Bereichen werden auch kompetente Behördenmitarbeiter von dem besseren Verdienst der Privatwirtschaft in Versuchung geführt. Viele Händler sind anfangs Polizisten. Die Zetasbande war früher eine Eliteeinheit der Armee.\nÜber das Abwerben (und Enthaupten)\nPersonal bleibt weiterhin ein Problem für die Kartelle, was angesichts der gewalttätigen Pensionierung von jährlich rund 10.000 Mitarbeitern keine Überraschung darstellt. Untere Arbeitsstellen werden leicht besetzt, aus dem zehnmillionenköpfigen Reservoir von ninis, Jugendliche die ni estudian ni trabajan (weder lernen, noch arbeiten). Aber die schlechte Lage mexikanischer Schulen (die schlechtesten der OECD) bedeutet, dass auch Drogenexporteure denselben Problemen wie andere Weltkonzerne gegenüberstehen: Das Anwerben hochqualifizierter Mitarbeiter. ManpowerGroup, ein Beratungsunternehmen im Bereich Personalbeschaffung, stellte fest, dass 42% der legitimen mexikanischen Firmen von Problemen bei der Stellenbesetzung berichten. Die Meisten berichten, sie müssten Einwanderer in Führungspositionen einstellen. Diese Situation gilt auch für das Drogengeschäft: Die Zetas wenden sich den ehemaligen Mitgliedern Guatemalas Kaibiles Sondereinheiten zu, um ihren wachsenden Bedarf an erfahrenen Killern zu stillen. Jedenfalls bleibt die Visumpflicht außen vor.\nDie Beziehungen zur Öffentlichkeit sind ein heikles Thema für das Geschäft, das in Mexiko in den letzten 6 Jahren circa 60.000 Tote verursacht hat. Deswegen halten Kartellführer eine unternehmerische Gesellschaftsverantwortung für wichtig. Leitende Angestellte bleiben frei, zum Teil weil Leute nicht bereit sind, der Polizei einen Tipp zu geben. Angst ist ein Grund, ein zweiter liegt darin, dass die Drogenbarone ihren Gewinn gerne verteilen. Spenden an die örtliche Polizeimannschaft sind beliebt. Auffällige Philanthropie ist auch üblich. Im Bundesstaat Hidalgo errichtete eine glänzende Kapelle neulich eine Gedanktafel, die dem Geschäftsführer der Zetas, Heriberto Lazcano, für eine Spende dankt. Als dies für etwas Stirnrunzeln wegen „Drogenalmosen“ im Vatikan sorgte, entgegnete Ramón Godínez, ein mexikanischer Bischoff, dass als Maria Magdalena mit Parfüm die Füße Jesu waschte, fragte er sie nicht, wie sie dafür bezahlte. „Es gibt keinen Grund, Geld zu verbrennen, nur aufgrund seines bösen Ursprungs. Man muss es umwandeln. All Geld lässt sich umwandeln, genau so wie unsaubere Personen sich umwandeln lassen,“ so der Bischoff. Mit Gott als sein Geldwäscher, sollte die dreckigste Industrie Mexikos ihren hohen Kurs sicher halten können.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/08/22/rauschgiftwirtschaft/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Drugs","RelPermalink":"/tags/drugs/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/tags/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Mexico","RelPermalink":"/tags/mexico/"}],"title":"Rauschgiftwirtschaft"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" This entry is also available in English .\nIn ähnlicher Weise zu Dava Sobels Buch „Longitude “ dreht sich im „Nathaniel’s Nutmeg“ alles um die Erfahrungen eines der unsichtbarsten Protagonisten der Geschichte. Obwohl es sich um die Geschichte eines kleineren Maßstabes handelt, stimmt das Ziel des Werks überragend mit einem Zitat des Historikers E. P. Thompson überein, geschichtliche Figuren „from the enormous condescension of posterity“ zu retten. Die Hauptakteure dieses Buches werden den meisten Lesern unbekannt, sowie viele der Ereignisse, dennoch bleibt deren Auswirkung für die Gegenwart für jeden ersichtlich.\nDoch der Titel dieses Buches ist meiner Meinung nach komplett misslungen. Das Werk ist sehr ambitiös im Umfang und beschäftigt sich mit dem Gewürzhandel und der Segelschiffära, mitsamt Abschweifungen über die Amerikas und die Versuche, die Nordwestpassage durch den arktischen Ozean und dadurch einen kürzeren Seeweg nach Ostindien zu finden, sowie den Kriegen, den Erfolgen und den politischen Machenschaften der englischen und niederländischen Ostindien-Kompanien. Im Grunde versucht Milton mit diesem Buch die Heldentaten von einem Offizier der englischen Ostindien-Kompanie namens Nathaniel Courthorpe mit dem Schiksal Neuamsterdams/New Yorks zu verbinden. Jedoch bleibt dieser Versuch etwas oberflächlich und mager, dadurch, dass er sein Leben aus jedem Blickwinkel zu betrachten versucht. Im Endeffekte erscheint der namensgebende Nathaniel nur flüchtig am Ende des Buches. Mehr Platz hat der Autor dem angeblichen Hauptthema nicht einräumen können. Schließlich wirft das Buch jede Menge interessante Fragen auf, durch seine umschweifende Behandlung der Gesellschaften, deren Offiziere und des Gewürzhandels usw. Trotz der fast 400 Seiten bleiben diese Fragen jedoch leider größtenteils unbeantwortet.\nTrotz dieser Mankos ist das Werk nicht ohne Stärken. Der Autor hat die Geschichte trotz der mangelnden Quellenlage offensichtlich sehr sorgfältig recherchiert, und man muss ihm auch hoch anrechnen, dass er der Versuchung widerstanden hat, in Hinblick auf die etwas dürftigen Beweise wild darüber zu spekulieren. Da die Zielgruppe dieses Buches unter dem Fußvolk zu finden ist, ist es wie ein Schmöker aufgebaut, mit vielen Deutungen auf spätere Kapitel, die den Leser durch das Buch locken und begleiten. Die Charaktere und die Ereignisse stellen die Kulissen dar, so dass es auch für unterwegs ein geeignetes Buch ist, das man mit vielen Unterbrechungen und Ablenkungen leicht lesen kann. Trotzdem, dass der Stoff für ein Buch dieser Länge eigentlich zu breitgefächert ist, konzentriert sich Milton zumindest lediglich auf die holländischen und englischen Abenteuer, und schenkt dem zur gleichen Zeit stattfindenden portugiesischen und spanischen Treiben wenig Platz.\n„Nathaniel’s Nutmeg“ ist eine kurzweilige und interessante Lektüre, die auch für Leute geeignet ist, für die die Geschichte normalerweise kein Interesse weckt. Dank der ausgiebigen Recherchen ist das Buch sehr informativ, auch wenn des Buches Gegenstand eigentlich zu groß ist. Trotzdem hinterlässt das Buch ein Gefühl ähnlich dem eines Abends in einem chinesischen Restaurant: Bald nach dem Verzehr hat man wieder einen leeren Magen. In seinem Versuch, das Schicksal New Yorks mit der Lebensbahn Couthorpes in Verbindung zu bringen, hat Milton einen Stoff ausgesucht, dem er in diesem Werk einfach nicht gerecht werden konnte, und somit bleibt die Botschaft irgendwie seicht und unkonzentriert. Anders betitelt, mit einem weniger anspruchsvollen Ziel oder einem strengeren Redakteur wäre dieses Buch eine umso befriedigende Lektüre geworden.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/08/14/nathaniels-nutmeg-how-one-mans-courage-changed-the-course-of-history/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Colonialism","RelPermalink":"/tags/colonialism/"},{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Nathaniel's Nutmeg: How One Man's Courage Changed the Course of History"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Dieser Eintrag ist auch auf Deutsch verfügbar.\nIn a similar vein to Dava Sobel\u0026rsquo;s Longitude , Nathaniel\u0026rsquo;s Nutmeg revolves around the story of one of history\u0026rsquo;s largely invisible protagonists. Whilst this isn\u0026rsquo;t history on the same scale, it sits very nicely with something E. P. Thompson said, about rescuing characters \u0026ldquo;from the enormous condescension of posterity.\u0026rdquo; The major characters in this book will be unknown to most people, as will most of the events, but their importance for the modern world will be clear to everyman.\nThe book\u0026rsquo;s title is, however, a complete misnomer. The subject matter is very ambitious, dealing with the spice trade and the age of navigation, including forays in the Americas, attempts to find passages to the Indies via the Arctic Ocean, and all of the misadventures, wars, successes and political intrigues of the English and Dutch East India companies. Ultimately, Milton\u0026rsquo;s premise with the book is to tie the exploits of the English East India Company officer Nathaniel Courthope in with the fate of New Amsterdam/New York, but by trying to cover this from all angles, the book is left feeling rather thin and superficial. In the end, the titular Nathaniel makes only a relatively brief appearance near the end of the book, all the space that was left to deal with the book\u0026rsquo;s allegedly main focus. Finally, with such a broad range, the book throws up many interesting questions about the companies, their officers, the spice trade etc., most of which remain unfortunately unanswered, despite its near 400 pages.\nDespite these setbacks, the book does have its strengths. It is clearly very well researched, and despite the relative paucity of sources available to fill in the gaps, the author avoids the obvious temptation to speculate wildly. As a piece of decidedly \u0026lsquo;popular\u0026rsquo; history, the book is structured like a page-turner, with hints and references dropped to tease the reader into the coming chapters, focusing on a history driven by characters and concrete events, which makes it an easy book for reading on the go or with other distractions. And although the subject matter is really too broad for a book of this size, Milton does at least concentrate solely on the Dutch and English adventures, paying relatively little attention to Portuguese and Spanish goings on at the same time.\nNathaniel\u0026rsquo;s Nutmeg is a pleasant and interesting diversion, particularly for people whose interest would not normally be piqued the idea by a history book. It is clear that a good deal of research has gone into the book, and the breadth of the subject matter makes this no light task. Yet the impression left is one akin to scoffing fast food empty calories; in order to tie Couthorpe to New York, the author has chosen too broad a subject matter for so short a book, leaving the text too shallow and unfocused. A different title, a less ambitious aim, or a more vigilant editor, and this book could have been an all the more satisfying read.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/08/14/nathaniels-nutmeg-how-one-mans-courage-changed-the-course-of-history/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Colonialism","RelPermalink":"/tags/colonialism/"},{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Nathaniel's Nutmeg: How One Man's Courage Changed the Course of History"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/categories/translation/"}],"content":" Whilst I can\u0026rsquo;t claim to have had massive expectations from this book, the author\u0026rsquo;s reputation, experience, and the subject matter piqued my interest at first glance. This book is a collection of essays roughly sewn together reflecting the author\u0026rsquo;s personal experiences in the field of translation, either via conversations and experiences with translators and translations of his own works, or through translating by his own hand.\nAs a collection of personal reflections collected together in essay form, there are plenty of interesting and oft amusing anecdotes which Eco ties together to support his thesis of translation as a form of negotiation between cultures. Relying to a large extent on examples taken from the various translations of his own works, he illustrates how the idea of translation must be seen through the capacity of the medium. That is to say that a language provides only a limited resource, and one rooted in its culture, which makes the art of translation a constant battle, a question of compromise, of content and connotation, of rhyme and register, of familiarity and foreignness. Eco\u0026rsquo;s own works provide plenty of toothy work for the translator, which he here amply dissects and compares, and these are at times supplemented by no lesser fry than the likes of James Joyce\u0026rsquo;s Finnegans Wake , for example.\nEco\u0026rsquo;s thesis notwithstanding, there are problems with the book which for me detracted from its enjoyment. Firstly, as some other reviewers have pointed out, there are some pretty steep language requirements in order to really be able to fully understand many of Eco\u0026rsquo;s examples. Italian is, naturally, the most often quoted language, along with French and Spanish as a Romanic trio of languages, and German crops up on occasion. In the case of the latter, there were a number of obvious mistakes in the book, which no doubt rest to a large extent on it not being one of Eco\u0026rsquo;s stronger suits. Indeed, although nominally a work exploring translation as a whole, the author\u0026rsquo;s own (albeit impressive) lingual skills narrows it down to an investigation of translation between Romance languages and English, with really very little mention of non-Indo-European languages or cultures, where far more interesting problems doubtless arise.\nAnother important detractor is that as the book is a compilation of essays based on a lecture series, rather than one contiguous treatise, there were numerous occasions where Eco repeated himself relatively excessively. One example which springs to mind is his quotation of W. V. Quine that a sentence such as \u0026ldquo;neutrinos lack mass\u0026rdquo; is for some languages of the world untranslatable, a quotation which crops up three or four times in different essays.\nOne final criticism, although this is certainly more a matter of taste, is that with all that brain power, Eco tends to write with a lot of hubris. Another commenter quoted an excellent line which I think sums it up nicely: \u0026ldquo;Sometimes I ask myself if by chance I write novels purely in order to put in hermetic references that are comprehensible only to me. I feel like a painter who, in a landscape, puts among the leaves of the trees - almost invisible - the initials of his beloved. And it does not matter if not even she is able to identify them.\u0026rdquo; For all the fascination that the subject of translation has to offer, discussing the translation of symbols invisible to everyone but the author is certainly the most abstract and esoteric topic the author could have chosen to concentrate on.\nUltimately this book offers a very interesting read, but only for the right, qualified reader. I should say a command of at least one Romance language is a must, as well as a reasonable familiarity with the field of translation. For the uninitiated, a more basic but also more thorough and elaborate investigation of the world of translation can be found in the recent Is That a Fish in Your Ear?: Translation and the Meaning of Everything .\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/08/13/mouse-or-rat-translation-as-negotiation/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/tags/translation/"}],"title":"Mouse or Rat?: Translation as Negotiation"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" A work born of the Great Depression, The Grapes of Wrath is surely one of the greatest, most powerful and important books in American literature. Focusing on a poor family of tenant farmers escaping the Dust Bowl of Oklahoma, Steinbeck set out with the express intention of shaming the people he held responsible for the plight of these losers of the Depression, and aimed quite simply to \u0026ldquo;rip a reader\u0026rsquo;s nerves to rags\u0026rdquo; with his tale. The Joad family sets out for California with their few remaining possessions, seeking work, land and new lives among the colourful orchards and vineyards of the western state, a veritable promised land. Instead they find further hardship, exploitation and abuse, labelled as \u0026lsquo;Okies\u0026rsquo; and reds, welcome if they\u0026rsquo;re willing to work for a pittance, hounded should they try to make a living for themselves.\nVery reminiscent of Upton Sinclair\u0026rsquo;s The Jungle , it\u0026rsquo;s easy to understand why the book was rewarded with so many accolades, and its author with the Nobel Prize for Literature. What sets the book apart from Sinclair\u0026rsquo;s style is the directness of Steinbeck\u0026rsquo;s writing. The family is full of quirky and unique characters, entirely believable, if slightly monochrome in flavour. Other readers have complained the book is divided rather obliquely into the \u0026lsquo;good\u0026rsquo; and the \u0026lsquo;bad\u0026rsquo;, and whilst they make a reasonable point, this neither detracts from the overall message of the novel, nor prevents those characters from acting as the real driving force of the story. The heroes of the novel are true salt of the earth, which gives the book openness and accessibility: that Steinbeck writes their dialogue in their vernacular is a powerful motif.\nSteinbeck intersperses his tale of the Joads with rather more artistic and morally or politically charged chapters covering the broader sweep of change facing America in the \u0026rsquo;30s. In effect, the chapters intertwine the individual experiences of the Joad family with the macrocosmic overview of society in the Depression years. Steinbeck\u0026rsquo;s rather more loaded and overt statements appear in these segments, but he also allows his characters to speak for him, especially Tom Joad and the preacher.\nThe Grapes of Wrath is entirely deserving of its accolades, and its place on countless lists of best novels or works to read before you die. Some reviewers had difficulty persevering past the book\u0026rsquo;s opening, others found the vernacular language distracting, but generally speaking this is an extremely accessible novel which doesn\u0026rsquo;t require a great deal of background knowledge to be appreciated.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/07/18/the-grapes-of-wrath/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Grapes of Wrath"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" This is the only Stephen Ambrose book I\u0026rsquo;ve read, spurred on by recently rewatching Saving Private Ryan and Band Of Brothers . A look at the American soldiers in the European theatre from D-Day to the end of the war, the book is based on oodles of research and countless memoirs, oral and written, from the people who were actually there. It doesn\u0026rsquo;t go into the actual events of the war in any detail, so it would behoove readers to have some background knowledge, but Ambrose does a decent job of sketching out the general situation.\nTechnically, this book should have been easy to whole-heartedly recommend. Ambrose has sewn together an extremely important collection of memories, thoughts and feelings of the troops on the front lines of the last war, allowing the people who were actually there to tell their stories. Whilst some have criticised the relative paucity of attention to the other Allies, other theatres, the Germans etc., that is precisely because they fall outside this book\u0026rsquo;s remit. Concentrating on the written and oral memories of US soldiers, Ambrose nevertheless weaves them into the course of the war, so even people relatively unfamiliar with events on the Western front should not get lost.\nOne particular strength of the book is its organisation. The different campaigns during the war are dealt with separately, as one might expect, but there is also a whole part dedicated to different groups and aspects of the war. It is very welcome that chapters are dedicated to such oft ignored facets as the \u0026lsquo;Medics, nurses and doctors\u0026rsquo;, \u0026lsquo;Prisoners of war\u0026rsquo; and especially a chapter on the uglier side of war, on the criminals, profiteers and racists. Aside from these specific chapters, there are plenty of other interesting titbits of information scattered throughout the book, such as the reports of dud ammunition (sadly not researched, but backed up in a letter to the author from a Jewish slave labourer in a German concentration camp in the afterword), the fanaticism of some of the SS troops (one is mentioned dying after refusing a transfusion from a US medic, on the chance it might contain Jewish blood), or the German soldier executed for spying when caught with forged papers (the original reading \u0026ldquo;Not a Pass\u0026ndash;For Indentification Only\u0026rdquo;, and the forger having corrected the spelling mistake).\nSadly, for all this the book is not without its flaws. Another reviewer, when trying to come up with a single word to sum up the book decided on \u0026lsquo;frustrating\u0026rsquo;, and I think this rather hits the nail on the head. This book is well written, well compiled, well researched, but unfortunately it isn\u0026rsquo;t a great piece of history, when if very much should have been. Ambrose writes with an agenda, one that is seldom disguised, seldom explored, rarely supported. He seems to have a personal vendetta against Montgomery, and on numerous occasions quotes sources to the effect that he was responsible for much of the mishandling of the war effort. Granted, the work is entirely concentrated on the US army\u0026rsquo;s endeavours, but such focus is also combined with a very dismissive attitude to the soldiers of the other nations. The one great hypothesis that Ambrose seems wont to flaunt is that the greatest capitalist democratic economy simply produced the best soldiers in the world, despite the very same book deriding the army\u0026rsquo;s lack of training, the system of replacements, the ignorance of the army commanders, the poor or unsuited equipment etc. Given the otherwise relatively sober portrayal of events from the eyes of those who fought, such jingoist conclusions are unfitting and unnecessary.\nRumours of plagiarism aside (Ambrose states clearly in the introduction that his aim was to \u0026ldquo;let [his] characters speak for themselves by quoting them liberally\u0026rdquo;), there is also call to believe that some of his quotes are taken well out of context to further his agenda. I don\u0026rsquo;t believe for a second that this is particularly warranted, but his openly opinionated comments unfortunately lead to such nagging suspicions. Finally, there were apparently also numerous obvious inaccuracies in the book, the sort of figures and facts which most WW2 enthusiasts soon spot, and which also detract from its overall image (I think these errors were corrected in the version I read, which included an afterword dealing with the many letters the author had received).\nUltimately, as a testament to the people who fought, this book is an important and engaging work, and well worth reading for anyone with an interest in the Second World War, the US army, or wartime and soldiering in general. It is well organised, well structured and relatively readable, despite occasionally having too many different opinions and quotes tied into a handful of paragraphs. The accompanying maps and pictures are also a welcome complement to the stories and eyewitness accounts. But unfortunately the author\u0026rsquo;s reputation and his rather opinionated style detract from all of this, and leave something of a sour aftertaste to what is otherwise a very mature and sobering story.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/05/31/citizen-soldiers-u.s.-army-from-the-normandy-beaches-to-the-bulge-to-the-surrender-of-germany-june-7-1944-to-may-7-1945/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Second-World-War","RelPermalink":"/tags/second-world-war/"}],"title":"Citizen Soldiers: U.S. Army from the Normandy Beaches to the Bulge, to the Surrender of Germany, June 7, 1944 to May 7, 1945"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Much as I enjoyed another Tommy Jaud book (Resturlaub: Das Zweitbuch ), I found Vollidiot somewhat unrounded and altogether disappointing after finishing it. The story revolves around Simon Peters, a late-20s youngster in Cologne, who is fed up with his job, his friends, his being single\u0026ndash;his life in general\u0026ndash;and how he goes about trying to set things to rights. Essentially, of course, everything he tries to achieve goes wrong, and every action he takes has a punchline waiting around the corner.\nThere isn\u0026rsquo;t much by way of a story here - most of the action is punctuated by nights in the pub, and the best intentions trying to get a date, but Jaud has an eye for making even the most mundane humourous. Our antihero Simon\u0026rsquo;s cleaner, a Croatian by the name of Lala, adds a lot to the mix with her antics, setting him up on a blind date, accompanying him to a gig whilst he is on another date, as well as breaking things around the flat and apologising in her heavily accented German. Jaud could probably have enough material for another book just based on her day-to-day life.\nNevertheless, there simply isn\u0026rsquo;t enough here to tie the book together. Little happens of any consequence, and the humour factor ranges from sometimes inciteful, biting sarcasm, to simple cringe-inducing moments of mania on the part of the main character(s). It starts off strong, with some great descriptions of Ikea\u0026rsquo;s policy towards single people, or the gym Simon joins to get fit (which turns out to be a haven for homosexuals), but towards the end of the book I found there were fewer and fewer laughs to be had, and the ending is rather abrupt and feels somewhat rushed.\nStill, like the previous reviewer, I can certainly recommend reading something like this to people interested in learning German. This is by no means a prize-winning piece of literature, but the language is very contemporary, and should be relatively easy to follow for learners. It would probably appeal to most men in the same age-range (particularly anyone who\u0026rsquo;s experienced that feeling of being fed up with everything), and no doubt to the many women who find themselves in a relationship with one of these Vollidioten!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/05/04/vollidiot-der-roman/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Vollidiot: Der Roman"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Not normally one for autobiographies, I picked this book up on a whim as it was standing proudly on the local library shelf. It\u0026rsquo;s a pretty short, easy read with some interesting ideas and amusing anecdotes, essentially snippets hewn from Branson\u0026rsquo;s life and career with some generic advice strewn about. The autobiographical sections are probably the most interesting, though given the book\u0026rsquo;s format are often repeated or presented in a strange order.\nThere are plenty of interesting comments on Branson\u0026rsquo;s approach to sustainable capitalism, or his humanitarian and voluntary work. Occasionally, however, there are chapters dealing with issues like global warming which read all too much like a diatribe copied verbatim from some other book and feel like they have little place here. It would have been enough for Branson to say that he perceives global warming as an all-too-real threat to the planet, and is determined to tackle the problem head-on with his Virgin Empire, without trying to go into detail convincing readers that the figures add up.\nAll in all for a quick light read there were plenty of interesting titbits and anecdotes to make it worth picking up, but the haphazard and repeated presentation of events, and the over-the-top explanation of global warming were a distraction. I imagine Branson\u0026rsquo;s autobiography would make a much more worthwhile read.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/04/24/screw-it-lets-do-it-lessons-in-life/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Richard-Branson","RelPermalink":"/tags/richard-branson/"}],"title":"Screw It, Let's Do It: Lessons in Life"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" At its simplest level, this is merely a short novel about attitudes to love and the meanings of fidelity. The main characters approaches to love are almost diametric opposites, the surgeon Tomas, a promiscuous conqueror of women, and his wife Tereza, ashamed of her very body and unable to reconcile her husband\u0026rsquo;s habits with her view of married fidelity. While the events unfold in front of the backdrop of the Prague Spring and the difficult years that follow, this is a novel focussed on the smaller, personal image, albeit no less profound in scope.\nDespite this concentration on the characters, this is a novel bound to disappoint anyone looking for character and plot development. Various scenes are revisited from different perspectives, but there is no real plot to speak of, certainly the novel ends rather abruptly without any hint of a conclusion. Instead, we are treated to a philosophical tour of what it means to \u0026lsquo;be\u0026rsquo; at all. The characters are explored for who they are and how they deal with people and with the world around them, their approach to love, sex, relationships, work. The principal dichotomy on display is that between the weight of responsibility and the lightness of inconsequence, but there is plenty of musing in other fields. Kundera fleetingly touches on many areas of life, from the meaning of words and their role in (mis)communication, to the position of kitsch in art, and our treatment of animals.\nFor all its philosophising, this is an eminently readable book. The prose is straight-forward and the interspersed author\u0026rsquo;s comments on his creations provide plenty of food for thought, though this constant interruption might annoy some readers. Even its chapters are very short, which may have been Kundera\u0026rsquo;s intention to give the reader plenty of time to pause and reflect.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/04/24/the-unbearable-lightness-of-being/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Unbearable Lightness of Being"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" This is a truly fascinating story, an insight into the lives of those who endured the excesses of the Nazi state at the height of its power. Fallada wrote this book shortly after the war in less than a month, a novel inspired by reading through Gestapo files. It was his last, but one he was very proud to have written.\nAt heart, the book deals with one couple\u0026rsquo;s private campaign of resistance to the Nazi regime. As Fallada wrote in an article about the novel, \u0026ldquo;Über den doch vorhandenen Widerstand der Deutschen gegen den Hitlerterror\u0026rdquo;, his writings were dedicated to their sacrifice that it not be in vain. The core of the book centres on the Quangels, a couple who lose their son during Hitler\u0026rsquo;s invasion of France, and who strive to offer a token of resistance, by way of writing postcards and letters denouncing the Nazi acts. These political flyers almost unswervingly end in the arms of the Gestapo, who catalogue this defiance and use their ruthless methods in pursuit of the perpetrators, destroying lives as they do so. This, in my opinion, is one of the book\u0026rsquo;s greatest strengths, its depth of living characters, almost reminiscent to me of a Dickensian world, each role played by a figure of flesh and blood, and not merely props for the main actors to play up against. Thus the novel details episodes in the lives of thieves and prostitutes, Jews and Gestapo inspectors, youth and the permanently unemployed.\nAside from the insight into what life was like under the Nazis, the book also offers this strong message of hope. The very premise of the powerless individual trying to make a difference against the faceless society is a strong one. During the sham trial, the farcical nature of events finally sees the otherwise stoical Otto Quangel laughing at his prosecutor, something which many of us should no doubt revel in. It\u0026rsquo;s also fitting that Fallada should choose to end the novel with a look towards the future, at the youth who would inherit the responsibility for Germany in post-war Europe.\nAll in all a heartily recommendable read. The glimpse of life in Nazi-run Berlin is fascinating, and the police and courtroom scenery definitely sits in companion to the likes of Arthur Koestler\u0026rsquo;s portrayal of Soviet excesses in Sonnenfinsternis . It was a surprise to me to learn that the book was only recently translated into English.\nFinally, a word about the language. As another commenter has written, there is a fair amount of Berlin dialect in the book which for makes for a challenge for non-native speakers and advanced learners, and given the book\u0026rsquo;s age there are also a fair number of old-fashioned or unusual turns of phrase, but the book is otherwise written in a fairly straightforward style.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/04/07/jeder-stirbt-f%C3%BCr-sich-allein/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Second-World-War","RelPermalink":"/tags/second-world-war/"}],"title":"Jeder stirbt für sich allein"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Dieser Eintrag ist auch auf Deutsch verfügbar.\nEver wondered what it would be like to give in to your mid-life crisis, stick two fingers up to the world and start a fresh life? Well, Peter \u0026ldquo;Pitschi\u0026rdquo; Greulich does just that: shortly before he and his girlfriend and their other coupled friends are to depart for the umpteenth time for a holiday on Mallorca, he has a rash change of heart and perfidiously jets off instead to Buenos Aires armed with little more than the clothes on his back and his broken words of holiday Spanish.\nThere are plenty of laughs to be had in his ensuing adventures in the southern hemisphere, as Pitschi discovers that starting life afresh isn\u0026rsquo;t as easy as he\u0026rsquo;d imagined. Whilst the book is certainly more likely to appeal to men, as our anti-hero offs in pursuit of every man\u0026rsquo;s dream of unfettered freedom, chasing tail and drinking beer, no doubt women will also appreciate the way Jaud deals with man\u0026rsquo;s neuroses and lampoons his childishness. All of which is to say nothing of the nicely weaved events of this tragicomedy which build to a fine crescendo as Pitschi has to decide between his new world and the life he left behind. Despite its brevity, there are plenty of laughs to be had in this book\u0026rsquo;s 250 pages.\nJust a word to non-German readers, this is a relatively easy book for an advanced German learner to read, aside from the fact that Tommy Jaud has many of his characters \u0026lsquo;speak\u0026rsquo; Fränkisch. Anyone used to the idiosyncrasies of south German dialects shouldn\u0026rsquo;t have any problems, but learners unused to seeing anything beyond \u0026lsquo;High German\u0026rsquo; might be made a little \u0026lsquo;stutzig\u0026rsquo; by some of the conversations.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/03/16/resturlaub-das-zweitbuch/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Resturlaub: Das Zweitbuch"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" This post is also available in English .\nWundert man sich, wie das Leben wäre, wenn man sich seiner Midlifecrisis ergeben, der Welt den Stinkefinger zeigen und ein neues Leben anfangen würde? Genau das macht Peter „Pitschi“ Greulich: Kurz bevor er mit seiner Freundin und deren gepaarten Freunden in den üblichen Urlaub nach Mallorca fliegt, bekommt er plötzlich kalte Füße und in einem Sinneswandel düst stattdessen nach Buenos Aires davon, ausgestattet mit wenig mehr als seiner Kleidung und ein paar Brocken Urlaubsspanisch.\nIn seinen darauf folgenden Abenteuern auf der südlichen Erdhalbkugel sorgt Pitschi für viel Schmunzeln, als ihm langsam klar wird, dass ein neues Leben anzufangen doch gar nicht so einfach ist, wie er erwartet hätte. Auch wenn das Buch eher Männer anspricht, da unser Protagonist sein vorheriges Leben aufgibt und verschwindet, in der Hoffnung, eine entfesselte Freiheit zu entdecken, in der er sich der Schürzenjagd und dem Biertrinken zugleich widmen kann, werden auch Frauen die Art wertschätzen, wie Jaud die Zwangsneurosen eines jeden Mannes beschreibt, sowie sein kindisches Wesen persifliert. Ganz von der schönen Art zu schweigen, in der er die Ereignisse dieser Tragikomödie ineinander verwoben hat, die in einem Höhepunkt gipfeln, als Pitschi zwischen seiner neuen Welt und dem alten hinter ihm verlassenen Leben entscheiden muss. Trotz der Kürze bergen diese 250 Seiten jede Menge spaßige Momente.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/03/16/resturlaub-das-zweitbuch-de/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Resturlaub: Das Zweitbuch (DE)"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Giving this book a three-star rating seems unjust. When reading it, I found much I liked about the work, yet having had a few days to digest it, find myself struggling to justify just exactly what I found so appealing.\nTo deal first of all with the good, Kafka on the Shore is on a basic level a decent page-turner. Two related stories are interwoven, chapter for chapter, and while they don\u0026rsquo;t necessarily come together in the end, the narrative is nicely paced and suitably eventful to keep the reader engaged. There are various themes on display, from the Oedipal tragedy and the journey to adulthood, together with more complex issues dealing with time and reality, and plenty of the metaphorical and surreal elements to spice things up. If you aren\u0026rsquo;t enamoured by \u0026lsquo;magic realism\u0026rsquo; this will no doubt be an instant turn-off.\nAs for the prose, which some other reviewers have complained about as stilted or to be blamed on the translation, I found the book to be for the most part very pleasantly written. It must be said that the translation is American, which for a British reader did jar on occasion. There were also moments when the dialogue came across as particularly unrealistic and forced, but this probably has more to do with Murakami squeezing in a lot of metaphysical/philosophical discussion. This is a novel in which 15-year-olds can discuss interpretations of Schubert, and pick up books on Napoleon\u0026rsquo;s Russian campaign on a whim. It won\u0026rsquo;t appeal to everyone, but the discussions and ideas floating around in the book make for interesting intervals in the action.\nUnfortunately, having finished the novel I found my admiration began to wane. As others have pointed out, there is no \u0026lsquo;satisfactory\u0026rsquo; conclusion, which on its own is no problem, rather that none of the various threads of the novel have any answers. Thinking back, I find that what I read as interesting and titillating discussions or metaphorical events simply turned into question marks hanging over the book\u0026rsquo;s closed cover. The author himself suggests readers should use the book\u0026rsquo;s riddles to find their own solutions, and that multiple readings are recommended, but for that I have neither the time nor the inclination.\nTo my mind, Kafka on the Shore is a perfectly interesting diversion, and one which works on some levels as an engaging story. But where it tries to become more deeply meaningful, it offers only disconnected ideas that the reader has to piece together if he is to see any of the picture. This was my first Murakami, and whilst the book hasn\u0026rsquo;t made me a fan, it also hasn\u0026rsquo;t put me off picking up another of his novels should the opportunity arise. But for the sour aftertaste, it even deserves an extra star, or the sheer joyful way in which he has written a modern day fairy tale cum parable.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/03/07/kafka-on-the-shore/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Kafka on the Shore"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" This isn\u0026rsquo;t a book that requires any introduction, at least in terms of the furore and controversy surrounding it. I\u0026rsquo;d probably heard of Rushdie before I started to read for myself, such is the reputation which precedes this book. The title has been sitting at the back of my mind for a long time, so when I saw it on a bookshelf figured it was about time to dip into it.\nSome years ago, whilst taking part in a brief course on the history of modern India, I picked up Rushdie\u0026rsquo;s Midnight\u0026rsquo;s Children and thoroughly enjoyed it. The style was lucid, inspiring, at times witty, the plot meaningful, its events engaging and powerfully written. Unfortunately, The Satanic Verses is in comparison an utter disappointment. The book is simply difficult to like, try as one might. Rushdie\u0026rsquo;s writing, despite still being very imaginative, colourful, even amusing, is for the most part unnecessarily convoluted. The book\u0026rsquo;s plot is divided into various threads spanning time, space and reality, with enough levels, characters and subplots that the reader has to pay extreme attention not to become lost. Some of the characters go under different names, or names are shared among different characters, while the main characters undergo enough physical alterations, that trying to juggle the figures in your imagination becomes a feat in and of itself.\nWritten style aside, should you find yourself able to understand Rushdie\u0026rsquo;s message\u0026ndash;and thanks to the written style it\u0026rsquo;s easy not to \u0026lsquo;get\u0026rsquo;\u0026ndash;I simply can\u0026rsquo;t find very much worth recommending. If you are looking for examples of novels centred on the interplay of good and evil, issues of identity or multiculturalism, the parody of religion, or even merely novels featuring magic realism, there are simply so many better, easier, and more enjoyable works available, even from Rushdie\u0026rsquo;s own pen, that this work wouldn\u0026rsquo;t get a look in.\nAs other reviewers have said, were it not for the fatwa this book should probably have disappeared off most people\u0026rsquo;s radars without much word of comment. That it didn\u0026rsquo;t is unfortunate, since I don\u0026rsquo;t think this book particularly lends itself to many people, yet so many pick it up to find out what all the fuss was about. It is a frustrating and convoluted read, and while there are beautiful and intriguing passages which reminded me of what made Midnight\u0026rsquo;s Children so enthralling, these are ultimately pretty small fish for sieving through 500 other pages of nigh-on impenetrable packaging.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/02/20/the-satanic-verses/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Satanic Verses"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Despite the advancing years I had up until receiving this book for Christmas never read any Wodehouse, though I had been read excerpts in my younger years. Of course, the problem with Wodehouse is that being such a prolific author, it\u0026rsquo;s difficult to know where to start. And since most Wodehouse readers have their favourites, asking for advice on what to read is a bit like asking which football team you should support.\nAll of which is precisely why this compendium fits the bill nicely. There\u0026rsquo;s a little bit of everything here to give the newcomer a real taste of Wodehouse\u0026rsquo;s world, with stories from Jeeves, Blandings, Ukridge, Mr Mulliner, The Drones, Psmith and Uncle Fred. There\u0026rsquo;s also a section of golfing stories, and at the back, as a sort of appendix, a collection of letters and sundry other writings. As for the prose itself, well if you really need more convincing, you could always start by perusing the introduction by Stephen Fry.\nThe only other review of this book to date criticised the quality of the book, and to some extent I must agree. Whilst I found nothing lacking in the book\u0026rsquo;s manufacture, there were a surprising number of typographical errors to be seen, albeit only small niggly things. Nevertheless, for the price this volume is an absolute steal, a definite must for anyone looking for a glimpse into Wodehouse.\n(And having read the lot, I can now say that my jersey is emblazoned with the Blandings crest.)\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/02/01/what-ho-the-best-of-wodehouse/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wodehouse","RelPermalink":"/tags/wodehouse/"}],"title":"What Ho!: The Best of Wodehouse"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/categories/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" As someone only just playing around with digital photography, I picked up this book as a complement to Bryan Peterson\u0026rsquo;s Understanding Exposure to get me started and provide some inspiration. Neither book disappointed. Where Peterson\u0026rsquo;s book is an excellent starting manual for people new to the world of photography, Freeman\u0026rsquo;s goes into much greater depth about composition techniques.\nThe book is divided into 6 chapters, with each chapter further divided into sections dealing with a certain aspect of photographic design. Whilst some sections make reference to others, and in particular to photographs on other pages, in general it is possible to read this book piecemeal, skipping over bits that are of no interest, or returning and dipping into others. Each section abounds with example photographs, many also exploiting instances of photographs that didn\u0026rsquo;t quite work to further highlight a point.\nAs many have already said, the writing is at times a little academic, and has the feel of being written with a photography or similar course in mind, but there is little that should prevent the average reader from understanding everything covered here. Freeman quotes a number of other photographers to illustrate his points, as well as dipping into other artistic fields to contrast the particular challenges of photography. One genuine criticism I have of the book is that Freeman sometimes describes certain features of (albeit famous) photographs that, perhaps for economic or legal reasons, do not appear in the book. Whilst said images can easily be found with a quick search on the Internet, it nevertheless detracts from the book\u0026rsquo;s readability, particular for the novice this book is clearly aimed at.\nJust to pick up on two of the most common criticisms many of the negative reviews have on here:\nthe photographs are rubbish - whilst I personally find this to be pretty harsh criticism, the fact that not every image is a spectacular masterstroke is in my opinion one of the book\u0026rsquo;s greatest strengths. These may only be \u0026lsquo;ordinary\u0026rsquo; photographs, but by illustrating what makes them work it is easy to understand the principles being explored, whether focusing on the basic elements, perspective, timing, exposure etc. For instance, there is a photograph in one section of a house and a tree\u0026ndash;an entirely throwaway image, one that you wouldn\u0026rsquo;t normally linger to look at for more than a split-second\u0026ndash;but its inclusion is used as an illustration of using natural elements of the subject as a frame within the picture. the book has no lessons, it simply describes why some photographs work - this is more valid criticism, and I think down to personal taste. I found the book\u0026rsquo;s structure to be almost perfect - each section explored one particular concept, with a number of real-world examples used to highlight how this idea can be employed, and why this makes the photograph \u0026lsquo;work\u0026rsquo; where a different angle, a different exposure, a different composition etc. failed. Ultimately, with a value price tag, and Amazon\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;Look Inside\u0026rdquo; feature, the buyer can\u0026rsquo;t go wrong with this one. If you agree with other comments that the photographs should be nothing short of spellbinding in order to be able to learn from them, by all means look elsewhere. Nevertheless, this book\u0026rsquo;s structure and the authorship, combined with ample photographic examples, make for an excellent beginner\u0026rsquo;s guide for improving composition, and being aware of what is possible behind the lens.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/01/23/the-photographers-eye-composition-and-design-for-better-digital-photos/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Photographer’s Eye: Composition and Design for Better Digital Photos"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/categories/translation/"}],"content":" In titling his book (or having his book titled?) \u0026ldquo;Is that a fish in your ear?\u0026rdquo;, David Bellos has certainly made categorising this work a difficult task. It looks and feels like it should belong firmly in the \u0026lsquo;popular science\u0026rsquo; section, yet as other reviewers have pointed out, the writing sits it firmly in a half-way academic category. Still, the material covered should be of interest to a wide range of readers, with the book split into fairly short and relatively self-contained chapters, that one can really dip and choose or skip out the parts that are of little interest. The book covers a very wide range of topics, and skitters over numerous areas such as philosophy, biology, religion and of course linguistics.\nOne of the first things that struck me about the work as a whole was that Bellos was taking the opportunity to defend his profession, or at least his approach to the business of translation. Chapters often deal with a particular assault on translation or translators, mainly in the form of an every day platitude, which is then investigated, tested and (for the most part) satisfactorily overturned. I found myself disagreeing with his opinions on occasions, but the evidence is presented well enough that the reader can draw his own conclusions most of the time. Neverthelees, there appear to be some contradictions in the book, and some of his arguments felt at times overdrawn. For instance, he criticises a statement made by Nabokov regarding Pushkin\u0026rsquo;s poetry that \u0026rsquo;to reproduce the rhymes and yet translate the entire poem literally is mathematically impossible\u0026rsquo;. He then goes on to illustrate how the form of said poetry lent itself well to translation, and that the root of Nabokov\u0026rsquo;s statement lay in his reluctance to attempt it. Whilst this isn\u0026rsquo;t necessarily untrue, it doesn\u0026rsquo;t detract from Nabokov\u0026rsquo;s original statement about the impossibility of translating both form and content, nor does the statement that other gifted translators give a \u0026lsquo;good approximation of Pushkin\u0026rsquo;s verse\u0026rsquo;. Bellos\u0026rsquo; own chapter on poetry, as another reviewer well pointed out, if anything confirms Nabokov in his statement.\nIn his defense of translation, Bellos covers a wide range of fields and periods, from Sumeria through the Bible to the EU, with humour, legalese and interpreting all playing a part. He depaints the difficulties the translator faces, having restrictions of space (e.g. comics), time (e.g. film subtitles/dubbing), dealing with grammatical features that are missing in target or source language, or simply requiring clarification of meaning where there is none to be had. The chapters covering the workings of the EU and the UN are particularly interesting, as is the thread running through the work about the dominant role of English and its potential effects on other languages through the work of translators. Another strong point is Bellos\u0026rsquo; inclusion of plenty of examples and anecdotes that help to elucidate his points, both in terms of the difficulties and the successes.\nWhilst there were a few statements in the book which I would consider \u0026lsquo;mistakes\u0026rsquo;, these were always peripheral to the main argument, and the work is otherwise extremely well-researched and detailed. Bellos writes with authority, and despite his strong points of view never comes across as condescending - in fact, a real sense of modesty peers through his writing, especially when dealing with areas of translation that are not his particular field.\nUltimately, this is a book that will definitely appeal to the right reader. Despite my finding some of his arguments to be not particularly convincing, Bellos presents enough information and evidence to allow his readers to make their own minds up. As an overall introduction and summary to the world of translations, this book is a thorough success, most suited to students of language, those considering becoming translators, and perhaps people interested in finding out more about the translations they themselves consume. Yet as others have pointed out, it isn\u0026rsquo;t as straightforward a read as the title or dustjacket make out, so a quick dip into Amazon\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;Look inside!\u0026rdquo; feature would probably save a few rumpled foreheads.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/01/11/is-that-a-fish-in-your-ear-translation-and-the-meaning-of-everything/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/tags/language/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/linguistics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/tags/translation/"}],"title":"Is That a Fish in Your Ear?: Translation and the Meaning of Everything"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" This post is also available in English .\nDer Klappentext behauptet, dieses Buch sei „Der stumme Frühling“ des literarischen Geistes. Zwar vergleicht man hier Äpfel mit Birnen, aber im Kern gibt es in diesem Buch eine provozierende Erörterung der Auswirkung verschiedener Techniken auf die Funktionsweise des Geistes. Carrs Hauptthese, die er in seinem Artikel „Is Google making us stupid?“ schon ausführlich erklärt, ist, dass das Internet Veränderungen in unseren Hirnen auslöst, die unsere Denk- und Erinnerungsvermögen nicht unbedingt positiv verändern. Grundsätzlich spielt das Internet die Rolle eines Universums der Ablenkung, das eine unendliche Vielfalt an leichter Unterhaltung und sinnlosen Unterbrechungen einführt, wodurch wir unsere Gehirne nach einem süchtig-machenden Muster von ineffektivem Multitasking trainieren. Wir heben die neue Technik auf ein Podest, als Eingang zu einer neuen Welt des Wissens und der Kommunikation, die viele Vorteile im Rahmen von sozialer Wechselwirkung, persönlicher Freiheit und wissenschaftlicher Bemühung mit sich bringt. Carr ist jedoch der Meinung, dieses Portal sei beileibe nicht ohne Nachteile, dass diese Technik unsere Fähigkeit des tiefen Denkens und das effektive Nutzen des Gedächtnisses beeinträchtigt.\nObwohl die Veröffentlichung seines Artikels / dieses Buches für Furore sorgte, worin der Autor als demagogischer Technikfeind dargestellt wurde, gibt es wenig luddistische Rhetorik hier, und das Buch ist mitnichten die großspurige Jeremiade, als die es oft abgestempelt wird. Das Buch selbst ist zum größten Teil gut geschrieben, die Kernargumente bleiben der Schilderung immer nah, und Recherchen, die die Behauptungen unterstützen, sind reichlich vorhanden. Sicherlich ist dies keine ernsthafte wissenschaftliche Arbeit und der Vorwurf ist wohl gerechtfertigt, dass sich Carr nur die besten Befunde herausgepickt hat, die seine These unterstützen. Dennoch bleiben genug Denkanstöße. Die Argumente des vorher erwähnten Artikels sind in dem Buch näher ausgeführt, mit interessantem, historischen Hintergrund, Forschungsergebnissen aus den Bereichen der Neurowissenschaft und Psychologie, und Parallelen zu anderen technischen Veränderungen. Trotzdem liest sich der Text phasenweise wie ein hetzend-geschriebener Studienaufsatz: Eine Kette von hoffnungsvoll würdigen Zitaten verknüpft durch gelegentliche Bindewörter („\u0026hellip;und\u0026hellip;“, „\u0026hellip;aber\u0026hellip;“). Die besten Kapitel sind die, wo sich der Autor vor dem Personalpronomen „ich“ nicht gescheut hat und die, die eigene Erfahrungen und Kämpfe des Autors mit der neuen Technik wiedergeben, sowie der leider allzu kurze Kapitel über den Einfluss des Internets auf den Verbrauch unserer Gedächtnisse.\nMit weniger als 250 spärlich gedruckten Seiten sollte dieses Buch selbst die Aufmerksamkeitsspanne von dem „novus homo“, den das Buch beschreibt, nicht erschöpfen. Es wird wohl für Menschen von Interesse sein, die auf beiden Seiten der Internetgeburt geboren wurden, und die gut recherchierten Berichte über historische Parallelen und psychologische Aspekte bieten viele kleine Leckerbissen für das Gehirn zu verdauen. Dass Carr getadelt wird, keine Lösungen zu den problematischen Entwicklungen, die er hervorhebt, anzubieten, zählt meiner Meinung nach zu den Stärken, nicht den Schwächen. Es handelt sich hier eher um einen Kommentar, und keine Kritik. Gesellschaftlicher Wandel lässt sich genau so gut aufhalten wie die Gezeiten, obwohl wir als Individuen unsere eigenen Wege beschreiten dürfen. Aber es ziemt sich für uns, diesen Wechsel wahrzunehmen.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/01/07/the-shallows-what-the-internet-is-doing-to-our-brains/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/tags/technology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Web","RelPermalink":"/tags/web/"}],"title":"The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" The blurb claims this book to be a \u0026ldquo;Silent Spring\u0026rdquo; for the literary mind. That is certainly comparing apples to oranges, but at the core to this book there is a thought-provoking argument about the impact of various technologies on the workings of the mind. Carr\u0026rsquo;s main thesis (to be found almost in its entirety in his article \u0026ldquo;Is Google making us stupid?\u0026rdquo;) is that the Internet is changing our minds, our ability to think and the way we use our memories, and all this not necessarily for the better. Essentially, the Internet is a universe of distractions, offering endless light entertainments and pointless interruptions that train our brains into an addictive shallow pattern of ineffectual multitasking. We hold up the new technology on a pedestal as a doorway to a new world of knowledge and communication, bringing with it benefits for social interaction, personal liberty and scientific endeavour, but Carr claims that this portal is not without its drawbacks vitiating our ability to think deeply, or use our memories effectively.\nWhilst much of the furore that came after the publication of his article/this book ascribes him to being a drum-bashing technophobe, there is little Luddite rhetoric here, and this book is far from the grandiloquent jeremiad its often labelled as being. The book itself is largely well-written, with the core argument never far from the narrative, and there is plenty of research here to back up the claims. Certainly this is no serious scholarly work, the charge often levelled at Carr that he only cherry-picked research findings which bolstered his main argument is probably justified, but there is enough food here for thought. The arguments of the aforementioned article have been padded out with some interesting historical background, findings from the realms of neuroscience and psychology, and parallels to other technological shifts, but at times it does feel like one is reading an undergraduate essay hurried off to a deadline: a string of hopefully worthy quotes, strung together by the occasionally conjunction (\u0026quot;\u0026hellip;\u0026quot; and \u0026ldquo;\u0026hellip;\u0026rdquo;, however \u0026ldquo;\u0026hellip;\u0026rdquo;). The best chapters are those which don\u0026rsquo;t shy away from using the personal pronoun \u0026lsquo;I\u0026rsquo; and reflect the authors own observant struggles with the new age technologies, and the sadly all too short chapter on the Internet\u0026rsquo;s influence on our use of memory is of its own a very thought-provoking aside.\nAt less than 250 sparsely-packed pages, this is a book that shouldn\u0026rsquo;t exhaust even the attention span of the novus homo it describes. It should be of interest to people born both sides of the Internet divide, and the well-researched reports on historical parallels and psychological aspects offer plenty of titbits for our minds to work on. The reproach that Carr offers no solutions to the problematic developments he highlights is, in my opinion, to the book\u0026rsquo;s strengths not weaknesses. It is a commentary, rather than a critique. Social change can be halted about as easily as the tides, though we might as individuals choose to tread our own paths. But it behoves us all well to acknowledge Change\u0026rsquo;s existence.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2012/01/07/the-shallows-what-the-internet-is-doing-to-our-brains/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/tags/technology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Web","RelPermalink":"/tags/web/"}],"title":"The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":" Translated from the original German (Ein schwarzer Engel des Zufalls) By Oehmke, Philipp und Schmitter, Elke\nLiterature professor Manfred Schneider talks about the rationality and irrationality of killers, the paranoid psyche of western society, and its search for explanation\nSPIEGEL: Herr Schneider, on 8th January 22-year-old Jared Lee Loughner shot Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in the head, and killed six other people at point blank range. And while the world agonises for an explanation, it is possible to find explained in your recent book, Das Attentat, that an assassin such as Loughner isn\u0026rsquo;t actually irrational, rather the product of hyperrationality. What do you mean by that?\nSchneider: Every assassin is an acute observer and interpreter of signals and events. For him, nothing happens by chance; he scans the world for evil doings. He sees conspiracies everywhere. The result appears to us to be crazy and insane. However, at the same time it is precisely logic and reason running in overdrive, that lead to these paranoid conclusions. Paranoia isn\u0026rsquo;t a form of irrationality, but one of hyperrationality. Loughner is a typical example of this.\nSPIEGEL: As if he had read your book.\nSchneider: Yes, almost.\nSPIEGEL: What is so typical about him?\nSchneider: Firstly, subjectively, Loughner acted highly ethically. The paranoiac rescues the world from a threat. He disconnects his system of interpretation from everything else and creates inside this system a sense of order, which is no longer worrying for him. Secondly, Loughner left behind messages, which is always part of a rational assassination plan. We\u0026rsquo;re clearly dealing with a very thoroughly considered, well-planned mission. Thirdly, it was a political action. Insanity, which has uncountable forms of expression, takes on a political form in would-be assassins. Think about the video message in which he talked about the gold standard and currencies. These are elementary symbols of western society, which he wants to renew or exchange. It\u0026rsquo;s crazy, but it is an attempt to make contact with those in power.\nSPIEGEL: What if Loughner hadn\u0026rsquo;t talked about gold and currencies, but instead about a new human being with three arms and four legs? Where does pure insanity start?\nSchneider: With gibberish. When the only thing left is utter psychobabble. That\u0026rsquo;s one boundary. The other is that the fundament of paranoia is power. Paranoia isn\u0026rsquo;t a preoccupation with an illusion, as in the example you just gave.\nSPIEGEL: At a public meeting in 2007, Loughner asked Congresswoman Giffords if she knew \u0026ldquo;why words mean what they mean\u0026rdquo;. Strangely, she apparently answered him in Spanish. Her inadequate response to his question is supposed to have deeply embittered Loughner.\nSchneider: This fundamental doubt about our system is a consistently encountered symptom. The former soldier Denis Lortie, who stormed the Québec Parliament on 8th May, 1984, and arbitrarily opened fire on anything that moved, said in his messages before the event: \u0026ldquo;I want to destroy everything that wants to destroy language.\u0026rdquo; And Loughner is recorded to have said: \u0026ldquo;the government is controlling grammar.\u0026rdquo;\nSPIEGEL: Is paranoia always destructive?\nSchneider: Not necessarily. Consider the fabled Sherlock Holmes: he decyphers random signals better than anyone else, and is able to form the most shrewd suspicions from them. A scrap of paper here, a pile of cigar ash there. A class A paranoiac! But always acting for good.\nSPIEGEL: But there is a difference. Holmes always draws the right conclusions.\nSchneider: Loughner thought the same. But paranoiacs are missing self-reflection, the ability to verify. In terms of mental ability, this is the decisive flaw. An assassin like Loughner is always a lone warrior, whose suspicion will eventually turn into certainty. Without communicating and comparing with his surroundings, he starts to build a system of explanation for those things which worry and plague him.\nSPIEGEL: But is it possible to tell if someone is a Holmes or a Loughner?\nSchneider: That can be extremely difficult. For example: intelligence services operate along Holmes\u0026rsquo; lines. But Colin Powell\u0026rsquo;s analysis in front of the UN Security Council in February 2003, according to which mobile biological weapons laboratories were being operated in Iraq, had the same structure as the delusions of Adelheid Streidel, who perilously injured Oskar Lafontaine in 1990 with a knife: she believed there were underground human killing factories in Wackersdorf.\nSPIEGEL: The investigating sheriff in Tucson said soon after the attempt, that they were dealing with \u0026ldquo;a typical troubled individual, a loner.\u0026rdquo; That\u0026rsquo;s too simple, isn\u0026rsquo;t it?\nSchneider: Certainly. But I also understand, how such an assumption comes about.\nSPIEGEL: How?\nSchneider: The assassin arrives like an arbitrary angel of darkness. Suddenly something inconceivable happens in our rational world, which fits in no model or explanation. That something terrible happens so randomly, however, is especially difficult for us to endure. And so that, in the case of Jared Lee Loughner, we don\u0026rsquo;t have to concede this, we search for causes which make the event logical and to some extent predictable.\nSPIEGEL: For example with the prompt assertion that the assassin had read Hitler\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;Mein Kampf\u0026rdquo;.\nSchneider: Exactly. But that doesn\u0026rsquo;t account for anything. Everyone hopes, however, that that\u0026rsquo;s the case. Loughner is also supposed to have been an adherent of the right-extremist conspiracy theorist David Wynn Miller. If that were the case, we\u0026rsquo;d have found something that reduces the danger. That is to say, we could theoretically have prevented the deed, and we can learn from this failure for the future. As far as the casual spectator is concerned, something went wrong, some security measures must have failed. We need a reason and we need a culprit.\nSPIEGEL: What stops us from recognising that the assassination attempt was pure chance, unfathomable, crazy, mindless?\nSchneider: We have to look for reasons when something terrible happens. Everything has its reason, that has been the fundamental principle of our rational way of thinking ever since the Enlightenment. And for the explanation as to why someone should attempt an assassination, we call on representatives of evil: Communism, Fascism or the media. These days new representatives are appearing on the horizon, the Muslim enemy as topical paranoid figure or the heinous bankers. Politics can\u0026rsquo;t afford to say: \u0026ldquo;Ah well, this financial crisis, it was just a case of hard lines!\u0026rdquo; No, they must explain that there were certain players who acted one way or another and thus precipitated certain results. Should this argument fail, however, being considered unbelievable, confusion and resentment ensue. If this takes on a paranoid form, then the assumption arises that there must be something working in the background, a bigger, secret plan, a dark conspiracy of the most evil forces. That is what I term paranoid reasoning, delusional but not abnormal reasoning. The assassin is paranoid.\nSPIEGEL: Sarah Palin and the Tea Party are accused of being partly responsible for the atmosphere in the USA which led to such an attack. She denies, almost in your sense, the societal paranoid explanation attempt, and says that such attacks reflect only themselves, and are thus random.\nSchneider: Trying to turn Palin into a culprit is naturally fallacious. Nevertheless even without drawing paranoid conclusions it is possible to recognise a mesh of coherences surrounding the attack which point towards Loughner. And the Republican fundamental polemic is part of this context. For example, in using the term \u0026ldquo;mind control\u0026rdquo;. This is the central paranoid notion of the American right, which assumes that the government controls the thoughts of its citizens through the language and media. Palin\u0026rsquo;s call to see the attack as an isolated incident, i.e. pure chance, is paradoxical, since she thus suddenly resigns from the system of paranoia – catchword \u0026ldquo;Mind Control\u0026rdquo; – that she and the Tea Party have set up.\nSPIEGEL: Is it not curious that attacks, paranoia and renunciation of change spread most particularly in those places where voter participation, open information and permeability are of the highest order, i.e. in western democracies?\nSchneider: That has been statistically proven. The more open and transparent the system, the stronger the suspicion that something unseen is directing affairs in the background.\nSPIEGEL: In which case WikiLeaks would also be a would-be assassin in the sense of paranoid reason?\nSchneider: WikiLeaks is driven by the same paranoid craving to throw light into the darkest of corners and wrest every last secret from those in power. This contains its own paradox, since the makers of WikiLeaks also rely on secrecy. They must protect their informants, in doing which they create their own mysteries and bearers of secrets, which may in turn lead to new groupings and new suspicions.\nSPIEGEL: Many of the signals and signs in which paranoiacs see meaning noticeably stem from literature and cinema.\nSchneider: Would-be assassins are intensive users of media. The media is the source of their suspicion, and at the same time it empowers the fierce hankering to appear in precisely these media. John Hinckley, who in 1981 attempted to assassinate Ronald Reagan, was a film buff. Hinckley was particularly impressed by Martin Scorsese\u0026rsquo;s film \u0026ldquo;Taxi Driver\u0026rdquo;, and began to stalk the then 13-year-old Jodie Foster. He wrote her poems and sent her numerous letters. Of course these remained unanswered. In a letter to the New York Times, he then wrote the terrible sentence: \u0026ldquo;The shooting was the greatest love offering in the history of the world.\u0026rdquo; This insignificant, unhappy, miserable little guy thought in such world historical dimensions. It was his dream to live in the White House with Jodie Foster.\nSPIEGEL: And Ronald Reagan was obviously in the way. But doesn\u0026rsquo;t this would-be assassin negate your theory about paranoid reason? In this case we really can\u0026rsquo;t talk about reason.\nSchneider: Au contraire. He knew the whole history of assassination. He knew about those who went before him and had in some way identified with them. It was clear to him what would happen after his actions, that pictures of him would appear and circle the world in a day. He understood that he would move from the invisible to the visible. And he would soon be with the woman he adored. To move from the world of the invisible to the visible is a strong motivator.\nSPIEGEL: Which assassin interests you in particular?\nSchneider: Mark David Chapman is one, the attacker who shot John Lennon. Not that I have particular sympathy for him, but his fate is moving and staggering. He believed to have read his own story in J. D. Salinger\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;The Catcher in the Rye\u0026rdquo;. Immediately after the attack, while Lennon still lay bleeding in the corridor of the Dakota Building, he grabbed the book and started to read it again. Chapman also spoke from synchronicities, which confirmed his decision to commit the attack.\nSPIEGEL: By synchronicity you mean events, which actually have nothing to do with one another, but are nevertheless seen to be connected?\nSchneider: The term comes from C. G. Jung and means the correlation of events which are ostensibly purely random. For example, the man who sold the murder weapon to Chapman in Honolulu was called Ono, like Lennon\u0026rsquo;s wife. When Chapman picked up a magazine on his flight to New York, John Lennon was on the cover. There was a whole series of such details, which he perceived as synchronicities and which rationally strengthened his resolve: it\u0026rsquo;s obvious, I have my mandate. \u0026ldquo;I had to do it,\u0026rdquo; that\u0026rsquo;s a sentence which often comes from assassins.\nSPIEGEL: The prototypical assassin in your analysis is Brutus, one of Caesar\u0026rsquo;s murderers. Was this man paranoid?\nSchneider: Certainly not in the clinical sense. But he, like his co-conspirators, entertained the basic suspicion that Caesar wanted to become king. That would have meant the death of the republic. Sure, Caesar had asserted that he didn\u0026rsquo;t want the crown, but based on their interpretation of his behaviour, the conspirators drew the opposite conclusion.\nSPIEGEL: They followed their suspicions.\nSchneider: The would-be assassin is always first an interpreter: of facts and figures, gestures, sentences or silence. Brutus\u0026rsquo; case is indeed so interesting and is discussed even today, because there were comprehensible reasons for murdering Caesar. Dante placed him in hell, but Brutus has always had adherents, from Cicero to the present, his reputation is almost immaculate.\nSPIEGEL: When does a mistrustful stance or perception turn into paranoia?\nSchneider: When all of the non-rational moments which belong to reason fall away, then it becomes pathological. When there is no longer any doubt in thinking, no delay in acting. When empathy is no longer possible and the feeling becomes established, that this or that must be done under any circumstances in order to prevent something terrible: then the person is no longer acting paranoiac but paranoid.\nSPIEGEL: But what about someone like Georg Elser, who made out to kill Hitler? You surely can\u0026rsquo;t talk about paranoia there.\nSchneider: In this case it wasn\u0026rsquo;t the assassin who was paranoid, but his opposite number, Hitler as well as a large proportion of German society. It is certainly possible, Stalinism is evidence enough, that the majority of a group can share an irrational, delusional position.\nSPIEGEL: You provide Sherlock Holmes as an example of a so-called healthy paranoia. Is the detective our doctor for acute cases of \u0026lsquo;randomness intolerance\u0026rsquo;?\nSchneider: Definitely. He annihilates randomness, because he can read something logical in otherwise apparently random indices. We delegate our hope to criminal heroes like him, to investigators and policemen, our hope that it is possible to recognise and fight evil.\nSPIEGEL: You call the would-be assassin the \u0026ldquo;arbitrary angel of darkness\u0026rdquo;. He\u0026rsquo;s invisible, comes out of the blue like Loughner or the school shooters of Columbine, he wreaks havoc by killing apparently at random.\nSchneider: The randomness is routine. Sebastian B., the school shooter from Emsdetten, regarded the Columbine killer Eric Harris as a god, and Dylan Klebold, Harris\u0026rsquo; friend, considered himself to be \u0026ldquo;some kind of god\u0026rdquo;. None of these young men – the typical killer is male and around 20 years old – was crazy or moronic. Through their actions they played god, they were daemons of fortune. The pretension of being able to decide life and death over any person for a few hours or minutes bestowed upon them the utmost elation. One of the last entries in Dylan Klebold\u0026rsquo;s diary was \u0026ldquo;have fun!\u0026rdquo;\nSPIEGEL: And how does this bear with Islamic suicide bombers?\nSchneider: It\u0026rsquo;s different to the Loughners and school shooters, who sense the inescapability of their actions via paranoid thought processes. These radical believers get their decision to act from a third party. They live in the collective paranoid conviction that nothing happens that isn\u0026rsquo;t God\u0026rsquo;s will. They also act for a recognisable reason. Their appearance on 11th September, 2001 was for our world the most extreme case of randomness: unpredictable, terrible, simply incomprehensible. But politically, the wish to teach our system a lesson in uncertainty lay behind it. That is something you actually can\u0026rsquo;t defeat. It\u0026rsquo;s the attempt to spread paranoia in our society. Their actions, however, have a reason, which we have learned to understand in the meantime. It\u0026rsquo;s no longer a paranoid incident, and that has an advantage.\nSPIEGEL: Which?\nSchneider: In the meantime we have developed a pretty good picture of the typical suicide bomber. There\u0026rsquo;s a phenotype, around which the investigators orient themselves. The attackers of 11th September were unforeseeable, but ten years on their would-be successors no longer have this advantage. We know enough about this type of person to be able to be act to prevent them.\nSPIEGEL: Herr Schneider, thank you for this interview.\nThe interview was conducted by editors Philipp Oehmke and Elke Schmitter.\n[Image ©European Parliament/Pietro Naj-Oleari ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/08/26/an-arbitrary-angel-of-darkness/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Assassination","RelPermalink":"/tags/assassination/"},{"LinkTitle":"Der-Spiegel","RelPermalink":"/tags/der-spiegel/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Jared-Lee-Loughner","RelPermalink":"/tags/jared-lee-loughner/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/tags/translation/"}],"title":"An Arbitrary Angel of Darkness"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"German","RelPermalink":"/categories/german/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Dieser Eintrag ist auch auf Deutsch verfügbar .\nAnother curiosity which cropped up whilst reading Kafka’s Der Prozess can be found in the following quote:\nAußerdem schien es der Maler mißzuverstehen, warum K. nur am Bettrand blieb, er bat vielmehr, K. möchte es sich bequem machen und ging, da K. zögerte, selbst hin und drängte ihn tief in die Betten und Polster hinein.\nFranz Kafka, Der Prozeß Ignoring for a second changes in the use of the ß, most learners of German would assume from this sentence the word missverstehen should be a separable verb. That is to say the painter seemed misszuverstehen and not zu missverstehen. As a result, you\u0026rsquo;d be forgiven for thinking that were the painter to misunderstand something K. said, Kafka would write:\n*Der Maler verstand ihn miss.\nA thread on the WordReference language forums brings some more light to the situation:\nDie Verwendung von missverstehen ist schwankend bezüglich der Trennbarkeit (der Duden charakterisiert das Verb als unregelmäßig). In finiter Form wird es in der Regel untrennbar verwandt: Er missverstand ihn Die Variante *Er verstand ihn miss ist ungewöhnlich und gilt meines Wissens auch als standardsprachlich inkorrekt.\nDer Infinitiv mit zu wird aber von vielen Sprechern so gebildet, als sei missverstehen trennbar aber von nicht wenigen Sprechern auch so, als sei das Verb nicht trennbar. Entsprechend ist sowohl zu missverstehen oder misszuverstehen anzutreffen.\nMeines Wissens ist misszuverstehen die standardsprachlich vorgezogene Form; die Variante zu missverstehen würde ich aber ebenfalls als standardsprachlich korrekt ansehen.\nSo missverstehen is simply irregular, having both separable and inseparable verb properties. In particular, the infinitive with zu is more commonly formed as if the verb were separable, but finding it used otherwise as a separable verb is much rarer.\nFinally, here\u0026rsquo;s the Duden Online entry , which includes an example of the \u0026lsquo;jokingly colloquial\u0026rsquo; separable variant.\nmiss­ver­ste­hen Wortart: unregelmäßiges Verb\neine Aussage, eine Handlung [unbeabsichtigt] falsch deuten, auslegen\nBeispiele jemanden, etwas missverstehen sie missversteht mich absichtlich du hast mich, meine Frage missverstanden die Bemerkung war nicht misszuverstehen er fühlt sich missverstanden (umgangssprachlich scherzhaft) verstehen Sie mich bitte nicht miss (verstehen Sie mich nicht falsch) eine nicht misszuverstehende (eine eindeutige) Handbewegung ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/05/24/nicht-misszuverstehen/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Franz-Kafka","RelPermalink":"/tags/franz-kafka/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"}],"title":"Nicht misszuverstehen"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"German","RelPermalink":"/categories/german/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Reading Kafka’s Der Prozeß recently, I came across an interesting construction that I hadn\u0026rsquo;t seen before.\nTrotzdem K. gerade jetzt nicht daran gedacht hatte, sagte er sofort: \u0026ldquo;Gewiss, ich muss fortgehn. Ich bin Prokurist einer Bank, man wartet auf mich, ich bin nur hergekommen, um einem ausländischen Geschäftsfreund den Dom zu zeigen.\u0026rdquo; Franz Kafka, Der Prozeß I\u0026rsquo;d only ever heard trotzdem used in a main sentence, and never before to form a verb-shunting Nebensatz. I figured at first this might be a mistake on the part of the publishers – my copy was of rather low-budget quality – and that the word obwohl had been intended, but the form repeated itself a number of times throughout the book.\nA quick bit of Google research later revealed that this form is perfectly common in the Randregionen of the German language, particularly in Bohemia and in Alpine areas, and used as a matter of course by authors such as Kafka, Stifter and Dürrenmatt. This older thread on wer-weiss-was.de has a great explanation, explaining that the form arose as a contraction of the now old-fashioned trotz dem, dass, and further points out that the form is pronounced with the stress on the second syllable.\nDuden\u0026rsquo;s entry on the matter.\ntrotz|dem Bedeutung obwohl, obgleich\nBeispiel er kam, trotzdem (standardsprachlich: obwohl) er krank war\nHerkunft entstanden aus: trotz dem, dass …\nNow to find out why the version of the text published here replaces these forms of trotzdem with the word obwohl. And why in my copy Kafka never capitalised the word gewiss even at the start of sentences.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/05/23/trotzdem-als-nebensatz/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Franz-Kafka","RelPermalink":"/tags/franz-kafka/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"}],"title":"Trotzdem als Nebensatz"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" Extravagant Spam\nA topic I\u0026rsquo;ve previously written about has lately become something of a pain, to such an extent that I\u0026rsquo;ve actually decided to change my way of dealing with it. Whilst I could certainly complain that the number of spam messages on this blog far exceeded those few genuine comments (by a factor of several hundred), glancing over the list of catches once a week, it didn\u0026rsquo;t take all that long to weedle out the very occasional piece of ham incorrectly identified by Akismet as \u0026lsquo;spiced\u0026rsquo;.\nUnfortunately, in recent months the deluge seems to have increased. This blog has seen almost as much spam in the last three months as in the whole of 2010. Even a cursory scan over the pages of detritus has become chore enough that I\u0026rsquo;m no longer willing to bother. ((What made the situation worse is that I installed the IntenseDebate plugin, which at the moment doesn\u0026rsquo;t seem to handle Akismet spam in any intelligent way, instead leaving the comments hidden and requiring the user to disable the plugin to clean out the spam each time.)) Added to which, rumours are abound of Akismet changing its free nature , only fair given how much traffic they must receive, and the search for an adequate free replacement could take some time.\nSo instead and at least in the short term, I\u0026rsquo;m just going to go about disabling comments on those posts which accrue the most unwanted attention. There are currently just a few posts which seem to be targeted heavily by the spambots, so I\u0026rsquo;ll soon see if this makes an impact on the figures. Otherwise I might simply switch to a general policy of switching off comments on all posts of a certain age, as many other blogs do. For the occasional interesting slices of ham this blog gets, closing the window after a certain period really won\u0026rsquo;t make much of a difference.\nAnd on a slightly related side-note, here\u0026rsquo;s proof that spammers will find and target anything. Spammers are just like young boys with their genders: if there\u0026rsquo;s a box, they\u0026rsquo;ll put their details into it.\n[Photo courtesy of The Other Dan ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/04/06/the-spam-strikes-back/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Akismet","RelPermalink":"/tags/akismet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Comments","RelPermalink":"/tags/comments/"},{"LinkTitle":"Spam","RelPermalink":"/tags/spam/"}],"title":"The Spam Strikes Back"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" Slightly confusing argument to start with, but this comic provokes enough argument for legal eagles and philosophising owls alike. Would the three go down for attempted murder or conspiracy to commit murder? Would Alp get sentenced for manslaughter for being the last one out of the room and apparently the one to finally turn the key? Should Aaron take the blame for ultimately removing the water, the pre-meditated poison going unused? Did Harold commit suicide by being so dopey about sitting around in there with just a bottle of water in the first place? Could Alp get committed for being so loopy as to drill several holes in a bottle after confusing sand and water?\nSadly, however, rather little to do with the real question of free will!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/03/29/free-will/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Comic","RelPermalink":"/tags/comic/"},{"LinkTitle":"Free-Will","RelPermalink":"/tags/free-will/"},{"LinkTitle":"Philosophy","RelPermalink":"/tags/philosophy/"}],"title":"Free Will?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"Sifting through a flurry of invitations that rained upon them with the approach of spring, Keats and Chapman eventually settled upon visiting a dear animal-lover, Geoffrey Malmouth, for what was billed to be the Greatest Cat Show in The North. Away from the blustery, biting winds sweeping in off the North Sea, what on first glimpse appeared to be nothing but a large warehouse had been converted into a true Aladdin\u0026rsquo;s cave for the cat fancier. Felines of all sizes and breeds, colours and patterns were present, and there were prizes for all manner of category, youthful and old, hirsute and bald, a veritable multitude of attractions to grab the visitor\u0026rsquo;s attention.\nThe highlight of the prize-giving ceremony was to be the awarding of the Breeder\u0026rsquo;s Achievement Award, conferred upon the breeder who had in the eyes of the panel done the most for his or her chosen breed in the course of the year. Whilst Geoffrey was not short-listed for it, he had been given what in his view was an honour greater than the prize itself: that of supplying the model for the so-called AilurOscar, a gold-plated, life-sized cast replica of last year\u0026rsquo;s champion. Said model, a superb Burmese specimen by the name of Mystique, had been put into a narcosis and taken to the sculptors just a few days earlier, and should have been returned with the unveiling of the prize. The latter now stood gleaming on the prize-winners\u0026rsquo; table, but of Mystique there was no sign.\nAs the day wore on, it eventually came for the prizes to be awarded, the judges having had sufficient time to make their decisions on the vast quantity of fur and claws they had seen that day. Geoffrey started to get particularly agitated that he still hadn\u0026rsquo;t seen his cat, especially when he noticed the sculptor sidle into the room and take up a place at the back of the crowd, without word or sign of Mystique in tow. His agitation soon took effect on Chapman who, more suo, decided to take the bull by the horns and demand an explanation. Rather pale in the face, he returned.\n\u0026ldquo;Well,\u0026rdquo; prompted Geoffrey, after waiting patiently for Chapman to begin, \u0026ldquo;where\u0026rsquo;s Mystique?\u0026rdquo;\n\u0026ldquo;I\u0026rsquo;m afraid our friend over there seems to have gotten the wrong end of the stick about your instructions, dear boy,\u0026rdquo; came the stammered reply. \u0026ldquo;He took it that your feline companion was in something, well, far deeper than a narcosis, and the prize was to double as something of a sarcophagus.\u0026rdquo;\nGeoffrey was aghast; his mouth working like a fish, he eventually sputtered out his disbelief. Chapman assured him he wasn\u0026rsquo;t tugging on anyone\u0026rsquo;s appendages.\n\u0026ldquo;You mean that little statuette is my Mystique?\u0026rdquo; came the blurted response, to which Chapman nodded in affirmation. \u0026ldquo;But this is an absolute disaster!\u0026rdquo;\n\u0026ldquo;I think,\u0026rdquo; offered the till-now silent Keats politely, \u0026ldquo;you mean a catastrophy.\u0026rdquo;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/03/14/keats-and-chapman-at-the-show/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Keats-Chapman","RelPermalink":"/tags/keats-chapman/"}],"title":"Keats and Chapman at the Show"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Pet-Hates","RelPermalink":"/categories/pet-hates/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"Partly inspired by Linden \u0026rsquo;s little snapshot of her life , and obviously a rip off of the film title, this is simply a mini-list of truths about myself that grate.\nI write better when it\u0026rsquo;s dark Not in the dark but when it\u0026rsquo;s dark. Whether it\u0026rsquo;s because that\u0026rsquo;s when I\u0026rsquo;m at my most lucid, or perhaps because the tiredness helps me overcome my inhibitions, the small hours have often been when I\u0026rsquo;m at my most productive. In fact, the idea for this very post was sketched at 5am one very idle night, when the neural aurorae kept me from dropping off. The ideas hop and flow and melt into one another like chocolate on a hot stove—and there\u0026rsquo;s never a pen around when you need it.\nI wish so much to be creative Not in any specific fashion either. Regardless of method, there\u0026rsquo;s always been something itching inside, scratching the back of my retina, urging me to put the effort and dedication into creating something I can be proud of, whether it be with the pen or the paintbrush, the camera or the chisel. Sadly, there\u0026rsquo;s a rather stunting lack of any raw talent, which leaves for disappointment every which way I turn. And more pertinently, I\u0026rsquo;m too much of a lazy sod to ever practice enough at anything to actually hone those blunt and crooked tools in my head to produce something worth being proud of.\nI put it all off for later As the proverb has it:\n\u0026ldquo;Ther is an old proverbe,\u0026rdquo; quod she, \u0026ldquo;seith that \u0026lsquo;the goodnesse that thou mayst do this day, do it, and abide nat ne delaye it nat til tomorwe.\u0026rsquo; And therfore I conseille that ye sende youre messages, swiche as been discrete and wise, unto youre adversaries, tellynge hem on youre bihalve that if they wole trete of pees and of accord, that they shape hem withouten delay or tariyng to comen unto us.\u0026rdquo;\nThe Tale of Melibee , Geoffrey Chaucer\nSadly, however old this proverb may be, it\u0026rsquo;s still one to have had the meagrest effect on my genes. Putting it all off for \u0026lsquo;when I have more time\u0026rsquo; has virtually become my sport of profession. This very post is testament to the fact, which according to Wordpress was started back in September of the last year. There are always more hours in a day, more days in the week, more weeks in the year, more years in a lifetime, in that concave vortex of my temporal perception.\nI never finish what I start My life and living spaces are littered with the unfinished. Books half-read, films half-watched, stories half-written, designs half-cooked. ((Sometimes even dinners half-cooked.)) What starts with good intentions soon ends up unloved, disregarded, unashamedly shunned for something else; if in fact it should ever get started in the first place. It is probably telling that for every book I read, there are two on the shelf; for every moment spent on writing, there are a thousand spent on the waiting-to-be-draughted.\nI have a passion for procrastination When time eventually does land in my lap, like a giant rainbow trout fresh out of water, I find myself less inclined to take the beast by the shanks, to scale it, bone it, fillet it, eat it, nor even to take pity on it, to rescue it, cover it, take it back to water. Instead I watch it flap about and squirm and shake, with gaping mouth and aching gills, its precious moments dying fast, its glassy eyes bright to the last. Don\u0026rsquo;t ask me where that came from. I\u0026rsquo;m just wasting time when I should best be getting on with some work.\nI put effort in where it is wasted Perhaps this is entirely linked to procrastinating, however much I don\u0026rsquo;t like to acknowledge it. Putting effort in to wasted time means that no one can judge you for not trying–and since it is wasted nor will they judge what your efforts produce. All of which doesn\u0026rsquo;t detract from the fact that all my efforts lie in the wrong place. I write on forums no one visits. I author blog posts no one reads. I soliloquise at length as though there were a fourth wall on my life. ((But even were I a Shakespearean character, I\u0026rsquo;d be a Dogberry.)) Those portions of my life wreak of effort, which remain unseen, unheard, unused, unwanted. And to the detriment of that public face, which has a degree in every volume of inadequacy.\nI was born in the wrong century Perhaps not technically something I hate about myself, this probably has more to do with my believing the grass is greener on the other side. But looking at my recent forebears, I nevertheless feel I\u0026rsquo;d have been more at peace with life wielding a pick in my hands as a coal miner, or with a mattock slung over my shoulder as a navvy, than I am in this fast-paced world of gadgets and gizmos. Not that I look back on history through rose-tinted spectacles, but knowing my place in the gutter I abhor the society that doesn\u0026rsquo;t agree that I belong there.\nI have a superficial interest in the world Just a quick glance at my bookshelf is enough to testify to how scatterbrained I really am. There\u0026rsquo;s no direction, no taste, no depth, no concentration. Just an eclectic mix of all kinds. Perhaps that\u0026rsquo;s a good thing, having a desire to sample all of life\u0026rsquo;s waters. On the other hand it shows how utterly superficial my interest in the world is, and that surface-skating translates itself nattily into real life. No real wonder I never finish what I start, when I barely get started on anything.\nI eat too much Difficult to believe for those who know me, easier to believe for those who know me well, I don\u0026rsquo;t just restrict myself to food in saying I eat too much. My life sometimes feels like an exercise in waste, a product of the consumer society, for all that I wish it would be otherwise. Food, electricity; water, most especially water. It\u0026rsquo;s probably already too late to make up for the squandery with an early adieu, but if anything here could or should change, this is the one to work on.\nI\u0026rsquo;m merely waiting for the end There was sadly no choice about being born, or if there was, I\u0026rsquo;m sure I ticked the other box. Were we assigned to lead our lives on the basis of previous errors? If so, as in the real world, I must have discarded the manual in favour of just getting to grips with the controls. Yet however much fun that experience can be, I still firmly believe that had I been given a conscious choice, I\u0026rsquo;d have declined this mortal coil. Whatever impression I give others, I really just spend my days wandering through life, looking for the exit.\nI know all this and do nothing For all those keeping track, yes this is the eleventh sin, but it\u0026rsquo;s easy to think up more once you start to enumerate them all. ((I only hope I shan\u0026rsquo;t make the same mistake as Charles Freck on my taking leave.)) Perhaps this isn\u0026rsquo;t really such a thing I hate, as much as an acknowledgement of reality. I can\u0026rsquo;t change. I won\u0026rsquo;t change. These flaws and failures are simply part of who I am. That doesn\u0026rsquo;t mean I have to like it. But that has meant I\u0026rsquo;ve learned to live with it.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/02/15/ten-things-i-hate-about-me/","tags":[],"title":"Ten Things I Hate About Me"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"Our eponymous heroes returned to Blighty after a short sojourn on the continent, during which time Keats had become rather enamoured with practising his high-school German. Unsure what to do with themselves after such an extended period away, they took it upon themselves to visit an old friend of theirs, who had reputedly retreated himself from high society, to take up the role of school headmaster in a quaint village on the south-west coast of Scotland.\nOn their arrival there, they discovered that his institution at the school had provoked a little wave of anti-English sentiment in the village, with his demands that the pupils talk \u0026lsquo;proper\u0026rsquo; English, none of this uneducated Scots drivel. Partly as a result of his estrangement by the village community, their friend had rather taken somewhat to the produce of the local distillery.\nOne morning during their stay, hoping to catch a glimpse of their pal in his element at the school, Keats and Chapman set off down the road from the inn. On their journey they began to meet an increasingly dense trickle of schoolchildren which, it not even being noon and in the middle of the school day, they found rather odd. The trickle of pupils turned gradually into a stream as they neared the school, and they arrived to find their friend locking up the school door.\n\u0026ldquo;What the devil does he think he\u0026rsquo;s doing at this time?\u0026rdquo; exported Chapman.\n\u0026ldquo;It seems pretty obvious to me,\u0026rdquo; retorted Keats with a slight wave of his hand, \u0026ldquo;er macht die Schotten dicht.\u0026rdquo;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/01/20/keats-and-chapman-return-from-the-continent/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Keats-Chapman","RelPermalink":"/tags/keats-chapman/"}],"title":"Keats and Chapman Return from the Continent"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Here\u0026rsquo;s a little tip for anyone like me still using Windows Vista who\u0026rsquo;s having trouble with the system logging/locking you out after a certain period of inactivity (usually 5 or 10 minutes). The two most common culprits for this are the screensaver settings or possible power saving options, both accessible from within the Control Panel. However, what isn\u0026rsquo;t obvious and what drove me mad trying to find, is that even if you have None selected as your screensaver of choice, it appears Windows still sees fit to still log the user out after the allotted period of time. This despite the fact that the On resume, require logon checkbox is greyed out.\nAfter much headscratching and searching through forums, I eventually discovered that you can prevent Windows automatically presenting you with the login screen after a few minutes of inactivity by reenabling the screensaver, providing an extraordinarily large number and unchecking the On resume, require logon checkbox. No more interrupted video viewing!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/01/18/windows-on-inactivity/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Screensaver","RelPermalink":"/tags/screensaver/"},{"LinkTitle":"Software","RelPermalink":"/tags/software/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vista","RelPermalink":"/tags/vista/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows/"}],"title":"Windows on Inactivity"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"If like me you\u0026rsquo;ve decided at some point to move your phpBB install to a new domain or location within a domain, there are a number of little hurdles to jump before you can successfully consider the move complete. Here\u0026rsquo;s my short one-two-three guide for getting your forum moved over to a new address.\nMy first port of call was to use Thorsten Hartmann \u0026rsquo;s th23 Domain mod , which enables users to log in to your forum from different domains. The mod is no longer being updated, but I can confirm that I have it running with the current version of phpBB (3.0.8). As long as your two (or more) domains or addresses point to the same location, this mod should allow the user to access the forum as if he\u0026rsquo;d used the default address. In fact, with a little php wizardry at your disposal, you could use the mod as the basis for having your forum displayed differently depending on the web address used.\nAfter making sure I had the forum running currently from two addresses, I then did the standard thing and followed the official guide to moving your forum over at phpbb.com. You may be able to skip certain sections of that guide depending on whether or not you are actually moving server.\nUpdating links Once your forum is working correctly under the new domain, one final alteration you may need to make would be to update all those backlinks in your forum posts to point to the right place. Simply run the following SQL queries (using phpMyAdmin or otherwise), replacing the addresses OldDomain.com/forums and NewDomain.com/forums with your relevant old and new forum web addresses.\nUPDATE phpbb_posts SET post_text = replace(post_text, \u0026#39;www\u0026amp;#46;OldDomain\u0026amp;#46;com/forums\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;www\u0026amp;#46;NewDomain\u0026amp;#46;com/forums\u0026#39;); UPDATE phpbb_posts SET post_text = replace(post_text, \u0026#39;www.OldDomain.com/forums\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;www.NewDomain.com/forums\u0026#39;); You may need to run this twice if you also allowed access to your forum via a different subdomain (e.g. both OldDomain.com/forums and www.OldDomain.com/forums) . And whilst not strictly necessary, the same principal can be applied to updating backlinks in private messages and forum signatures.\nUPDATE phpbb_privmsgs SET message_text = replace(post_text, \u0026#39;www\u0026amp;#46;OldDomain\u0026amp;#46;com/forums\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;www\u0026amp;#46;NewDomain\u0026amp;#46;com/forums\u0026#39;); UPDATE phpbb_privmsgs SET message_text = replace(post_text, \u0026#39;www.OldDomain.com/forums\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;www.NewDomain.com/forums\u0026#39;); UPDATE phpbb_users SET user_sig = replace(post_text, \u0026#39;www\u0026amp;#46;OldDomain\u0026amp;#46;com/forums\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;www\u0026amp;#46;NewDomain\u0026amp;#46;com/forums\u0026#39;); UPDATE phpbb_users SET user_sig = replace(post_text, \u0026#39;www.OldDomain.com/forums\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;www.NewDomain.com/forums\u0026#39;); ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/01/05/changing-your-phpbb3-domain/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Guide","RelPermalink":"/tags/guide/"},{"LinkTitle":"Phpbb","RelPermalink":"/tags/phpbb/"}],"title":"Changing Your phpBB3 Domain"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"One bright morning in late spring, whilst the nuclear ash was still falling over the majestic cities of the east, Keats and Chapman were sunning themselves out on the terrace with a pot of Earl Grey. The Sino-American War over Central Asia was largely over, and for gentlemen of the west it was a time of relief and contemplation. The Americans had relented to the will of the darkest minds in the forces, and the bombs falling on cities had been like raindrops splashing on a frozen pond. The winter had been a nuclear one.\n\u0026ldquo;You know, I find it hard to believe that they\u0026rsquo;re ready to start rebuilding their cities so soon after the nukes,\u0026rdquo; remarked Chapman. \u0026ldquo;According to the papers, those Pashtuns are about ready to announce a new name for their capital.\u0026rdquo;\n\u0026ldquo;Indeed, and I\u0026rsquo;ve got a wager with the landlord as to the name they\u0026rsquo;ll announce.\u0026rdquo; Chapman looked on, flummoxed. \u0026ldquo;Why, what else could they call it?\u0026rdquo; continued Keats, \u0026ldquo;New Kabul.\u0026rdquo;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2011/01/05/keats-and-chapman-and-the-sino-american-war/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Keats-Chapman","RelPermalink":"/tags/keats-chapman/"}],"title":"Keats and Chapman and the Sino-American War"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"Great little short film on YouTube, asking some of the age-old questions, and answering some more pertinent ones, like why I won\u0026rsquo;t be committing suicide with British Rail.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IX-qwnVjRhs ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/10/08/why/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Public-Transport","RelPermalink":"/tags/public-transport/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Why?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"President Sarkozy will not be the one to tell French schoolchildren that the borders of Europe extend to Syria and Iraq , ((Earlier report on Sarkozy\u0026rsquo;s election here [in German].)) should Turkish overtures to the EU be fully accepted. One must assume then, that he would have no problem explaining that the current borders of the EU extend to Morocco on mainland Africa , or that France itself shares borders with Brazil and Suriname. Or perhaps that under fifty years ago, its borders extended south to the Sahara Desert .\nThe question of Europe is a naturally contentious issue. Assuming one isn\u0026rsquo;t to treat it as a mere archipelagical extension of Asia, Europe has one of the most fluid and imprecise geographic borders of any of the continents. Claiming that Europe ends with the Atlantic Ocean, the Urals, the Volga or the Bosporus is perhaps all very appropriate, except that none of today\u0026rsquo;s borders actually conform to the logic. Whilst the EU might today stake the strongest claim to defining Europe, would Sarkozy\u0026rsquo;s schoolchildren really see it that way? Their idea of Europe is as likely to be influenced through football and music , as much as through other political and international bodies.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/10/04/the-problem-of-europe/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Eu","RelPermalink":"/tags/eu/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/tags/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nicolas-Sarkozy","RelPermalink":"/tags/nicolas-sarkozy/"}],"title":"The Problem of Europe"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" This is a book with much promise. Neal Stephenson is a very decent writer; his prose can be both engaging and exciting, without pandering to the reader in the way many techno-thriller authors choose. Unfortunately, this is also a book that seems to have been written in an ecstasy of authorship, without enough time and consideration given to making the book a reader\u0026rsquo;s choice. My copy weighed in at over 1100 pages, which is a very long expanse for Stephenson to ultimately say very little.\nCryptonomicon is essentially several smaller storylines all rolled into one. There are two distinct timeframes, and several major/minor characters all pursuing their own goals, occasionally overlapping along the way. The problem is that all the hopping backwards and forwards simply adds pages, as Stephenson has to constantly remind us who we\u0026rsquo;re reading about, where they are and what they\u0026rsquo;re doing. By which point, we\u0026rsquo;ve moved back 50 years and half-way around the world to another thread in the story. If you put the book down for a few days, you\u0026rsquo;ll probably find yourself reading a few chapters just to get your head around what all the various characters are currently up to, before you can continue on to something fresh.\nAll of which isn\u0026rsquo;t to say the book doesn\u0026rsquo;t have its moments. There\u0026rsquo;s clearly a lot of time, effort and research gone into this book, and this shows, particularly in the historical timeframe and the bits dealing with cryptography. Isoroku Yamamoto\u0026rsquo;s death, for instance, is featured as a nice allusion to the importance of what the main characters are up to. Yet for all its breadth, this novel is a pure geek\u0026rsquo;s heaven, and despite the oodles of space given over to something like Van Eck phreaking, there\u0026rsquo;s little space to give the characters anything more than a lick of paint. Others have commented that the female characters are wooden objects in a male-dominated world: I\u0026rsquo;d go as far as to say the entire piece is being played out by marionettes.\nWhilst I wasn\u0026rsquo;t exactly expecting inner drama from a book like this, and could have suspended my disbelief for a few lack-lustre characters, there\u0026rsquo;s only so much fantasy I can take whilst reading a book gushing with technical detail. I\u0026rsquo;ve no doubt many readers would be quite satisfied with the defence of \u0026lsquo;artistic license\u0026rsquo; but I found myself confusedly shaking my head a number of times reading Cryptonomicon, trying to work out quite whether I was supposed to be taking what I was reading seriously. Not satisfied with creating characters and events, Stephenson creates new countries and languages.\nAfter a few hundred pages I was already getting a bit weary of some of the characters, and a number of far-fetched/unbelievable events and entirely fictitious \u0026lsquo;facts\u0026rsquo; had strained my enjoyment of the plot. But persisting for several hundred more pages didn\u0026rsquo;t produce much in the way of a reward. The picture that gradually gets revealed over this meandering epic really isn\u0026rsquo;t equal to the effort that the author (and reader!) put into it.\nThis book has been described elsewhere as \u0026ldquo;the ultimate geek novel.\u0026rdquo; You\u0026rsquo;ll either love the book\u0026ndash;for the winding journey, the nauseating detail, the multi-page descriptions, possibly even the cardboard-cutout characters\u0026ndash;or like me you\u0026rsquo;ll find the whole escapade rather tedious, unbelievable, unnecessarily long, and ultimately disappointing.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/09/27/cryptonomicon/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science-Fiction","RelPermalink":"/tags/science-fiction/"}],"title":"Cryptonomicon"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" I should first of all declare: I am musically illiterate. Though I do enjoy listening to classical music and have on occasion been to a concert or two, my understanding of and ability to talk about the music itself is virtually non-existent.\nWhich is precisely why I picked up this book when it was on offer. Purporting to be \u0026ldquo;an accessible guide\u0026rdquo; and advertising itself as \u0026ldquo;the place to start\u0026rdquo; when wishing to learn a bit more about the symphonic form, this book seemed perfect for someone like me, who would be likely to listen in to the BBC Proms but very unlikely to turn up and get his hands on the programme. In the introduction, Nicholas Kenyon explains that this book was designed to provide the information prepared for the programme notes produced for the Proms to a much wider audience of music lovers.\nAs a first volume (Kenyon hints there might be more) they have stuck to the more mainstream pieces in the repertory, and the choices are perfectly reasonable: whilst the selection won\u0026rsquo;t please everyone, the usual suspects are all present and correct, no doubt covering most of the bases for a typical Proms season. Each symphony summary is designed to be read on its own, with each composer given a little introduction beforehand. On the whole, the form works nicely, with the majority of the nearly three dozen contributors producing very concise pieces packed with historical details, personal motivations and an overview of the music itself. There are just over 100 symphonies from nearly 30 composers described here, which should mean a little something for everyone\u0026rsquo;s tastes.\nSadly, there are some things which detract from making this guide wholly recommendable. The composers are listed alphabetically, which I couldn\u0026rsquo;t help but feel was the least helpful order they could have chosen. The introduction could have been a little longer, and given more of an overview of the development of the symphony as a recognised form, though this is just a personal gripe. Whilst the introduction admits that there may be some repetition, each summary designed to be readable independently, it nevertheless made skimming through the book rather tedious at times. As I decided to read the full section on Haydn, for example, I think I read the history and reasoning behind the naming of his London symphonies 3-4 times, and given that this introduction might take up half a page out of a 2-3 page summary, it\u0026rsquo;s clear just how much space is almost tangibly wasted.\nFar more of a blot on the book, however, was the fact that some summaries were probably more dense to read than the music itself is to listen to. Whilst the best contributors could condense a short history of the composer and his period, as well as an elucidation of a symphony\u0026rsquo;s movements and peculiarities all within a couple of pages, others might ramble on for four or five pages of what I found to be unfathomable description riddled with unexplained musical terminology. Particularly galling if that happens to be a favoured piece. And whilst the German time-markings of Mahler\u0026rsquo;s symphonies, for example, would be helpfully translated, all Italian was reproduced verbatim without even a glossary for us illiterati.\nIn summary, a bit hit and miss. For casual listeners and people interested in the history and workings of the symphonies and their composers, it certainly is a reasonable place to start, at least if you don\u0026rsquo;t buy the book for those symphonies finding themselves in particularly sticky chapters. I imagine that my feelings about the book have been coloured somewhat by their inclusion, and that there are in fact many more \u0026lsquo;good\u0026rsquo; summaries than \u0026lsquo;bad\u0026rsquo; ones, but they do sadly leave the book only recommendable with reservation. For a guide to the composers themselves, however, I can wholeheartedly recommend The Lives of the Great Composers . Whilst not at all focussed on their symphonies, the book does give a excellent introduction to many if not all of the great composers on that list, placing them in historical context and describing their contributions to the great classical music lineage.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/09/10/the-bbc-proms-pocket-guide-to-great-symphonies/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Classical-Music","RelPermalink":"/tags/classical-music/"},{"LinkTitle":"Music","RelPermalink":"/tags/music/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"The BBC Proms Pocket Guide to Great Symphonies"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"}],"content":" I’ve given up, and I’m not afraid. Only there’s something I would like to understand. And I don’t think anyone can explain it. You see, I know it’s the end for me. I know it, but I can’t quite believe it, I can’t feel it. It’s so strange. There’s your life. You begin it, feeling that it’s something so precious and rare, so beautiful that it’s like a sacred treasure. Now it’s over, and it doesn’t make any difference to anyone, and it isn’t that they are indifferent, it’s just that they don’t know, they don’t know what it means, that treasure of mine, and there’s something about it that they should understand. I don’t understand it myself, but that’s something that should be understood by all of us. Only what is it, Kira? What?\nAyn Rand, We the Living\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/07/19/we-the-living/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Ayn-Rand","RelPermalink":"/tags/ayn-rand/"},{"LinkTitle":"Objectivism","RelPermalink":"/tags/objectivism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Quotation","RelPermalink":"/tags/quotation/"}],"title":"We the Living"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" GTA: Vice City\nIt\u0026rsquo;s good to be back!\nLast week I had one of those urges that only a pregnant man can have, to step back into the shoes of Tommy Vercetti and relive the delights of Vice City. This 2003 Rockstar outing was easily one of the best games I ever played, everything about it simply oozed style and polish. It\u0026rsquo;s almost as if the developers took a standard checklist of things that get rated in a game, made sure every area got given the works, and then spent the rest of their time filling in the gaps. Because it\u0026rsquo;s exactly that which nails it for this game, the attention to detail that makes playing Vice City like stepping into the \u0026rsquo;80s: the clothes, the music, the cars, the giant mobile phones, heck, even the intro scene features the game being loaded on a Commodore 64 . Rockstar\u0026rsquo;s particular sense of humour is also here to see by the bucketload, from the tongue-in-cheek nature of some of the missions, through the fantastic dialogue and hilarious radio stations, to the small jabs and puns that little the streets of Vice City.\nAll of which is without even touching on the gameplay. Sitting firmly in the sandbox genre, Vice City gives you a wonderful feeling of being able to go about things your own way. Goofing around, stealing cars, running from the police, there\u0026rsquo;s plenty to do in the game when you aren\u0026rsquo;t really doing anything! But fortunately that doesn\u0026rsquo;t mean that Rockstar skimped out on the main storyline, which is by all means fantastic, and features all sorts of mission types, from starting riots, racing through the streets, to knocking off banks and delivering numerous methods of \u0026lsquo;persuasion\u0026rsquo; to various denizens of the city. Aside from the main plot, there are plenty of other side missions and extras to discover, which add ample distraction to the standard mayhem generally meted out whilst driving between missions.\nCensorship Unfortunately, on account of where I currently live, the copy I got hold of was one of the draconian censored versions designed for people with severe mental disabilities and no wish to stand up for themselves. Frankly, the censorship wasn\u0026rsquo;t immediately conspicuous: it\u0026rsquo;s been long enough since I last loaded the game up, that I didn\u0026rsquo;t notice the lack of blood under the tires, or the inability to kick people when they\u0026rsquo;re down. Even in a mission involving a chainsaw and a nice Hawaiian shirt, it didn\u0026rsquo;t immediately occur that there were no droplets of blood on the screen.\nEventually, however, I found my way to a location where I knew there to be a hidden rampage, one of Vice City\u0026rsquo;s mad little sub-missions involving a mad psychotic killing spree against the clock, only it wasn\u0026rsquo;t there. After a quick search on the web, I realised that this was in fact on account of the censorship, and not any corruption in the game or an error on my part. Fortunately, whilst searching for the reason I also found the solution: the BlutPatch replaces the game\u0026rsquo;s main executable and restores all of those missing features hacked out to try to put some kind of moral fibre into this hellraiser of a game.\nAnd honestly, what is the point of it? On installing the \u0026lsquo;patch\u0026rsquo; I realised just how many little details had been taken out of the game. Like the ability to rob the people you\u0026rsquo;ve killed was entirely removed, so what exactly is the message we\u0026rsquo;re supposed to get? Ripping someone from the front seat of their cars and being them to death with a hammer is fine, but taking $20 from their wallets afterwards is beyond the pale? Or the issue of sex. The game revolves around the criminal underworld, it kicks off with a drug deal, ends in a massacre, and has everything in between, yet it was the ability to hire a prostitute and sit in a squeeking car whilst your health goes up that was deemed unfit for polite society. Unfortunately I didn\u0026rsquo;t play the game long enough without the BlutPatch to tell if the censored version also touches on those other likely offensive areas in the game, namely the strip club and the porn studios.\nVista Issues Sadly, the game hasn\u0026rsquo;t entirely lived up to the test of time. Whilst the gameplay, humour and polish of the game are still as fresh as they were on its release, getting the game to run with any degree of reliability is a bit of a trial. I was running it under Vista, which wasn\u0026rsquo;t necessarily the greatest problem, but no doubt the BlutPatch did nothing to help matters. Fortunately after a bit of tinkering I got the game to run fairly smoothly, albeit with a couple of annoying issues:\nMouse sensitivity was unfortunately rather crazy, and affected the vertical rather more than the horizontal. This mouse has a few buttons for tweaking the DPI, but there are also some tools below which may help. Occasionally the mouse would refuse to function at all, generally fixed by pressing escape, or restarting the game. This would not happen mid-game, only when moving from the main menu screen and back again. The game would occasionally crash outright after some kind of collision involving a police/military vehicle. Not entirely sure what this was caused by, nor if it was restricted to police vehicles, and it was fairly infrequent, though highly annoying when reminded of it on Vigilante level 15. For most of these and many other problems, there is an excellent guide over on the GTAForums . Some of the solutions call for the use of some tricks produced by the ToCA Edit team, sadly rather hidden away on their website and so reproduced below. ((Downloads since removed.))\nThere are also a couple of patches originally produced here (original website now defunkt) for fixing two specific bugs, namely the never-ending slow motion camera on doing Unique Jumps, and the unreachable Cuban outfit on doing missions in a certain order. Using the patches is a simple matter:\nAll game fixes are meant to be coding fixes for common game issues. As their role is intended to be fixes, they are in fact plug and play. That means you drop them into your data folder (AFTER backing up your original main.scm), rename it to main.scm, and you load your save without having to start a new game.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/05/19/gta-vice-city/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Gta","RelPermalink":"/tags/gta/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vice-City","RelPermalink":"/tags/vice-city/"}],"title":"GTA: Vice City"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"}],"content":" Meine Gedichte brauche ich dazu nicht mehr; in meinen Bücherregalen ist das alles viel besser gesagt. Aber was würde mit einem passieren, wenn das schon ein Grund wäre, etwas aufzugeben? Wo blieben wir alle? So schreibe ich weiter, doch oft genug erscheint es mir grau und papieren gegen den Abendhimmel, der jetzt über den Dächern weit und apfelfarben wird, während der violette Aschenregen der Dämmerung schon die Straße füllt.\nErich Maria Remarque, Der schwarze Obelisk\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/05/14/wo-blieben-wir-alle/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Erich-Maria-Remarque","RelPermalink":"/tags/erich-maria-remarque/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Quotation","RelPermalink":"/tags/quotation/"}],"title":"Wo blieben wir alle?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"It might not be particularly well featured, but Google Docs does at least provide a quick and easy way to share your documents, albeit with messed up formatting and various other caveats. Today, however, I came across a problem uploading some small files which produced the rather pallid error message \u0026ldquo;Server rejected.\u0026rdquo; Something wrong with my files? With the browser upload? With the server itself? No idea.\nFortunately there was an easy, if rather roundabout fix available: simply email the files to my Gmail account, and use the option there to open them with Google Docs. Bingo!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/05/06/the-google-docs-server-rejected-roundabout/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Gmail","RelPermalink":"/tags/gmail/"},{"LinkTitle":"Google","RelPermalink":"/tags/google/"},{"LinkTitle":"Google-Docs","RelPermalink":"/tags/google-docs/"}],"title":"The Google Docs Server Rejected Roundabout"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"There are plenty of videos like these, usually decrying the stupidity of Americans, but as anyone who\u0026rsquo;s actually considered it knows, you could do the same anywhere in the world with similar results. Only yesterday I saw a number of Germans being interviewed, who believed that the sun revolves around the Earth, and even a couple that thought the sun is so hot because it is being shined upon by so many planets.\nYet this little viral video series actually has an aim, aside from simply highlighting blissful ignorance for cheap laughs, being to get more young people to visit the South African Apartheid Museum . As their motto goes, \u0026ldquo;a history forgotten is a history lost.\u0026rdquo; But it also says a lot about the influence of US culture around the world, and how surprisingly gesticulatory answering questions in South Africa can be!\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2Tyf744rvI Click for the full series: 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 [Via African Politics Portal]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/04/23/knowing-your-history/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Apartheid","RelPermalink":"/tags/apartheid/"},{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"South-Africa","RelPermalink":"/tags/south-africa/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Knowing Your History"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Although it\u0026rsquo;s only slated for release sometime in May, the first beta of the new WordPress 3.0 is already doing the rounds. Blog Oh Blog has a nice summary of the changes and additions in the new version : most of the updates are fairly innocuous, perhaps the largest mention should go to the integration of WordPress-mu, for setting up multi-user blogs and networks.\nHowever, the announcement that really put the cat amongst the pigeons has been that the core development team may now be promoting what were formally called canonical plugins, now known as core plugins following the unpublished results of a poll in December . It appears that whilst attempting to address a genuine issue, the very idea of having plugins that stand in the limelight with an official stamp of approval has incensed many community plugin developers.\nSome really excellent debate has been held which has, amongst other things, revealed that the initial go ahead for core plugins will be very limited; just three plugins, including an old, out-of-date plugin, a chunk hived off from the core, and a newly developed plugin. Nevertheless, the potential for these core plugins to have wide-reaching effects on the plugin development pool, create stagnation in the community and a greater top-down hierarchy is something that in the eyes of many developers and enthusiasts, has not been addressed.\nThe Pros Most of the people arguing in favour of core plugins have the same ultimate motivation as the core developers. They don\u0026rsquo;t acknowledge the potential negative side-effects of the move, and if they do, they don\u0026rsquo;t consider them to be negative.\nReliability. Perhaps the biggest driving issue for this move is that of plugin reliability. Most WordPress users will have come across the problem of using a plugin to such an extent that a site essentially relies on its features, or may even have been built around it, only to find that the plugin developer has got bored of his project, and the next version of WordPress breaks it entirely. Finding a suitable, working replacement may take a lot of time and effort, but will not guarantee that the situation won\u0026rsquo;t repeat itself. Security. Stemming largely from the above phenomenon, users making use of plugins that are no longer maintained by their developers find themselves loath to update their WordPress installations for fear of having their sites fall apart should those plugins no longer be compatible. They voluntarily take the risk of running an out-dated version with potential, known security flaws, unnecessarily making themselves a potentially viable target. Of course, even if that plugin works in the latest version of WordPress, it doesn\u0026rsquo;t preclude that the unmaintained plugin itself isn\u0026rsquo;t wide open to abuse, just another potential security hole in an otherwise fairly sound system. Support. There are literally thousands of plugins out there, the vast majority written by individuals who developed their plugins for their own special needs, and out of a bit of thought for the community, decided to share their creations with other users. They probably aren\u0026rsquo;t looking for any form of reimbursement, neither gold nor glory, other than a bit of gratitude. And whilst there may be some of that, they are far more likely to drown in a hail of support issues, bug fixing and feature requests, something they are neither capable or inclined to cope with. Some people post on the WordPress Extend site itself, many ask questions on the release post on the author\u0026rsquo;s blog, other plugin authors run their own forums, but even these may require that users sign up just to find how little information there is or how infrequently the author actually answers posts. Where exactly can users go then for help? Quality. The WordPress Extend repository proudly states that there are over 9,000 plugins with a cumulative 80 million downloads: and the vast majority of those are utter cruft. I don\u0026rsquo;t think anyone should have any illusions about that. A plugin is obviously more than just what it purports to do on the box, and a good plugin in particular is one that ticks more than just the boxes for functionality. It needs to have accurate and up-to-date documentation, how to install, use and (ideally) uninstall the plugin. There should be an accurate and preferably human-readable changelog detailing the key alterations, bug fixes and feature additions between each version. That\u0026rsquo;s a lot of work for one man, and I very rarely find a plugin that gets it all right: I\u0026rsquo;ve seen plugins which link to other pages for an up-to-date changelog that doesn\u0026rsquo;t include the last two versions, or others which link to a trac page without even the slightest attempt to translate that list in something regular users would likely understand. One popular plugin has documentation that is sadly so incomplete, that users point to posts on other blogs for fuller idea of how to use it. The Cons Labels. Core, Canonical, Official, Godly, call it what you will, all those plugins which make it into the selected few and get the rubber stamp will destroy the efforts of many other plugin developers who weren\u0026rsquo;t so lucky. Regular users will of course browse through the official lists before turning to true third-party solutions to their problems. In what developers like to call the plugin free market, it really is a case of all plugins are equal, but some are more equal than others. Hierarchy. One of the other big concerns from developers is that the move presents an encroachment in an otherwise egalitarian ecosystem. Plugin developers invariably create their plugins to fulfill a particular need, their own or someone else\u0026rsquo;s. They are the ones with the final say when it comes to fixing bugs, adding features and writing the code. With an official plugin, however, who\u0026rsquo;s the one who gets the final say when it comes to adding new features? Who\u0026rsquo;s to decide which code gets included, which issues get priority, and so on? Monopoly. A developer sets up a WordPress site and finds he needs something that isn\u0026rsquo;t covered in the core software, and for whatever reason hasn\u0026rsquo;t been implemented or implemented well by another plugin, so writes his own and publishes it for others to use. Of course, in all likelihood there are other plugins already available, which may approach the issue from different angles, or with different feature sets. These plugins, however, essentially overlap in terms of their usage, and the ensuing competition should result in more well-rounded plugins that are up-to-date, flexible, reliable and secure. Only the fittest survive. At least, in theory. With these official plugins, all of this competition goes out of the window, technically more proficient plugins with better features and tight code, will be overlooked by users in favour of the canonicals. A personal take In case it wasn\u0026rsquo;t already clear, I would have to say that despite the objections, everytime I\u0026rsquo;ve gone through the arguments in my head I\u0026rsquo;ve come out in favour of the core plugins idea. One of WordPress\u0026rsquo; greatest strengths has definitely been its flexibility and easy extensibility. As one critic of this decision wrote, the bar for entry is low, it doesn\u0026rsquo;t take a coding genious to install WordPress, decide he needs something extra, and write a plugin to cover it. Recent updates have also made the WordPress repository so much more accessible; users can now search for and install plugins right from the WordPress installation.\nYet the quality and reliability of those plugins remains a major issue. I\u0026rsquo;m not even referring to those coding one-offs with barely a hundred downloads that presumably make up the vast majority of the plugin repository. ((Some actual statistics on plugin downloads and updates etc. from the repository would actually make interesting reading.)) Many of the more well-known solutions out there still fall at one or another hurdle as already mentioned, whether it concern support, timely updates or documentation. To say nothing of the millions of potential issues of interoperability.\nOne of the more interesting complaints that a number of developers had was that of having a top-down hierarchy dictating what goes into which plugin, something that I found entirely fallacious. As it stands, the vast majority of plugins I\u0026rsquo;ve come across are developed by a single person, with occasional patches sent in by more able users. They are the ones who decide what happens, what gets fixed, what gets included, when things are released. And if they decide to give up on the project, for us mere mortal users we can only hope that someone equally competent will pick up the reigns and provide support and future updates. Sadly, that isn\u0026rsquo;t necessarily going to be the case. The idea of the core plugins brings at least some stability to proceedings, a guarantee that updating WordPress won\u0026rsquo;t bring everything to a crashing halt, and the knowledge that the entire project doesn\u0026rsquo;t revolve around the mind of a single man. It\u0026rsquo;s the very principle that has ensured WordPress itself has grown from strength to strength, why should it bring nightmares to the plugin world?\nThe great alternative that many people seem to be lauding is that of making improvements to the tools available to plugin developers. As already mentioned, recent WordPress updates brought the regular users and the plugin repository much closer together, by making the latter navigable from within the regular WordPress installation. This change, as well as other updates on the repository itself, have ensured that users can see when a new version of their favourite plugin is available, as well as read a changelog (assuming there\u0026rsquo;s one available), and check to see if the current version will work on the latest version of WordPress.\nBut these changes need to continue to support good plugin development work, and help users separate out the chaff. One of the most popular plugins on the repository, with well over a million downloads, has has only 800 ratings from users: the compatibility of the latest version with the latest version of WordPress at the time of writing has been reported on by less than 10 users, and there\u0026rsquo;s no elucidation as to what\u0026rsquo;s going wrong for the few who\u0026rsquo;ve reported it to be broken. With that in mind, how are regular users expected to know which plugin to install, when they search for an open or popular term and are presented with a dozen or more plugins? And since these are all likely one-man projects, what will they do when the time invariably comes and the developer gives up on updating the plugin and moves on to new horizons? Actually mentioned facetiously, since one of the contentious issues of the core plugins is that they will be presented on their own page on the WordPress backend, but the idea of having an editor\u0026rsquo;s choice list of plugins that fulfill a selection of standards for inclusion actually wouldn\u0026rsquo;t go amiss as an alternative to the current turmoil.\nAll in all I can only say I welcome the move, and look forward to its repercussions. Attempting to ensure high standards, compatibility, support and open source development are all laudable goals, that neither preclude the disappearance of competition and variety, nor the ability to provide plugins that are commercially supported (just that the open source alternatives might be all the better!). And here\u0026rsquo;s to a core plugin for creating multilingual blogs, I\u0026rsquo;ve had enough trouble switching over from one system, to another, to another!\nFor anyone really interested in the debate, the posts on Weblog Tools Collection and One Fine Jay in particular are definitely the places to look.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/04/13/the-wordpress-3.0-milestone/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"The WordPress 3.0 Milestone"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" The Internet Trail\nAn email arrives from a company you\u0026rsquo;ve never heard of telling you about a change to their user policy. It could very well have been spam, except that the details are actually correct for a change, and you\u0026rsquo;re not being offered a credit card, mortgage, or a million dollars from a Nigerian general. The email details alterations to a privacy policy you probably never read, particularly since the company name itself doesn\u0026rsquo;t register. You\u0026rsquo;ve just stumbled upon your Internet trail, crumbs you\u0026rsquo;ve scattered around the place registering here and there over the years.\nBut just how big is your Internet footprint? If you\u0026rsquo;re a conscientious user who goes out of their way to protect their information and avoid pointless trivia on the Web, it could be that you\u0026rsquo;ve only left a few grains behind you. But for the rest of us, those little titbits could very well be quite liberally scattered throughout the Internet, potentially accessible to just about anyone with the time and inclination. Whilst the content we\u0026rsquo;ve created ourselves might be relatively humble, today\u0026rsquo;s social web has ensured that all but the most camera shy can end up having their pictures online for virtually anyone to see, and references to us can be found with just a few simple searches. But our Internet footprint isn\u0026rsquo;t just limited to those relevant bits which appear when we\u0026rsquo;re Googled—which after all is as much dependent on the uniqueness of our names or the fields in which we work—but simply, how many little instances there are of us out there.\nControl of information Just how much information about us is available out there on the Internet can sometimes come as an unpleasant surprise. French magazine Le Tigre set themselves the challenge of publishing the life story of a young French architect based solely on the information it could glean from Internet sites such as Facebook, Flickr and YouTube. The article appeared in the magazine in December, 2008, and a more tempered version that appeared at the gentleman\u0026rsquo;s behest can still be found he re (in French). Certainly, the man in question was clearly au fait with the new world of social networking sites and the like, but none too concerned about his privacy. Information on his holidays, his former girlfriends, his work and friends, even such information as his mobile phone number and whereabouts were all gleaned from these sites with a scanty amount of detective work. In this case, the man was responsible for publishing a large amount of information about himself on the Internet, but how can any of us stop third parties doing the same? How many of the 350 million Facebook users has a real clue about its privacy settings? And how many of those are friends with people who are conscious about controlling the information available about them?\nA captcha of logins Signing up to a social networking site, you might be forgiven for thinking that at least then you can have some form of control over the information available about us. But there is more information available on the Internet for those with a desire to look for it. Just think about how many sites out there you have an account for. Just how many little instances of ourselves are there out in the wild? Email accounts, social networking sites, online banking, multimedia sites, shops, forums, services, blogs. Even just counting the ones we use with any amount of regularity, that could easily amount to a few dozen user accounts, and that\u0026rsquo;s to say nothing of the various gizmos we use that aren\u0026rsquo;t accessed via the Web, such as instant messaging platforms, backup or VoIP services, online games etc. More importantly, how many other extra accounts are there out there from services we\u0026rsquo;ve only merely sampled and don\u0026rsquo;t use with any frequency? How many accounts out there belong to users who have signed up to give a website a trial and perhaps never came back? Or worse, have been forced to sign up in order to access essentially free material, or to leave a one-off comment, and left their account ever after disused?\nPersonally, I would not be surprised if my own number of instances scattered around the Internet included over a hundred accounts. People more active on the web no doubt have many more. Those accounts may not all contain the same information—different usernames, passwords, email addresses, heck, sometimes even different names—but they are all linked to me, and the differences are not usually so bold. Most of us probably have a particular username and password combination that we like to use; it makes our lives easier if we only have to remember a single combination for all of our online activity. Occasionally those plans go awry when we find our username has already been taken, forcing us to adopt an arbitrary modification, like adding a number to the end, or an underscore in the middle. Other times our passwords have to change to accommodate some rules for a particular service, meaning our regular password has to suddenly grow or lose a number or special character, or grow or shrink accordingly. But in general, our online presences are cloned copies of our logins sprinkled across the Internet like a particular allele in the gene pool.\nWell, so what? It\u0026rsquo;s not like these details are generally put on public display. Except that they can be. Try typing your own unique username into a site like User Name Check. And all it would take is for one of those sites to have a flaw in their security for someone to potentially have access to any number of services you\u0026rsquo;ve become a member of over the years. Only recently, a popular social website with over 30 million members proved to be a ripe source for the usernames and passwords of all its members. As detailed here , this represented a pretty basic flaw in security, yet despite its popularity, the site nevertheless failed to protect the information of its members. Would you really trust every little site and service you\u0026rsquo;ve signed up to to do the same?\nThe circle of trust The web has to a large extent now grown to become an extension of the societies in which we live. Web presences have been something of a standard for most reasonable-sized businesses for a long time, and many small outfits have long since followed suit. Yet the last few years have seen that requirement spread to the general populace. It seems like every man and his dog has a Facebook account. ((Or else Bebo, MySpace, Orkut, Friendster, LinkedIn etc.)) Information about us that would once require some serious detective work can now be gleaned from the comforts of your own home, with a bit of patience and a supply of coffee. The potential is still there to control how some of that information is shared, but only to a certain extent. And how many people are actually aware or savvy enough to look after that information is an entirely different matter.\nNevertheless, we are usually willing to place a lot of faith in the many online services we subscribe to, often without so much as reading the privacy policy or terms and conditions. In order to save ourselves the heartache of memorising different usernames or passwords for those services, we tend to limit ourselves to a small handful, all too often to some of those found on lists such as this one . With the potential for any one of those services to become victim of an attack and reveal to unknown third parties information including, but not limited to, usernames, email addresses, passwords, personal and payment details, it seems borderline lunacy that we leave so many unnecessary little copies of our details scattered around the Internet. This latter point is particularly true if you use the same username and password combination for the majority of sites. On the Internet we are willing to accept many into our circle of trust, but it still only takes one site to be broken for us to have a potentially large headache on our hands.\nSo what can we do to minimise our risks? Simply follow the same rules of common sense you would adhere to in the real world: keep your passwords secure and make yourself a smaller target; actually read the privacy policies and terms and conditions before agreeing to anything; acquaint yourself with the privacy settings on social networking sites, and keep control of the information about yourself; if you run a site of your own, don\u0026rsquo;t force users to sign up for an account unless absolutely necessary; and as a general Internet user, try to limit the number of instances you create, and delete the ones you no longer use.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/03/10/internet-footprint/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Facebook","RelPermalink":"/tags/facebook/"},{"LinkTitle":"Passwords","RelPermalink":"/tags/passwords/"},{"LinkTitle":"Social-Networking","RelPermalink":"/tags/social-networking/"},{"LinkTitle":"Web-2-0","RelPermalink":"/tags/web-2-0/"}],"title":"Internet Footprint"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"There\u0026rsquo;s one problem which was driving my parents nuts on XP for some time before we finally got around to finding a reasonable solution. For whatever reason, one of their computers insisted on automatically adding the shared network printer on the other machine as the default printer in the list. This regardless of whether we had already assigned a local default, and whether the network printer was already in the list.\nWhilst that already caused some consternation when documents would be sent to the wrong machine, it was compounded by the fact that if the printer was offline at the time, Windows XP would spend 100% CPU time trying to find the damn thing, leaving the PC highly unresponsive until the print queue was manually cleared. Meaning the options were between remembering to change the printer on every print job, or forgetting and rebooting the machine in between.\nFortunately, we found the handy little script below on some forum or other (praise be to the original author). It stops Windows\u0026rsquo; printer service, deletes any waiting print jobs, and then restarts the service. Copy the lines below into a batch file (or into a simple text file and change its extension to .bat) or alternatively download the same script as a file.\n@echo off echo. echo Purging the print queue . . . net stop Spooler echo Deleting all print jobs . . . ping localhost -n 4 \u0026gt; nul del /q %SystemRoot%\\system32\\spool\\printers\\*.* net start Spooler echo Done! ping localhost -n 4 \u0026gt; nul ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2010/03/09/fixing-a-broken-network-printer/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Printer","RelPermalink":"/tags/printer/"},{"LinkTitle":"Usb","RelPermalink":"/tags/usb/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vista","RelPermalink":"/tags/vista/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows/"},{"LinkTitle":"Xp","RelPermalink":"/tags/xp/"}],"title":"Fixing a Broken Network Printer"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" Steam\nI\u0026rsquo;ve been using Steam for a fair while now, in fact pretty much since the beginning, and have seen the program grow on from its fairly humble origins. There are now hundreds of titles available, including games from big-name publishers and independent game houses alike, and the usual crashes and quirks that afflicted the early releases are pretty much gone. Nevertheless, there are still a number of key areas in which Steam continues to live up to standards, at times making using the system a bit of a nightmare. This is a list of some of those issues which in my eyes prevent Steam from becoming a really top class product, delivering everything the platform really promises. Some of these issues admittedly have their origins outside of Valve\u0026rsquo;s headquarters, but the way in which they are dealt with only compounds the problems further, for both customers and clients.\nSteam Friends It\u0026rsquo;s an instant messenger on a budget. Think of your favourite system, but without any of the frills. There are no file transfers, no webcams, none of the various add on junk you find with most of the big name instant messaging clients. And let\u0026rsquo;s face it, Steam Friends is all the better for it. It\u0026rsquo;s a simple service that does what it needs to. At least most of the time. Which is exactly where this little service fails to live up. Steam Friends suffers so much downtime, it makes you wonder what the system is actually running on; it crashes about as often as Windows 95.\nFor the most part, that downtime isn\u0026rsquo;t much of a problem, since few people use it for anything important, and even if the service is up and down like a yo-yo, the periods of downtime generally aren\u0026rsquo;t particularly long. But the outages are sufficiently frequent to leave you wishing that Steam really did have some of those standard added extras common to other instant messaging services. The lack of being able to send offline messages means you end up having to hold staccato conversations trying to keep in time to the downtime conductor\u0026rsquo;s baton. And with no chat logs there\u0026rsquo;s no recourse to checking what was last said if you happen to close the window. Which can be doubly troublesome if you happen to have the Steam overlay open at the same time, since the messages people send might appear on the window on your desktop, but not on the game overlay, meaning you\u0026rsquo;ll still have to ALT+TAB out of the game you\u0026rsquo;re in to read the messages, one of the supposedly key advantages of using Steam Friends in the first place!\nWhy hasn\u0026rsquo;t this API been opened up to third party clients? Why can users navigate the Steam Communities pages, leaving messages and reading profiles, but have to run Steam as soon as they want to send a live message? The downtime, exclusivity, and lack of \u0026lsquo;regular\u0026rsquo; frills leave Steam Friends to be a last resort mechanism, when it has the potential to be a very promising communication tool.\nSteam Group Chat Similar to the Friends service above, Steam\u0026rsquo;s Group Chat provides every group on the Steam Communities page with their own little chat room. Very generous, very appealing, but does anyone actually use it? I\u0026rsquo;m sure there are some groups out there in the dark corners of the gaming world who actually pop into those chat rooms and spout some drivel, but for the rest of us, I really can\u0026rsquo;t see the point. Most other groups have already come up with their own solution to such problems, using IRC or other such technologies, and those who haven\u0026rsquo;t will have difficulty finding the Group Chat options anyway. If group administrators had the ability to tie in their chat rooms to other pieces of software, particularly IRC for example, these rooms actually might find some use, but as it is they stand pretty exclusively neglected among Steam\u0026rsquo;s various other appendages.\nSteam Prices One of the key supposed advantages of buying games via an online content distribution service such as Steam is that the savings made by the \u0026lsquo;publisher\u0026rsquo; are passed on to the customer. And not to do Steam any discredit, the customer has certainly had the opportunity to benefit from some great prices and bargains, in many cases undercutting in-store prices considerably. But that isn\u0026rsquo;t always the case. Particularly since the introduction of prices in Euros and Pounds in December, 2008, customers have been able to see the discrepancies between the various zones. Especially in the Eurozone this could leave games for sale that were actually more expensive than their box-and-disc in-store equivalents, and significantly more expensive than the prices listed in pounds or US dollars.\nWhilst Valve cannot be held to blame for the price differences of many of the titles chosen by other publishers and distributors, the discrepancies can often also be seen with Valve\u0026rsquo;s own titles, most especially when games are put on limited-term offers. Of course, some users can work around the restrictions, by having others buy them games as a gift (see below) or else logging in themselves in another country, and making their purchases in the relevant currency.\nSteam Payment Of course, giving your money to Valve for Steam purchases should be one of the easiest things in the world, but unfortunately, this just isn\u0026rsquo;t the case. Probably related to the differences in pricing mentioned above, Steam has some pretty pernickety requirements when making purchases above the payment method used and the location you\u0026rsquo;re buying from. I\u0026rsquo;ve had my Steam account locked from purchases on two or three separate occasions, without notification, for using a payment option on another account (these were the days before Steam Gifts). Clearly that\u0026rsquo;s one step away from money laundering. And only recently, my payment was refused because the address of my payment option wasn\u0026rsquo;t in the country I was buying from. This despite there being a clear option to check a box whether or not I was currently in the stated country; quite what this option is for if it is irrelevant to them, I can\u0026rsquo;t say. Is there something particularly insolent about making purchases from another country that I wasn\u0026rsquo;t aware of?\nSteam Geography As a system capable of delivering content to pretty much anywhere with an Internet connection, it\u0026rsquo;s perfectly reasonable that Steam acknowledges local laws and adjusts its own system to abide by them. This applies to a large extent to the pricing issues mentioned above, where various distributors only have the right to publish games within certain geographic locales. In which case, it\u0026rsquo;s up to the people of those nations to find workarounds, or to complain to their governments if they feel they are being unfairly treated. But it does lead to some rather irritating and odd situations when using Steam\u0026rsquo;s services. Take one of Valve\u0026rsquo;s own recently released titles like Left 4 Dead 2. The game generated a little controversy with its content, and ended up requiring Valve to publish milder versions for customers in Australia and Germany, according to the laws in those countries. Naturally the government of Germany feels that its citizens are a little more puerile and paramnesic in character than the rest of the world, and didn\u0026rsquo;t want to risk having a few people see a bit of gore. They might have been incited to invade Poland again, who knows. Anyway, buying a copy of the game in one of those countries will result in the customer having a permanently crippled version of the game, ((As an aside, I\u0026rsquo;ve tried the crippled version of the game\u0026rsquo;s demo, and have to say the changes are pretty drastic. Instead of reacting bloodily when challenged, dead enemies instead disappear unrealistically into the ether, an effect which is rather surprising and at times quite confusing. Do German soldiers in Afghanistan get a shock when Taleban soldiers actually start bleeding when shot?)) which as far as I\u0026rsquo;m aware, cannot be fixed easily. On the other hand, loading up an account with a copy of the game purchased in another country will present the full flavour version that was supposed to be banned.\nSteam Gifts As mentioned earlier, I had my Steam account blocked from purchases in earlier days because I had the audacity to use my payment methods to log in to other people\u0026rsquo;s accounts and buy them games. Fortunately, with the introduction of Steam Gifts, this no longer became necessary. When buying a game, just tick the box that makes this available as a gift, and the copy will go to the person of your choosing; similarly, should you buy a game that you already own in a bundle, you can simply give the extra copy away.\nThe idea is all well and good, except for the limitations listed above about payment options, added to the problems of products only being available in certain versions in certain countries. But this is compounded by the fact that buying a gift means delivering that gift on the same instant; if you actually do want to buy someone a present for a specific occasion and want to keep it as a surprise, you\u0026rsquo;ll either have to concoct your own time-delay private email address, buy the game on the special day, or just apologise your gift is coming early!\nSteam Accounts Buy a game, a book, a car, a house, or a tube of toilet paper, and you generally find you have the right to sell it on to someone else. Alright, second-hand toilet paper is still a growth market, but you get the picture. With Steam, buy something and Valve reserve all rights for you to resell your items, including the account you bought the games on, refusing you even the right to \u0026ldquo;sell, charge others for the right to use or otherwise transfer [an] account.\u0026rdquo; Some might consider this to be a reasonable condition, for the lower prices and level of service Steam offers, but for those of us used to selling off old copies of games, the physical versions of that software does maintain some of its appeal. Perhaps more disconcerting is the fact that tying the serial keys of games bought in the shops to a Steam account can render them similarly unsaleable.\nSteam Files Just how does Steam organise the files it puts on your system? Is there actually meant to be some method to the madness? Whilst I can see that for the most part, Valve have little say over how its clients utilise the Steam system, Valve\u0026rsquo;s own titles are about as confusing as the lot of them. Most of Valve\u0026rsquo;s titles appear in the Steam\\steamapps directory as compressed .gcf files, whilst third-party titles appear under the Steam\\steamapps\\common directory. Valve\u0026rsquo;s Left 4 Dead title, however, does the latter. Some of the titles store their user files in sensible places under in the user directory, others store them in their own folders in the common directory, whilst most of Valve\u0026rsquo;s titles go one step further, creating extra files per Steam account under the steamapps directory. That\u0026rsquo;s difficult enough when trying to backup your savegames, locate your screenshots, or edit a config file. But the latter variety causes even more problems if you have even just a few Steam accounts being used on a single PC; since each account creates its own personalised files, items such as cached models, sounds, third-party maps and extensions are all replicated, swelling the size of the installations entirely unnecessarily. I sometimes wonder how LAN centres which have several users signing in per day deal with the associated cruft (ignoring for the moment Valve\u0026rsquo;s Cyber Café Program).\nSteam Backup One of the obvious (dis)advantages of Steam, depending on which side of the fence you\u0026rsquo;re sitting, is the ability to download your games from wherever you are logged in. If your Internet connection is fast enough, you can get your games downloaded ready for play the moment they are \u0026lsquo;released\u0026rsquo;; faster than it can be delivered in most cases, certainly faster than having to get your copy from the shops. But for those of us with slow connections, downloading items from Steam can be a slow and painful experience, and one that you don\u0026rsquo;t like to have repeated every time you decide to switch hardware. Which is why the implementation of a backup system to Steam was pretty much a no-brainer. Select Backup games from the main Steam menu and you can have your downloads all neatly arranged in CD or DVD sized chunks, ready to be reinstalled at the touch of a button.\nNot a bad idea, except it functions about as well as combing your hair with barbed wire. The backup process is fairly slow, slower than simply copying the files manually, but that\u0026rsquo;s reasonably forgiveable since it does at least chop up the files in reasonable sized chunks. The real problems come when trying to reinstall games using the backed up files. Installing more than one game at a time left my Steam program actually trying to download the games from the Internet, exactly what the backups were supposed to avoid, and actually left the program so unresponsive I had to kill it. Trying to install the programs one at a time often threw up the error that the servers were too busy to handle my request; when I looked again, the games were being updated from the Internet. Not too busy to suck up my bandwidth I see! Third time lucky and the game actually did start installing from the backups, albeit as slowly as it was backed up in the first place, and for each game I had to go through the same rigmarole, which would have been even more painful had I actually had the backups spread across half a dozen DVDs.\nValve However, the number one thing holding Steam back is Valve. You can normally draw a line in the sand separating companies into those with decent moral standards, and Microsoft, and Valve would almost certainly fit into the former category. They listen to their customer base, they generally keep their products up-to-date, fixing bugs and releasing new content for free, and they opened up the Steam platform to what are essentially their competitors. Each title released is like a mini-celebration in the industry, and is generally met with decent reviews and rewardingly good sales figures.\nYet the power they wield with Steam is not to be underestimated. Since no sales figures are actually published, one can only speculate, though it is bound to be a considerable proportion of the online distribution market. This monopoly type situation is particularly problematic when you consider Steam to be a marketplace run by one of the main competitors. Even if there is no deliberate attempt on Valve\u0026rsquo;s part to give themselves pride of place, with such power comes great responsibility that should not rest in uneven hands. I\u0026rsquo;ve seen days in which one of Valve\u0026rsquo;s titles will take pride of place in their store front, ahead of game of the year winners and new releases. And I forget now where I read it, but the number of people Valve actually has working on Steam is incredibly small, something like half a dozen staff. If it were properly managed, all of the above issues with the platform could no doubt in some way be addressed, for the benefit of customers and clients alike.\nSummary Fair play to Valve, they had the idea and they ran with it, dealing with the early teething problems and creating a popular and successful piece of software, and they deserve the financial reward for it. Ideally, however, Steam should now be hived off from Valve as a separate, independent company, to focus on the equal online distribution of titles from all software houses. It\u0026rsquo;s surprising in fact that many of the larger publishing houses haven\u0026rsquo;t already pushed for such a move, or made overtures to the courts. Who knows, with that bit of extra development, they could even get round to porting the Steam platform over to other operating systems and opening up the market further. As things stand, however, that little development push on Valve\u0026rsquo;s part is lacking, and this potentially well functioning, open marketplace is slightly stifled by the monopolistic nature of Valve\u0026rsquo;s position. Steam is not a bad product. Far from it, the complaints in this list are mostly areas lacking polish, oversights that a little more focused development would soon fix, or issues that arise from Steam\u0026rsquo;s interaction with national laws and distributors rights. But the basis is certainly there, for a free, open marketplace that gaming enthusiasts and developers alike can benefit from.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/12/23/ten-reasons-valves-steam-fails-to-live-up-to-standards/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Steam","RelPermalink":"/tags/steam/"},{"LinkTitle":"Valve","RelPermalink":"/tags/valve/"}],"title":"Ten Reasons Valve's Steam Fails to Live Up to Standards"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"There are plenty of examples out there of WordPress installs suddenly displaying blank pages—on admin pages as well as frontend posts—after changing themes, adding/removing plugins or updating the WordPress backend. Whilst there is plenty of good information out there covering most of the usual suspects, I just came across another which was fairly difficult to track down given the lack of information, though pretty easy to solve once I\u0026rsquo;d found it. If like me you\u0026rsquo;ve at any point tried to streamline your WordPress install by cutting down on a few unnecessary services, and reducing the number of calls to the database, you may have added some lines to your wp-config.php file like so:\ndefine(\u0026#39;TEMPLATEPATH\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;/path/to/theme/directory\u0026#39;); define(\u0026#39;STYLESHEETPATH\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;/path/to/theme/style.css\u0026#39;); Fairly innocuous, until you actually change your WordPress theme, in which case those long forgotten about resource savers will leave you with little more than a blank page to diagnose your problem. If this is the case though, just updating the lines or commenting them out will leave you with a workable system once again.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/12/22/another-wordpress-blank-page/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Troubleshooting","RelPermalink":"/tags/troubleshooting/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"}],"title":"Another WordPress Blank Page"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/categories/television/"}],"content":"The Intelligence² group hosted a debate in the Methodist Central Hall, Westminster, in October, considering whether the Catholic church is a force for good in the world. Speaking for the motion were Archbishop John Onaiyekan, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, Nigeria, and the Rt Hon Ann Widdecombe, Conservative MP and Catholic convert. Speaking against were Christopher Hitchens, writer, broadcaster and polemicist, author of the bestselling book \u0026ldquo;God is not Great\u0026rdquo;, and Stephen Fry, actor, comedian and television presenter. The debate was presented by Zeinab Badawi.\nSince the new Intelligence² website appears to have done away with transcriptions, I\u0026rsquo;m publishing this one here. Please note that this is an entirely unofficial transcription, so any mistakes are my own. The full video can be found on the official site, as well as on YouTube .\nBefore After Change For: 678 268 -410 Against: 1102 1876 +774 Undecided: 346 34 -312 Transcript: Zeinab Badawi Hello and welcome from central London. We\u0026rsquo;re just a stone\u0026rsquo;s throw away from the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, we\u0026rsquo;re here in Central Hall for this Intelligence Squared debate on the Catholic church is a force for good in the world. Well, that\u0026rsquo;s a subject that\u0026rsquo;s going to generate a lot of heat, I think, and some light too, I hope. I\u0026rsquo;m delighted to be chair of this debate. We have a panel which includes some of the most provocative, intelligent and stimulating commentators and practitioners on the subject. Arguing for the motion: the Archbishop of Abuja in Nigeria, John Onaiyekan; the British Conservative MP, Ann Widdecombe. Arguing against the motion: the actor, broadcaster and author, Stephen Fry, and the journalist and commentator, Christopher Hitchens. Well, our first speaker is John Onaiyekan, His Grace the Archbishop of Abuja, the capital of Nigeria, and His Grace is one of Africa\u0026rsquo;s best known, most respected commentators of the church, the Catholic church, so please make your way to the podium, speak at the microphone.\nArchbishop John Onaiyekan Friends, I must, I certainly must say I am grateful to be here, because for me this is more than a matter of debate, because that\u0026rsquo;s what my life is all about. If I didn\u0026rsquo;t believe that the Catholic church is a force for good, I would not devote my whole life to precisely working in that institution, hoping that I am involved in something that is good for the whole world. You see, for me to be a Catholic is a gift of God. Let me start with the word \u0026lsquo;church\u0026rsquo;, the Catholic \u0026lsquo;church\u0026rsquo;. Obviously, it means many things to many people, but I think as an Archbishop I should be in the position to say what it does mean, especially to us Catholics. Yes, the Catholic church is an institution, and some people say it is perhaps the best organised institution in the world, but that\u0026rsquo;s not really the essence of our church. We should go beyond institution. Now for us the church is first and foremost a community of believers. And this is a community of believers that is spread all over the world, made up of all kinds of people. And the institution itself, as well as those whom we normally consider church people—people dressed up like me, for example—we are there only because of that huge community of people who claim, who are Catholics. I\u0026rsquo;m stressing this, so that when you are asking yourself \u0026ldquo;is the Catholic church a force for good in the world?\u0026rdquo;, don\u0026rsquo;t look at me, don\u0026rsquo;t look at Benedict XVI, look at the Catholics all over the world.\nThat the church is a force for good in the world seems obviously to me, is quite obvious, the question probably which you will ask is \u0026ldquo;what kind of force?\u0026rdquo; There was once an arrogant dictator who asked in disdain \u0026ldquo;how many battalions has the Pope?\u0026rdquo; Obviously, he completely missed the point. It is not about military force or physical force, but it is about force, it is about the force of the spiritual message. The force of values, which has stood the test of two thousand years. And not only two thousand years in time, but has spread its message all over the world among different kinds of people, different races. We must also not forget the sheer weight of the number of Catholics. I have checked the statistics and we have told you that now we have about 1.2 billion Catholics all over the world, out of a population of 6.6 billion, 17.3%, and these are young, these are made up of all categories of people—young and old, women and men, peasant farmers and high tech professionals, simple citizens and even heads of states and world leaders. This is the great army, that is a great force for good in the world, and whatever they are doing, we consider it as being done, largely also as a result of the spirit which guides them. Independent statistics have shown that the Catholic church is doing far more than its numbers and its population would probably suggest. The action of the church is most significant in communities that are reduced to poverty and misery by human neglect, and sometimes by hostile environments. Talking of statistics, I spoke recently with the Director General of UNAIDS, which is the United Nations agency for HIV and AIDS, and he said that 26% of the health institutions in the world directly involved with the treatment of HIV and AIDS are run by the Catholic church. And please note, that it is a well-known policy of our church, whenever we are engaged in social welfare work, it is always given to all without any discrimination, whether you believe or not, irrespective of creed. Indeed, it is an integral part of our faith that our church is made up of saints and sinners. We are all struggling towards that perfection which Jesus asked us all to follow. Nor am I denying that the Catholic church has always and everywhere done excellent things, even sometimes in high levels, but this again only proves that we are in this world. Even the late Pope John-Paul II had no difficulty at all in admitting the mistakes that people who claim to be Catholics or to be working in the name of the church have done in the past. And he apologised, and suggestions of apology is very rare in our world today.\nLet me conclude by drawing your attention to one particular aspect of my faith, which I admire greatly: we are very open to dealing, and moving, and collaborating with others. And I think this is very important for the world of ideas. We are talking of the world of today. We need more and more effects to link hands across all divides, so that we can manage to make our planet a better place. A world of peace and peace. Is there still anybody here who still doubts whether the Catholic church is a force for good in the world? Thank you very much.\nZeinab Badawi Our next speaker is Christopher Hitchens, he\u0026rsquo;s arguing against the motion. He is a writer, journalist and commentator, particularly well known for his trenchant views and very original thinking. So, Christopher Hitchens, let us hear what you have to say, your time starts now, please make your way to the podium.\nChristopher Hitchens Now I\u0026rsquo;m sorry to have to begin by disagreeing with His Grace. If you\u0026rsquo;re going to be a serious grown-up person, and appear to defend the Catholic church in public in front of an educated and literate audience, you simply have to start by making a great number of heartfelt apologies and requests for contrition and forgiveness. Now you might ask \u0026lt;applause\u0026gt; You\u0026rsquo;re fully entitled to ask, brothers and sisters, who am I to say that? Well, in the jubilee millennium year of 2000 the Vatican spokesman Bishop Piero Marini said, explaining a whole sermon of apology given by His Holiness the Pope, given the number of sins we\u0026rsquo;ve committed in the course of twenty centuries, reference to them must necessarily be rather summary. Well I think Bishop Marini had that just about right, I\u0026rsquo;ll have to be summary, too. His Holiness on that occasion—it was March the 12th, 2000, if you wish to look it up—begged forgiveness for, among some other things, the crusades, the Inquisition, the persecution of the Jewish people, in justice towards women, that\u0026rsquo;s half the human race right there, and the forced conversion of indigenous peoples, especially in South America, the African slave trade, the admission that Galileo was right, and for silence during Hitler\u0026rsquo;s Final Solution or Shoah. And it doesn\u0026rsquo;t end there, there are smaller but significant—equally significant—avowals of a very bad conscience. These have included regret for the rape and torture of orphans and other children in church-run schools in almost every country on Earth, from Ireland to Australia. These are very serious matters, and they\u0026rsquo;re not to be laughed off by the references to the occasional work of Catholic charities. But I draw you attention not just to the apologies, ladies and gentlemen, but to the evasive and euphemistic form that they take. Joseph Ratzinger, the current Pope, considered by some, considered by Catholics to be the Vicar of Christ on Earth, in his comment, one of the few he\u0026rsquo;s made on the institutionalisation of rape and torture and maltreatment of children in Catholic institutions, he said it\u0026rsquo;s a very severe crisis which involves us, he said, in the following: in the need for applying to these victims the most loving, pastoral care. Well I\u0026rsquo;m sorry, they\u0026rsquo;ve already had that, and to say that this is the response to be laid upon you, by the horrific admission that you\u0026rsquo;ve already had to make is not accepting responsibility in any adult sense. The same euphemism comes, in the term some Christians allow themselves to be deceived in this way and to act against the gospel, well, anti-Semitism was preached as an official doctrine of the Church until 1964. Do you think that might have something to do with public opinion in Austria, and Bavaria, and Poland, and Lithuania? There\u0026rsquo;ll come a time, when the church will issue apologies, and explanations, and half-baked appeals for forgiveness for things it\u0026rsquo;s still doing. I think that there will be an apology for what happened in Rwanda, the most Catholic country in Africa, where priests and nuns and bishops are on trial, for inciting from their pulpits and on the Church\u0026rsquo;s radio stations and newspapers, the massacre of their brothers and sisters. Staying in Africa, I think it will one day be admitted with shame that it might have been in error to say that AIDS is bad as a disease, very bad, but not quite as bad as condoms are bad, or not as immoral in the same way. I say it in the presence of His Grace, and I say it to his face, the teachings of his church are responsible for the death and suffering and misery of his brother and sister Africans, and he should apologise for it, he should show some shame. For condemning my friend Stephen Fry for his nature, for saying you couldn\u0026rsquo;t be a member of our church, you\u0026rsquo;re born in sin. He\u0026rsquo;s not being condemned for what he does, he\u0026rsquo;s being condemned for what he is. You\u0026rsquo;re a child made in the image of God – oh no, you\u0026rsquo;re not, you\u0026rsquo;re a faggot, and you can\u0026rsquo;t join our church and you can\u0026rsquo;t go to heaven. This is disgraceful, it\u0026rsquo;s inhuman, it\u0026rsquo;s obscene, and it comes from a clutch of hysterical, sinister virgins, who\u0026rsquo;ve already betrayed their charge in the children of their own church. For shame! For shame!\nI don\u0026rsquo;t wish any ill on any fellow primate or mammal of mine, so I don\u0026rsquo;t at all look forward to the death of Joseph Ratzinger, I don\u0026rsquo;t, or any other bloke, not really, except for one tiny reason which I ought to confess and share with you. When he dies, there\u0026rsquo;s quite a long interval till the conclave can meet, and for that whole time, that whole interval—it is a delicious, lucid interlude—there isn\u0026rsquo;t anyone on Earth who claims to be infallible. Isn\u0026rsquo;t that nice? All I think, all I want to propose in closing is this: that if the human species is to rise to the full height that\u0026rsquo;s demanded by its dignity, and by its intelligence, we must all of us move to a state of affairs, where that condition is permanent, and I think we should get on with it. Okay, thank you for having me.\nZeinab Badawi Well Christopher, thank you very much for all of that. Our next speaker is going to have her work cut out, because she\u0026rsquo;s speaking in favour of the motion that the Catholic church is a force for good: the Conservative MP and former government minister, Ann Widdecombe. She\u0026rsquo;s as well-known for her religious views as for her politics. If you recall, she left the Church of England in 1992, in a blaze of publicity, when it allowed the ordination of women priests. The following year she converted to Catholicism, and has become one of the most vocal and staunchest defenders of the Catholic Church since then. Ann Widdecombe, the floor is yours.\nAnn Widdecombe If apologies are due tonight, they are due from Christopher Hitchens, who has just run through one of the longest series of misrepresentations of the Catholic Church that I have heard in a long time. He has said, with that certainty that characterises his utterances, that the Catholic Church has had a history of anti-Semitism. Let us just look at the record of the Catholic Church, when the Jewish community was under the most serious threat that it has faced in recent centuries, and just look at the role that the Catholic Church played in the last World War. Mr Hitchens ignores the thousands of Jews who were secreted and rescued in churches and monasteries throughout Europe. He ignores the 3000 Jews, who in the course of that conflict, took refuge in the Pope\u0026rsquo;s own summer palace. And coming nearer to our day, of course Christopher Hitchens is right, and who could possibly dispute with him, that the abuse of children, of innocent children, is one—in fact it is the—worst offence that anybody can commit. Of that, no doubt. But again he seems to think that the Catholic Church should have had some unique insight, which demonstrably was lacking in society as a whole, do not expect the Catholic Church somehow, when that was the state of knowledge at the time, to have acted in a unique and completely different way. In retrospect, yes, of course. In retrospect, yep. In retrospect, it should\u0026rsquo;ve done–so should the magistrates, so should the Samaritans, so should the National Council of Civil Liberties. But when we ask, whether the Catholic Church is a force for good, let\u0026rsquo;s just try to imagine a world today without, for example, the billions of pounds that are poured into overseas aid by the Catholic Church, contributing year on year more than any single nation. Imagine the developing world had been left without the input of the medicine and the education that was brought to it by the missions. Imagine the absence of those collections, Sunday upon Sunday, for famine relief. Imagine the absence of the church in the local community. We play a vital role. And you don\u0026rsquo;t need to be a Catholic to acknowledge that we play that role. What is the church? It is its members: it is the nuns and the monks and the priests and the layworkers and the congregations. It is not just the hierarchy of the Church. And I believe that the Church to which I belong is a massive, massive force for good. But, let us not just keep the debate at that level. I knew somehow that when we were here tonight, we would be discussing child abuse—and condoms, they came in the end, I almost thought we were going to get through an entire speech from Christopher Hitchens without condoms, but we got them at the end—but that isn\u0026rsquo;t what the Catholic Church is about, it isn\u0026rsquo;t only about the physical relief of the poor, it isn\u0026rsquo;t only about the work it does on Earth, but it is the message that it preaches. And that message is one of hope, that message is one of salvation. And it is all very well for some people to say, in an intellectual arrogance, we can do without that, but actually billions of people across the world live by that message of hope and of salvation. They try to live by the commandments and also by the interpretation of those commandments by Christ. Yea, sometimes they fail, sometimes their leaders fail—human beings do fail—but overwhelmingly, I say to you tonight with no apology whatever, that a world without the Catholic Church would be poorer, would be more hopeless, and would be a worse place in which to live.\nZeinab Badawi Well thank you very much indeed, Ann Widdecombe. And our final speaker is against the motion: Stephen Fry, a bit of an all-rounder really, Stephen can turn his hand to many things. Stephen, let\u0026rsquo;s hear your views.\nStephen Fry I genuinely believe that the Catholic Church is not, to put it at its mildest, a force for good in the world, and therefore it is important for me to try and martial my facts as well I can to explain why I think that. But I want first of all to say that I have no quarrel and no argument and I wish to express no contempt for individual devout and pious members of that church. It would be impertinent and wrong of me to express any antagonism towards any individual who wishes to find salvation in whatever form they wish to express it. That to me is sacrosanct as much as any article of faith is sacrosanct to anyone of any church or any faith in the world. It\u0026rsquo;s very important. It\u0026rsquo;s also very important to me, as it happens, that I have my own beliefs. They are a belief in the Enlightenment, a belief in the eternal adventure of trying to discover moral truth in the world, and there is nothing, sadly, that the Catholic Church and its hierarchs likes to do more than to attack the Enlightenment. It did so at the time: reference was made to Galileo and the fact that he was tortured, for trying to explain the Copernican theory of the Universe. Just imagine in this square mile how many people were burned for reading the Bible in English. And one of the principle burners and torturers of those who tried to read the Bible in English, here in London, was Thomas More. Now, that\u0026rsquo;s a long time ago, it\u0026rsquo;s not relevant, except that it was only last century that Thomas More was made a saint, and it was only in the year 2000, that the last pope, the Pole, he made Thomas More the Patron Saint of Politicians. This is a man who put people on the wrack for daring to own a Bible in English: he tortured them for owning a Bible in their own language. The idea that the Catholic Church exists to disseminate the word of the Lord is nonsense. It is the only owner of the Truth for the billions that it likes to boast about, because those billions are uneducated and poor, as again it likes to boast about. It\u0026rsquo;s perhaps unfair of me, as a gay man, to moan at this enormous institution, which is the largest and most powerful church on Earth, has over a billion, as they like to tell us, members, each one of whom is under strict instructions to believe the dogmas of the church, but may wrestle with them personally of course. It\u0026rsquo;s hard for me to be told that I\u0026rsquo;m evil, because I think of myself as someone who is filled with love, whose only purpose in life was to achieve love, and who feels love for so much of nature and the world and for everything else. We certainly don\u0026rsquo;t need the stigmatisation, the victimisation, that leads to the playground bullying when people say you\u0026rsquo;re a disordered, morally evil individual. That\u0026rsquo;s not nice, it isn\u0026rsquo;t nice. The kind of cruelty in Catholic education, the kind of child—let\u0026rsquo;s not call it child abuse, it was child rape—the kind of child rape that went on systematically for so long, let\u0026rsquo;s imagine that we can overlook this and say that it is nothing whatever to do with the structure and nature of the Catholic Church, and the twisted and neurotic and hysterical way that its leaders are chosen, the celibacy, the nuns, the monks, the priesthood, this is not natural and normal, ladies and gentlemen, in 2009, it really isn\u0026rsquo;t.\nI have yet to approach one of the subjects dearest to my heart, I\u0026rsquo;ve made three documentary films on the subject of AIDS in Africa. My particular love is the country of Uganda, it is one of the countries I love most in the world. There was a period when Uganda had the worst incidence of HIV/AIDS in the world, but through an amazing initiative called ABC—Abstinence, Be faithful, Correct use of condoms—those three, I\u0026rsquo;m not denying that abstinence is a very good way of not getting AIDS, it really is, it works, so does being faithful, but so do condoms, and do not deny it! And this Pope, this Pope, not satisfied with saying \u0026ldquo;condoms are against our religion, please consider first abstinence, second being faithful to your partner,\u0026rdquo; he spreads the lie that condoms actually increase the incidence of AIDS, he actually makes sure that aid is conditional on saying no to condoms. I have been to the hospital in Bwindi in the west of Uganda, where I do quite a lot of work, it is unbelievable the pain and suffering you see. Now yes, yes it is true abstinence will stop it. It\u0026rsquo;s the strange thing about this church, it is obsessed with sex, absolutely obsessed. Now, they will say we with our permissive society and our rude jokes, we are obsessed. No, we have a healthy attitude, we like it, it\u0026rsquo;s fun, it\u0026rsquo;s jolly, because it\u0026rsquo;s a primary impulse it can be dangerous and dark and difficult, it\u0026rsquo;s a bit like food in that respect only even more exciting. The only people who are obsessed with food are anorexics and the morbidly obese, and that in erotic terms is the Catholic Church in a nutshell.\nDo you know who would be the last person ever to be accepted as a prince of the Church? The Galileean carpenter. That Jew. They would kick him out before he tried to cross the threshold. He would be so ill-at-ease in the Church. What would he think, what would he think of St. Peter\u0026rsquo;s? What would he think of the wealth, and the power, and the self-justification, and the wheedling apologies? The Pope could decide that all this power, all this wealth, this hierarchy of princes and bishops and archbishops and priests and monks and nuns could be sent out in the world with money and art treasures, to put them back in the countries that they once raped and violated, they could give that money away, and they could concentrate on the apparent essence of their belief, and then, I would stand here and say the Catholic Church may well be a force for good in the world, but until that day, it is not. Thank you.\nZeinab Badawi Well, Stephen Fry, thank you very much. So, you\u0026rsquo;ve heard all our four speakers. It\u0026rsquo;s going to be your turn, the audience, next, and I\u0026rsquo;ll give you a couple of minutes to think about what you want to ask our panellists, any questions or comments you may wish to make. Because I\u0026rsquo;m going to give you, now, the result of that vote that you all gave when you were coming in here to Central Hall. The motion is: the Catholic church is a force for good in the world. In favour of the motion were 678. Against the motion, that the Catholic church is a force for good, were 1102. Big difference. However, 346 of you were undecided, so Archbishop and Ann Widdecombe, you\u0026rsquo;re not only going to have to win over the undecided, but actually convert some from the other side. Let\u0026rsquo;s see if we can sway any opinions here amongst all of you by listening to some points that you wish to raise with the panel, and then we\u0026rsquo;re going to ask you to vote again. Now, put your hand up if you want to speak, a question, the lady with the spectacles.\nQuestion I would like to ask Mr Hutchens if he is only against the Catholic church or against all religions.\nZeinab Badawi Okay, go back there, the lady in the pink.\nQuestion Hi there, this is a question for Christopher Hitchens. Many people today feel that we\u0026rsquo;re really living in some kind of moral crisis, and you can see that all around us. Now, if one thing that the Catholic church does do for good in my opinion, is give us the ten commandments, a very basic and obvious way of giving us some kind of moral guidance. Would you not agree with that?\nChristopher Hitchens The lady in front began by asking me do I reserve this condemnation only for the Holy Roman church and not for Catholics, for example Byzantine Catholics and Protestants and so on. I think they\u0026rsquo;re all the same equivalent glimpses of the identical untruth. Now of the commandments, the first two or three are entirely about fearing the author of the audits, entirely about being terrified of someone you\u0026rsquo;re enjoined to love. I don\u0026rsquo;t know about you, ladies and gentlemen, but the idea of compulsory love has always struck me as a bit shady, especially if you\u0026rsquo;re ordered to love someone who you absolutely must fear. So, the first three are: look out for me, and keep at least one day of my way or you\u0026rsquo;ll be terrified full-time.\nZeinab Badawi Ann Widdecombe, Ten Commandments, bedrock of moral teaching?\nAnn Widdecombe I would have thought it quite obvious that the Ten Commandments set out a blueprint for a moral and successful society. Let us just look at some of them: honour thy father and thy mother—think of today\u0026rsquo;s disrespect—thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not commit adultery, and thou shalt not covet – tell that to the bankers with their bonuses.\nZeinab Badawi Okay, Archbishop, do you want to come in briefly on this?\nArchbishop John Onaiyekan The Ten Commandments are in the Bible, but my father know it before he became a Christian. All African religions recognised those basic norms of morality, everybody knows that.\nZeinab Badawi Okay, let\u0026rsquo;s take some more questions from the floor, okay.\nQuestion This is a very simple question for Ann Widdecombe. You might think it may be a naïve question, if so I\u0026rsquo;d be very happy to be educated, why is it wrong for a woman to become a priest, but perfectly acceptable for a woman, such as yourself, to become an MP?\nZeinab Badawi Okay, thanks. I think we\u0026rsquo;re going to go just across here next.\nQuestion Ann made a point about the billions that are poured into Africa. I respect your faith, I respect the message you give, but why to pass that message on do you need the finery you wear, do you need the palace of the Vatican?\nZeinab Badawi Okay, point made. I think we\u0026rsquo;re going to go, here.\nQuestion Archbishop, of which current Roman Catholic policy are you most ashamed?\nArchbishop John Onaiyekan I don\u0026rsquo;t know whether you\u0026rsquo;re serious in that question, or you just want to provoke, because all of our Catholic policies are not just dreamt overnight by the Pope or anybody. If it is a Catholic policy, it is reasonable, it is based on our traditions and scriptures, and there\u0026rsquo;s none about which I am assumed.\nZeinab Badawi Okay, and the other question about\u0026hellip;\nArchbishop John Onaiyekan And I don\u0026rsquo;t know what billions that he says the Vatican has. The billions of this world I think are not in the Vatican, we know where they are, and they are not coming to Africa, on the contrary, Africa is being sucked dry by those people, those multinationals, they are the ones who should be bringing our money back to us. I think we are targeting the wrong place. I come from Africa, and the funds that come from church agencies for us are very important.\nZeinab Badawi Ann Widdecombe, one specific question to you, why not women priests in the Catholic church?\nAnn Widdecombe Well, no, the specific question was, why is it not alright for a woman to be a priest but it is for a woman to be an MP, that\u0026rsquo;s the specific question. And I have to say to you, that really does betray a vast ignorance. A Member of Parliament, male or female, does not stand in persona Christi at the point of consecration. But I don\u0026rsquo;t believe that it is any more possible for a woman to represent Christ at the point of consecration than for a man to be the Virgin Mary.\nZeinab Badawi Okay, thanks. Lots of hands up and I really do want to go around everybody, so panel, if you could keep your responses to the point as much as you can. Up there, please.\nQuestion Question to Stephen Fry, I\u0026rsquo;m a Catholic, but I like you a lot, about \u0026hellip; I don\u0026rsquo;t know that the Catholic church condemns homosexuality as such, only recommends chastity for everybody, and then, if I\u0026rsquo;m not married I should be chaste, whether I am homosexual or heterosexual.\nQuestion Hi, question for Ann Widdecombe actually. You accused Christopher Hitchens of judging the Catholic church by the standards of the time, but surely the truths in your doctrines are either eternal or they\u0026rsquo;re not.\nZeinab Badawi Okay, Stephen Fry, the question about the Catholic church apparently doesn\u0026rsquo;t condemn homosexuality, that question asked.\nStephen Fry Well, I\u0026rsquo;m afraid it simply does, it does condemn it, yes. It calls it, the official word is a disorder, but it was refined by the current Pontiff, Ratzinger, who called it a moral evil. But on the other hand we must remember, as the point that was made, is that the church is very loose on moral evils, because although they try to accuse people like me, who believe in empiricism and the Enlightenment, of somehow what they call moral relativism, as if it\u0026rsquo;s some appalling sin, where what it actually means is thought, they for example thought that slavery was perfectly fine, absolutely okay, and then they didn\u0026rsquo;t. And what is the point of the Catholic church if it says \u0026lsquo;oh, well we couldn\u0026rsquo;t know better because nobody else did,\u0026rsquo; then what are you for?\nZeinab Badawi Can you just clarify for us on this thing about homosexuality, the Catholic church condemns the act but not the individual. Did Jesus Christ himself actually say anything about homosexuality?\nArchbishop John Onaiyekan That is a wrong question in this subject\u0026hellip; \u0026hellip;no, because we not aware about homosexuality, the morality of homosexuality, being a matter that drew the attention of Jesus. But Jesus certainly spoke about the Ten Commandments and adultery, and I do not think we should deny the church the right to propound its own doctrines, you are not obliged to take it.\nZeinab Badawi Let\u0026rsquo;s hear more from the floor, and then we\u0026rsquo;ll come\u0026hellip;yep, go on.\nQuestion Our life is based on the life of Jesus Christ, not on emotion or peace or the way the world is going. So, I think all the people who are listening, I think the message we are getting here will lead us to live a good life.\nZeinab Badawi Okay, thanks, let\u0026rsquo;s just get through some more comments. Okay, yep, briefly please, briefly.\nQuestion I spent 38 years of my life as a Catholic and then I saw the light, and my life now is going back and forth to Africa and next month I go to Uganda, and I\u0026rsquo;m working on trying to stop mothers dying in pregnancy and childbirth. What I\u0026rsquo;m saying is, please, please, reverse the ruling on condoms and family planning and contraception and save more lives, save the thousands and thousands of lives\u0026hellip;\nZeinab Badawi Let\u0026rsquo;s keep this moving, briefly please.\nQuestion As a Catholic I\u0026rsquo;m actually very pleased to be here this evening to hear two sides of a very important argument, and the positive thing I take away is that the Catholic church can take the opportunity to reflect upon these comments and that we look for the future, and that it is by actually accepting these comments and by looking for a way forward that the church can actually grow and have a more important part in the world.\nZeinab Badawi Thank you. We can\u0026rsquo;t take any more questions from the floor, really, but panel, what I propose is this: you\u0026rsquo;ve heard the points that are raised, some of them were comments, some of them were questions, you\u0026rsquo;re going to have a few minutes to make your closing statements, please incorporate these questions that you heard in your closing statements. Because audience, I want you to vote again. Now for those of you who are watching at home, if you\u0026rsquo;d like a briefing booklet on some of those issues that you\u0026rsquo;ve heard raised today, then please go to www.intelligencesquared.com and you can download that booklet, anybody can do it and it\u0026rsquo;s absolutely free. Okay, so everybody\u0026rsquo;s doing that, so while you\u0026rsquo;re all doing that, it\u0026rsquo;s going to take a little bit of time, we\u0026rsquo;re going to hear the closing statements incorporating some of the points that you the audience raised, and we\u0026rsquo;re going to do it in reverse order this time, and it\u0026rsquo;s going to be Stephen Fry first.\nStephen Fry Well it\u0026rsquo;s been a really interesting debate, and I\u0026rsquo;ve loved some of the questions from the floor. I suppose I\u0026rsquo;m slightly disappointed that Ann Widdecombe in particular should say \u0026ldquo;oh, I knew they\u0026rsquo;d bring up condoms and child rape and homosexuality.\u0026rdquo; It\u0026rsquo;s a bit like a burglar in court saying \u0026ldquo;you would bring up that burglary and that manslaughter, you never mentioned the fact that I gave my father a birthday present.\u0026rdquo; You know, yes, yes, are you getting the message? There is a reason we hammer home these issues: because they matter. It\u0026rsquo;s such an opportunity, owning a billion souls at baptism. It\u0026rsquo;s such an opportunity to do something remarkable, to make this planet better, and it\u0026rsquo;s an opportunity that is constantly and arrogantly being avoided and I\u0026rsquo;m sorry for that.\nZeinab Badawi Okay, thank you. Final statement from Conservative MP Ann Widdecombe for the motion that the Catholic church is a force for good in the world.\nAnn Widdecombe Right, we have had all the usual stuff, about how the Catholic church, being against condoms, has apparently caused untold misery. As I\u0026rsquo;ve said, our opponents always try to home in on sex, when the teachings of the church, which are after all only about the stability of family, the maintenance of fidelity, the virtue of chastity, when the church teaches that as one part of all its teaching, I do sometimes despair at the way that these debates always, always come back to that. So, I\u0026rsquo;m very pleased to have been here tonight, despite the fact that I think the incoming poll was slightly discouraging. I\u0026rsquo;m very pleased to have been here, to have been here with the Archbishop, and with the two gentlemen opposite, and thank you for the opportunity.\nZeinab Badawi Against the motion, Christopher Hitchens.\nChristopher Hitchens Unanswered questions: amazing, no one, though they were asked repeatedly, would say whether they thought Stephen Fry, my friend, was in a state of mortal sin or not. They wouldn\u0026rsquo;t tell you. Something about the question brought out their inner coward. Well, I say that homosexuality is not just a form of sex, it\u0026rsquo;s a form of love, and it deserves our respect for that reason. That when my children were young, I\u0026rsquo;d have been proud to have Stephen as their babysitter, and I\u0026rsquo;d\u0026rsquo;ve told them they were lucky, and if anyone came to my door as a babysitter wearing holy orders, I\u0026rsquo;d call first a cab and then the police.\nZeinab Badawi Final statement from our final speaker, Archbishop of Abuja, John Onaiyekan. You\u0026rsquo;ve gotta make your final pitch now, to the audience.\nArchbishop John Onaiyekan Thank you very much. I just want to draw the attention of the audience back to the topic, and the topic is quite clear, the Catholic church is a force for good in the world. It did not say it is the only source for good. It did not say it has always been a source for good, it\u0026rsquo;s not in the past, it is in the present tense – is a source for good. I still cannot see how they have in any way shown the Catholic church is not a force for good in the world. I can say all kinds of things about other people, but I think it is fair enough that when it comes to \u0026ldquo;what does the Church say about condoms? what does it say about homosexuality? what does it say about women priests?\u0026rdquo; we have to take the trouble to find out exactly what it is saying. Not what the newspapers are saying that we are saying. We never said that the Catholic church is perfect, we continue to do our best, to be as close as we can to Jesus Christ and what he wants us to be, and to constantly be a force for good in the world, and I thank you.\nZeinab Badawi Archbishop, thank you. Audience, you\u0026rsquo;ve all voted again. Now the moment of truth, panel. Let me remind everybody that before the debate, when everybody came in, this is how you voted: for the motion \u0026ldquo;that the Catholic church is a force for good in the world\u0026rdquo; 678, against the motion 1102, and the undecideds, the \u0026lsquo;don\u0026rsquo;t know\u0026rsquo;s were 346. This is how you voted subsequently: for the motion \u0026ldquo;that the Catholic church is a force for good\u0026rdquo; from 678 it\u0026rsquo;s gone to 268. I\u0026rsquo;m sorry. Against the motion, it\u0026rsquo;s now 1876. And you can see that doesn\u0026rsquo;t leave very many \u0026lsquo;don\u0026rsquo;t know\u0026rsquo;s, it\u0026rsquo;s 34 undecided. So commiserations Archbishop and Ann Widdecombe, congratulations Stephen Fry and Christopher Hitchens. Thank you all, from me Zeinab Badawi, good bye.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/12/02/intelligence-catholic-church-debate-transcript/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Catholic-Church","RelPermalink":"/tags/catholic-church/"},{"LinkTitle":"Debate","RelPermalink":"/tags/debate/"},{"LinkTitle":"Intelligence-Squared","RelPermalink":"/tags/intelligence-squared/"},{"LinkTitle":"Religion","RelPermalink":"/tags/religion/"},{"LinkTitle":"Transcript","RelPermalink":"/tags/transcript/"}],"title":"Intelligence² Catholic Church Debate: Transcript"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"It\u0026rsquo;s a fairly common problem with Windows. Somehow a program manages to create a file with a name containing illegal characters or otherwise outside the file system\u0026rsquo;s parameters. No matter what you try, you just can\u0026rsquo;t rid yourself of it. The file certainly isn\u0026rsquo;t in use and being locked up by another program. Trying to delete or rename the file only results in Windows telling you the file cannot be found: \u0026ldquo;This is no longer in . Verify the item\u0026rsquo;s location and try again.\u0026rdquo; Even running the Command Prompt with administrator privileges doesn\u0026rsquo;t allow you to move, rename or delete the blasted thing!\nFortunately, I managed to find an easy solution. Fire up the 7-zip File Manager , and rename the file from there. Bingo - don\u0026rsquo;t ask me how Vista couldn\u0026rsquo;t manage it, or indeed why 7-zip could, but at least now you can delete the damn thing! Kudos to the guys on this forum for the answer.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/11/19/deleting-the-undeletable/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"File-System","RelPermalink":"/tags/file-system/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vista","RelPermalink":"/tags/vista/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows/"}],"title":"Deleting the Undeletable"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Does it disturb you that despite the general appliance of Grimm\u0026rsquo;s Law, there are still some words which appear to deviate from the rule? Then you\u0026rsquo;re probably already well aware of Verner\u0026rsquo;s Law, but nevertheless here\u0026rsquo;s a really cute, little summary created by Ari Hoptman and filmed at the University of Minnesota.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aal9VSPkf5s Part 2 , Part 3 [Via Mr. Verb ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/11/14/verners-law-the-movie/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/linguistics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Verners-Law","RelPermalink":"/tags/verners-law/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Verner’s Law: The Movie"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"}],"content":"Interesting little book review on the Irish Times website about the role of Cromwell in the disappearance of wolves in Ireland. Kieran Hickey\u0026rsquo;s book (possibly entitled The Natural and Cultural History of Wolves in Ireland—the article makes no reference) seems to confirm the role of Cromwell\u0026rsquo;s appearance in Ireland with the hunting and eventual extinction of the Irish wolf. I\u0026rsquo;m not aware of any attempts to reintroduce wolves to Ireland, and as this post on the Blather points out, there were fears that no one had learned from history, when policies in recent years called to cull badger numbers in the hopes of combating bovine tuberculosis.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/11/11/cromwell-and-irish-wolves/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Biology","RelPermalink":"/tags/biology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ireland","RelPermalink":"/tags/ireland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wolves","RelPermalink":"/tags/wolves/"}],"title":"Cromwell and Irish Wolves"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"}],"content":"Andrew W. K. shows us the dangers of partying too hard.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6H6n _onZI0\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/11/06/corpsing-on-infidelity/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Andrew-W-K","RelPermalink":"/tags/andrew-w-k/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Corpsing on Infidelity"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" No smoking. And soon, no drinking and no talking!\nYou have to give it to the man who wrote this. I still remember laughing at Eddie Izzard\u0026rsquo;s little piece on the smoking ban in California . Smoking bans have since then proliferated to such a state, that the Pacific island of Niue is intending to ban smoking altogether . And fair play to them. One wonders how long down the line before such a blanket ban appears in some larger nations. Smoking is essentially acceptable, despite the decades spent fighting it, and an outright ban would appear to be the only logical conclusion. Whilst opinions based on fact can cause uproarious controversy in the world of drugs , alcohol and tobacco remain relatively immune. But every step towards removing tobacco from the public light is a step towards the ban which will put tobacco in with cannabis and LSD.\nPerhaps then we will see an end to these rediculous signs, and churches can go back to focusing on telling people to stop begrudging their neighbour\u0026rsquo;s donkey.\n[Photo by Simon White ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/11/06/dearly-beloved/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Smoking-Ban","RelPermalink":"/tags/smoking-ban/"}],"title":"Dearly Beloved"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/categories/television/"}],"content":"Ireland may have been the land that saved western civilization, ((À la Thomas Cahill, How The Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Heroic Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe .)) and certainly enjoyed a period of setting priests alongside agricultural products as the major export, but that\u0026rsquo;s not to say that nothing good came out of the experience. Their perhaps unique relationship with the Catholic church has put Irish comedians in a wonderful position, and combined with a deep love/hate relationship with the English, provides a rich source of material for us all to enjoy. Republicans, Catholics, Patriots, Atheists: here are some of my favourites of Ireland\u0026rsquo;s sons.\nTommy Tiernan Perhaps one of the most controversial of Ireland\u0026rsquo;s homegrowns in the last couple of decades, this Donegal born son is also far and away one of the most successful. He holds the Guinness World Record for the longest stand-up comedy show by an individual. He\u0026rsquo;s also been accused of blasphemy by the Irish Senate, of killing Father Ted by Ardal O\u0026rsquo;Hanlon, and provoked quite an uproar recently with some jokes on the Holocaust. And he\u0026rsquo;s great!\n[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3UL_uCNWCo[/youtube]\nDara Ó Briain I\u0026rsquo;m not a religious man, I don\u0026rsquo;t even believe in God. But I’m still Catholic, of course. Catholicism has a much broader reach than just the religion. I’m ethnically Catholic, it’s the box you have to tick on the census form: \u0026lsquo;Don’t believe in God, but I do still hate Rangers.\u0026rsquo; The fact is that it’s a shared hinterland between me and every other Irish person, a collection of references that we all understand, stories we all know\u0026hellip; Once you\u0026rsquo;ve started Catholic, frankly, there\u0026rsquo;s no really way to stop being Catholic\u0026hellip; It’s like a huge club you can’t ever leave. ((Courtesy of An Odyssey of Quotes .))\nÓ Briain is certainly the more presentable face of Irish comedy, as his common appearance on the BBC attests. The worst criticism he has to contend with is a bit of sexism in his role as moderator of weekly satire program Mock the Week. Irish speaking he might be, at least he\u0026rsquo;s from The Pale!\n[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0123R6vjIoE[/youtube]\nDave Allen Tallaght\u0026rsquo;s most famous son? At least for me—I\u0026rsquo;m sure Mick McCarthy would have another candidate . ((Robbie Keane is another.)) Dave Allen\u0026rsquo;s laid back, intimate style of show, with stories regaled over a smoke and a glass of whiskey interspersed with various sketches was certainly an inspiration for many who followed him. The world\u0026rsquo;s most dedicated practicing atheist will be sorely missed.\n[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxo81Ok9Urk[/youtube]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/11/06/irelands-sons/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Comedy","RelPermalink":"/tags/comedy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Dara-O-Briain","RelPermalink":"/tags/dara-o-briain/"},{"LinkTitle":"Dave-Allen","RelPermalink":"/tags/dave-allen/"},{"LinkTitle":"Eire","RelPermalink":"/tags/eire/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ireland","RelPermalink":"/tags/ireland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Tommy-Tiernan","RelPermalink":"/tags/tommy-tiernan/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Ireland’s Sons"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" The Fold\nMany of us are probably familiar with the idea advanced in the early days of the Internet, that most users don\u0026rsquo;t know how to scroll through a website. Today that seems pretty unbelievable. The vast majority of websites, and indeed many of the most regularly visited, not only favour scrolling but to a large extent rely on it for navigation. So have the rules of the so-called \u0026lsquo;fold\u0026rsquo; changed since the Internet\u0026rsquo;s inception? And what role should it play in decisions made regarding a website\u0026rsquo;s design today?\nViewing the web can be a very personal experience. Depending on your very own choice of browser, monitor or resolution, the web can look a very different place. If you\u0026rsquo;ve ever for some reason been forced to view one of your regularly visited websites on a much lower resolution monitor, for example, you\u0026rsquo;ll know what I mean. What once appeared spacious and easy to read suddenly seems squashed and cluttered. The cute little thumbnail images now take up good chunks of room and force you to scroll around them to get at the text. And should that site employ a fixed-width design that is wider than the current resolution, even more space goes to waste with the appearance of a side scrollbar.\nOf course, well designed websites take their average readership into account, using accrued data to work out profiles that fit the viewing set up of their users. But finding out where that \u0026lsquo;fold\u0026rsquo; lies can nevertheless be a tricky business, even armed with knowledge regarding the average resolutions used, given the various toolbars and other gimmicks most browsers can come equipped with, to say nothing of the size of the browser window, the workspace of the operating system, or whether the site will be viewed \u0026lsquo;zoomed\u0026rsquo;.\nSo does the fold even really matter? Jeff Atwood over on his blog at Coding Horror posits that scrolling fast became something of a litmus test for web users. Scrolling soon proved to be a prerequisite skill for web surfing, and thanks to the principle of survival of the fittest, every web user today should be a scroller. Yet old ideas die hard. Trying to cram as much content as possible into the top section of a web page is pretty common practice even today, and more graphically inventive or intensive preamble to content hidden beyond the fold are more of a rarity than they perhaps otherwise would be. The fear that content not immediately displayed on a page will go unread then, is perhaps given users\u0026rsquo; willingness to scroll unfounded. But just because everyone is in the position to do something, doesn\u0026rsquo;t necessarily mean they\u0026rsquo;re going to do it.\nAs the research over at cxpartners points out, scrolling is par for the course, and in fact having content that is obviously cut-off or clearly points to content further down a page increases the amount of time users will spend scrolling through it. That isn\u0026rsquo;t to say there aren\u0026rsquo;t any pitfalls to avoid, and one thing that can seriously distract users and disguise potential content hidden offscreen is the use of strong, horizontal lines. Particularly if these should ever happen to coincide with the bottom of a browser window, such lines can act as a mental barrier, as users expect the content to end. A second pitfall can be the use of scrollable content embedded in the page, which remains hidden from the main scrollbar, an tool often used to gauge further content according to the results.\nBut the most important conclusion drawn from the test is that sites should avoid trying to cram too much content above the fold. Assuming that users will be drawn in by their first impressions of a site is one thing; concluding that they will only care for what they first see is entirely another. There are things that certainly belong in that noble place above the fold, depending on the type of site. A site logo/link to the home page, the main site navigation, the search form, a link to the checkout, the login form/registration link. We\u0026rsquo;ve come to expect that such staples of the web find themselves in an easy to find location above the fold. Sites which break these conventions, however, are not unheard of.\nThe original reason I started this little post was seeing Chris Coyier\u0026rsquo;s personal blog redesign detailed over at CSS-Tricks . I was particularly impressed by the use of custom designs for various pages, such as this one and this one . What does this have to do with the fold? Because with this miniature resolution I\u0026rsquo;m using, there\u0026rsquo;s little content to see on first impressions, and only the content of the entries themselves to draw the reader further in. What made the pages particularly inviting, however, was certainly this attempt at customisation, a move towards giving each of his entries a more personal look suited to the content it is delivering. This step towards a magazine-style approach to displaying content is, in my eyes, a very welcome one. Of course, Coyier\u0026rsquo;s site is a personal blog and can perhaps be forgiven for breaking the other \u0026lsquo;rules\u0026rsquo;, ((In my opinion the site suffers from a poor navigation and a lack of search functions.)) but I hope his reckless approach to the fold, along with throwing more colourful and individual content out into his posts will prove to be a success and an inspiration to others.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/10/31/back-to-the-fold/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Web-Design","RelPermalink":"/tags/web-design/"}],"title":"Back to the Fold"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"}],"content":" Dungeons \u0026amp; Dragons Online\nDungeons \u0026amp; Dragons Online: Play for free\nHow do you turn a free product into a profitable enterprise? That\u0026rsquo;s normally the challenging issue to be faced in today\u0026rsquo;s increasingly competitive online market. Internet giant Google continues to have issues attempting to monetise its expensively acquired YouTube daughter. Yet game developer Turbine is looking to do exactly the opposite, converting their current business model into a subscription-supported free product. But does \u0026lsquo;free\u0026rsquo; pay?\nIt certainly appears that Turbine\u0026rsquo;s decision to offer their MMO Dungeons \u0026amp; Dragons Online for free has paid off. Hundreds of thousands of new players have signed up to take advantage of the new offer, and despite the \u0026lsquo;free\u0026rsquo; price tag, subscriptions are up 40%. In addition, many players are taking advantage of an in-game payment mechanism to buy additional items and open up new sections of the game. Previously the game had required players to pay a one off purchase price, followed by a monthly subscription fee. Now just about anyone can download the game and be playing within half an hour, paying or otherwise. Turbine also maintain that some players are paying even more per month than the previous subscription fee alone, removing an important cap on how much individual players could pay into the game. Rather than seeing players who play without paying as freeloaders, Turbine are confident that such players bring their own benefit to the company, generating interest, advertising via word-of-mouth, and thereby generating new subscriptions and one-off payments.\nJust how successful this move will prove to be in the long-run is difficult to estimate. It\u0026rsquo;s clear that the business model has worked to some extent, generating plenty of fresh interest in a game that is already over three years old. But will the benefits dry up once the hype is over? What is clear is that this move represents yet another step away from traditional methods of sale, and is another example of a trend away from that classic method of promoting games —the demo.\nIndeed, it would appear that there is plenty of evidence that offering games for free, if only for short periods, acts as one of the best methods of advertisement. Figures produced earlier this year by Valve boss Gabe Newell suggest that offering their action zombie-fest Left 4 Dead at a discount price over a free test weekend boosted sales figures to such an extent that they beat launch figures. The same source reveals that the release of new content for their other key title Team Fortress 2 also boosted Valve\u0026rsquo;s sales significantly.\nOf course, in the case of games sold via Steam the main impulse for the impressive sales figures lies in the buyer\u0026rsquo;s perception of the short-term heavy discounts being offered. But the principle of no cost gaming models isn\u0026rsquo;t limited to only short-term probation periods, nor is Turbine unique in pursuing their policy of a combined free and subscription service. Gaming giant EA recently entered the market with Battlefield Heroes, a comical extension to their successful Battlefield series, this time free to play via browser, and supported by player micro-payments for upgrades and vanity items. Certainly an experimental move on EA\u0026rsquo;s part, recent figures do suggest that there has been some success, with players who make use of the game\u0026rsquo;s extra features paying an average of $20, and the total number of players recently tipping the 2 million mark.\nAnd it\u0026rsquo;s not just the big players who are experimenting with new sales tactics. 2D Boy are taking a leaf out of Radiohead\u0026rsquo;s books, and offering their award-winning World of Goo title for a limited time at whatever price the buyer wishes. Whilst I can\u0026rsquo;t see such a risk being taken by any of the larger games producers any time soon, regardless of how successful 2D Boy\u0026rsquo;s trial proves, it does represent yet another departure from the traditional sales models.\nAs ever, however, failure remains an important component of every experiment. Whilst systems of in-game micro-payments are providing some evidence of success for EA and Turbine, it appears other alternatives to direct subscription gaming aren\u0026rsquo;t bringing home the bacon. id Software\u0026rsquo;s Quake Live was to be a free browser-based game funded via in-game advertising, however earlier this year John Carmack revealed that a premium subscription service would be have to be offered in addition, an honest admission that their advertising model alone won\u0026rsquo;t foot the bill.\nNevertheless, it is clear that games companies are becoming increasingly willing to try new tactics when it comes to funding their productions. Direct payment and subscription methods are being gradually supplemented in part with micro-payments, and attempts are being made to integrate in-game advertising, although to date it seems with little relatively success. Valve\u0026rsquo;s Steam content delivery system is proving to be an able testing ground for offering short-term probation periods for gamers, and the different levels of discounts and their positive effect on games sales will provide plenty of food for thought for games publishers and psychologists alike. Whilst we are still some way from seeing such methods commonly applied to mainstream games, it will be interesting too see whether these current examples remain profitable, and if they will inspire others to do the same. It seems even a free product can turn a profit.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/10/15/profit-for-free/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Battlefield-Heroes","RelPermalink":"/tags/battlefield-heroes/"},{"LinkTitle":"Left-4-Dead","RelPermalink":"/tags/left-4-dead/"},{"LinkTitle":"Quake-Live","RelPermalink":"/tags/quake-live/"},{"LinkTitle":"Team-Fortress-2","RelPermalink":"/tags/team-fortress-2/"},{"LinkTitle":"Valve","RelPermalink":"/tags/valve/"}],"title":"Profit for Free"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"So was Barack Obama awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last week. Cue gasps of glee, plenty of head-scratching surprise, and a profusion of controversy. Because the question on many people\u0026rsquo;s minds is quite clear: what for?\nIgnoring the fact that Obama was nominated for the award only days after his inauguration, his term thus far has certainly been one of optimism and change. It would be unfair to dismiss his achievements, and plain wrong to chastise his goals. Amongst others, Obama has been responsible for: moving to close the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay; furthering plans for the US withdrawal from Iraq; easing tension with Russia by abrogating plans for the missile defense shield in Eastern Europe; moving to open talks with pariah states North Korea and Iran; extending a palm leaf to the Islamic world; fostering much-weakened international institutions and supporting diplomatic methods in the Middle East.\n[…] for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.\nNoble Peace Prize\nBut is all that enough? Supporters of the decision argue that the award will act as a stimulus and a compulsion for further efforts to strengthening international diplomacy, both on the part of the Obama administration and others. As should be well remembered, the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded not only for congratulating on past achievements, but for encouraging those who have struggled and continue to struggle for a peaceful world. Casting a glance over the list of former recipients, it is easy to spot examples of both, occasionally embodied in the same man. So if not for his past achievements, was Obama at least deserving for his dedication to the cause?\nNot likely. Or at least, not if one considers the 10 months of Obama\u0026rsquo;s term to be equivalent to the untiring efforts of the prize\u0026rsquo;s many other recipients. Are we then to accept that the prize was awarded on the basis that he is better than \u0026rsquo;that other guy\u0026rsquo;? That he has attempted to set right the failures of his forebear, starting to bridge the rift that had opened between America and much of the rest of the world? It has been pointed out elsewhere , that the prize acts as yet another deliberate snub to the achievements of former president George Bush, following the previous awards to the United Nations and Kofi Annan , the International Atomic Energy Agency and Mohamed ElBaradei , and of course the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and Al Gore .\nYet the award of the prize also stands as a rather greater insult to former President Bill Clinton , whose efforts both during his presidency, in Northern Ireland and the Middle East, as well as work in the interim, such as his recent achievement in North Korea , have been overlooked. That would also be to say nothing of the many other candidates , whose nominations to the 2009 Peace Prize will not officially be revealed for 50 years.\nThe Nobel Peace Prize may be the most difficult to award, and a review of its history is bound to highlight the occasional dubious recipient. In 1973 for example, Henry Kissinger was awarded the prize for negotiating the ceasefire of the Paris Peace Accords and bringing an end to US involvement in Vietnam, a conflict he was not altogether innocent of, and spread secretly, and illegally, beyond its borders into neighbouring Cambodia. His co-recipient from North Vietnam, Lê Ðức Thọ , refused the award on the grounds that there was still no peace in his country. And the award in 2007 to Al Gore and the IPCC for perpetuating a theory truly stretches my imagination when it comes to defining the word \u0026lsquo;peace\u0026rsquo;. After all, as stated in Alfred Nobel\u0026rsquo;s will, the Nobel Peace Prize should be awarded:\nto the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.\nIn my opinion, the Norwegian Nobel committee made a terrible error of judgement in awarding Barack Obama the Peace Prize. Not because he has achieved too little, or campaigned for too short a time, although both of these factors contribute to the issue. The problem is that the award appears to have been lauded upon an idealist and a demagogue, for his policies of reconciliation, not his achievements for peace, and perhaps most of all, because one day, Obama would actually have been worthy.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/10/14/peaceful-intent/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Barack-Obama","RelPermalink":"/tags/barack-obama/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nobel-Peace-Prize","RelPermalink":"/tags/nobel-peace-prize/"}],"title":"Peaceful Intent"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Business","RelPermalink":"/categories/business/"}],"content":" Amazon Kindle\nReading this post recently, I found myself asking why ebooks haven\u0026rsquo;t really taken off as a medium. Certainly more recent efforts, such as Amazon\u0026rsquo;s Kindle, have helped to reignite the market after a rather dubious development period over the past decade or so, but if one compares the ubiquity of mobile phones or digital audio players, e-books are entirely missing from the landscape. ((According to The Guardian in April 2008, ebooks accounted for less than 1% of the total publishing market, albeit this share has no doubt increased since.))\nIn purely utilitarian terms, should the technology ever be fully and appropriately used, ebooks have a lot to offer over their paper counterparts. There are far fewer requirements and resources needed for production, and distribution is much easier. Whilst a device on which to read ebooks might outweigh a single volume, additional books add nothing, and in terms of transporting books en mass, ebooks are clearly in favour. The ability to flick through a paper volume might be lost in the electronic form, but this is clearly compensated for by vastly improved tools for search and cross-referencing. Likewise combining other forms of media such as video and audio is a perfectly reasonable conception with ebooks, that the paper variety can\u0026rsquo;t really compete with on any level. They\u0026rsquo;re also more easily manipulable, in terms of being able to zoom, highlight or simple leave your own annotations about the place. All of which is to say nothing of the potential advantages for newspapers and other periodicals.\nYet although the technology is certainly in a position to deliver an entirely new experience for readers, the potential has not really been tapped to any great extent, and in fact it would appear as though it is being deliberately held back. Tempting as the current technology may appear, there are still many questions left unanswered that prevent any real rapid transfer. Can books somehow be backed up to prevent possible corruption? What happens to the titles previously bought should one buy a different reader? When buying a paper book, customers can feel confident that their purchase is physically in their position, to use as they see fit. Even simple, everyday acts that we would normally take for granted with a paper book, ((Though with the potential to infringe upon copyright laws.)) such as photocopying pages or lending it to a friend, suddenly become problematic when dealing with the ebook equivalent. And what about being able to sell a book on when you\u0026rsquo;re finished with it? In addition, the recent case of Amazon withdrawing books sold for their Kindle reader, ((Pictured above. Image by davidking via Flickr.)) including deleting the items from user\u0026rsquo;s devices, highlights yet one more issue that users face when choosing between paper and electronic formats.\nThe current situation reminds me very much of that surrounding the invention and spread of mp3s in the later 1990s. Whilst the format gained in popularity and notoriety in the years following its publication in 1994-5, the music industry treated the news entirely as a threat to its position, and sought to localise and stifle the Internet phenomenon. When one considers that it wasn\u0026rsquo;t until mid-2003 that today\u0026rsquo;s largest online music retailer iTunes opened its e-doors, it becomes clear just how difficult working against such conservative forces can be. It\u0026rsquo;s an interesting phenomenon, given that most technological advances are met with very early attempts to capitalise upon them, that such an opportunity went virtually ignored and even shunned for almost a decade, before a success story could be made out of it. Perhaps all that is needed to really revolutionise the world of publishing is that mp3 format of ebooks, a format that will provide readers both the security of ownership that a regular paper equivalent manifests, combined with every advantage today\u0026rsquo;s technology can provide. That format for books has nothing to do with size and ease of distribution, as it did with music, rather a format that will open up a digital format to all publishers, and make the rather fledgling e-publishing market explode.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/10/06/the-paper-mp3/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Amazon-Kindle","RelPermalink":"/tags/amazon-kindle/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"E-Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/e-book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reading","RelPermalink":"/tags/reading/"}],"title":"The Paper mp3"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Interesting little snippet about the current state of South African Internet services. Designed simply to show up the state of South Africa\u0026rsquo;s Internet options, the test pitted a pigeon against a connection delivered by their largest provider. The pigeon managed to deliver 4GB of data 60 miles in little over an hour, and it took the company another hour to upload the data (one can only assume they were for some reason using an old USB 1.o/1.1 connection). In this time, just 4% of the data had been transferred via ADSL. Humbling though this message might be, I really wonder if services in the UK would fare much better? At a rough estimate, in the total amount of time it took the pigeon, my own connection might have managed around 5% of the total. The average business connection would probably have achieved twice that, but either way, the pigeon method wins hands down. Having said that, I don\u0026rsquo;t think we\u0026rsquo;ll be seeing any alternative pigeon networks set up in the UK just yet. \u0026lsquo;Packet loss\u0026rsquo; due to hawk attacks would be monumental.\n[Via African Politics Portal]\nUpdate 5th October, 2010: Twelve months after this little stunt in South Africa, a similar experiment was repeated in rural Yorkshire . This time 24% of a 300MB video clip had been uploaded by the time the pigeons had covered the 75 miles to Skegness.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/09/13/dick-dastardlys-dsl/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Adsl","RelPermalink":"/tags/adsl/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Pigeons","RelPermalink":"/tags/pigeons/"},{"LinkTitle":"South-Africa","RelPermalink":"/tags/south-africa/"}],"title":"Dick Dastardly’s DSL"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" The Great Belt Bridge\nBridge solutions\nMany of us have found ourselves in this position. Your business or group make use of an online system, such as a forum, wiki, blog etc., which you then wish to augment or combine with some other system. How you go about doing that, of course, depends entirely on your goals and the systems you\u0026rsquo;re trying to use together. Design and styling are usually the least of those worries.\nThe problem which consistently presents itself when attempting such a combination is what to do with the userbase. Whilst this issue can sometimes be simply ignored, in the hope that only a small number of the users of one system will need access to the second, this isn\u0026rsquo;t always the case. When it comes to one userbase requiring access to two or more systems, the first question that needs to be answered is whether the user information should be shared, enabling a unified login procedure amongst other benefits. Requiring users to sign up to various different pieces of the puzzle is a time-consuming process, and one that many will find confusing and unnecessary. And since different online systems often have conflicting requirements when it comes to usernames and passwords, for example, this can also lead to more lost password checks and work for the system administrator. However, programming such functionality oneself certainly isn\u0026rsquo;t within the realms of the abilities of all of us, and keeping such modifications functioning across various systems and versions can be a painful procedure.\nFortunately, in certain instances such functionality may well be freely available, usually in the form of third-party hacks or bridges, as they are often known. ((Take this list of WordPress/forum bridges as an example.)) Installing such addons is, in comparison to a home grown solution, much easier, safer and reliable. But reliance on a third piece of software does not guarantee that all of the features required will be available, and it also presents its own set of security issues. Aside from the software hiding its own potential security pitfalls, it can also lead to services being inoperable after an upgrade, if it isn\u0026rsquo;t kept regularly up-to-date with the latest versions of the systems it is meant to bridge, and in so doing advocates running outdated software.\nThis post provides no answers or alternatives. In fact, I\u0026rsquo;m not even sure if what I\u0026rsquo;m proposing is already available, or otherwise feasible or not. The news on the OpenTTD project website was the first to jog my mind about this, wondering exactly how they had solved their problems, and whether or there might be a simpler, more user-friendly option. Essentially, my idea would be for a new open source project, to offer a simple solution to the issue of shared user details across a variety of different online systems, be they forums, wikis, blogs, bugtrackers, etc. Beyond handling simple login information, the system could be used by administrators for handling various user-related issues, such as assigning general rights and permissions, handling groups, cookies, password requirements, user info and so on, but the basic benefit would be a central one-key-fits-all solution for unifying user accounts across a variety of different systems.\nDoes such a system already exist somewhere, one that is user-friendly, free-to-use, and supporting a wide variety of platforms? If not, would such a system even be feasible, given the different requirements and standards of the different systems, and the various issues of security and privacy involved?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/09/03/open-source-bridges/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Bridge","RelPermalink":"/tags/bridge/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Open-Source","RelPermalink":"/tags/open-source/"}],"title":"Open Source Bridges"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"It\u0026rsquo;s all a bit late now. Boris Johnson writes about the Gary McKinnon case in The Telegraph and points out what anyone living under a rock wearing a bag on their heads could already see. McKinnon is charged with breaking into US military computers from his 56k modem, leaving messages, deleting files and causing general mayhem. He admits to all accounts of hacking in, though denies deliberate attempts at causing damage, claiming these charges were invented to pursue extradition proceedings. Quite what the prosecutors are trying to achieve with this man are unclear, given that his crazy quest for the secrets of little green men and free energy actually provided a service to the US military authorities in pointing out their lax security. As Boris Johnson points out, they could as well be offering him consultancy fees, as trying to clap him in irons. But how long does it take before someone is willing to stand up for common sense? And given the seemingly endless machinations of the legal process, will such calls even have an affect? Aside from highlighting the blatant partiality of the US-UK Extradition Treaty, these proceedings have once more underlined the spinelessness of the UK government when it comes to rectifying gross injustice, and defending its people against what can only be described as foreign tyranny. Watching paint dry, grass grow, the wheels turn in Whitehall: the simile edges ever closer to a regular place in our vocabularies.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/08/04/boris-johnson-on-the-mckinnon-case/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Boris-Johnson","RelPermalink":"/tags/boris-johnson/"},{"LinkTitle":"Extradition","RelPermalink":"/tags/extradition/"},{"LinkTitle":"Gary-Mckinnon","RelPermalink":"/tags/gary-mckinnon/"}],"title":"Boris Johnson on the McKinnon Case"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":"In a multi-record breaking event, marred by controversy over the technology of the new swimsuits , the final day of the 2009 World Aquatics Championships featured a fairly typical line-up for the Men\u0026rsquo;s 4 x 100m Medley Relay . Aside from Australia replacing Canada, and Brazil in place of Italy, the event could very well have been made for the G8. A fact no less marked than that the victors had a full replacement team to the one that qualified earlier in the day. Whoever said sport and money were a bad combination?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/08/02/swim-when-youre-winning/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Swimming","RelPermalink":"/tags/swimming/"}],"title":"Swim When You're Winning"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":" Harry S Truman\nHarry S Truman\nPresident Truman famously kept a sign on his desk that said \u0026ldquo;The buck stops here\u0026rdquo;, a gift from an avid poker player. Yet whilst we might appreciate the imagery and the sentiment, should we really rely on there being a \u0026lsquo;buck \u0026rsquo; to pass? Is there always a man in charge, someone with whom the ultimate responsibility lies? The public at large like to believe so. Having someone who is nominally in charge provides a feeling that there is some level of control over daily events, that there is some direction to the madness that seems to govern our lives. It isn\u0026rsquo;t particularly important whether that person you believe in is God, the president, the Führer or Chuck Norris. Nor does that responsible person need to be an individual, it can just as easily be taken as being particular position, a group of people, or an organisation.\nYet having someone to look to as the \u0026lsquo;Man in Charge\u0026rsquo; also entails having someone to blame when things go wrong. In general, people are not willing to look at events as the result of complex systems of uncountable interconnected threads. Such systems lack palpability, they invoke confusion and lack obvious conclusions. Much easier to view events as the result of simple inputs and outputs, revolving around the decision-making roles of important personages. When the proverbial hits the fan, the easiest response is to find those at the helm, whether particular individuals or a group, and lay the blame as thick and fast as the cement mixers can provide it. It\u0026rsquo;s a simple and effective reaction, since any person that can be held culpable must have made decisions, and any decision can be deemed retrospectively fallacious. Ergo any individual can be made and held responsible. ((We should not forget, of course, that as much as we enjoy seeing certain individuals as being responsible for the workings of the world, both for the comfort it gives us whilst things are ticking along smoothly, as well as the convenience of having someone to blame when they don\u0026rsquo;t, the individuals themselves also enjoy a level of revelry in the illusion that they are the ones with all the answers.))\nTake a quick flick through the history books, and you can find countless examples of this kind of scapegoating. The individual in question need not be reprimanded or even blamed, but we can see how the complex events of history were pinned on the actions and decisions of this one great personage. Take the failed General Strike of 1926 , which occurred because Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin went to bed early, for example. Or the Battle of Borodino , was lost because Napoleon had a cold that day. There are any number of examples strewn throughout the historical literature, which describe the passing of major events through the actions and ideas of great individuals. Such writing of history maybe frowned upon, but it makes for a simple and entertaining discussion. How often have you seen a history of Europe in which whole peoples are summed up in such remarks as \u0026ldquo;the Germans believed\u0026rdquo; or \u0026ldquo;Russia felt\u0026rdquo;? How often are the courses of nations described as if being the personal hobby of one or other historical personality? Or how many people would recognise the name Gavrilo Princip as belonging to the man who started the chain of events that apparently led to the First World War?\nResponsibility for events perhaps never takes a more crazy turn than in the realm of economics. For all the bales of paper used exhorting economic theory, for all the man-hours and computing power spent documenting the ticking of our economies, the complexities of a system that relies on the psychologies of six milliard people factored up by any number of other inputs, outputs and interactions remains as difficult to predict and describe as it perhaps ever will be. And yet the ups and downs, the dippings and divings, the riding of Kondratiev waves and Kuznets cycles, can all be pinned on the policies and opinions of a group of individuals. As William Easterly wrote in this post on Aid Watch ,\nWhy do we all fall for the Man in Charge fallacy? We like to anthropomorphize a complex system of multiple power centers, bottom-up social norms, and spontaneous markets, innovators, and entrepreneurs, because it is scary to think of such a complex system with no Man in Charge.\nPerhaps fear is exactly what prevents us from acknowledging the complexity of such systems. Though a certain level of convenience must also be acceded. Opponents of the government can argue that in the face of an economic crisis, it is clear that they overspent in the preceding year(s). Others argue that they spent too little. Some that they interfered too much in the market, yet others that they were too lax. It is the greatest position for the opposition to be in, since every argument they use is right. For the government was responsible at the time, thus the government must have been in error, therefore the government made the wrong decisions, and in that experimental laboratory of history there are no control tests and no repeat conditions.\nYet whilst the truth of what Easterly writes is fairly evident to see, for all who stop and think for more than a few seconds, the illusion of anthropological authority will always be with us. Set aside the angst ridden problems of an existentialism based on chaos and unrule, we need the chimera of the reprehensible individual as an idea we can understand and utilise. A complex system with more factors than we can conjure may be something to study in an ivory tower, but it isn\u0026rsquo;t something we can talk about, argue about, and shout about in the streets. Man is the centre of Man\u0026rsquo;s universe, and his self-deification continues to this very day. When Man created God, he had God conveniently recreate Man in his own image. Now that God has for many become optional, Man is left to fill the gap of responsibility. Despite the evidence of his exploits staring him in the face, Man continues to distance himself from the world around him. Extinctions almost always have his actions at root, global warming is a result of his ignorance or greed. Even the very products of his toil are labelled as man-made, counterpoint to all that is natural in the world. We take responsibility onto ourselves as a species - and then we play pass the buck.\nResponsibility is an interesting phenomenon, when we step and look at it a little more objectively. We deal in it as currency, taking it when it suits, gladly passing it on where it doesn\u0026rsquo;t, and when things go wrong, laying the finger of blame on anyone we happen to find carrying it. Finding the roots of this psychology would be a difficult quest, though an interesting one, and one that no doubt shows fundamental equivalents in other members of the animal kingdom. But I cannot in any event imagine a future in which responsibility will not play a part in everyday society, qualming angst before unpredictability, providing the illusion of control over the unaccountable, and affecting change through the apportioning of blame and the running of scapegoats.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/07/11/bucking-the-trend/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/tags/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Harry-Truman","RelPermalink":"/tags/harry-truman/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"}],"title":"Bucking the Trend"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":"It\u0026rsquo;s fairly rare for me to bother reviewing anything I read on here, however since I had some spare minutes and some actual opinions on some of the books I read this last month, there seemed to be enough to say to make up at least a short post. In fact it turned out to be a bit on the long side, so scroll down the relevant review if you\u0026rsquo;re really interested—being Stephen Fry\u0026rsquo;s strange debut The Liar , J.M. Coetzee\u0026rsquo;s rather aggravating Slow Man , Isabel Allende\u0026rsquo;s book for children City of Beasts , Zadie Smith\u0026rsquo;s impressive opener White Teeth and Murray Walker\u0026rsquo;s charming little autobiography Unless I\u0026rsquo;m Very Much Mistaken .\n“The Liar” by Stephen Fry The Liar\nThe Liar\nThis wasn\u0026rsquo;t really one on my reading list, rather something I was asked to read for my opinion. I read Fry\u0026rsquo;s autobiographical Moab is my Washpot some time ago and found it a fairly interesting tale, though wasn\u0026rsquo;t particularly attracted enough to turn to his works of fiction. Fry\u0026rsquo;s reputation obviously precedes him, and despite The Liar being his first work of fiction, came with some reasonable acclaim and decent reviews.\nPlunging in, it quickly became clear how much the plot owes to Fry\u0026rsquo;s own life (at least judging from what was revealed in Moab). At every turn I was reminded of snippets of that work of autobiography, stretched and bedecked with fansifications from Fry\u0026rsquo;s extremely fertile mind. Whilst I\u0026rsquo;ve no doubt many of the characters are based on real people, the book very much feels aloof from reality and announces itself as such. But such an approach doesn\u0026rsquo;t make a book bad. What The Liar lacked was anything to appeal to it beyond the language. Plot, such as there was, often became confusing, with frequent unmarked jumps of scene and timeframe. Whilst they weren\u0026rsquo;t so outrageous as to get the reader lost, they did sometimes require a bit of backtracking, particularly when picking the book up again. Added to that were some sections in italics in which the characters\u0026rsquo; identities were disguised, and whilst they may have been intended like so much corn flour to thicken the plot, they were abstract in the utmost and entirely destroyed come the book\u0026rsquo;s final revelations. To my mind, the problem was that the story tried to offer too much, instead of focusing on being a lighthearted yarn. It\u0026rsquo;s a work of fiction, and tries to be funny with it, but I felt the few openly amusing moments were all too infrequent on account of making the plot out to be something that much more than it was.\nAs his first work of fiction, I can\u0026rsquo;t claim that Fry did a particularly bad job. It was interesting enough to make me want to finish it, and whilst at times the unexpected time jumps and secluded identities made the plot a little confusing, the ultimate lightness of the storyline meant that this wasn\u0026rsquo;t too much of a problem. The writing itself is of course interesting and pleasant to read, as one would expect from such an eloquent and vociferous character. This itself was enough to carry the story to its rather overinflated conclusion, but the book was ultimately a disappointment. Perhaps I should\u0026rsquo;ve been more wary of the fact that some of the highest words of praise on the book\u0026rsquo;s jacket came from Fry\u0026rsquo;s longtime friend Hugh Laurie:\nIt\u0026rsquo;s very unfair. It took Joseph Heller seven years to write Catch 22. Stephen seems to have knocked this one off on a couple of wet Wednesday afternoons in Norfolk.\nA couple of wet afternoons, indeed, and any comparison to Catch 22 is rather a tad on the optimistic side! Only for the die-hard Fry fans, I can only assume his later works show a more mature hand, but for those who expect novels to deliver what they promise, I recommend reading Moab is my Washpot, the original version of The Liar, sans the guff.\n“Slow Man” by J.M. Coetzee Slow Man\nSlow Man\nCoetzee is an author I\u0026rsquo;d never picked up before, but given the reputation thought I should try on for size. And the opening third of the book certainly appealed to me. The writing is concise, descriptive, and at times you might say beautiful. And the story appeals for its simplicity: an active, elderly man loses a leg in a cycling accident, and has to deal with this sudden change in his life. Not only has his whole way of life been affected by the alteration, but he is sharply introduced to the way society views him, an old man, perhaps even before he became emasculated.\nThen come the people in his life. The early introduction of helpers with whom he has to become accustomed promises much of the story, and indeed starts off as an interesting exploration. All of which is sent completely out of the window with the appearance of Elizabeth Costello. As an author who appears to have absolutely nothing to do with the story, it\u0026rsquo;s difficult to know exactly how to deal with her. Is she supposed to embody Paul, the main character\u0026rsquo;s inner thoughts? Or perhaps she\u0026rsquo;s supposed to be Coetzee himself, and the ensuing discussions which take place principally between Paul and Elizabeth are a form of dialogue that investigate the very nature of the author\u0026rsquo;s relation to his subject? Who the fuck knows. I\u0026rsquo;m afraid to say, I don\u0026rsquo;t. It\u0026rsquo;s a very rare book indeed that I start and don\u0026rsquo;t manage to get through to the end, and for a book as short as Slow Man, it says rather a lot that I didn\u0026rsquo;t. The character of Elizabeth is irritating in the extreme; her presence, quite baffling. In the end I found myself put off by the combination of these two factors and moved on to other things. Perhaps those interested more in writing than reading will find more to earn from reading this book, but for myself it was off-putting.\nWhat began as an intriguing, well-styled look at such everyday relations was completely spoiled by this aggravating and unexplained intrusion. I can only assume it was all something I didn\u0026rsquo;t understand, else Coetzee\u0026rsquo;s acclaim stems from his other works.\n“City of the Beasts” by Isabel Allende City of Beasts\nCity of Beasts\nMoving on up from Coetzee should\u0026rsquo;ve been easy, but unfortunately I made a mistake with this work from Isabel Allende. Another author I\u0026rsquo;d never previously got around to reading, I picked this book up on a whim from the library shelves, and took it as being a \u0026lsquo;dead cert\u0026rsquo; after the disappointments of Slow Man. What I hadn\u0026rsquo;t realised however (and what wasn\u0026rsquo;t particularly clear from the cover—a fact a lot of Amazon reviewers also agreed with), was that City of the Beasts is a book for young adults.\nSuch as it was, I actually got through a fair few chapters before giving up, which may be a good sign at least as far as recommending this book to the intended age group. The subject matter is probably sufficiently interesting, the sense of adventure reasonably acute, and the writing free-flowing and inviting enough to appeal to children of the right age. Of course the main character is a child, and the other main protagonists are suitably bland figures lacking in much depth that is probably well-suited to a younger mind. There was no way I could stomach forcing myself through to the end, however. I\u0026rsquo;m still very much of the opinion, as the wonderful and very sadly missed Linda Smith remarked, that adults who wish to \u0026lsquo;read\u0026rsquo; books like Harry Potter in public should at least have the decency or common sense to disguise it with something more appropriate like pornography. ((YouTube links to Linda Smith\u0026rsquo;s Room 101 possibly available here: 1 , 2 , 3 .)) Not that there\u0026rsquo;s anything wrong with children of the right age reading it, but I honestly fail to see the appeal or sense in reading trivialities, largely no doubt on the basis that it is popular, when there\u0026rsquo;s such a wealth out there to choose from.\nWhether City of the Beasts really lives up to such expectations then, you\u0026rsquo;ll have to find out elsewhere. But for me this was just another sad disappointment in a month of poor reads.\n“White Teeth” by Zadie Smith White Teeth\nWhite Teeth\nFortunately, this month of bad picks was finally rescued by Zadie Smith\u0026rsquo;s surprisingly excellent first novel. I\u0026rsquo;d originally intended to read this book on the recommendation of a friend almost ten years ago, and it was just by chance that I finally got around to picking it up now. After the thorough disappointment of the previous books, I suppose anything with half a plot and a few interesting characters would have sufficed, but White Teeth lived up to its reputation as the award-winning bestseller it is advertised as.\nThe book follows the tribulations of a handful of families thrown together in the London melting pot, taking snippets out of their lives as the decades roll by. Described by some as a \u0026lsquo;serious comic novel\u0026rsquo;, Smith certainly approaches her subject in a light-hearted manner, weaving plenty of humourous little moments into what is otherwise a fairly serious look at the issues of multiculturalism in late-twentieth century Britain. Despite the large cast of characters, the different generations and jumps back and forth in time, Smith does a good job of keeping the reader aware of what\u0026rsquo;s going on, and it never felt unnecessarily confusing or convoluted. There are occasional threads in the story that appear to have little meaning or significance in the overall plot, and could have been left out to save a few pages, but the writing is so attractive that it didn\u0026rsquo;t detract from the overall goal.\nWhether White Teeth would have come so highly acclaimed had it not been published when it was, however, is another matter entirely. Although perfectly readable, and highly entertaining, the book is not without its fair share of problems. The novel is built upon the strength of its characters, and Smith has what has elsewhere been described as a Dickensian tendency to deliver a rich array of supporting players, each of them individual, each as important as a major character. Whilst it was clear to see where the adjective had sprung from, Smith\u0026rsquo;s minor characters don\u0026rsquo;t quite have that sublime combination of simplicity and depth of Dickens, yet worse is the fact that some of her major characters felt rather more wooden than these throwaway roles. Smith\u0026rsquo;s guiding light, however, is not a man like Dickens but rather Salman Rushdie. The few references thrown in along the way are only the more glaring hints that it is this style which Smith is trying to emulate. White Teeth appeals at heart as a contrastive and comparative look at dealing with the gray areas of multiculturalism, from different perspectives and different generations, yet there are clear signs that Smith was attempting to turn the novel into an epic along the lines of Midnight\u0026rsquo;s Children, spanning more generations and decades, entwining key historical events. The only thing really missing was the magic realism of Rushdie. Yet where others have lambasted the mimicry, I rather enjoyed the similarity, because Smith is far from being just a mockingbird, and her own unique voice was a pleasure to read.\nFor a first novel, White Teeth certainly illustrates a lot of promise and potential in Smith\u0026rsquo;s writing. Many complained that the book did not deserve the praise it received, and they certainly are justified in pointing out certain problems in the overall picture. But personally, I found any complaints I had were niggling and temporary, and thoroughly enjoyed the style, the characters and message of this debut novel. I only need wait and see now whether it takes me another decade to pick up another Zadie Smith or not.\n“Murray Walker: Unless I\u0026rsquo;m Very Much Mistaken” by Murray Walker Murray Walker\nUnless I\u0026rsquo;m Very Much Mistaken: Murray Walker\nNormally I wouldn\u0026rsquo;t review an autobiographical work such as this, let alone read one. I have little patience for most self-eulogies, but occasionally I find myself tempted, and for a man like Murray Walker, I gladly make an exception.\nI should perhaps first make clear that I\u0026rsquo;m not the greatest motor racing fan. Particularly when I was younger, I was perhaps aware that it went on, and would occasionally make a mental note of the results when such would appear on the news, but this was usually limited to a few races a year, and I don\u0026rsquo;t believe I ever actually sat down to watch a race. Yet I was nevertheless aware of this man\u0026rsquo;s presence. He really was the Voice of Formula 1 like no man perhaps ever again shall be. With British television being as it was, sports coverage was for many years dominated by the BBC. As the independent stations began to take a keen interest, and of course the cable and satellite subscription services became popular, after some competitive bargaining the BBC was left with scant coverage of generally fairly lesser ranking events for some years. Formula 1 moved over to ITV, but unlike in pretty much every other instance, at least that springs to mind, that voice of commentary went with it!\nAnd that\u0026rsquo;s pretty much where I came into F1 racing I think. For whatever reason, with the move to ITV I finally found myself taking the time on a Sunday afternoon to put my feet up and watch the coverage from wherever the event happened to be. That might have principally been down to the terrible television signal we had for the BBC stations at that time. Either way, it\u0026rsquo;s testament to the man\u0026rsquo;s presence that perhaps without really knowing his name or who he was, I knew Murray Walker\u0026rsquo;s voice like I knew my own father\u0026rsquo;s. Whoever was in the run, wherever the action took place, the scene wouldn\u0026rsquo;t be complete without his commentary.\nFormula 1 is a sport that virtually cannot exist without commentary. If you\u0026rsquo;ve ever watched a race with the sound off, you\u0026rsquo;ll perhaps understand what I mean. Since the action doesn\u0026rsquo;t always happen in front of your eyes, and the nature of the race means that the full stretch of track can have important events happening at once, motor racing does at times seem singularly unsuited as a spectator sport. Perhaps the reason why the Americans took to the circular track form to make it more spectator-friendly. With cars pitting, crashing, overtaking and lapping, the order can get very confusing, very quickly, till the viewer has hardly more clue about who\u0026rsquo;s leading the race as a boxing fan knows who\u0026rsquo;s winning a fight on points.\nWhich is where Murray Walker seemed perfectly made for his job. As a motor racing enthusiast and son of a fairly successful motorcycle racer, he had the opportunity early in life to take up the commentator\u0026rsquo;s microphone. From humble beginnings blossomed a long-standing career, as private passion first accompanied then replaced his regular work in advertising. And what a fortune for those of us on the receiving end. His genuine enthusiasm for the sport turned Formula 1 seasons into thrilling epics akin to gladiatorial fights. When something happened on the track, you\u0026rsquo;d know instantly just how important that was, and what that meant for the race and the championship. Throwing in some extra tidbits of information from races and seasons past, even the relatively quiet moments of a Grand Prix would be filled with something informative, an important accessory in a sport in which for large periods of time, the casual observer could be forgiven for thinking that nothing of any import was happening. When someone at the back of the field was making progress, you\u0026rsquo;d hear; when someone made a pitstop, you\u0026rsquo;d understand what that meant for the ones around him; when someone set the fastest lap, you\u0026rsquo;d know how that compared to previous years or previous fastest laps. All these little hints and titbits made his commentary all the more engaging and informative, but kept the viewer exactly on the button in an otherwise incredibly detailed sport.\nOf course, given such details and the speed with which things happen in motorsport, people make mistakes, and Murray Walker was infamous for them. The very title of his autobiography indicates as much. Whilst some might argue that his \u0026lsquo;Murrayisms\u0026rsquo; detracted from the commentary and were indications that he was losing it towards the end of his career, I couldn\u0026rsquo;t disagree more. There was always something harmless about his gaffs, something comical and endearing, that neither detracted from what he was trying to say (at least most of the time—there were occasions when it was difficult to work out what he was on about) nor interrupted the wonderful flow of enthusiasm he conveyed. A few of his more illustrious Murrayisms are on this blog\u0026rsquo;s Quote Collection —a full list could exhaust a post of itself!\nAfter reading this book, I had originally planned to write a separate post about this wonderful man. However, since I\u0026rsquo;d already decided to write about some of my recent reads, it seemed more appropriate to append it to this post. One final thing that became clear from reading Murray Walker\u0026rsquo;s autobiography was how great a gentleman he really was. So much was fairly clear from his commentary, and I can hardly imagine a harsh word spoken by him about any of the competitors, even when all around him were screaming abuse for one reason or another. When accusation of cheating or unsportsmanship were floating around, Murray would always give the benefit of the doubt, and it\u0026rsquo;s not difficult to see why he was so well liked by his colleagues and associates. Although some of his thoughts and opinions might not be everyone\u0026rsquo;s cup of tea, he was deserved of every accolade he received, and more besides. A true pillar of sport commentary, F1 hasn\u0026rsquo;t been the same without him, and whilst rumours abound about his return with the shift of F1 coverage back to the BBC, I think it would be wrong of him to take any role greater than the one of website commentator already revealed.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/06/02/recent-reads/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Isabel-Allende","RelPermalink":"/tags/isabel-allende/"},{"LinkTitle":"Jm-Coetzee","RelPermalink":"/tags/jm-coetzee/"},{"LinkTitle":"Murray-Walker","RelPermalink":"/tags/murray-walker/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reading","RelPermalink":"/tags/reading/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Stephen-Fry","RelPermalink":"/tags/stephen-fry/"},{"LinkTitle":"Zadie-Smith","RelPermalink":"/tags/zadie-smith/"}],"title":"Recent Reads"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"At least, so you could be forgiven for believing. Taking photos of buses can get you in some trouble these days. Perhaps now the British government would think twice about stepping in to prevent their own tourists from suffering judicial heavy-handedness . Even snapping a bobby in London could land you up to 10 years, under Section 76 of the Counter-Terrorism Act 2008. You can see how important that \u0026ldquo;Counter\u0026rdquo; part in the title was felt to be; if they\u0026rsquo;d left it out you\u0026rsquo;d never be quite sure which way to interpret the act. Fortunately there are still some people willing to stand up for common sense . Nevertheless, the UK government policy seems clear. Whilst UK citizens have to accept being the people most spied upon by their government, the latter is taking every advantage to make sure the cameras only point one way. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/05/08/all-tourists-are-potential-terrorists/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Law","RelPermalink":"/tags/law/"},{"LinkTitle":"Public-Transport","RelPermalink":"/tags/public-transport/"}],"title":"All Tourists are Potential Terrorists"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Left 4 Dead\nFor whatever reason, Valve deemed last weekend to be worthy of celebration, and in addition to offering a welcome discount, offered a free trial for their action-packed zombie fest Left 4 Dead . Never one to pass up on such offers, and having a few friends who\u0026rsquo;d already bought the game, I spent a fair few hours last weekend testing the game out, enough so to have convinced me to actually buy the thing!\nWhilst Left 4 Dead sits firmly in the survival horror genre, it is without a doubt a shooter through and through. Whilst the genre may have its early origins with games like Alone in the Dark , Left 4 Dead is to that what 28 Days Later is to Night of the Living Dead . It\u0026rsquo;s a high-energy bloodbath, which is well and truly the game\u0026rsquo;s essence. Forget setting, plot or character development, the game boils down to an assault course for four, through levels strewn with zombies to some method of escape, with occasional safe points along the way.\nThat might not sound particularly novel, but the game\u0026rsquo;s central tenet is its co-operative side. Whilst there are plenty of games past that have featured zombies in one way or another, none have quite provided the experiences associated with the stereotypical zombie genre. Left 4 Dead clearly owes a lot to the zombie movie, from the opening intro to the closing credit sequences, and the gaming world has been truly aching for such a game. Mods such as Zombie Panic! or Zombie Master filled a gap, but Left 4 Dead has made full use of the Source engine to create a movie experience built for four.\nTeamwork Over the trial weekend I was lucky enough to have had 3 experienced veterans to guide me through the game\u0026rsquo;s four campaigns. Each features the characters making their way through a typical dystopian setting, liberally sprinkled with the living dead, towards some form of rescue. Generally the levels are punctuated by minor set pieces, and an occasional pause whilst something important happens, during which time the characters have to hold their ground as a horde of zombies is thrown at them. Whilst that might sound simple enough, and nothing that a player couldn\u0026rsquo;t manage on his own, without those extra three guns a player would quickly find it difficult if not impossible to withstand the tide of brain eaters.\nIn terms of the teamwork element, Left 4 Dead is quite probably one of the best co-operative gaming experiences to date. Although there are plenty of other games with co-op modes built in, these tend to add nothing to the single player mode save having to find extra weapons and health packs for your companion(s), and you might as well be running around on your own for all the use that the extra players bring. In Left 4 Dead, however, running off on your own will likely soon find you lying under a rugby scrum of zombies all trying to take a memento of your flesh. Players can easily become \u0026lsquo;incapacitated\u0026rsquo; by being trodden down under the weight of too many fiends, or else attacked by one of the few special zombies each equipped with certain abilities. Without another player handy to rescue them, it would soon be lights out.\nInstinct Guns \u0026rsquo;n\u0026rsquo; Ammo\nIf the game owes so much to its shooter heritage and zombie film inspiration, then we can thank Valve that it plays like it should. That is to say, if you\u0026rsquo;ve played other FPS games and seen a zombie film or two, you should know what to expect. The game is peppered with time- and thought-saving features that generally go unnoticed, but which all serve to make the game run so seamlessly. Take the weapons, for example. Each player immediately comes equipped with a pistol with unlimited ammunition, which for anyone who\u0026rsquo;s experienced being reduced to playing an FPS with nothing more effective than the tattoos on your knuckles and harsh language as a means of defending yourself, immediately appeals as a good idea. The player chooses their main weapon from a small selection of the usual suspects arrayed out at each safety point in the campaign (i.e. the beginning of each stage), and ammunition is available in occasional piles scattered throughout the levels, regardless of weapon. Aside from those two guns, players can take one medikit, one grenade and one packet of pills (a temporary health booster), all of which prevents players from stockpiling weapons from their teammates, or having to constantly swap around guns for lack of ammunition.\nThe clever level design is another efficient time-saver. Rather than have players walking around as headless as the zombies they\u0026rsquo;re trying to avoid, the levels are laid out fairly simply and intuitively, each section leading to the next. When there is an occasional set piece, the task is highlighted so that the players know exactly which lever to press, which lift to climb into, or which radio to use. This highlighting feature is also used to show players where their teammates are, by displaying bright blue outlines of the players when they would normally be out of sight behind objects, a really excellent idea that serves to prevent players from getting completely lost and separated from the group, and really comes into its own when a player finds himself incapacitated or smothered by a wall of undead flesh. Without that ghostly blue outline to help find him, a player might as well put his calls for help on hold and enjoy the cheesy lift music.\nMr. Hyde The regular campaign mode, although perhaps the highlight of the game, is only a part of its repertoire. When you\u0026rsquo;re fed up of running through the campaigns as a survivor (of which more later), the option is there to put the boot on the other foot and play as one of the opposing \u0026lsquo;special\u0026rsquo; zombies against a team of survivors. Each of the four zombie types has its own special ability to cause general mayhem and suffering, ranging from the Hunter, a nimble, springy beast that might remind players of the alien mode in Aliens vs. Predator , through to the rarer but more dangerous Tank, a lumbering beast that takes some serious firepower to stop, somewhat resembling the untoward appearances of Mr. Hyde in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen . The way the zombie players spawn in is another nice feature of the game, having them able to see the ghostly outlines of the other zombie players before they choose their spawning location, as well as being able to follow the survivors around, seeing their outlines through walls, thereby being far more able to set up ambushes and the like.\nAlthough an interesting idea, from what I\u0026rsquo;ve seen the mode really doesn\u0026rsquo;t have all that much to endear itself. The zombies, although now perhaps a little more coordinated being human controlled, are still just as easy to spot and kill as when controlled by the AI, with the zombies making the same giveaway noises they normally would: the projectile vomiting Boomer zombie eliciting sounds dreadfully similar to those heard in most British city centres on a Friday night. Added to that are the sadly long spawn times between lives, and the players on the zombie team inevitably end up feeling rather more like spectators than participants. Fortunately the teams are usually swapped at the end of every segment and the two quartets compete as to who can complete the levels with more of their brains unchewed, but it still doesn\u0026rsquo;t add very much to the original co-op mode, and feels rather much a cute novelty than a real gaming mode.\nIn fact, Left 4 Dead at times appeals to the rather more cynical side in me, which suggests that the name for the game really came about when the developers stopped working on the project and moved on to other things. The original four campaigns in their co-op mode are thoroughly enthralling, and the versus mode at least offers some variation on the theme, but playing through the same four segments repeatedly soon gets very tired. Naturally there are different difficulty settings—but which FPS doesn\u0026rsquo;t have one of those—and the so-called \u0026ldquo;AI director\u0026rdquo; does at least ensure that the segments aren\u0026rsquo;t entirely predictable, by changing the locations of health, ammo and special zombies and calling in zombie hordes occasionally. But honestly, whether a horde of zombies appears a third of the way through the level rather than at the half-way stage isn\u0026rsquo;t exactly the most radical alteration worthy of a repeat performance.\nConclusion Fire\nWith the help of a team of experienced zombie fest veterans, I managed to play through the four campaigns in the one evening of the free trial, arguably exhausting a good chunk of the game\u0026rsquo;s playability. And despite that fact, still went out of the way to buy the game. In fact, as ever with Valve, actually parting with my money was a more difficult feat than pre-loading the game and taking advantage of the free trial. Apparently, purchasing from them using a payment method that isn\u0026rsquo;t tied to the country you\u0026rsquo;re in is considered somehow suspicious by Valve, a completely retarded policy if ever I heard one, which I swiftly outmanoeuvred through a bit of remote administering of a computer in another country. This wasn\u0026rsquo;t even the first time I had difficulties paying via Steam, having had accounts locked in the past for using payment methods in ways deemed incompatible with their policies.\nBut I digress. Although I was persuaded enough by the trial (and the discount!) to buy Left 4 Dead, as the package currently stands it really doesn\u0026rsquo;t live up to its regular price tag. The original co-op campaign modes are really well made, and easily one of the best four-player co-op experiences available in an FPS, but with around an hour\u0026rsquo;s playtime for each, the game weighs in extremely short in terms of regular play, replayable though it is. The versus mode on the other hand has its moments, but in general doesn\u0026rsquo;t live up to expectations, and really feels more like a way of distracting four players whilst the other team actually plays through the game.\nWhat Left 4 Dead really does have on its side, however, is Valve\u0026rsquo;s reputation as developers. Their dedication to adding features and fixes long after a game\u0026rsquo;s release is certainly to be factored into the game\u0026rsquo;s longevity. There was recently a new game mode introduced, which I haven\u0026rsquo;t yet had the time to try out, and no doubt there are many other ideas swimming around in their fertile little minds. As with many developers today, Valve\u0026rsquo;s development cycle really has shifted much further beyond the release date than ever before, with Left 4 Dead being a perfect example of a game released in a half-complete state in terms of content, albeit that half being well polished and gruesomely good fun!\nPros Graphics—perhaps not the prettiest graphics around, but still looks very authentic Co-operative mode—grab three friends and have some of the most fun you can have with your clothes on Gameplay—set off a car alarm by mistake, and hear the howls as the entire zombified neighbourhood comes to dine Cons Length—the four main campaigns last perhaps an hour each, and apart from replaying those, there isn\u0026rsquo;t very much extra content Versus mode—more of a gimmick than an extra playable mode And if you came here mistakenly expecting to read something entertaining, here\u0026rsquo;s a saving grace in the form of Yahtzee \u0026rsquo;s wonderful 4 minute Left 4 Dead review.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/05/08/left-4-dead-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Left-4-Dead","RelPermalink":"/tags/left-4-dead/"},{"LinkTitle":"Valve","RelPermalink":"/tags/valve/"}],"title":"Left 4 Dead Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Films","RelPermalink":"/categories/films/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":"This isn\u0026rsquo;t meant to be a list of classic films. In fact, many classics would find it difficult to creep on to this list. These films don\u0026rsquo;t have to have bemusing screenplays, flawless acting, blood-pumping soundtracks, or brilliant cinematography. But they are all linked by that special je ne sais quoi which makes me able to watch them time and time again. That isn\u0026rsquo;t to say there aren\u0026rsquo;t plenty of great movies that share this rather dubious accolade. I could and would watch many of them again, but the experience is always be somewhat diminished from that initial viewing.\nThe films on this list, however, have something special that gives them enduring longevity. It\u0026rsquo;s not the film itself but the film experience that counts. With the intricacies of the plot laid bare, the twists, turns, shocks and surprises all blunted by experience, what\u0026rsquo;s left is whatever ethos the film can conjure up. Which is precisely what some cult classics manage so successfully. Umberto Eco once wrote that \u0026ldquo;Casablanca became a cult movie because it is not one movie. It is \u0026ldquo;movies\u0026rdquo;.\u0026rdquo; ((Umberto Eco, Travels in Hyperreality, (London, 1986), p. 208.)) His point was that the film itself wasn\u0026rsquo;t any particular gem, but it encapsulated what movie-goers expected to see. The lines were famous before they were spoken, perhaps the most famous line of all being the one that wasn\u0026rsquo;t even in it (\u0026ldquo;Play it again, Sam\u0026rdquo;). But films that are able to do that go on to be remembered long after they\u0026rsquo;re made, irrespective of their individual merits and the quality of their cinematography, acting or screenplay.\nThis is simply a list of films that qualify merely on account of springing to mind first when considering what makes a film rewatchable. They\u0026rsquo;re mostly quite mainstream, with a heavy slant on the action side, no doubt in part because drama is a singularly poor trait for repeat value. But they are foremost a very personal example, and I doubt whether others will share even a portion of their number.\nJames Bond series The James Bond Collection\nBond\nThis is of course a complete cheat entry, as there are more films here than in the rest of the list put together. Nevertheless, the series is a perfect representation of what I mean by a film ethos somehow entirely separate from its content. In fact, the film ethos is so far separated from the material, that there is no real storyline threading the films together—one could go as far as to say the films do better being stood in isolation than seen as part of a series. The contradictions are numerous, the plots often bear scant relation to one another, with hardly ever a reference to what went before or what will come after. How else could so many actors have played multiple roles in the series?\nThe Bond films are an encapsulation of fantasy and escapism, the same as their belletrist predecessors. The third Fleming novel, Moonraker, was less well received in comparison to the other Bond outings, primarily because it is set entirely in England, and without the exotic locations that characterise so many of Bond\u0026rsquo;s adventures, the book lost some of its charm. The films endear to precisely those same principles, and would in a sense be incomplete without the clever gadgets, fast cars, racy women, wicked villains and so on. That\u0026rsquo;s not to say that each film is a carbon copy of the others, merely that watching a Bond film is entirely akin to unwrapping a chocolate bar: the experience will be entirely what you expect.\nAlthough the films are not in themselves particularly bad, there is nevertheless plenty to criticise. The plotlines are often genuinely ludicrous, the villains are cardboard cutouts, and Bond himself, despite the change of actors and the seemingly unaged complexion after nearly 60 years of service, is a great ball of clichés. Which is curiously entirely to the series\u0026rsquo; credit. Bond can find himself challenged by a chess Grand Master, a karate world champion, or a marathon race through the desert against a camel, and he will come through looking as though he were about to attend the embassy ball. As Raymond Chandler put it, \u0026ldquo;Bond is what every man would like to be and what every woman would like to have between her sheets.\u0026rdquo; That just about sums up one of the greatest figures in cinema\u0026rsquo;s history.\nIndiana Jones \u0026amp; The Last Crusade Indiana Jones \u0026amp; The Last Crusade\nIndy\nIndiana Jones \u0026amp; The Last Crusade was the film which started this list. One idle Sunday afternoon when I should probably have been mowing grass, revising for exams, or generally doing something vaguely productive, I had a flick through the TV guide and noticed this film was on. Before another thought popped into my head, the TV was on, my feet were up, and a mug of hot tea had magically appeared on the table beside me.\nThis film certainly bears plenty of relation to the previous entry. The most obvious link is that the character of Indiana Jones was modeled to a large extent on that of James Bond. Adequate reason to have \u0026rsquo;the father of Bond\u0026rsquo;, Sean Connery, play Indiana Jones\u0026rsquo; father in this outing. This extra dollop of charisma on top of Harrison Ford\u0026rsquo;s already powerful on-screen presence was probably what made this film the best in the series in my opinion. But the film series in general also shared much in common with its Bond inspiration, including the characteristics of its tough and endearing hero, the exotic locations, evil villains (plundering the Nazi legend for all its worth), and plenty of stunning action sequences, lightly peppered with short comedy elements. Even the formula James Bond intro sequence, that had little if anything to do with the main plot, was incorporated into the series.\nWhilst the film offers nothing truly spectacular in comparison to many other films of the action/adventure category, nevertheless it built upon a successful heritage and represents one of the best in the genre. The story is solid enough that the film doesn\u0026rsquo;t simply feel like a collection of action sequences flimsily strung together, although if we\u0026rsquo;re honest, the film might just as well be described as a visual rollercoaster. John Williams\u0026rsquo; accompanying music provides one of the most recognisable signature tunes, and as I\u0026rsquo;ve mentioned elsewhere on this blog, the ending provides one of the most satisfyingly cheesy farewells in cinematic history.\nDuel Duel\nDuel\nShould you already have pictured what the rest of this list would look like, Duel probably wouldn\u0026rsquo;t have figured among many people\u0026rsquo;s guesses. This low budget and innocuous little film has earned the acclaim of having established Steven Spielberg\u0026rsquo;s career, as the first of three TV movies he produced for Universal Studios.\nQuite how I\u0026rsquo;ve managed to watch this film more than once is rather a surprise to me, given that I think every time I\u0026rsquo;ve noticed the film broadcast it has started at some unreasonably small hour in the morning. Nevertheless, the film has a certain charm about it that makes it so readily watchable. The simplicity of the story—a commuter on a lonely road finds himself harassed to the point of attempted murder by the unknown driver of an articulated truck—nevertheless fills the film\u0026rsquo;s 90 minute runtime nicely. With only one real character, and the open road for most of the filming, watching it is something akin to experiencing the thoughts of a man having a nightmare. The viewer literally is David Mann, murderously pursued by a great hulking truck for no apparent reason, attempting to find some kind of compromise, solution or escape.\nWhilst elsewhere described rather nicely as a cross between a road movie and a monster film, Duel somehow has a satisfying, almost calming effect watching it. Perhaps it\u0026rsquo;s the TV equivalent of staring into a burning fire. Or perhaps it\u0026rsquo;s just a damn good film.\nClue \u0026ldquo;Communism was just a red herring.\u0026rdquo;\nClue\nClue\nIf you\u0026rsquo;ve ever seen Murder by Death and had your hopes disappointed, I should hope Clue would provide adequate remedy. Based on the boardgame Cluedo, the story revolves around a (multiple) murder mystery in a large mansion, with the classic game elements—the weapons, the rooms, the secret passages—rather forcibly woven into the story. Whether you consider it a send-up of the murder mystery genre or a spoof on the boardgame, either way Clue is most definitely a comedy.\nYet the success of the film isn\u0026rsquo;t particularly to do with its story, script or the level of comedy. By themselves, none of these elements would prove much of a boon, although each in its own right is perfectly adequate to the task. The reason Clue works so well, where Murder by Death failed so miserably is through simple, good-natured fun. This combination of a simple plot, a decent screenplay, a little light music refreshment, and some decent acting makes it work, and where it succeeds most of all is in how it engages the viewer. It succeeds in creating a great atmosphere full of light-hearted shenanigans and dry humour. The script is pretty amusing on its own, but the efforts of the cast, and the combination of the music and setting serve to make it thoroughly hilarious. Tim Curry honestly deserves a medal for the energy he put into his performance, easily his best outside of The Rocky Horror Picture Show .\nFor all its merits, the film was rather unsuccessful, though it enjoys a significant cult following. One of the more interesting aspects of the film was its employment of true multiple endings, with only one being shown, dependent on the cinema. Naturally all of the endings are available on the DVD release. Yet it would be interesting to imagine what might have happened had Clue enjoyed more box office success. It\u0026rsquo;s not uncommon for films to feature half-hearted extra endings on the DVD editions these days, though these really tend to be more of a gimmicky extra than anything else.\nUltimately, the proof that Clue works so well as a film is in the rewatching. Despite knowing all the jokes, all the slapstick, every twist and turn, the film is frankly still as funny, cheerful and enjoyable as the first time round. With a few drinks and a few friends, it\u0026rsquo;s a great way to spend an evening!\nTop Gun Top Gun\nTop Gun\n\u0026ldquo;It\u0026rsquo;s too close for missiles. I\u0026rsquo;m switching to guns!\u0026rdquo;\nThis film wouldn\u0026rsquo;t normally make it onto a list of films I like, but it makes it onto this one for the number of times I\u0026rsquo;ve actually been persuaded to watch it. Top Gun is the true blue cheese of cheesy films. Everything about the film reeks of it, Tom Cruise\u0026rsquo;s cocky prodigy pilot character, the sleaziness in wooing the love interest, an emotional death scene, a euphoric victory scene, a smattering of cool high-fives, a bit of intense rivalry with some more macho meatheads, and the usual faceless bad guys. ((The bad MiGs are black, the good Tomcats white, the Russian pilots act like machines behind their tinted visors, the good guys have faces and names.))\nSomehow, though, Top Gun remains watchable despite the oodles of complaints you could make. To the film\u0026rsquo;s credit, the action sequences are pretty decent, and the soundtrack is pure 80s delight, perhaps one of the greatest of the decade, from Hans Zimmerman\u0026rsquo;s glorious theme tune, to the epic sappiness of Berlin\u0026rsquo;s overplayed Take My Breath Away with some great tunes from Kenny Loggins along the way. And on the bad side? Pretty much everything else! The film is formula cliché from start to finish. It runs on a par with the more recent Armageddon , yet for precisely the same reason that that film plumetted, Top Gun remains watchable over two decades on. Perhaps part of that is the pure 80s nostalgia, combined with that cheeky Tom Cruise grin. Or perhaps it\u0026rsquo;s all down to the homoeroticism of the male leads, the meatheaded environment, the infamous beach volleyball scene, and that utterly cringeworthy exchange between Cruise and Kilmer (You can be my wingman any time. / Bullshit! You can be mine). Who can say?\nTop Gun is no thinking man\u0026rsquo;s film, for if you try you\u0026rsquo;ll end up spending the entire time thinking about the film\u0026rsquo;s flaws. That I\u0026rsquo;ve watched part of the film in a language I didn\u0026rsquo;t understand and still somehow felt there was something to enjoy is fair testament to how the film can get by on soundtrack and visuals alone. There should be a warning on the box telling viewers to turn their brains off before watching. But if you can manage it, you\u0026rsquo;ll enjoy this film for being everything a film shouldn\u0026rsquo;t be, and getting away with it!\nDie Hard Die Hard\nDie Hard\n\u0026ldquo;Oh my God, the quarterback is TOAST!\u0026rdquo;\nThis film rightly tops out as my daddy of rewatchables! Die Hard has everything a decent action film needs: a likeable hero, some slick bad guys, thrilling action sequences, a smooth plot, an excellent script, and a director who knows how to put it all together and build up the tension. Of course there are plenty of films that have some or even all of these elements, but Die Hard has that magic that makes the film gel into something greater than its parts.\nIt probably isn\u0026rsquo;t for everyone, and it\u0026rsquo;s another which helps having a few friends round to watch, but the film is otherwise as slick as an oil spill. Alan Rickman is perhaps one of the most likeable bad guys to play against Bruce Willis\u0026rsquo; roguish, quick-thinking cop character. In fact, the actors generally do a good job, in large part helped by the film\u0026rsquo;s script. There are so many witty little one-liners, or classic exchanges, that the film at times borders on comedy. Certainly that means the few moments of tension the film produces are often rather side-lined by the interchange, but perhaps that\u0026rsquo;s precisely why watching this film again almost loses nothing of the first viewing. It\u0026rsquo;s pretty impossible to build tension when you know what\u0026rsquo;s going to happen next, but the dialogue is as enjoyable on a second viewing as it is on the first, if not more so. And nearly every character has his line!\nOf course it\u0026rsquo;s an action film, and that demands a share of fight scenes, shooting and big explosions, but Die Hard\u0026rsquo;s director John McTiernan knows his business, and makes everything fit within a storyline which actually works for a change. It might be a work of pure fiction, but the plot is realistic enough, and importantly it\u0026rsquo;s pretty believable. There are virtually no moments that jar against our concepts of realism, nothing to tear you out of enjoying the film to have to think \u0026ldquo;hold on a moment, that\u0026rsquo;s rubbish\u0026rdquo;. All the while, the film escalates nicely, as hero John McClane goes from dealing with one terrorist, then a bunch of terrorists, right up to having to fob off the FBI single-handed.\nAll in all, Die Hard is a damn entertaining film, which is just so well put together, that it rides top of my list of films worth watching again and again. Yippee-ki-yay!\nThis list is neither complete, nor conclusive. The films listed are merely examples that, for me, fit the description of a rewatchable film. Off the top of my head I could think of several other films that could suit this list: Withnail \u0026amp; I for the sheer hilarity factor and the brilliant performance of Richard E. Grant, Beverly Hills Cop III for memories of when I first watched it, or perhaps The Italian Job (original, naturally) for its classic quotability. And speaking of quotability, why not add Pulp Fiction for good measure. There are many others that I could probably have included, many that I\u0026rsquo;ve watched more often, many that provide better example of the type of film that revels in repeated viewings. None of these films even particularly appeals as one of my favourites; it might even be fair to state that many of my favourites would fail to live up to the remits of this list. That\u0026rsquo;s not because I wouldn\u0026rsquo;t watch them again, and many of them I would, but because they don\u0026rsquo;t have that requisite something to make you want to sit down and watch them time after time.\nSo just what makes a film worthy of this list? Does it need the suavity of Alan Rickman playing the bad guy? A ripping great soundtrack from the likes of Hans Zimmerman and Kenny Loggins? Colleen Camp in a revealing French maid\u0026rsquo;s uniform? All of things help, of course, but they alone aren\u0026rsquo;t what make these films so rewatchable. It would be a lie to say that watching a film a second time can conjure up the same feelings as the first viewing, and it\u0026rsquo;s hard to imagine that watching any film that provoked enjoyment the first time round would fail to produce even some shadow of that former feeling a second time. Nevertheless, the films on this list all have something about them that is more than just about their content, and I wouldn\u0026rsquo;t lightly pass up an opportunity to watch any of them again.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/05/06/the-repeatables/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Clue","RelPermalink":"/tags/clue/"},{"LinkTitle":"Die-Hard","RelPermalink":"/tags/die-hard/"},{"LinkTitle":"Duel","RelPermalink":"/tags/duel/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Indiana-Jones","RelPermalink":"/tags/indiana-jones/"},{"LinkTitle":"James-Bond","RelPermalink":"/tags/james-bond/"},{"LinkTitle":"Top-Gun","RelPermalink":"/tags/top-gun/"}],"title":"The Repeatables"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" Casablanca and Doom\nClassics of their medium, but which will have a harder time in the future?\nIn comparison to a medium like cinema, computer games suffer from a particularly poor level of longevity. The vast majority of films can still happily be viewed today, often in an updated format, though keeping to the original production. That isn\u0026rsquo;t to suggest that films do not become dated, nor that more than just distribution formats are updated in later productions. Only recently I had the privilege of watching a once lost silent Polish film, A Strong Man (Mocny Człowiek ), rediscovered in 1997. As there were no hints as to what musical accompaniment was meant to be played with the film, the DVD was released with a modern ambient style, that took a short while to get used to, but actually fit the film\u0026rsquo;s plot and style rather beautifully. On the whole, however, a film produced fifty years ago can be viewed with much the same clarity today as on the day it was released.\nWith computer games this issue is all too obviously unsolved. Not only do games age, as with any form of media entertainment, but they do so astonishingly quickly. The systems in place to support many of them gradually fade away, the communities surrounding them normally dissipate before too long (if there even is one), and in many cases the hardware and software required to run them simply move on.\nTo compare games to cinema is perhaps unwise, but many of the principle facets remain the same. Older games may not have the same visual complexities of today\u0026rsquo;s successors, nor the scope of their worlds or the detail of their mechanics, but their storylines and gameplay can remain as fresh as ever. A game such as Tetris will never die, on the basis of its blinding simplicity and addictive gameplay - but most importantly thanks to the myriad of rewrites, updates and clones that have kept the game alive to this day. Even the signature theme tune will live on as a classic example of gaming heritage.\nYet for every classic such as Tetris that has survived or been adapted for the modern era, there are simply thousands that have been essentially lost under the rolling wheels of technological advancement. Worst of all is that whilst many games become unplayable as operating systems and hardware develop, and as publishers stop producing them, copyright holders generally maintain their grasp on the games and consign efforts to keep them alive to pirates. This is quite frankly one of the more maddening aspects of computer game development, that golden classics should be consigned to history or piracy, since they cannot legally be made available for free, and cannot be purchased in any store that isn\u0026rsquo;t still anticipating the Millennium bug, is in my eyes simply a crime. All power to the outfits that make their games available after a certain period, or like id software have a policy of releasing their source code for free after a certain period.\nNevertheless, all is not Doom or Gloom . This post was originally inspired when I came across the remake of a classic of the 1980s game Ghostbusters , entirely rewritten for today\u0026rsquo;s machines. No doubt the original is out there somewhere, and playable via one of the many decent emulator programmes available, but trying to acquire and run these things can be a challenging experience. The more popular platforms have well developed, stable emulators with a lot of support, and finding ROMs for these isn\u0026rsquo;t particularly challenging, but for the more obscure platforms and titles, this can still be a frustruting and fruitless search.\nFortunately, some really great work has been done on a number of projects to keep certain niches alive. The ScummVM project has done some excellent work to make a number of classic adventure games playable on today\u0026rsquo;s operating systems. Quite how they\u0026rsquo;ve run into battles with the LucasArts legal team when trying to rescue their back catalogue from the dustbin is beyond me. A number of projects have also arisen around the selection of older id software games, such as Doomsday , which providing an updated game engine for Doom, Heretic and Hexen, helped in large part to id software\u0026rsquo;s laudable policy of releasing the source code (not to mention having the temerity to port many of their games in the first place). With a more general aim, the DOSBox project empowers a great many classics with a new lease of life, although this can be a tricky process, made much easier by the D-Fend Reloaded frontend. As per the recent entanglements with Worms, however, even this can cause some headscratching.\nMy favourite project of this ilk, however, has to be the astoundingly good OpenTTD . The ultimate goal being to create an entirely free re-working of Chris Sawyer\u0026rsquo;s classic Transport Tycoon Deluxe, the project certainly sits on shaky legal ground for attempting to present a copy of the game, but that aside the software is able to utilise the original game\u0026rsquo;s graphics and sounds, and not only recreate the original experience, but also improve upon it. Amongst other merits are the plethora of options, the feature additions which are well within the tone of the game, and of course the brilliantly updated multiplayer options which has given this game a decidedly extended lease of life. I could happily go on raving about this project, but that\u0026rsquo;s probably best left for another post altogether.\nOne might like to believe that the future looks brighter as far as gaming longevity is concerned. Distribution platforms such as Valve\u0026rsquo;s Steam allow games to be \u0026lsquo;published\u0026rsquo; long after the traditional cycle, and has even been in large part responsible for resurrecting some old classics (e.g. Commander Keen ). It may also spur developers to keep their catalogues \u0026lsquo;current\u0026rsquo;, at least as far as running on the latest Microsoft operating system. Nevertheless, the modern computer game has certainly moved far from its humble origins. The classic games of yesteryear that have remained with us on account of their unique simplicity, are mimicked today in the largely plotless gameplay oriented multiplayer games of the Counter-Strike or Unreal Tournament ilk. There are of course more recent and highly successful moves in the direction of more immersive and detailed worlds, and although World of Warcraft alone probably accounts for well more than half of all players of MMORPGs, clearly in terms of gaming attributes the multiplayer aspect has grown to highly significant proportions.\nUltimately then, whilst there are numerous well-intentioned projects out there to attempt to rescue many classic games from the grave, will the future of gaming make that job actually harder rather than easier to achieve? Certainly any multiplayer gaming experience relies to some extent on the quality of the players involved, but setting up a multiplayer game of Doom is probably easier today than it was when it was released, the only thing needed are the players. But for games that rely on servers and a myriad other players cannot really hope to be recreated in the future, in the same way that an old DOS or Amiga game can be rewritten or emulated. In the future, will we be forced to look back upon a game like World of Warcraft as a phenomenon?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/04/21/reliving-an-old-gaming-experience/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Dosbox","RelPermalink":"/tags/dosbox/"},{"LinkTitle":"Freeware","RelPermalink":"/tags/freeware/"},{"LinkTitle":"Open-Source","RelPermalink":"/tags/open-source/"},{"LinkTitle":"Openttd","RelPermalink":"/tags/openttd/"},{"LinkTitle":"Transport-Tycoon","RelPermalink":"/tags/transport-tycoon/"},{"LinkTitle":"Worms","RelPermalink":"/tags/worms/"}],"title":"Reliving an Old Gaming Experience"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"I recently had one of those urges to dig up an old classic and relive some memories when we had a guest over to stay. Worms was one of those games we\u0026rsquo;d both played when it was new and became instantly hooked. Amazing to think that it was released over a decade ago. At the time of its release, most games needed a bit of memory tinkering to work properly, and although I don\u0026rsquo;t remember now whether Worms was one of them, getting the game to run under a modern operating system was similarly tricky. To that end I thought I\u0026rsquo;d write a little guide showing how we managed it.\nBasic tools For simplicity we used D-Fend Reloaded , a handy graphical frontend for DOSBox . This emulates the DOS environment that allows Worms to run exactly as it did when it was released. The installation should be pretty straightforward, simply download and run the latest installer package.\nInstalling the game Depending on your source, the game itself will need to be installed. It may be possible to find this game on abandonware sites, or lurking elsewhere in the tubes, but I\u0026rsquo;ll assume you have the game on CD.\nLaunch D-Fend Reloaded.\nIn the window which pops up, double-click the entry \u0026ldquo;DOSBox DOS\u0026rdquo;. You should be presented with a classic C:\\\u0026gt; DOS prompt.\nEnter the following commands, replacing \u0026ldquo;d:\u0026rdquo; with the drive letter your CD is loaded in:\nmkdir WORMS mount d d:\\ d:\\ install This should run the Worms install programme. Install the game, ensuring to choose C:\\WORMS as the installation target.\nDOSBox\nInstall the game via DOSBox\nSetting up Assuming the previous stage completed successfully, you now only need to set up Worms in D-Fend Reloaded.\nPress F3, or select Add \u0026ndash;\u0026gt; Add with wizard\u0026hellip; In the ensuing guide, select DOSBox if it isn\u0026rsquo;t already highlighted, and click Next. Select the programme to be run (normally .\\VirtualHD\\WORMS\\WORMS.BAT) and optionally the setup programme (this will depend on your version of the game) and click Next. The programme should automatically choose a template that matches your game (either Worms or Worms Plus). If this isn\u0026rsquo;t the case, you can choose one of these templates from under the Use user-defined auto setup template list. Click Next. The next screen simply contains details of the game and how it will be displayed in the D-Fend menu. Alter these if you wish, otherwise click Next. The final screen should list the drives mounted by DOSBox when the game is run. Currently this should only include .\\VirtualHD as the C drive, but we also need to mount the CD. Click Add\u0026hellip; and in the following window change the Type to CD-drive and select the root of your optical drive as the Folder for mounting. The Drive letter should be D and the Label can be WORMS or anything else for that matter. Click Ok. Before closing this wizard, tick the box labelled Open profile editor when wizard closes, and then click Ok. For some reason, the sound is disabled by default, so in this final menu, we need to select Sound and then tick the box Activate sound. Click Ok. D-Fend Worms\nWorms listed in D-Fend Reloaded\nPlay There should now be a second entry in the D-Fend menu in addition to DOSBox, which should run the game in virtually all its former glory! We still ran into a few problems with our version, namely that the intro FMV sequence had to be skipped (by pressing S when prompted) and the few little FMV sequences in the game itself ran extremely jerkily, and were better off being by-passed altogether (pressing Escape). More disappointingly, the CD music refused to play, an ingredient sorely missed! Otherwise, the game failed to disappoint any of those expectations heaped upon us by nostalgia.\nWorms Menu Screen\nWorms menu screen\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/04/16/worms-under-dosbox/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Dosbox","RelPermalink":"/tags/dosbox/"},{"LinkTitle":"Worms","RelPermalink":"/tags/worms/"}],"title":"Worms under DOSBox"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Longitude\nLongitude is a short tale of an individual from an indistinct background and minimal education, striving to solve one of the most difficult conundrums of his day, through patience, diligence and a monumental attention to detail, combined with the exertions of half a century of labour. The story has plot twists and setbacks, rivals and allies, and if one wishes to stretch the imagination a little, even a villain. And of course, it\u0026rsquo;s all true.\nIn many ways, this book is little out of the ordinary, or at least its subject matter isn\u0026rsquo;t. Over the past few centuries this world has produced many remarkable personages: daring adventurers, shocking geniuses, revolutionary thinkers, and in this instance, plain hard-working pioneers. The age of discovery was perhaps particularly fertile in producing such remarkable characters, and a complete survey of the eighteenth century could easily fill a small library.\nWhich is precisely why Sobel\u0026rsquo;s book is so charming. In a period so active, a society so effervescent with ideas, Sobel has picked one lonely character, and one particular problem, and distilled a story that any layman can pick up and read. Despite the prominent cast of characters, the Isaac Newtons and Edmund Halleys, James Cooks and astronomers royal, the book in its entirety stretches to just 175 pages, and that in a fair spaced typeset. This brevity is precisely the book\u0026rsquo;s strength. The story needs no embellishment, it virtually tells itself, each iteration of John Harrison\u0026rsquo;s timepiece carried its own chapter heading in his life, each page a new development in the search for accurately keeping longitude at sea. Where many other books of this sort ramble on for a few hundred more pages about things entirely unpertinent to the theme, Sobel\u0026rsquo;s Longitude is concise and self-explanatory. What longitude is, how it proved such a problem to calculate, what rival solutions to the problem were being developed, and how John Harrison managed to essentially solve the riddle in one swoop, in a manner completely against the contemporary views of the time, all are clearly outlined and explained in this wonderfully distilled book.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/03/23/longitude/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Dava-Sobel","RelPermalink":"/tags/dava-sobel/"},{"LinkTitle":"John-Harrison","RelPermalink":"/tags/john-harrison/"},{"LinkTitle":"Longitude","RelPermalink":"/tags/longitude/"},{"LinkTitle":"Navigation","RelPermalink":"/tags/navigation/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Longitude"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"After initially solving my database character encoding problems by ignoring the specific strings in the wp-config.php file, I was finally forced to alter the characters in the database during a recent reshuffle. Whilst there are two automated solutions available via plugin, namely g30rg3x \u0026rsquo;s UTF-8 Database Converter and the Modified UTF8 Sanitize Plugin , sadly neither worked in my particular instance, and indeed the former is no longer supported for current versions of WordPress, though reports on the WordPress support forum suggest there should be no issues.\nFortunately, an excellent guide was available on Alex King\u0026rsquo;s blog . For more information and follow-up comments, you should definitely read the full post, but here\u0026rsquo;s a summary of the method that worked for me.\nNote that you should always backup your database before attempting any such conversions. WP-DBManager comes highly recommended.\nIf you have access to phpMyAdmin:\nUse phpMyAdmin to dump the database (this should be in UTF-8 by default). Open the dumped file in Notepad or similar, and save it to ANSI format. In Notepad++ you can find this under \u0026ldquo;Format\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;Convert to ANSI\u0026rdquo;. Open the saved file in your web browser, and then change the character encoding to UTF-8. Copy the contents of the current display, and paste this into a new document in Notepad. Check that any and all references to CREATE TABLE within this file use the character set \u0026lsquo;utf8\u0026rsquo;. If this is not the case, find and replace all references of the previous character set (e.g. from \u0026rsquo;latin1\u0026rsquo; to \u0026lsquo;utf8\u0026rsquo;). Save this new file to yourfilename.sql using UTF-8. If you are moving the database, import the newly changed file into the new database, modify your wp-config.php file and then check your site. If you are changing your database in situ, drop the affected tables (you already backed up, right?), then import the new file and check your site. If you have shell access, you could also try using the script detailed here or here .\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/03/22/playing-with-the-wordpress-database/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Mysql","RelPermalink":"/tags/mysql/"},{"LinkTitle":"Unicode","RelPermalink":"/tags/unicode/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"Playing with the WordPress Database"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"This post is nothing more than the idle musings of a person entirely unqualified to judge upon the vagaries of the German language. Certainly being no linguist, nor even having control over anything stronger than a tiny smattering of Denglish, I can only claim to comment as an outsider looking in, and any resemblance to reality is purely coincidental. ((And yes, the title is a play on that rather more succinct and eloquent survey, The Awful German Language by Mark Twain.)) Regardless, here a couple of thoughts that my contact with German has provoked.\nEnglisch ist dem Deutsch sein Tod The first, probably most obvious, currently ongoing change is the seemingly unceasing influence of English. English is the new lingua franca, and affects many of the world\u0026rsquo;s languages to an extent and intensity perhaps never before felt. The traditional external vectors of word formation, those of \u0026lsquo;borrowing\u0026rsquo; words from neighbours, and likewise the adoption of words for new technologies, have both been largely monopolised by English. Of course, technology is only an umbrella term, which really disguises the actual dominance of the English language in many broad fields. English is the language of computers, of the Internet, of science, of music, of sport, of business, of politics, of entertainment—in summary, the language of globalisation. Irrespective of these other avenues, new technologies in recent decades have been heavily anglophonic in origin, and these very same technologies have created a world in which the geographic boundaries which formerly limited a language\u0026rsquo;s influence have been completely broken down. English now occupies a central position as the most prominent neighbour to a great many of the world\u0026rsquo;s other languages.\nBut the relationship between English and German is a very special one. Part of this, I think, relies on the open willingness of Germans to use English words and phrases in their language. Matt Groening can appear on German television undubbed and unsubtitled, advertising a German TV station, for the simple reason that Pro Sieben \u0026rsquo;s motto is \u0026ldquo;We love to entertain you\u0026rdquo;. English crops up in many different guises and in all manner of unexpected places, and certainly not for the purpose of helping to orientate foreign tourists. In fact, I would actually go as far as to say translations for tourists are not only far less frequent than one might expect, in airports or train stations for example, but are also of much inferior quality. ((Compare the original \u0026ldquo;Bitte verlassen Sie diesen Ort, wie Sie ihn vorzufinden wünschen\u0026rdquo; with the translated \u0026ldquo;Leave please this place as you it to find desires\u0026rdquo; seen in a coach serving Frankfurt Hahn airport.))\nWillingness to import English words for terms or new developments for which German has no equivalent, however, is only one part of the story. There are plenty of cases where English terms are retained despite the clear ability to translate them into German. The RTL quiz show \u0026ldquo;Wer wird Millionär?\u0026rdquo; has an example of this in the use of a \u0026lsquo;fifty:fifty\u0026rsquo; joker; the O2 Flatrate-Weekend package is another example, and these are merely the tip of the iceberg. In fact, much of the time with German product marketing, it becomes unclear whether sentences are English ones with a smattering of German, or German ones with a truckload of English terms thrown in. Occasionally this serves a particular purpose, one not confined to English: bottles of wine, olive oil or Balsamic vinegar are often written in French or Italian, despite their obviously having been produced for German markets (regardless of origin). Perhaps this adds some hint of authenticity, and no doubt does have a psychological effect on the purchasing public, but that authenticity argument only stretches so far. Given the seriousness with which certain English people treat their afternoon tea, it certainly is plausible that selling packets of black tea in Germany under an English-sounding brand name may purport to increase saleability, but English hygiene standards can hardly have been the inspiration for selling \u0026lsquo;Bodylotion\u0026rsquo; can it? This has nothing to do with the retention of English mottos by international companies, ((After all, Audi use their German motto \u0026ldquo;Vorsprung durch Technik\u0026rdquo; in English advertisements just as effectively.)) but is rather the more influenced by the rise of English mottos for firms originating in German-speaking countries.\nAnother reason for the easy import of English words in German has to be the close lingual relations between the two languages. A word like \u0026ldquo;Chat\u0026rdquo; can enter the language and immediately settle down in its role as verb and noun, in all its various forms, without losing touch with its parent. Whether it will eventually undergo spelling reform like previous imports into the language (das Klischee) or not (die Chance) is debateable, but the word does highlight an interesting aspect of some of the words entering German in this current wave. Chatten may now be a German verb too, but it only corresponds (at least for the moment) with one meaning of its English equivalent. Das Handy, however, illustrates a loanword which is already entirely adrift from its parent, possibly deriving from some curious contraction of handset to provide the German word for a mobile.\nEnglish words succeed in replacing their German equivalents through repetition, whether their origin is lazy translation or passionate adoption. Der Fernsprecher has long since been killed by das Telefon, whilst downloaden might ultimately replace herunterladen, but these are only examples from the realms of technology. Could it be that much more fundamental words will feel the encroachment of the hip and fresh English sound? A few weeks past, we heard some youngster remark \u0026ldquo;Wie geht\u0026rsquo;s deiner Sister?\u0026rdquo; in the tram. Such trespassings might sound alarm bells for some, but such is the natural progression of languages. They all show examples of loanwords from their journeys through history, English certainly no least of all. Yet whilst English may not be something new , the extent to which it influences other languages is as perhaps never before felt.\nA separable verb malady In one of my recent reads I came across a wonderful example of a language developing new grammatical constructions, through the repetition of a particular form used for exaggeration whose meaning is gradually eroded until it becomes a necessity. Every schoolchild studying French can tell you that to form a negative, two parts are required and placed either side of the verb: je ne sais pas. But what exactly does the \u0026lsquo;pas\u0026rsquo; convey? It appears that the original meaning of the phrase, in which pas is simply the French word for step, would convey a extra emphasis similar to the English \u0026lsquo;I don\u0026rsquo;t know at all\u0026rsquo;—literally, I don\u0026rsquo;t know a step! With repetition and time, the emphasis was lost and the construction became a necessary one. ((A similar tale can be seen with the word aujourd\u0026rsquo;hui which now means merely \u0026rsquo;today\u0026rsquo; but originates from an emphatic \u0026lsquo;on the day of today\u0026rsquo;. In fact, this word may yet go through another iteration, with the phrase \u0026lsquo;au jour d\u0026rsquo;aujourd\u0026rsquo;hui\u0026rsquo; occasionally being used today—or \u0026lsquo;on the day of the day of today\u0026rsquo;!))\nThese kinds of constructions occur all the time through all the language families. Phrases, words or affixes that are used to add stress or impart extra information can through simple repetition not only lose their effectiveness in conveying that stress, but also become compulsory appendages that serve to convey the original meaning (just as the pas is now required, yet adds nothing that the ne did not already convey in the example above). On the other hand, such additions may also develop into concrete cases or prepositional structures which indeed continue to carry more significant meaning, though this is by no means always the case. Whilst it is easy, however, to spot the development of these forms in the history of a language, the tendencies in our current tongues are seldom so clear, and many changes that might in fact aim along this path ultimately disappear as nothing more than a phase or fashion.\nSo I should with some hesitancy propose that there appears to be another separable verb form in the making. The German word Mal, meaning time (in the sense of an occasion), is used in a wide variety of contexts, but of particular interest is those situations in which the word serves essentially no purpose beyond its own existence. Take this exchange from Das Wunder von Bern as an example:\nChrista: Hast du nicht schon genug, sag mal? Tiburski: Einer geht noch. Sag mal \u0026rsquo;n Satz mit \u0026ldquo;Hamama\u0026rdquo; und \u0026ldquo;Hattata\u0026rdquo;. Christa: Haste denn Geld mit? Tiburski: Hamama \u0026rsquo;ne Fahrradtour gemacht, hattata geregnet.\nThe joke might circle around the curious sounds of everyday speech (\u0026lsquo;hamama\u0026rsquo; for \u0026lsquo;haben wir mal\u0026rsquo;; \u0026lsquo;hattata\u0026rsquo; for \u0026lsquo;hat es da\u0026rsquo;), but it also illustrates the extra use of \u0026lsquo;mal\u0026rsquo; as a filler which adds little to the meaning of the sentence.\nThe \u0026lsquo;mal\u0026rsquo; change affects certain verbs above others, those involving sight perhaps most of all, with \u0026ldquo;mal gucken\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;mal sehen\u0026rdquo; or \u0026ldquo;mal schauen\u0026rdquo; all creeping gradually towards separable verbdom. The \u0026lsquo;mal\u0026rsquo; syllable does not yet occupy entirely regular positions for a separable verb, though it easily might, and it could be a very long time before such a construction came to be regularised and recognised. It is entirely possible that this construction will take on another guise before this time, and it is just as liable to disappear altogether, but the potential is certainly there.\nA living language German is a living language. To state so is almost tautological, but nevertheless a great many of the world\u0026rsquo;s languages lie on the brink . However, to confuse the changes taking place in the German language with the death knell that sounds for so many others, is to misunderstand the influence that Anglizismen have on the German language. In the past, other languages have held dominant relations over their neighbours, such as French held in nineteenth century eastern Europe, and to this day there are words of French origin easily visible in Polish and Russian , for example. But they are nevertheless scant reminder of the influence once held by French, particularly in the upper circles of society. English today doubtless commands a much greater influence than French did, but it is all too easy to suggest that today\u0026rsquo;s influx of English languages into German will have a permanent, besmirching effect. The use of English in German is a natural phenomenon of language, and thus no \u0026rsquo;threat\u0026rsquo; as many perceive it to be . How many of the words used today in German will remain and become part of the regular vocabulary is anyone\u0026rsquo;s guess. It is naturally quite likely that the words that have entered as a result of technological and scientific progress will remain, whilst others which temporarily replace or complement regular German expressions may have a seasonal fair, but it is more than likely that the longer the words are used in German, the better integrated they should become.\nIt is thus extremely difficult to understand the position of those who consider German to be under direct threat from the encroaching Englishisms. A language perishes through the failure of people to speak it, not from the influx of foreign words. In the British Isles alone, the death of Cornish and Manx and the demise of Irish all indicate that a language comes under threat when for political, social, and principally for economic reasons people chose to rear their children speaking another language in preference to their own. This is more easily seen in the case of migrants, and German history displays some excellent examples, the massive influx of Polish workers into the Ruhr in the nineteenth century being just one. It will be interesting, meanwhile, to see the future of the Turkish language in Germany .\nWhilst I am of the opinion that fear of lingual change is completely unwarranted, given that languages will change according to the will and the minds of the people that speak them, there are however some unfortunate side-effects to change. None of us carries with us the exact lingual tools of our neighbours, each of us builds his own kit out of the various words, constructions and forms we encounter. These are of course a product of our times, and the older generation will always despair at what they perceive as the breakdown and corruption of their language. Yet perhaps they are at times justified, when that language is essentially displaced in ways entirely unexpected and unrequired. English may be used in German because it describes something new, or because it is snappier, or simply because it sounds \u0026lsquo;cool\u0026rsquo;. It may be used for accuracy, or it may be used simply to appeal to youth. But when it is used to be directed at the whole population, many of whom haven\u0026rsquo;t the slightest inkling about English, then one has to ask oneself whether the changes come because it is the evolution of language, or the manipulation of language. ((Such was the outcry when Deutsche Telekom altered its billing terms.)) As an English speaker wandering German streets, I find it at once amusing to see my own tongue being used to advertise items, mostly unnecessarily, occasionally wholly inappropriately, yet at the same time can understand the irritation of those who cannot understand the encroaching Denglish marketing speak.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/03/16/the-infected-german-language/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/tags/linguistics/"}],"title":"The Infected German Language"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Phantoms in the Brain\nIn Phantoms in the Brain, V. S. Ramachandran has attempted to emulate the forebears he cites in the Preface, who inspired him to write science that is both informative and interesting to the general reading public. In this he has certainly succeeded, his style is highly approachable, and the content not only comprises interesting titbits, but wholly thought-provoking suggestions and analyses. I picked up Phantoms in the Brain on the basis of a recommendation from a friend more involved in the scientific fold than I am, yet found the book to be readily accessible to these with even only a meagre understanding of the way our brains function.\nThe book is for the most part concerned with the fundamental inner workings of the brain revealed to us through curiously specific medical conditions, often brought about by severe physical traumas such as strokes. Some of the findings are, perhaps, fairly well known by now, yet I’ve no doubt that many will still be quite shocking to most readers. However, Ramachandran keeps the presentation of both old and new findings fresh, in his natural inquisitive approach to each individual problem. His curiosity and novel attitude in dealing with many of these strange rarities of medical science at times remind one of the naïve questioning of a young child, who by approaching problems from altogether unexpected angles can come up with profound thoughts and solutions that would not normally strike an adult.\nIn the form of this popular presentation of at times rather technical science, Ramachandran is liberated to explore the themes discussed to the very brink of conjecture. In such a young area as neuroscience, there is no doubt that such speculation is a necessity, in the face of such a formidable lack of experimental evidence, yet the author does an excellent job of keeping the focus on the actual cases available, leaving the more madcap suggestions and ponderings to the footnotes. The relations of his own personal investigations mark the highlight of the book, with a jocular style that only adds an extra gleam to the clearly sparkling prose that Ramachandran uses to relate what he is so clearly very passionate about. Many of the topics covered are extremely precise in scale, and thereby perhaps quite difficult to relate, but by relegating any complicated elaborations to the endnotes, the book remains perfectly readable despite the occasional paragraph gleaming with words of Greek origin. The text is also punctuated with small tests that the reader can try out for themselves, alone or with the aid of a partner, to get some sense of the kind of symptoms under investigation. Whilst these little optical illusions and sensual tricks obviously cannot replicate the bewildering changes that some of Ramachandran’s patients have suffered, they do help to illustrate some of the hidden workings of the brain on a more tangible scale to the everyday reader.\nHowever, these aforementioned endnotes can, as a result of their extensiveness, cause something of a problem, if like myself you’re a reader who checks endnotes as and when they crop up. Not only does that result in a lot of flicking back and forth between the main text and the endnotes, but when doing so to read an endnote that is itself two pages long, it\u0026rsquo;s quite easy to lose thread of the narrative. In addition, since there is no way of telling whether that endnote is merely a citation reference, an entertaining anecdote, or some detailed explanation of the particular brain anatomy under discussion, it does leave one wondering whether a couple of dedicated appendices, along with a set of regular footnotes or endnotes for citations, would not have been preferable.\nWhilst this popular science medium allows Ramachandran plenty of scope for hypothesis and exploration of his topics, I couldn’t help get the impression that his conjectures on occasion got rather more ‘off topic’ than would normally be the case. He himself at times corrected himself whilst taking a tangent that led him into the realms of evolutionary biology, for example, no doubt hearing in his mind the criticism of colleagues and friends working in those particular fields. Yet his similar forays into religious and philosophical areas went rather much more unchecked, and the book could probably have been lightened somewhat, had these more meandering speculations been left out.\nFor my own part, Phantoms in the Brain was an interesting read, highlighting numerous facets about the human brain that are yet to be properly explored. Ramachandran’s writing is entertaining and informative, yet not quite as well distilled as it probably should be. However, it is clear from the experiments and investigations he himself has undertaken, that his mind is extremely sharp, and he is not afraid to test out his theories, nor expound them to the greatest extents of conjecture in this little book. I was personally rather disappointed with his conclusion, in that despite the discoveries laid out in the main part of the book, Ramachandran felt it necessary to expound his own theories of the ‘self’ and share his ideas on qualia. ((Ramachandran, V. S. and Hirstein, W. (1997), “Three laws of qualia; What neurology tells us about the biological functions of consciousness”, Journal of Consciousness Studies, 4:5-6, 429-57.)) Each chapter unveiled another brain process of which we were perhaps previously unaware, each piece pointing to a subconscious that makes up a far more significant part of ourselves than we either realise or, far more importantly, care to admit. Almost as an apology, however, Ramachandran appeared to feel it necessary to reinforce his belief in consciousness, free will, and the self, arguably in spite of the evidence he himself had accrued, ideas which jar with my own personal philosophy.\nIt is perhaps unfair to say that future research will clear up some of the many questions left, since there are only questions left to be answered in this vast area of unexplored scientific territory. Ramachandran’s book offers a glimpse into that vast, uncharted land that does well to follow in the footsteps of those other great pioneers he was hoping to emulate. And he is clearly already on the way to following them outside of the literary field.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/03/09/phantoms-in-the-brain/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Biology","RelPermalink":"/tags/biology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Neuroscience","RelPermalink":"/tags/neuroscience/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science","RelPermalink":"/tags/science/"}],"title":"Phantoms in the Brain"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Pet-Hates","RelPermalink":"/categories/pet-hates/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"Tattoos are a fashion. Whilst I\u0026rsquo;m sure many may feel personally insulted by that statement, it would take a blind man not to see that it is true. But allow me to qualify that statement. The act of tattooing itself is nothing new, and as Ötzi recently proved , is probably an older custom than we once assumed. People have been doing it for millennia, and will continue to do so into the future, but there will always be a significant social layer to its existence. The social dimension of tattoos is an important factor in their prevalence and popularity, as a result they become a part of what we can call \u0026lsquo;fashion\u0026rsquo;. Which is no bad thing—social customs, styles, modes of intercourse, even our language evolves—and the rise of tattoos to their level of prominence today is merely a reflection of a society in natural motion. There may be clashes between old and young generations, between those who dominate society and those who will inherit it, over the acceptability of tattoos, but every generation must go through that process, and in turn the wheel may eventually turn full circle. Tattoos today can make employment in certain instances more difficult, for example, and can bring condescension from that generation which associates inking with particular classes or groups (e.g. the stereotypical trio of bikers, convicts and sailors). But in time those particular stereotypes will fade, those social values will die out, and today\u0026rsquo;s crop of fashionable, tattoo-sporting youngsters will inherit their place and complain about the next generation\u0026rsquo;s taste in bad music and disgraceful fashions.\nSo what exactly do I dislike in this state of affairs?\nPermanence Unlike most of the changes that undergo society, tattoos represent something that is essentially permanent and irrefutable. Whilst hairstyles and clothing fashions can be changed and forgotten, tattoos are for the vast majority of people permanent adornments that will be just as visible in a few decades as the day they were made. As society shifts, we move with it, altering the way we dress, the way we speak and interact, and even the way we shape and manage our bodies, but those inklings will remain as testament to the styles of yesteryear. Well, so what? Some things don\u0026rsquo;t change, why should we regret our past? Quite true, and all power to people who enjoy their body art and are proud of it. But for the rest of us on our journey to the grave, tattoos can and do become the embodiment of regret, a manifestation of our former selves that no longer exists. Countless times I\u0026rsquo;ve heard people remark that they would never get the name of a loved one tattooed on their bodies, the reason of course being that they realise the greater fidelity of a little ink under the skin than our feelings, and the people in our lives. Which quite belies the fact that our feelings are just as likely to change about a swirly pattern or a favoured quote as the love of our lives.\nVery few of us are so singular in purpose that we can lead our lives without change. Although we might fear it, change is a natural part of us, and most of us alter the way we look and the way we live as we tread the stepping stones across life\u0026rsquo;s babbling brook. Tattoos, however, are not so easily washed off in the splashing waters of life, and can be a life-changing pivot in the future, should they not fit in with the people or the lives we choose to lead.\nConformity Tattooing is in many instances an example of conformity. As social animals we conform to the pressures around us, whether they stem from our families, our friends or society in general, and tattoos are no different. It only takes a walk down the street on a hot summer\u0026rsquo;s day to see that. Of course tattoos are limited in how and where they can be manifested, and people are inspired to get them for all kinds of reasons and purposes, but looking at the vast majority of body art on display it\u0026rsquo;s very clear to see the limits of that inspiration. I often hear how a tattoo is a \u0026lsquo;self-design\u0026rsquo; or has a very personal meaning. Yet the person telling me this invariably could not fill a matchbox with artistic skills, and the tattoo itself looks like so many other \u0026lsquo;self-designed\u0026rsquo; pieces that actually came off the wall or were created by merging two other designs together. In other cases, the body art fits into one of several other catch-all categories, such as a little butterfly or a flower, a cross or a pretty star, a word written in a language the person can\u0026rsquo;t speak, or a name in a script they can\u0026rsquo;t read. And some people even seem to be going about ticking off each cliché as they add it to their collection.\nIt is terrible easy to ignore the social pressures upon us that shape and mould our lives, and believe that what we are doing is for our own private, personal reasons. Tattooing is no different from any other avenue of life in this regard, and it is easy to see conformity in people, when you\u0026rsquo;re told that the swirly pattern on someone\u0026rsquo;s leg that looks exactly like four other swirly patterns you\u0026rsquo;ve seen that day on various other body parts around town, was personally designed and has a deep, personal significance.\nMistakes Perhaps it is unfair to criticise tattoos on the basis of badly implemented ones, but given the prevalence of mistakes in tattoo art, I stand by this heading. Having a tattoo that is, shall we say, less than perfect, is almost a category all of its own in terms of the most common forms of body art. Whilst it\u0026rsquo;s only to be expected that an uneditable piece of work will contain minor blemishes, it is far from surprising to find a tattoo that is altogether wrong at heart. Whether that is a result of a change in circumstances, or miscommunication between artist and client, this most commonly afflicts those stereotypical written tattoos. Poor translations and bad calligraphy can lead to people being inked with inverted letters, incorrect words or ungrammatical statements, and indeed can occasionally lose all meaning whatsoever. And even tattoo fans as big as David Beckham are not completely immune to making such stereotypical mistakes. Yet other forms of tattoo can be just as liable to mistake, and their permanence leaves many of them plenty of opportunity to evolve from their position as a once cherished act of rebellion or devotion, to a sad reminder of times rather forgotten.\nHypocrisy One thing that particular ires me about many people with tattoos is their attitude to those of us who don\u0026rsquo;t appreciate them. If they wish to adorn or besmirch their bodies, that is up to them and all power to them, but that they then try to take a higher tone over people who find them detestable is unreasonable. \u0026ldquo;You shouldn\u0026rsquo;t judge a book by its cover,\u0026rdquo; I\u0026rsquo;ve often been told by people who feel I\u0026rsquo;m being overly judgemental about their body art. Why are you doodling on it then? Because we\u0026rsquo;re not machines, we\u0026rsquo;re complex biological beings that react on a whole host of stimuli. Whether you like it or not, we do judge one another on the basis of something as ethereal as appearance, we always have and probably always will, and only a real casuist would argue that people who get tattoos are never motivated by this fact. The drive to look more individual, more rebellious, more attractive or simply fashionable plays a large part in many people\u0026rsquo;s decision to get inked, and there should be no surprise that people don\u0026rsquo;t always interpret things the same way.\nOf course this isn\u0026rsquo;t the only example of hypocrisy when it comes to tattoos. The ubiquitous \u0026lsquo;self-design\u0026rsquo; represents another aspect of tattooing that often manifests itself in a form of self-delusion, along with the example of the tattoo which has deep personal meaning, and yet sits on one of those many parts of the body that aren\u0026rsquo;t visible to the owner without the help of a mirror or some serious anatomical reconfiguration! It\u0026rsquo;s often said that we don\u0026rsquo;t realise how much we care for something until it\u0026rsquo;s gone—yet with a \u0026lsquo;personal\u0026rsquo; tattoo in a place that can\u0026rsquo;t be seen, I often find it hard to imagine that its sudden disappearance would cause any reaction, except from those privileged ones who are allowed to see it.\nEye of the beholder My most cogent reason for disliking tattoos, however, is simply that I find them unsightly. Much as many people adorn their bodies with ink to appear more attractive, so I consider the opposite to be true. Certainly, there are some pieces of body art in the world that might make me think twice, some that provoke a thought or turn my eye, but then the same is true of virtually every medium. But these are to the majority of tattoos, what a Constable is to wallpaper. And that to my mind is the most important reason I can have for detesting what others find so wonderful. I hate the fact that they are so casually adorned, that people choose to get them for reasons of social integration, and yet defend their decision with flimsy arguments about \u0026lsquo;deep personal meaning\u0026rsquo; and \u0026lsquo;self-expression\u0026rsquo;, I cannot understand why so many choose to go the same route of having a stereotypical emblem dawdled on their anatomy, or have words written in languages they don\u0026rsquo;t understand emblazened on their bodies. I hate their permanence, and the lack of respect that many have for that permanence (or the cost and pain of undoing such an action), and I hate the blame placed on me for disliking others\u0026rsquo; tattoos. But above all, I hate tattoos because I find them just plain ugly!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/03/06/to-tat-or-not-tattoo/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Tattoos","RelPermalink":"/tags/tattoos/"}],"title":"To tat, or not tattoo"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" Whilst I normally steer clear of this kind of book, I saw it in a local library and thought I\u0026rsquo;d have a look, thinking there might at least be a few useful tips. Unfortunately, I was not only disappointed on the tips front, but in the general presentation of this book. Like a previous viewer, I was left rather perplexed as to exactly who the book is aimed at. The blurb suggests it is designed for people planning to build professional, rather than personal websites, and yet the content never quite seems to match up. At once Lopuck suggests that when providing designs for clients you should delegate to members of your team (also dummies, presumably?) so that the designs reflect different interpretations of the requirements, and a few pages later, something as mundane as copying and pasting images will be covered.\nThe book is so riddled with such strange juxtapositions that it really ends up being of very little use to anyone. Real beginners will be sorely disappointed by many of the chapters, which assume either a background in print design, or that the reader is already a member of a web design team (begging the question, why they should be reading a book purportedly for dummies), or perhaps that the reader already owns software such as Dreamweaver, Fireworks or Photoshop. More experienced readers may find a few useful tips, but I should imagine have already covered the key sections of this book elsewhere, and will only be insulted by the more mundane chapters on the vagaries of web adaptive palettes or font types.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/03/01/web-design-for-dummies/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Web-Design","RelPermalink":"/tags/web-design/"}],"title":"Web Design for Dummies"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Kati Wilhelm\nThe Biathlon World Championship got underway this weekend in Pyeongchang, South Korea, and what an eventful start it\u0026rsquo;s been. The weekend began with the news that three members of the Russian team had been banned following failed drugs tests, two from the women\u0026rsquo;s and one from the men\u0026rsquo;s events, all very strong contenders. In addition, the track had to be entirely covered with artificial snow to make the event even possible, after warm weather had melted all of the natural covering, leading not only to speculation that the later men\u0026rsquo;s event would be even more difficult to undertake, but also complaints from competitors and team managers that the snow covering was unsuitable. As if the problem of snow wasn\u0026rsquo;t sufficient, the track\u0026rsquo;s location near a wind farm was indication enough of the rather difficult atmospheric conditions for shooting, but as the weekend unfolded it became clear that the adverse conditions would only play a supporting role to the actions of the competitors.\nSaturday – Sprint Women\u0026rsquo;s 7.5km Sprint On Saturday, the Women\u0026rsquo;s 7.5km Sprint set the ball rolling. As expected, the absence of the Russians Ekaterina Iourieva and Albina Akhatova left more space at the top for the other teams, an opportunity firmly grasped by the German squad. The poor condition of the snow saw a number of small accidents on the course, although the winds were not as great a factor as they were to be on the following day. Kati Wilhelm claimed victory over teammate Simone Hauswald, who pulled out an excellent performance on this semi-home fixture, being half-Korean herself, though she admitted after the race that she would need to ask her mother for the Korean for \u0026lsquo;silver\u0026rsquo;. Two of the remaining Russian biathletes, Olga Zaitseva and Anna Boulygina, arrived third and fourth respectively, with all in the top four hitting all ten targets. Belarus\u0026rsquo; Darya Domracheva, who was perhaps one of the favourites before the race, placed a surprisingly poor 53rd, having missed a total of 6 targets.\nPOS BIB NAME NAT. SHOOTING T RESULT 1 87 y WILHELM Kati GER 0+0 0 21:11.1 0.0 2 22 HAUSWALD Simone GER 0+0 0 21:21.0 +9.9 3 11 ZAITSEVA Olga RUS 0+0 0 21:38.2 +27.1 4 49 BOULYGINA Anna RUS 0+0 0 22:04.4 +53.3 5 90 JONSSON Helena SWE 1+0 1 22:05.8 +54.7 6 58 HENKEL Andrea GER 1+1 2 22:06.1 +55.0 7 19 KUZMINA Anastasiya SVK 0+1 1 22:18.4 +1:07.3 8 99 NEUNER Magdalena GER 2+1 3 22:19.6 +1:08.5 9 103 NAZAROVA Olga BLR 0+1 1 22:37.4 +1:26.3 10 59 BAILLY Sandrine FRA 1+0 1 22:38.1 +1:27.0 Complete results available here .\nMen\u0026rsquo;s 10km Sprint Although the event took place in the later evening, and the corresponding drop in temperature allayed fears about the melting snow, the conditions remained challenging for the Men\u0026rsquo;s 10km Sprint. The Brit Lee-Steve Jackson unfortunately provided some early comic relief, slipping fully on the snow and breaking his rifle. His troubles were only compounded by being unable to find the team\u0026rsquo;s replacement rifle. But even some of the strongest competitors found the conditions difficult, with Ivan Tcherezov looking to have injured himself badly in the race, eventually placing 38th. Despite some recent hiccoughs in form, however, it was to be the Norwegians who entirely dominated play. Starting late in the order, first Alexander Os and Halvard Hanevold set the fastest times, before Lars Berger, normally a poor shot, managed to post a time 10 seconds ahead. Unfortunately, the final Norwegian from the starting blocks, Ole Einar Bjørndalen, was to spoil that dream, squeezing an extra second out of the track to claim the gold. Given their recent form, it looked all set for the Norwegians to dominate the pursuit event from their top four places.\nPOS BIB NAME NAT. SHOOTING T RESULT 1 122 BJOERNDALEN Ole Einar NOR 1+1 2 24:16.5 0.0 2 102 BERGER Lars NOR 1+1 2 24:17.7 +1.2 3 86 HANEVOLD Halvard NOR 0+0 0 24:29.0 +12.5 4 83 OS Alexander NOR 1+0 1 24:41.1 +24.6 5 19 TCHOUDOV Maxim RUS 0+0 0 24:45.6 +29.1 6 85 FOURCADE Simon FRA 0+1 1 25:06.6 +50.1 7 43 GREIS Michael GER 1+1 2 25:10.2 +53.7 8 51 EDER Simon AUT 0+1 1 25:15.7 +59.2 9 106 HALLENBARTER Simon SUI 1+0 1 25:28.4 +1:11.9 10 88 MARIC Janez SLO 1+0 1 25:35.5 +1:19.0 Complete results available here .\nSunday – Pursuit Women\u0026rsquo;s 10km Pursuit Before the women started the second day, there was news of another disqualification, this time of the defending champion Andrea Henkel, who bizarrely fired a live round during so called \u0026ldquo;dry training\u0026rdquo; (firing blanks to practice trigger control). Normally this takes place away from the sporting arena, however due to strict gun laws in Korea, the athletes have to practice within the stadium building. Nevertheless, the focus was on the leading figures in the sprint, and in particular Kati Wilhelm after Simone Hauswald made some early shooting mistakes. The winds, however, had picked up overnight, and the more difficult conditions left far more biathletes in the penalty lap than normal. In the end, both Kati Wilhelm and Olga Zaitseva missed 6 shots and were leapfrogged by the Swede Helena Jonsson who missed only 2 targets, and overcame the 55 second deficit from her sprint time. Darya Domracheva also missed only 2 shots, but managed to jump from 53rd to 5th in the pursuit, whilst mention must go to the Frenchwoman Marie Laure Brunet, the only biathlete in the women\u0026rsquo;s event to hit all twenty targets in the pursuit, earning her a similarly impressive ranking of 7th, having started 52nd. Germany\u0026rsquo;s darling Magdalene Neuner proved that whilst the conditions for shooting had considerably deteriorated, despite the overnight snowfall the track could still prove treacherous, skidding out on the final lap and looking to be in considerable pain as she slid over the line in 11th position.\nPOS BIB NAME NAT. SHOOTING T RESULT 1 5 JONSSON Helena SWE 2+0+0+0 2 34:12.3 0.0 2 1y WILHELM Kati GER 1+1+3+1 6 34:30.6 +18.3 3 3 ZAITSEVA Olga RUS 0+3+1+2 6 34:36.4 +24.1 4 23 BOULYGINA Anna FIN 1+0+1+0 2 34:49.2 +36.9 5 53 MÄKÄRÄINEN Kaisa BLR 1+0+1+0 2 34:51.4 +39.1 6 12 DOMRACHEVA Darya GER 0+0+1+1 2 34:59.0 +46.7 7 52 BRUNET Marie Laure FRA 0+0+0+0 0 35:07.2 +54.9 8 43 LEVCHENKOVA Natalia MDA 0+0+1+0 1 35:27.1 +1:14.8 9 19 BERGER Tora NOR 0+0+1+2 3 35:28.2 +1:15.9 10 18 VITKOVA Veronika CZE 1+0+0+1 2 35:29.1 +1:16.8 Complete results available here .\nMen\u0026rsquo;s 12.5km Pursuit Ole Einar Bjoerndalen\nThe men\u0026rsquo;s event got off to a far more contentious start. On the first corner, less than a minute into the race, leaders Bjørndalen and Berger for some reason skipped through the track markers and took a different route, though arguably not a shortcut, to the rest of the course. Much confusion followed, as a total of ten of the front running biathletes chose this altered route instead of the one marked. Whilst the rules clearly state that a diversion from the track of more than five metres, which results in a benefit in time, should result in disqualification, the race proceeded without intervention, though with many of the teams waiting anxiously for any news of a decision from the judicial body. Ultimately, the Norwegian advantage from the Spring event served as an excellent platform for them to dominate the Pursuit result, with Ole Einar Bjørndalen easing ahead more than 40 seconds over his nearest competitor, Maxim Tchoudov of Russia. The more difficult shooting conditions showed in Lars Berger\u0026rsquo;s tally, as he dropped down to 5th, missing a total of 8 targets, with the year\u0026rsquo;s current leader, Tomasz Sikora of Poland, jumping up to 4th place with some excellent shooting.\nNevertheless, there was still plenty of indecision when the race was over as to how to deal with the ten offending biathletes. Most of the trainers, commentators and biathletes interviewed agreed that those involved were technically liable to be disqualified, but also considered that there had been little if any benefit in taking the wrong route. After some considerable debate, the board decided to penalise all of those culpable with a minute penalty, resulting in Maxim Tchoudov being awarded the gold. The decision came after an official complaint from the Russian team, and it seems clear that this decision was taken to ensure the penalty would affect Bjørndalen\u0026rsquo;s position. Nevertheless, after some delay and further complaints from seven other teams, the penalty was rescinded and the original result was left to stand.\nPOS BIB NAME NAT. SHOOTING T RESULT 1 1 BJOERNDALEN Ole Einar NOR 0+2+0+2 4 31:46.7 0.0 2 5 TCHOUDOV Maxim RUS 0+0+1+2 3 32:28.4 +41.7 3 4 OS Alexander NOR 0+0+2+1 3 32:39.5 +52.8 4 16y SIKORA Tomasz POL 0+0+2+1 3 33:20.1 +1:33.4 5 2 BERGER Lars NOR 2+3+1+2 8 33:39.6 +1:52.9 6 3 HANEVOLD Halvard NOR 0+1+3+1 5 33:53.6 +2:06.9 7 12 DERYZEMLYA Andriy UKR 0+1+2+1 4 33:56.5 +2:09.8 8 18 FOURCADE Martin FRA 0+0+2+2 4 34:07.6 +2:20.9 9 14 ROESCH Michael GER 0+1+2+1 4 34:15.9 +2:29.2 10 6 FOURCADE Simon FRA 2+1+2+1 6 34:18.4 +2:31.7 Complete results available here .\nQuite what repurcussions this decision will have on the rest of the tournament is anyone\u0026rsquo;s guess. Certainly, the danger of a precedent for biathletes to go unpunished for flagrant breaking of the rules is now present, and it will be interesting to see what happens the next time someone is disqualified for stepping outside of the proscribed lines. Yet what I still fail to understand is why this mistake could not have been avoided from the beginning. The course was designed such that the biathletes had to ski over the bridge on every lap, apart from when approaching the shooting stands, which meant they should ski to the left and then under the bridge. The only exception to this, however, was the first lap, when the biathletes were meant to ski to the left of the bridge and then parallel to it, the course being altered thereafter—clearly the cause of such confusion in the first place. Whilst it is unfair to blame the organisers for a lack of snowfall or windy conditions, it is clear that there are other problems which need to be resolved to avoid further besmirching of first time hosts Korea\u0026rsquo;s organisational skills, ahead of their 2014 Winter Olympics bid for Pyongchang.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/02/16/ibu-biathlon-world-championship-under-way/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Biathlon","RelPermalink":"/tags/biathlon/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ibu-World-Championship-2009","RelPermalink":"/tags/ibu-world-championship-2009/"},{"LinkTitle":"Pyongchang","RelPermalink":"/tags/pyongchang/"}],"title":"IBU Biathlon World Championship Under Way"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Our language is constantly evolving. That\u0026rsquo;s almost a tautology for any language that hasn\u0026rsquo;t been officially pronounced dead. Whilst the rate of change often appears virtually imperceptible to us, a quick flick through a dictionary containing word etymologies, or a glance at the literature from bygone centuries soon proves the point. Words arise and mutate, they spontaneously alter their usage and change their position in a sentence, they crop up in unusual scenarios through metaphor, and before long appear to us in an entirely new guise from their original form. Whilst we occasionally borrow words from foreign languages, and typically for the moment derive new words for new technologies, the main source of new words in our language comes from the current stock. Each of us has an inbuilt sense of how words should be used and formed, and through repetition and popularity, a new word (or an old one with new stripes) can worm its way into one of those revered tomes we like to call dictionaries.\nBut just what is that makes a word worthy of that rubber stamp of approval? Most of us use words in our everyday speech which would not appear in a dictionary, be they so-called slang terms, or simply words of our own fabrication that follow those deeply ingrained rules of our language. Taking a new term such as the name of the website Google provides as an example, it is not uncommon to hear people who use \u0026ldquo;google\u0026rdquo; as a verb, and nor do we require an extra lesson in English to know that the past tense of the verb is \u0026ldquo;googled\u0026rdquo;, that the particle is \u0026ldquo;googling\u0026rdquo;, that a person who googles would be a \u0026ldquo;googler\u0026rdquo; etc. No one will be sent running for a dictionary to work out what any of those terms mean, but the previous sentence is nevertheless littered with wavy red lines in my browser. Of course this is only one example, and perhaps one that will ultimately make its way into the major dictionaries, but how many such examples would litter our spoken language?\nOf course, our spoken language alters in different ways than just the formation and reimplementation of words. Our way of speaking shifts, sometimes drastically, such that given enough time and relative isolation, two strong dialects can diverge into two mutually unintelligible languages. It seems difficult to imagine how such a shift can occur in our way of speaking, such that in one swoop words like the German drei and the English three could become so radically different in sound (or even, to take a word that altered at both extremes, the German Dieb and the English thief). Yet would it be such a surprise if we found that the soft \u0026rsquo;th\u0026rsquo; sound was replaced in certain parts of the anglophone world with a \u0026lsquo;f\u0026rsquo;? That is to say, would firty-free feories really be so unimaginable, or even unintelligible? But it would appear that the speed and extent to which linguistic change occurs has been retarded by the mass spread of literacy and new technology. The latter has made the world a much smaller place, and broken down the normal geographical confines of our languages. Isolation is now no longer as simple as settling in the next valley, or the next island, or even on another continent, and the normal understanding we have of borrowing words from neighbouring languages is in many languages overruled by other concerns. In the former case, however, the written word provides a stone framework upon which many of us develop our spoken language, even if this written form does not do a particularly good job of representing our language .\nBut perhaps we are coming across a period of acceleration, once again. We are all, of course, authors of spoken language and to such an extent we all contribute to the way in which our spoken language alters. Though these changes are usually very gradual, they are certainly noticeable, as when comparing English to its nearest linguistic relatives, or even simply pondering the origin of the variety of sounds that remain petrified in a single written form such as \u0026lsquo;ough\u0026rsquo; (e.g. through, though, bough, lough, enough). Yet where previously, the spread of technology and literacy had a halting effect on the rate of change, today\u0026rsquo;s technologies are empowering more people to become authors of all kinds of \u0026lsquo;written\u0026rsquo; content, through email, SMS, social networking, blogging, twittering and so on. Unlike the written material of the past, so often carefully proof-read to conform to all the prescribed rules, or private, written correspondence that would have very few readers, today\u0026rsquo;s authors are both carefree and numerous, and their recipients likewise. The number of txt messages sent on a daily basis is frankly staggering, and whilst they represent a particular niche form of the written word, there is plenty of other published material to add to that tally, which comes from ordinary minds processing the English language as they see fit, without proofreaders or editors watching over their shoulders.\nTo some extent it is largely too soon to tell quite what the effect of this rapid expansion in people\u0026rsquo;s written output will be. The rules of language are descriptions of the way in which we use it, just as a dictionary records the words as they are used in a language, rather than prescribing the way words must be used. As our language changes, so must the rules move to accommodate it. And these rules will not be created by some small ivory tower institution, but will develop piecemeal through official and unofficial custom. Take Birmingham City Council \u0026rsquo;s recent decision to remove apostrophes from place names, for example, a slightly detracted but certainly not wholly unrelated manoeuvre to Bournemouth Council \u0026rsquo;s move late last year to prohibit the use of certain Latin terms.\nSo back to where we started then—how much attention do you pay to the squiggly red line? Typos aside, would you stop and reconsider, and use another word you know to exist? Or do you allow yourself to create freely, hang all the rules? And how far do you consider yourself to be author, not only of the words, but of the \u0026lsquo;rules\u0026rsquo; of our language?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/02/12/beware-the-squiggly-red-line/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Words","RelPermalink":"/tags/words/"}],"title":"Beware the Squiggly Red Line"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"After spending time this last month trying to sort out the increasingly lengthy drafts list on this blog, I\u0026rsquo;ve come to the conclusion that some things will just never be ready, and trying to chisel readable posts out of the draft mountain only produces a mountain of chiselled drafts. Unfortunately they\u0026rsquo;ll have to remain unfinished, as this January will see me moving to Germany, and I don\u0026rsquo;t expect there to be much opportunity for keeping this blog updated, at least initially. On the other hand, I\u0026rsquo;ll be making more time for writing with good old-fashioned pen and ink, and I\u0026rsquo;ve no doubt there\u0026rsquo;ll be plenty in the Bundesrepublik to spark my appetite.\nOn a more serious note, I\u0026rsquo;d just like to comment on the rather sad news that Noah Grey \u0026rsquo;s blog is now closed. As there doesn\u0026rsquo;t seem to be anywhere more pertinent, I may as well use this post to pay my respects to Noah and wish him all the best for the future. The Web is palpably missing some real creativity and inspiration.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2009/01/02/in-store-for-the-new-year/","tags":[],"title":"In Store for the New Year"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"Thought I\u0026rsquo;d post this little selection, sadly missing from its original home , before it gets lost in that tangled salad of Internet pipes. Also an excuse to try out WordPress\u0026rsquo; gallery function without putting any effort whatsoever into creating pretty pictures.\nReproduced entirely without permission.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/12/30/zoo-of-untrue/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cartoon","RelPermalink":"/tags/cartoon/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/tags/humour/"}],"title":"Zoo of Untrue"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"With the latest 2.7 release barely out of the door, the WordPress team are already looking to set out the roadmap for 2.8 . The recent update had an impressive mix of tweaks, fixes, features and a nice interface overhaul, and their little survey has a list of tasks to prioritise for the next release. Unfortunately, however, the one thing I should really like to see doesn\u0026rsquo;t make an appearance, that being some simpler ways to create a multilingual blog built into the core. At the moment there are a number of plugins out there that offer to do just that, and whilst they may do exactly as they say on the tin, the potential for a plugin to become outdated and fall behind the current WordPress release could create a lot of work sometime in the future, not to mention the fact that each plugin goes about creating a multilingual environment in its own unique way. Whilst I\u0026rsquo;m not alone in calling for at least some standardised framework, I can\u0026rsquo;t see any progress being made in the near future.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/12/25/wordpress-2.8-roadmap/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"WordPress 2.8 Roadmap"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Power Grid Power Grid is a simple, business game for two to six players, in which participants compete to buy power plants, the fuels to run them, and then build networks to sell their generated electricity over. In turn, the profits from electricity sales are used to build newer, improved plants, supplying more electricity, stockpile resources, earning greater profits, with a winner eventually determined on who supplies the most consumers.\nThe gaming elements are simple enough that the rule booklet, which is clearly written, can be read through and understood virtually in its entirety immediately before play. Each turn of the game runs through four phases. Firstly, power plants are bought at auction, each player proffering an available plant in turn, with the plant going to the highest bidder. Purchased plants are replaced from a visible \u0026lsquo;futures market\u0026rsquo;, allowing players to plan ahead with their bids. The second stage involves buying raw materials from the market. Each plant produces energy from one of five sources: coal, oil, garbage, nuclear or renewable. The latter plants require no raw materials at all and are oft hardest fought over at auction. The other fuels become increasingly expensive as supply dwindles, forcing players to either diversify their sources, or stockpile for future shortages. The third phase has players building an electricity network to supply power to their consumers. The network costs are based on proximity, and as players can only initially build in unoccupied cities, good initial placement can be a crucial factor. The final phase of the game is called the \u0026lsquo;bureaucracy\u0026rsquo; phase, dealing with the supply of electricity (and thus generating profits), and various bits of setup to keep the game flowing.\nFar and away the most crucial and successful element in the game\u0026rsquo;s mechanics is the turn order. Players in a leading position are essentially penalised in every phase of the game, enabling players who are lagging behind to catch up. Going first means having more competition during the power plant auction phase (since you may only buy one power plant each round, other players may bid on your choice, but you may not bid on theirs), and then the turn order is reversed for the following two phases, meaning buying raw materials last (generally more expensive) and building the electricity network last (also potentially more expensive). A final \u0026lsquo;cap\u0026rsquo; on players\u0026rsquo; advance is the increasingly poor return on electricity sales, the more consumers are supplied, so that the player with the network twice as large as anyone else may only receive an extra sixty percent of earnings over the others if he is able to power it all.\nOf course, this turn order isn\u0026rsquo;t decided by human invention but by the game\u0026rsquo;s mechanics, meaning that it can (and should) be manipulated by the players to avoid having to be in pole position. Turn order is determined by the size of a player\u0026rsquo;s network, and thereafter on who has the highest rated power plant in the event of a tie, and players often end up deliberately underdeveloping in order to stay their hand until a later stage in the game. Whilst some might decry the unrealistic way in which this serves to level the playing field a bit, it does mean that players cannot turn an early advantage into a runaway success quite so easily, simultaneously adding an extra tactical element to the game.\nPower Grid\nThe German Board\nAlthough playable with a minimum of just two players, Power Grid really benefits from bringing extra players to the table. The game comes with a double-sided playing board, with a map of Germany and the USA on either side, with each country being split into regions, with the number of adjoining regions played over corresponding to the number of players. Furthermore, the resources are restocked at a rate relative to the number of players taking part, and other restrictions are made on the power plants market with fewer players present. In these ways, the game attempts to increase competition for games with few players, but these measures cannot hope to replace the competition that can be provided by thinking players. With just two players, every city is open to be built in, there is more chance that specific resources can be monopolised, and the competition in the power plant market is largely negated. With six players, cities can easily be blocked (a maximum of three players can supply electricity to a city, and that only at the latest stage of the game), resources monopolised, power plant competition becomes more vocal, and in general the game becomes much more involving and less like a game of multiplayer patience.\nNevertheless, the game isn\u0026rsquo;t to everyone\u0026rsquo;s liking, and isn\u0026rsquo;t too forgiving on beginners. The rules which allow players doing badly to catch up can often times be manipulated, to such an extent that a player gaining a reasonably early lead who can then artificially maintain a low position will go on to win the game later as long as he times his move right. The key element to the game is the auction stage, which relies on players being aware of what power plants are potentially available, as well as calculating their paper worth against the available resources. Whilst this is a strong central characteristic, it relies on players being able (and willing) to keep track of their finances, and can often be the cause of many a headache, as those carefully laid plans are altered by another player sending the price of coal up. Furthermore, as this isn\u0026rsquo;t an elimination game, players who make an early mistake and find themselves beyond the game\u0026rsquo;s built-in rescue mechanisms will end up going through the motions in last place till the game\u0026rsquo;s conclusion, entirely unable to make up for their earlier mistakes. Whilst not so common when players have a few games under their belt, this unforgiving element can easily put beginners off playing the game again.\nOverall then, Power Grid offers a decent business game that has enough elements to keep the game quite tactical even after several plays. The mechanisms in place to ensure the leading player doesn\u0026rsquo;t run away with it, and the collateral ability of players to manipulate this element, work quite nicely, with the whole ruleset in general feels quite tight and well tested. Unfortunately, that does leave the game to be quite precise on the financial side, forcing players to continually plan ahead and keep up the arithmetic to ensure they\u0026rsquo;re getting the best deals and still have enough money left over to do all they wanted to. With a smaller number of players, the game doesn\u0026rsquo;t force enough competition between the players, and players are unable to directly impact on others (particularly not without detriment to themselves) leaving the game all too often a foregone conclusion well before the end. With more players, the competition increases in a number of areas, and gives players behind in the rankings a chance to at least retard the big players between them. Nevertheless, the final result very rarely comes as a surprise, and in my experience the game always ends on something of a low ebb, checking to see that the player expected to win actually did, with the peak in excitement coming somewhere in the middle. And given the unforgiving nature of the game for beginners, this isn\u0026rsquo;t one that works well when integrating new and experienced players.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/12/20/power-grid/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Power-Grid","RelPermalink":"/tags/power-grid/"}],"title":"Power Grid"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Memes","RelPermalink":"/categories/memes/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":"This is one the larger circulars out there, of a fairly arbitrary list of books to read. The source is a title of the same name that appeared in print, edited by Peter Boxall. It\u0026rsquo;s not a particularly bad selection, and with any such list it would be impossible to please everybody, but I think it is fair to say that the more recent decades were rather over-represented (in particular 70 books from the 2000s, despite the book only being published in 2006). However, the list does make a good starting point, and it\u0026rsquo;s nice to see Miss Rowling\u0026rsquo;s works were conspicuous only by their absence — just such a shame that the price to pay was that of excluding all children\u0026rsquo;s literature.\nAs for getting through the list, I doubt very much if I\u0026rsquo;ll even read 1001 books before I die, let alone fiction books, or the particular ones from this list. However, I have ticked off a few titles already, and no doubt as many of them coincide with titles on my reading list I\u0026rsquo;ll be able to whittle the list down a little further. Titles I\u0026rsquo;ve read to date are in bold.\nLast update: 18th July 2024\n2000s Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro\nSaturday – Ian McEwan\nOn Beauty – Zadie Smith\nSlow Man – J.M. Coetzee\nAdjunct: An Undigest – Peter Manson\nThe Sea – John Banville\nThe Red Queen – Margaret Drabble\nThe Plot Against America – Philip Roth\nThe Master – Colm Tóibín\nVanishing Point – David Markson\nThe Lambs of London – Peter Ackroyd\nDining on Stones – Iain Sinclair\nCloud Atlas – David Mitchell\nDrop City – T. Coraghessan Boyle\nThe Colour – Rose Tremain\nThursbitch – Alan Garner\nThe Light of Day – Graham Swift\nWhat I Loved – Siri Hustvedt\nThe Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time – Mark Haddon\nIslands – Dan Sleigh\nElizabeth Costello – J.M. Coetzee\nLondon Orbital – Iain Sinclair\nFamily Matters – Rohinton Mistry\nFingersmith – Sarah Waters\nThe Double – José Saramago\nEverything is Illuminated – Jonathan Safran Foer\nUnless – Carol Shields\nKafka on the Shore – Haruki Murakami\nThe Story of Lucy Gault – William Trevor\nThat They May Face the Rising Sun – John McGahern\nIn the Forest – Edna O’Brien\nShroud – John Banville\nMiddlesex – Jeffrey Eugenides\nYouth – J.M. Coetzee\nDead Air – Iain Banks\nNowhere Man – Aleksandar Hemon\nThe Book of Illusions – Paul Auster\nGabriel’s Gift – Hanif Kureishi\nAusterlitz – W.G. Sebald\nPlatform – Michael Houellebecq\nSchooling – Heather McGowan\nAtonement – Ian McEwan\nThe Corrections – Jonathan Franzen\nDon’t Move – Margaret Mazzantini\nThe Body Artist – Don DeLillo\nFury – Salman Rushdie\nAt Swim, Two Boys – Jamie O’Neill\nChoke – Chuck Palahniuk\nLife of Pi – Yann Martel\nThe Feast of the Goat – Mario Vargos Llosa\nAn Obedient Father – Akhil Sharma\nThe Devil and Miss Prym – Paulo Coelho\nSpring Flowers, Spring Frost – Ismail Kadare\nWhite Teeth – Zadie Smith\nThe Heart of Redness – Zakes Mda\nUnder the Skin – Michel Faber\nIgnorance – Milan Kundera\nNineteen Seventy Seven – David Peace\nCelestial Harmonies – Péter Esterházy\nCity of God – E.L. Doctorow\nHow the Dead Live – Will Self\nThe Human Stain – Philip Roth\nThe Blind Assassin – Margaret Atwood\nAfter the Quake – Haruki Murakami\nSmall Remedies – Shashi Deshpande\nSuper-Cannes – J.G. Ballard\nHouse of Leaves – Mark Z. Danielewski\nBlonde – Joyce Carol Oates\nPastoralia – George Saunders\n1900s Timbuktu – Paul Auster\nThe Romantics – Pankaj Mishra\nCryptonomicon – Neal Stephenson\nAs If I Am Not There – Slavenka Drakuli?\nEverything You Need – A.L. Kennedy\nFear and Trembling – Amélie Nothomb\nThe Ground Beneath Her Feet – Salman Rushdie\nDisgrace – J.M. Coetzee\nSputnik Sweetheart – Haruki Murakami\nElementary Particles – Michel Houellebecq\nIntimacy – Hanif Kureishi\nAmsterdam – Ian McEwan\nCloudsplitter – Russell Banks\nAll Souls Day – Cees Nooteboom\nThe Talk of the Town – Ardal O’Hanlon\nTipping the Velvet – Sarah Waters\nThe Poisonwood Bible – Barbara Kingsolver\nGlamorama – Bret Easton Ellis\nAnother World – Pat Barker\nThe Hours – Michael Cunningham\nVeronika Decides to Die – Paulo Coelho\nMason \u0026amp; Dixon – Thomas Pynchon\nThe God of Small Things – Arundhati Roy\nMemoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden\nGreat Apes – Will Self\nEnduring Love – Ian McEwan\nUnderworld – Don DeLillo\nJack Maggs – Peter Carey\nThe Life of Insects – Victor Pelevin\nAmerican Pastoral – Philip Roth\nThe Untouchable – John Banville\nSilk – Alessandro Baricco\nCocaine Nights – J.G. Ballard\nHallucinating Foucault – Patricia Duncker\nFugitive Pieces – Anne Michaels\nThe Ghost Road – Pat Barker\nForever a Stranger – Hella Haasse\nInfinite Jest – David Foster Wallace\nThe Clay Machine-Gun – Victor Pelevin\nAlias Grace – Margaret Atwood\nThe Unconsoled – Kazuo Ishiguro\nMorvern Callar – Alan Warner\nThe Information – Martin Amis\nThe Moor’s Last Sigh – Salman Rushdie\nSabbath’s Theater – Philip Roth\nThe Rings of Saturn – W.G. Sebald\nThe Reader – Bernhard Schlink\nA Fine Balance – Rohinton Mistry\nLove’s Work – Gillian Rose\nThe End of the Story – Lydia Davis\nMr. Vertigo – Paul Auster\nThe Folding Star – Alan Hollinghurst\nWhatever – Michel Houellebecq\nLand – Park Kyong-ni\nThe Master of Petersburg – J.M. Coetzee\nThe Wind-Up Bird Chronicle – Haruki Murakami\nPereira Declares: A Testimony – Antonio Tabucchi\nCity Sister Silver – Jàchym Topol\nHow Late It Was, How Late – James Kelman\nCaptain Corelli’s Mandolin – Louis de Bernieres\nFelicia’s Journey – William Trevor\nDisappearance – David Dabydeen\nThe Invention of Curried Sausage – Uwe Timm\nThe Shipping News – E. Annie Proulx\nTrainspotting – Irvine Welsh\nBirdsong – Sebastian Faulks\nLooking for the Possible Dance – A.L. Kennedy\nOperation Shylock – Philip Roth\nComplicity – Iain Banks\nOn Love – Alain de Botton\nWhat a Carve Up! – Jonathan Coe\nA Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth\nThe Stone Diaries – Carol Shields\nThe Virgin Suicides – Jeffrey Eugenides\nThe House of Doctor Dee – Peter Ackroyd\nThe Robber Bride – Margaret Atwood\nThe Emigrants – W.G. Sebald\nThe Secret History – Donna Tartt\nLife is a Caravanserai – Emine Özdamar\nThe Discovery of Heaven – Harry Mulisch\nA Heart So White – Javier Marias\nPossessing the Secret of Joy – Alice Walker\nIndigo – Marina Warner\nThe Crow Road – Iain Banks\nWritten on the Body – Jeanette Winterson\nJazz – Toni Morrison\nThe English Patient – Michael Ondaatje\nSmilla’s Sense of Snow – Peter Høeg\nThe Butcher Boy – Patrick McCabe\nBlack Water – Joyce Carol Oates\nThe Heather Blazing – Colm Tóibín\nAsphodel – H.D. (Hilda Doolittle)\nBlack Dogs – Ian McEwan\nHideous Kinky – Esther Freud\nArcadia – Jim Crace\nWild Swans – Jung Chang\nAmerican Psycho – Bret Easton Ellis\nTime’s Arrow – Martin Amis\nMao II – Don DeLillo\nTypical – Padgett Powell\nRegeneration – Pat Barker\nDownriver – Iain Sinclair\nSeñor Vivo and the Coca Lord – Louis de Bernieres\nWise Children – Angela Carter\nGet Shorty – Elmore Leonard\nAmongst Women – John McGahern\nVineland – Thomas Pynchon\nVertigo – W.G. Sebald\nStone Junction – Jim Dodge\nThe Music of Chance – Paul Auster\nThe Things They Carried – Tim O’Brien\nA Home at the End of the World – Michael Cunningham\nLike Life – Lorrie Moore\nPossession – A.S. Byatt\nThe Buddha of Suburbia – Hanif Kureishi\nThe Midnight Examiner – William Kotzwinkle\nA Disaffection – James Kelman\nSexing the Cherry – Jeanette Winterson\nMoon Palace – Paul Auster\nBilly Bathgate – E.L. Doctorow\nRemains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro\nThe Melancholy of Resistance – László Krasznahorkai\nThe Temple of My Familiar – Alice Walker\nThe Trick is to Keep Breathing – Janice Galloway\nThe History of the Siege of Lisbon – José Saramago\nLike Water for Chocolate – Laura Esquivel\nA Prayer for Owen Meany – John Irving\nLondon Fields – Martin Amis\nThe Book of Evidence – John Banville\nCat’s Eye – Margaret Atwood\nFoucault’s Pendulum – Umberto Eco\nThe Beautiful Room is Empty – Edmund White\nWittgenstein’s Mistress – David Markson\nThe Satanic Verses – Salman Rushdie\nThe Swimming-Pool Library – Alan Hollinghurst\nOscar and Lucinda – Peter Carey\nLibra – Don DeLillo\nThe Player of Games – Iain M. Banks\nNervous Conditions – Tsitsi Dangarembga\nThe Long Dark Teatime of the Soul – Douglas Adams\nDirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency – Douglas Adams\nThe Radiant Way – Margaret Drabble\nThe Afternoon of a Writer – Peter Handke\nThe Black Dahlia – James Ellroy\nThe Passion – Jeanette Winterson\nThe Pigeon – Patrick Süskind\nThe Child in Time – Ian McEwan\nCigarettes – Harry Mathews\nThe Bonfire of the Vanities – Tom Wolfe\nThe New York Trilogy – Paul Auster\nWorld’s End – T. Coraghessan Boyle\nEnigma of Arrival – V.S. Naipaul\nThe Taebek Mountains – Jo Jung-rae\nBeloved – Toni Morrison\nAnagrams – Lorrie Moore\nMatigari – Ngugi Wa Thiong’o\nMarya – Joyce Carol Oates\nWatchmen – Alan Moore \u0026amp; David Gibbons\nThe Old Devils – Kingsley Amis\nLost Language of Cranes – David Leavitt\nAn Artist of the Floating World – Kazuo Ishiguro\nExtinction – Thomas Bernhard\nFoe – J.M. Coetzee\nThe Drowned and the Saved – Primo Levi\nReasons to Live – Amy Hempel\nThe Parable of the Blind – Gert Hofmann\nLove in the Time of Cholera – Gabriel García Márquez\nOranges Are Not the Only Fruit – Jeanette Winterson\nThe Cider House Rules – John Irving\nA Maggot – John Fowles\nLess Than Zero – Bret Easton Ellis\nContact – Carl Sagan\nThe Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood\nPerfume – Patrick Süskind\nOld Masters – Thomas Bernhard\nWhite Noise – Don DeLillo\nQueer – William Burroughs\nHawksmoor – Peter Ackroyd\nLegend – David Gemmell\nDictionary of the Khazars – Milorad Pavi\nThe Bus Conductor Hines – James Kelman\nThe Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis – José Saramago\nThe Lover – Marguerite Duras\nEmpire of the Sun – J.G. Ballard\nThe Wasp Factory – Iain Banks\nNights at the Circus – Angela Carter\nThe Unbearable Lightness of Being – Milan Kundera\nBlood and Guts in High School – Kathy Acker\nNeuromancer – William Gibson\nFlaubert’s Parrot – Julian Barnes\nMoney: A Suicide Note – Martin Amis\nShame – Salman Rushdie\nWorstward Ho – Samuel Beckett\nFools of Fortune – William Trevor\nLa Brava – Elmore Leonard\nWaterland – Graham Swift\nThe Life and Times of Michael K – J.M. Coetzee\nThe Diary of Jane Somers – Doris Lessing\nThe Piano Teacher – Elfriede Jelinek\nThe Sorrow of Belgium – Hugo Claus\nIf Not Now, When? – Primo Levi\nA Boy’s Own Story – Edmund White\nThe Color Purple – Alice Walker\nWittgenstein’s Nephew – Thomas Bernhard\nA Pale View of Hills – Kazuo Ishiguro\nSchindler’s Ark – Thomas Keneally\nThe House of the Spirits – Isabel Allende\nThe Newton Letter – John Banville\nOn the Black Hill – Bruce Chatwin\nConcrete – Thomas Bernhard\nThe Names – Don DeLillo\nRabbit is Rich – John Updike\nLanark: A Life in Four Books – Alasdair Gray\nThe Comfort of Strangers – Ian McEwan\nJuly’s People – Nadine Gordimer\nSummer in Baden-Baden – Leonid Tsypkin\nBroken April – Ismail Kadare\nWaiting for the Barbarians – J.M. Coetzee\nMidnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie\nRites of Passage – William Golding\nRituals – Cees Nooteboom\nConfederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole\nCity Primeval – Elmore Leonard\nThe Name of the Rose – Umberto Eco\nThe Book of Laughter and Forgetting – Milan Kundera\nSmiley’s People – John Le Carré\nShikasta – Doris Lessing\nA Bend in the River – V.S. Naipaul\nBurger’s Daughter - Nadine Gordimer\nThe Safety Net – Heinrich Böll\nIf On a Winter’s Night a Traveler – Italo Calvino\nThe Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams\nThe Cement Garden – Ian McEwan\nThe World According to Garp – John Irving\nLife: A User’s Manual – Georges Perec\nThe Sea, The Sea – Iris Murdoch\nThe Singapore Grip – J.G. Farrell\nYes – Thomas Bernhard\nThe Virgin in the Garden – A.S. Byatt\nIn the Heart of the Country – J.M. Coetzee\nThe Passion of New Eve – Angela Carter\nDelta of Venus – Anaïs Nin\nThe Shining – Stephen King\nDispatches – Michael Herr\nPetals of Blood – Ngugi Wa Thiong’o\nSong of Solomon – Toni Morrison\nThe Hour of the Star – Clarice Lispector\nThe Left-Handed Woman – Peter Handke\nRatner’s Star – Don DeLillo\nThe Public Burning – Robert Coover\nInterview With the Vampire – Anne Rice\nCutter and Bone – Newton Thornburg\nAmateurs – Donald Barthelme\nPatterns of Childhood – Christa Wolf\nAutumn of the Patriarch – Gabriel García Márquez\nW, or the Memory of childhood – Georges Perec\nA Dance to the Music of Time – Anthony Powell\nGrimus – Salman Rushdie\nThe Dead Father – Donald Barthelme\nFateless – Imre Kertész\nWillard and His Bowling Trophies – Richard Brautigan\nHigh Rise – J.G. Ballard\nHumboldt’s Gift – Saul Bellow\nDead Babies – Martin Amis\nCorrection – Thomas Bernhard\nRagtime – E.L. Doctorow\nThe Fan Man – William Kotzwinkle\nDusklands – J.M. Coetzee\nThe Lost Honor of Katharina Blum – Heinrich Böll\nTinker Tailor Soldier Spy – John Le Carré\nBreakfast of Champions – Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.\nFear of Flying – Erica Jong\nA Question of Power – Bessie Head\nThe Siege of Krishnapur – J.G. Farrell\nThe Castle of Crossed Destinies – Italo Calvino\nCrash – J.G. Ballard\nThe Honorary Consul – Graham Greene\nGravity’s Rainbow – Thomas Pynchon\nThe Black Prince – Iris Murdoch\nSula – Toni Morrison\nInvisible Cities – Italo Calvino\nThe Breast – Philip Roth\nThe Summer Book – Tove Jansson\nG – John Berger\nSurfacing – Margaret Atwood\nHouse Mother Normal – B.S. Johnson\nIn A Free State – V.S. Naipaul\nThe Book of Daniel – E.L. Doctorow\nFear and Loathing in Las Vegas – Hunter S. Thompson\nGroup Portrait With Lady – Heinrich Böll\nThe Wild Boys – William Burroughs\nRabbit Redux – John Updike\nThe Sea of Fertility – Yukio Mishima\nThe Driver’s Seat – Muriel Spark\nThe Ogre – Michael Tournier\nThe Bluest Eye – Toni Morrison\nGoalie’s Anxiety at the Penalty Kick – Peter Handke\nI Know Why the Caged Bird Sings – Maya Angelou\nMercier et Camier – Samuel Beckett\nTroubles – J.G. Farrell\nJahrestage – Uwe Johnson\nThe Atrocity Exhibition – J.G. Ballard\nTent of Miracles – Jorge Amado\nPricksongs and Descants – Robert Coover\nBlind Man With a Pistol – Chester Hines\nSlaughterhouse Five – Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.\nThe French Lieutenant’s Woman – John Fowles\nThe Green Man – Kingsley Amis\nPortnoy’s Complaint – Philip Roth\nThe Godfather – Mario Puzo\nAda – Vladimir Nabokov\nThem – Joyce Carol Oates\nA Void/Avoid – Georges Perec\nEva Trout – Elizabeth Bowen\nMyra Breckinridge – Gore Vidal\nThe Nice and the Good – Iris Murdoch\nBelle du Seigneur – Albert Cohen\nCancer Ward – Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn\nThe First Circle – Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn\n2001: A Space Odyssey – Arthur C. Clarke\nDo Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? – Philip K. Dick\nDark as the Grave Wherein My Friend is Laid – Malcolm Lowry\nThe German Lesson – Siegfried Lenz\nIn Watermelon Sugar – Richard Brautigan\nA Kestrel for a Knave – Barry Hines\nThe Quest for Christa T. – Christa Wolf\nChocky – John Wyndham\nThe Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test – Tom Wolfe\nThe Cubs and Other Stories – Mario Vargas Llosa**\nOne Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Márquez\nThe Master and Margarita – Mikhail Bulgakov**\nPilgrimage – Dorothy Richardson**\nThe Joke – Milan Kundera**\nNo Laughing Matter – Angus Wilson\nThe Third Policeman – Flann O’Brien\nA Man Asleep – Georges Perec\nThe Birds Fall Down – Rebecca West\nTrawl – B.S. Johnson\nIn Cold Blood – Truman Capote\nThe Magus – John Fowles\nThe Vice-Consul – Marguerite Duras\nWide Sargasso Sea – Jean Rhys\nGiles Goat-Boy – John Barth\nThe Crying of Lot 49 – Thomas Pynchon\nThings – Georges Perec\nThe River Between – Ngugi wa Thiong’o\nAugust is a Wicked Month – Edna O’Brien\nGod Bless You, Mr. Rosewater – Kurt Vonnegut\nEverything That Rises Must Converge – Flannery O’Connor\nThe Passion According to G.H. – Clarice Lispector\nSometimes a Great Notion – Ken Kesey\nCome Back, Dr. Caligari – Donald Bartholme\nAlbert Angelo – B.S. Johnson\nArrow of God – Chinua Achebe\nThe Ravishing of Lol V. Stein – Marguerite Duras\nHerzog – Saul Bellow\nV. – Thomas Pynchon\nCat’s Cradle – Kurt Vonnegut\nThe Graduate – Charles Webb\nManon des Sources – Marcel Pagnol\nThe Spy Who Came in from the Cold – John Le Carré\nThe Girls of Slender Means – Muriel Spark\nInside Mr. Enderby – Anthony Burgess\nThe Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath\nOne Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich – Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn\nThe Collector – John Fowles\nOne Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest – Ken Kesey\nA Clockwork Orange – Anthony Burgess\nPale Fire – Vladimir Nabokov\nThe Drowned World – J.G. Ballard\nThe Golden Notebook – Doris Lessing\nLabyrinths – Jorg Luis Borges\nGirl With Green Eyes – Edna O’Brien\nThe Garden of the Finzi-Continis – Giorgio Bassani\nStranger in a Strange Land – Robert Heinlein\nFranny and Zooey – J.D. Salinger\nA Severed Head – Iris Murdoch\nFaces in the Water – Janet Frame\nSolaris – Stanislaw Lem\nCat and Mouse – Günter Grass\nThe Prime of Miss Jean Brodie – Muriel Spark**\nCatch-22 – Joseph Heller**\nThe Violent Bear it Away – Flannery O’Connor\nHow It Is – Samuel Beckett\nOur Ancestors – Italo Calvino\nThe Country Girls – Edna O’Brien**\nTo Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee**\nRabbit, Run – John Updike\nPromise at Dawn – Romain Gary\nCider With Rosie – Laurie Lee\nBilly Liar – Keith Waterhouse\nNaked Lunch – William Burroughs\nThe Tin Drum – Günter Grass\nAbsolute Beginners – Colin MacInnes\nHenderson the Rain King – Saul Bellow\nMemento Mori – Muriel Spark\nBilliards at Half-Past Nine – Heinrich Böll\nBreakfast at Tiffany’s – Truman Capote\nThe Leopard – Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa\nPluck the Bud and Destroy the Offspring – Kenzaburo Oe\nA Town Like Alice – Nevil Shute\nThe Bitter Glass – Eilís Dillon\nThings Fall Apart – Chinua Achebe\nSaturday Night and Sunday Morning – Alan Sillitoe\nMrs. ‘Arris Goes to Paris – Paul Gallico\nBorstal Boy – Brendan Behan\nThe End of the Road – John Barth\nThe Once and Future King – T.H. White\nThe Bell – Iris Murdoch\nJealousy – Alain Robbe-Grillet\nVoss – Patrick White\nThe Midwich Cuckoos – John Wyndham\nBlue Noon – Georges Bataille\nHomo Faber – Max Frisch\nOn the Road – Jack Kerouac\nPnin – Vladimir Nabokov\nDoctor Zhivago – Boris Pasternak\nThe Wonderful “O” – James Thurber\nJustine – Lawrence Durrell\nGiovanni’s Room – James Baldwin\nThe Lonely Londoners – Sam Selvon\nThe Roots of Heaven – Romain Gary\nSeize the Day – Saul Bellow\nThe Floating Opera – John Barth**\nThe Lord of the Rings – J.R.R. Tolkien**\nThe Talented Mr. Ripley – Patricia Highsmith\nLolita – Vladimir Nabokov\nA World of Love – Elizabeth Bowen\nThe Trusting and the Maimed – James Plunkett**\nThe Quiet American – Graham Greene**\nThe Last Temptation of Christ – Nikos Kazantzákis\nThe Recognitions – William Gaddis\nThe Ragazzi – Pier Paulo Pasolini\nBonjour Tristesse – Françoise Sagan\nI’m Not Stiller – Max Frisch\nSelf Condemned – Wyndham Lewis\nThe Story of O – Pauline Réage\nA Ghost at Noon – Alberto Moravia**\nLord of the Flies – William Golding**\nUnder the Net – Iris Murdoch\nThe Go-Between – L.P. Hartley\nThe Long Goodbye – Raymond Chandler\nThe Unnamable – Samuel Beckett\nWatt – Samuel Beckett\nLucky Jim – Kingsley Amis\nJunkie – William Burroughs\nThe Adventures of Augie March – Saul Bellow\nGo Tell It on the Mountain – James Baldwin\nCasino Royale – Ian Fleming\nThe Judge and His Hangman – Friedrich Dürrenmatt\nInvisible Man – Ralph Ellison\nThe Old Man and the Sea – Ernest Hemingway\nWise Blood – Flannery O’Connor\nThe Killer Inside Me – Jim Thompson\nMemoirs of Hadrian – Marguerite Yourcenar\nMalone Dies – Samuel Beckett\nDay of the Triffids – John Wyndham**\nFoundation – Isaac Asimov**\nThe Opposing Shore – Julien Gracq**\nThe Catcher in the Rye – J.D. Salinger**\nThe Rebel – Albert Camus\nMolloy – Samuel Beckett\nThe End of the Affair – Graham Greene\nThe Abbot C – Georges Bataille\nThe Labyrinth of Solitude – Octavio Paz\nThe Third Man – Graham Greene\nThe 13 Clocks – James Thurber\nGormenghast – Mervyn Peake\nThe Grass is Singing – Doris Lessing**\nI, Robot – Isaac Asimov**\nThe Moon and the Bonfires – Cesare Pavese\nThe Garden Where the Brass Band Played – Simon Vestdijk\nLove in a Cold Climate – Nancy Mitford\nThe Case of Comrade Tulayev – Victor Serge\nThe Heat of the Day – Elizabeth Bowen\nKingdom of This World – Alejo Carpentier\nThe Man With the Golden Arm – Nelson Algren**\nNineteen Eighty-Four – George Orwell\nAll About H. Hatterr – G.V. Desani**\nDisobedience – Alberto Moravia\nDeath Sentence – Maurice Blanchot\nThe Heart of the Matter – Graham Greene\nCry, the Beloved Country – Alan Paton\nDoctor Faustus – Thomas Mann\nThe Victim – Saul Bellow\nExercises in Style – Raymond Queneau\nIf This Is a Man – Primo Levi\nUnder the Volcano – Malcolm Lowry\nThe Path to the Nest of Spiders – Italo Calvino\nThe Plague – Albert Camus\nBack – Henry Green\nTitus Groan – Mervyn Peake\nThe Bridge on the Drina – Ivo Andri_ć_\nBrideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh**\nAnimal Farm – George Orwell**\nCannery Row – John Steinbeck\nThe Pursuit of Love – Nancy Mitford\nLoving – Henry Green\nArcanum 17 – André Breton\nChrist Stopped at Eboli – Carlo Levi\nThe Razor’s Edge – William Somerset Maugham\nTransit – Anna Seghers\nFicciones – Jorge Luis Borges\nDangling Man – Saul Bellow\nThe Little Prince – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry\nCaught – Henry Green\nThe Glass Bead Game – Herman Hesse\nEmbers – Sandor Marai\nGo Down, Moses – William Faulkner\nThe Outsider – Albert Camus\nIn Sicily – Elio Vittorini\nThe Poor Mouth – Flann O’Brien\nThe Living and the Dead – Patrick White\nHangover Square – Patrick Hamilton\nBetween the Acts – Virginia Woolf\nThe Hamlet – William Faulkner\nFarewell My Lovely – Raymond Chandler**\nFor Whom the Bell Tolls – Ernest Hemingway**\nNative Son – Richard Wright\nThe Power and the Glory – Graham Greene\nThe Tartar Steppe – Dino Buzzati\nParty Going – Henry Green\nThe Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck\nFinnegans Wake – James Joyce\nAt Swim-Two-Birds – Flann O’Brien**\nComing Up for Air – George Orwell**\nGoodbye to Berlin – Christopher Isherwood\nTropic of Capricorn – Henry Miller\nGood Morning, Midnight – Jean Rhys\nThe Big Sleep – Raymond Chandler\nAfter the Death of Don Juan – Sylvie Townsend Warner\nMiss Pettigrew Lives for a Day – Winifred Watson\nNausea – Jean-Paul Sartre\nRebecca – Daphne du Maurier\nCause for Alarm – Eric Ambler**\nBrighton Rock – Graham Greene**\nU.S.A. – John Dos Passos\nMurphy – Samuel Beckett\nOf Mice and Men – John Steinbeck\nTheir Eyes Were Watching God – Zora Neale Hurston**\nThe Hobbit – J.R.R. Tolkien**\nThe Years – Virginia Woolf\nIn Parenthesis – David Jones\nThe Revenge for Love – Wyndham Lewis\nOut of Africa – Isak Dineson (Karen Blixen)\nTo Have and Have Not – Ernest Hemingway\nSummer Will Show – Sylvia Townsend Warner\nEyeless in Gaza – Aldous Huxley\nThe Thinking Reed – Rebecca West\nGone With the Wind – Margaret Mitchell\nKeep the Aspidistra Flying – George Orwell\nWild Harbour – Ian MacPherson\nAbsalom, Absalom! – William Faulkner\nAt the Mountains of Madness – H.P. Lovecraft\nNightwood – Djuna Barnes\nIndependent People – Halldór Laxness\nAuto-da-Fé – Elias Canetti\nThe Last of Mr. Norris – Christopher Isherwood\nThey Shoot Horses, Don’t They? – Horace McCoy\nThe House in Paris – Elizabeth Bowen\nEngland Made Me – Graham Greene\nBurmese Days – George Orwell\nThe Nine Tailors – Dorothy L. Sayers\nThreepenny Novel – Bertolt Brecht\nNovel With Cocaine – M. Ageyev\nThe Postman Always Rings Twice – James M. Cain\nTropic of Cancer – Henry Miller\nA Handful of Dust – Evelyn Waugh\nTender is the Night – F. Scott Fitzgerald\nThank You, Jeeves – P.G. Wodehouse\nCall it Sleep – Henry Roth\nMiss Lonelyhearts – Nathanael West\nMurder Must Advertise – Dorothy L. Sayers\nThe Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas – Gertrude Stein\nTestament of Youth – Vera Brittain\nA Day Off – Storm Jameson\nThe Man Without Qualities – Robert Musil\nA Scots Quair (Sunset Song) – Lewis Grassic Gibbon\nJourney to the End of the Night – Louis-Ferdinand Céline**\nBrave New World – Aldous Huxley**\nCold Comfort Farm – Stella Gibbons\nTo the North – Elizabeth Bowen\nThe Thin Man – Dashiell Hammett\nThe Radetzky March – Joseph Roth\nThe Waves – Virginia Woolf\nThe Glass Key – Dashiell Hammett\nCakes and Ale – W. Somerset Maugham\nThe Apes of God – Wyndham Lewis\nHer Privates We – Frederic Manning\nVile Bodies – Evelyn Waugh\nThe Maltese Falcon – Dashiell Hammett\nHebdomeros – Giorgio de Chirico\nPassing – Nella Larsen**\nA Farewell to Arms – Ernest Hemingway**\nRed Harvest – Dashiell Hammett\nLiving – Henry Green\nThe Time of Indifference – Alberto Moravia**\nAll Quiet on the Western Front – Erich Maria Remarque**\nBerlin Alexanderplatz – Alfred Döblin\nThe Last September – Elizabeth Bowen\nHarriet Hume – Rebecca West\nThe Sound and the Fury – William Faulkner\nLes Enfants Terribles – Jean Cocteau\nLook Homeward, Angel – Thomas Wolfe\nStory of the Eye – Georges Bataille\nOrlando – Virginia Woolf\nLady Chatterley’s Lover – D.H. Lawrence\nThe Well of Loneliness – Radclyffe Hall\nThe Childermass – Wyndham Lewis\nQuartet – Jean Rhys\nDecline and Fall – Evelyn Waugh\nQuicksand – Nella Larsen\nParade’s End – Ford Madox Ford\nNadja – André Breton\nSteppenwolf – Herman Hesse\nRemembrance of Things Past – Marcel Proust\nTo The Lighthouse – Virginia Woolf\nTarka the Otter – Henry Williamson\nAmerika – Franz Kafka\nThe Sun Also Rises – Ernest Hemingway\nBlindness – Henry Green\nThe Castle – Franz Kafka\nThe Good Soldier Švejk – Jaroslav Hašek\nThe Plumed Serpent – D.H. Lawrence\nOne, None and a Hundred Thousand – Luigi Pirandello\nThe Murder of Roger Ackroyd – Agatha Christie\nThe Making of Americans – Gertrude Stein\nManhattan Transfer – John Dos Passos\nMrs. Dalloway – Virginia Woolf**\nThe Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald**\nThe Counterfeiters – André Gide\nThe Trial – Franz Kafka\nThe Artamonov Business – Maxim Gorky\nThe Professor’s House – Willa Cather\nBilly Budd, Foretopman – Herman Melville\nThe Green Hat – Michael Arlen**\nThe Magic Mountain – Thomas Mann**\nWe – Yevgeny Zamyatin\nA Passage to India – E.M. Forster\nThe Devil in the Flesh – Raymond Radiguet\nZeno’s Conscience – Italo Svevo\nCane – Jean Toomer\nAntic Hay – Aldous Huxley\nAmok – Stefan Zweig\nThe Garden Party – Katherine Mansfield\nThe Enormous Room – E.E. Cummings\nJacob’s Room – Virginia Woolf\nSiddhartha – Herman Hesse\nThe Glimpses of the Moon – Edith Wharton\nLife and Death of Harriett Frean – May Sinclair\nThe Last Days of Humanity – Karl Kraus\nAaron’s Rod – D.H. Lawrence\nBabbitt – Sinclair Lewis\nUlysses – James Joyce\nThe Fox – D.H. Lawrence\nCrome Yellow – Aldous Huxley\nThe Age of Innocence – Edith Wharton\nMain Street – Sinclair Lewis\nWomen in Love – D.H. Lawrence\nNight and Day – Virginia Woolf\nTarr – Wyndham Lewis\nThe Return of the Soldier – Rebecca West\nThe Shadow Line – Joseph Conrad\nSummer – Edith Wharton\nGrowth of the Soil – Knut Hamsen\nBunner Sisters – Edith Wharton**\nA Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man – James Joyce**\nUnder Fire – Henri Barbusse\nRashomon – Akutagawa Ryunosuke\nThe Good Soldier – Ford Madox Ford\nThe Voyage Out – Virginia Woolf\nOf Human Bondage – William Somerset Maugham\nThe Rainbow – D.H. Lawrence**\nThe Thirty-Nine Steps – John Buchan**\nKokoro – Natsume Soseki\nLocus Solus – Raymond Roussel\nRosshalde – Herman Hesse\nTarzan of the Apes – Edgar Rice Burroughs\nThe Ragged Trousered Philanthropists – Robert Tressell\nSons and Lovers – D.H. Lawrence\nDeath in Venice – Thomas Mann\nThe Charwoman’s Daughter – James Stephens\nEthan Frome – Edith Wharton\nFantômas – Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre\nHowards End – E.M. Forster\nImpressions of Africa – Raymond Roussel\nThree Lives – Gertrude Stein\nMartin Eden – Jack London\nStrait is the Gate – André Gide\nTono-Bungay – H.G. Wells\nThe Inferno – Henri Barbusse\nA Room With a View – E.M. Forster\nThe Iron Heel – Jack London\nThe Old Wives’ Tale – Arnold Bennett\nThe House on the Borderland – William Hope Hodgson\nMother – Maxim Gorky\nThe Secret Agent – Joseph Conrad**\nThe Jungle – Upton Sinclair**\nYoung Törless – Robert Musil\nThe Forsyte Sage – John Galsworthy\nThe House of Mirth – Edith Wharton\nProfessor Unrat – Heinrich Mann\nWhere Angels Fear to Tread – E.M. Forster\nNostromo – Joseph Conrad\nHadrian the Seventh – Frederick Rolfe\nThe Golden Bowl – Henry James\nThe Ambassadors – Henry James**\nThe Riddle of the Sands – Erskine Childers**\nThe Immoralist – André Gide\nThe Wings of the Dove – Henry James**\nHeart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad****\nThe Hound of the Baskervilles – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle**\nBuddenbrooks – Thomas Mann\nKim – Rudyard Kipling\nSister Carrie – Theodore Dreiser**\nLord Jim – Joseph Conrad**\n1800s Some Experiences of an Irish R.M. – Somerville and Ross\nThe Stechlin – Theodore Fontane\nThe Awakening – Kate Chopin\nThe Turn of the Screw – Henry James\nThe War of the Worlds – H.G. Wells\nThe Invisible Man – H.G. Wells\nWhat Maisie Knew – Henry James\nFruits of the Earth – André Gide**\nDracula – Bram Stoker**\nQuo Vadis – Henryk Sienkiewicz\nThe Island of Dr. Moreau – H.G. Wells\nThe Time Machine – H.G. Wells\nEffi Briest – Theodore Fontane\nJude the Obscure – Thomas Hardy\nThe Real Charlotte – Somerville and Ross\nThe Yellow Wallpaper – Charlotte Perkins Gilman\nBorn in Exile – George Gissing\nDiary of a Nobody – George \u0026amp; Weedon Grossmith\nThe Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle\nNews from Nowhere – William Morris\nNew Grub Street – George Gissing\nGösta Berling’s Saga – Selma Lagerlöf\nTess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy\nThe Picture of Dorian Gray – Oscar Wilde\nThe Kreutzer Sonata – Leo Tolstoy\nLa Bête Humaine – Émile Zola\nBy the Open Sea – August Strindberg\nHunger – Knut Hamsun\nThe Master of Ballantrae – Robert Louis Stevenson\nPierre and Jean – Guy de Maupassant\nFortunata and Jacinta – Benito Pérez Galdés\nThe People of Hemsö – August Strindberg\nThe Woodlanders – Thomas Hardy\nShe – H. Rider Haggard\nThe Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde – Robert Louis Stevenson\nThe Mayor of Casterbridge – Thomas Hardy**\nKidnapped – Robert Louis Stevenson\nKing Solomon’s Mines – H. Rider Haggard**\nGerminal – Émile Zola\nThe Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain\nBel-Ami – Guy de Maupassant\nMarius the Epicurean – Walter Pater\nAgainst the Grain – Joris-Karl Huysmans\nThe Death of Ivan Ilyich – Leo Tolstoy\nA Woman’s Life – Guy de Maupassant\nTreasure Island – Robert Louis Stevenson\nThe House by the Medlar Tree – Giovanni Verga\nThe Portrait of a Lady – Henry James\nBouvard and Pécuchet – Gustave Flaubert\nBen-Hur – Lew Wallace\nNana – Émile Zola\nThe Brothers Karamazov – Fyodor Dostoevsky\nThe Red Room – August Strindberg\nReturn of the Native – Thomas Hardy\nAnna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy\nDrunkard – Émile Zola\nVirgin Soil – Ivan Turgenev\nDaniel Deronda – George Eliot\nThe Hand of Ethelberta – Thomas Hardy\nThe Temptation of Saint Anthony – Gustave Flaubert\nFar from the Madding Crowd – Thomas Hardy\nThe Enchanted Wanderer – Nicolai Leskov\nAround the World in Eighty Days – Jules Verne\nIn a Glass Darkly – Sheridan Le Fanu\nThe Devils – Fyodor Dostoevsky\nErewhon – Samuel Butler\nSpring Torrents – Ivan Turgenev\nMiddlemarch – George Eliot\nThrough the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There – Lewis Carroll\nKing Lear of the Steppes – Ivan Turgenev\nHe Knew He Was Right – Anthony Trollope**\nWar and Peace – Leo Tolstoy**\nSentimental Education – Gustave Flaubert\nPhineas Finn – Anthony Trollope\nMaldoror – Comte de Lautréaumont\nThe Idiot – Fyodor Dostoevsky\nThe Moonstone – Wilkie Collins\nLittle Women – Louisa May Alcott\nThérèse Raquin – Émile Zola\nThe Last Chronicle of Barset – Anthony Trollope\nJourney to the Centre of the Earth – Jules Verne\nCrime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoevsky\nAlice’s Adventures in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll\nOur Mutual Friend – Charles Dickens\nUncle Silas – Sheridan Le Fanu\nNotes from the Underground – Fyodor Dostoevsky\nThe Water-Babies – Charles Kingsley\nLes Misérables – Victor Hugo\nFathers and Sons – Ivan Turgenev**\nSilas Marner – George Eliot\nGreat Expectations – Charles Dickens**\nOn the Eve – Ivan Turgenev\nCastle Richmond – Anthony Trollope\nThe Mill on the Floss – George Eliot\nThe Woman in White – Wilkie Collins\nThe Marble Faun – Nathaniel Hawthorne\nMax Havelaar – Multatuli\nA Tale of Two Cities – Charles Dickens\nOblomovka – Ivan Goncharov\nAdam Bede – George Eliot\nMadame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert\nNorth and South – Elizabeth Gaskell\nHard Times – Charles Dickens\nWalden – Henry David Thoreau\nBleak House – Charles Dickens\nVillette – Charlotte Brontë\nCranford – Elizabeth Gaskell\nUncle Tom’s Cabin; or, Life Among the Lonely – Harriet Beecher Stowe\nThe Blithedale Romance – Nathaniel Hawthorne\nThe House of the Seven Gables – Nathaniel Hawthorne\nMoby-Dick – Herman Melville\nThe Scarlet Letter – Nathaniel Hawthorne\nDavid Copperfield – Charles Dickens\nShirley – Charlotte Brontë\nMary Barton – Elizabeth Gaskell\nThe Tenant of Wildfell Hall – Anne Brontë\nWuthering Heights – Emily Brontë\nAgnes Grey – Anne Brontë\nJane Eyre – Charlotte Brontë\nVanity Fair – William Makepeace Thackeray\nThe Count of Monte-Cristo – Alexandre Dumas\nLa Reine Margot – Alexandre Dumas\nThe Three Musketeers – Alexandre Dumas\nThe Purloined Letter – Edgar Allan Poe\nMartin Chuzzlewit – Charles Dickens\nThe Pit and the Pendulum – Edgar Allan Poe\nLost Illusions – Honoré de Balzac**\nA Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens**\nDead Souls – Nikolay Gogol\nThe Charterhouse of Parma – Stendhal\nThe Fall of the House of Usher – Edgar Allan Poe\nThe Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby – Charles Dickens\nOliver Twist – Charles Dickens\nThe Nose – Nikolay Gogol\nLe Père Goriot – Honoré de Balzac\nEugénie Grandet – Honoré de Balzac\nThe Hunchback of Notre Dame – Victor Hugo\nThe Red and the Black – Stendhal\nThe Betrothed – Alessandro Manzoni\nLast of the Mohicans – James Fenimore Cooper\nThe Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner – James Hogg\nThe Albigenses – Charles Robert Maturin\nMelmoth the Wanderer – Charles Robert Maturin\nThe Monastery – Sir Walter Scott\nIvanhoe – Sir Walter Scott**\nFrankenstein – Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley**\nNorthanger Abbey – Jane Austen\nPersuasion – Jane Austen\nOrmond – Maria Edgeworth\nRob Roy – Sir Walter Scott\nEmma – Jane Austen\nMansfield Park – Jane Austen\nPride and Prejudice – Jane Austen\nThe Absentee – Maria Edgeworth\nSense and Sensibility – Jane Austen\nElective Affinities – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe\nCastle Rackrent – Maria Edgeworth\n1700s Hyperion – Friedrich Hölderlin\nThe Nun – Denis Diderot\nCamilla – Fanny Burney\nThe Monk – M.G. Lewis\nWilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe\nThe Mysteries of Udolpho – Ann Radcliffe\nThe Interesting Narrative – Olaudah Equiano\nThe Adventures of Caleb Williams – William Godwin\nJustine – Marquis de Sade\nVathek – William Beckford\nThe 120 Days of Sodom – Marquis de Sade\nCecilia – Fanny Burney\nConfessions – Jean-Jacques Rousseau\nDangerous Liaisons – Pierre Choderlos de Laclos\nReveries of a Solitary Walker – Jean-Jacques Rousseau\nEvelina – Fanny Burney\nThe Sorrows of Young Werther – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe\nHumphrey Clinker – Tobias George Smollett\nThe Man of Feeling – Henry Mackenzie\nA Sentimental Journey – Laurence Sterne\nTristram Shandy – Laurence Sterne\nThe Vicar of Wakefield – Oliver Goldsmith\nThe Castle of Otranto – Horace Walpole\nÉmile; or, On Education – Jean-Jacques Rousseau\nRameau’s Nephew – Denis Diderot\nJulie; or, the New Eloise – Jean-Jacques Rousseau\nRasselas – Samuel Johnson**\nCandide – Voltaire**\nThe Female Quixote – Charlotte Lennox\nAmelia – Henry Fielding\nPeregrine Pickle – Tobias George Smollett\nFanny Hill – John Cleland\nTom Jones – Henry Fielding\nRoderick Random – Tobias George Smollett\nClarissa – Samuel Richardson\nPamela – Samuel Richardson\nJacques the Fatalist – Denis Diderot\nMemoirs of Martinus Scriblerus – J. Arbuthnot, J. Gay, T. Parnell, A. Pope, J. Swift\nJoseph Andrews – Henry Fielding\nA Modest Proposal – Jonathan Swift\nGulliver’s Travels – Jonathan Swift\nRoxana – Daniel Defoe\nMoll Flanders – Daniel Defoe\nLove in Excess – Eliza Haywood\nRobinson Crusoe – Daniel Defoe\nA Tale of a Tub – Jonathan Swift\nPre-1700 Oroonoko – Aphra Behn\nThe Princess of Clèves – Marie-Madelaine Pioche de Lavergne, Comtesse de La Fayette\nThe Pilgrim’s Progress – John Bunyan\nDon Quixote – Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra\nThe Unfortunate Traveller – Thomas Nashe\nEuphues: The Anatomy of Wit – John Lyly\nGargantua and Pantagruel – Françoise Rabelais\nThe Thousand and One Nights – Anonymous\nThe Golden Ass – Lucius Apuleius\nAithiopika – Heliodorus\nChaireas and Kallirhoe – Chariton\nMetamorphoses – Ovid\nAesop’s Fables – Aesopus\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/12/17/1001-books-to-read-before-you-die/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Meme","RelPermalink":"/tags/meme/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reading","RelPermalink":"/tags/reading/"}],"title":"1001 Books To Read Before You Die"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" In the last year, I heard how Dublin City Council had given up on plans to run a free, city-wide wireless Internet programme on the grounds that it was against EU regulations, anti-competitive and bad for the consumer. As Ireland currently has some of the slowest and most expensive broadband options available in Europe, it seems obvious how the consumer will benefit from having to continue paying for their poor services. But there could be a nicer alternative to centralised WiFi. In a post much earlier this year, Bruce Schneier generated a lot of debate when he claimed he leaves his wireless network open and unprotected for just about anyone to use. This he considers a common courtesy, and whilst acknowledging the risks, considers them to be largely inflated. As many of the people commenting on his article or reporting about it elsewhere point out, there are risks involved, and as far as many of the people in authority are concerned, his common courtesy leaves him much more culpable. Many ISPs stipulate that sharing a connection in this manner would be a breach of contract, and from a legal perspective infringements undertaken by someone piggybacking the network could result in a rather unwelcome investigation for the owner.\nNeedless to say, much of what Schneier writes makes sense. Wireless protection, like most forms of security, can only really be seen as a form of prevention. If someone were to hack his protected network and then carry out their nefarious activities, from a legal standpoint would his defense be any the stronger? ISPs may demand their customers run protected wireless networks, but at what level should we consider a network secure? I\u0026rsquo;ve been in places where the wireless was only secured by WEP, and even making the owner aware of its deficiencies only resulted in a shrug or a blank look. As is the case with many technologies, wireless was developed and put to market as soon as possible, and security concerns are only dealt with as and when they appear. It should be given a higher priority, and as Schneier points out, if a user intends to use his laptop on other open networks, such as those often provided to customers in airports, hotels, universities or cafés, a far more dangerous prospect as far as network security is concerned, it makes sense for that security to start at home. There are however several downsides to Schneier\u0026rsquo;s argument. From a security perspective, one of the first rules is always to present as small and undesirable a target as possible. Leaving a wireless connection open certainly allows would-be hackers an easier point of access, and raises its profile. Also, should the network be in a densely populated area, the amount of network piggybacking could quickly become an issue, to the extent that there could be extra charges or a reduction of service quality from the ISP. Furthermore, it is entirely plausible that users stealing bandwidth could find themselves charged , with the sensible argument running that even if someone leaves their door unlocked, walking in and stealing the TV would still be considered theft (even if the insurance company would term it negligence). Ultimately, whilst Schneier opens his network up to people in good faith, this could cause problems for people who aren\u0026rsquo;t security minded, or even for those thinking of using such open networks. Whilst a number of people have come up with their own solutions to the issue (such as putting a telephone number as the network\u0026rsquo;s SSID and giving people access if they should call), FON have turned it into something of a business model. Essentially, the system relies on users signing up to allow their connections to be shared with other FON members. An entirely distinct wireless network is enabled which any FON member can access using their details to gain Internet access. In return, members can earn some money if people pay to access the Internet through their access point, and of course have the benefit of being able to use other FON members\u0026rsquo; connections when they are on the move. The FON map shows just where those hotspots are, and there\u0026rsquo;s already quite a surprising amount of coverage in some areas. In the UK it seems that FON has made a partnership with the leading broadband supplier BT, who would sell access to the Internet via the FON network. The interesting corollary of this of course is that BT will thus derive some revenue from the reselling of its rivals\u0026rsquo; bandwidth (which may already have been purchased from BT). Personally I would consider running an open network in principle, but for a few minor problems. The first is that this building is so adequately wired that the wireless option on the router serves little purpose except when the occasional guest prefers to use it, otherwise the wireless is disabled. More troublesome is the fact that since our broadband provider limits our monthly usage, it could easily be considered an expense to run an open wireless network should anyone feel obliged to download vast amounts of data over it. Furthermore if anyone were to be leeching bandwidth it would make things like VoIP calls or online gaming a painful experience. These two problems could easily be stymied by keeping an eye out for potential abuse, or more logically by simply locking down the \u0026lsquo;public\u0026rsquo; wireless access to ensure that bandwidth is both limited and given the lowest QoS priority. After all, I see the greatest benefit for users of public WiFi in being able to check emails and do some idle surfing on the go, not downloading the latest linux ISO images or streaming movies from their favourite website. But the most important deterrent for me personally has to be the fact that even our nearest neighbours probably live outside of WiFi range, so unless a horde of people turned up on our road to use our wireless from their cars, they might as well come in and get plugged in properly and have a cup of tea to go with it! Schneier\u0026rsquo;s comments are very reminiscent of the claims Jeremy Clarkson made earlier in the year about the lack of danger presented by bank details being readily available, after another monumental data loss by a government department. To prove his lack of concern, Clarkson had published his own bank details and made it clear how easy it would be to find his address. Unfortunately for him, someone did indeed take up the gauntlet and set up a Direct Debit payment to charity Diabetes UK using precisely those details. At least to date I\u0026rsquo;m unaware of the same type of thing happening to Schneier, but the wager has been made.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/12/15/wireless-for-the-masses/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fon","RelPermalink":"/tags/fon/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Security","RelPermalink":"/tags/security/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wireless","RelPermalink":"/tags/wireless/"}],"title":"Wireless for the Masses"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Risk It\u0026rsquo;s about coming up to another one of those birthday events soon, the kind where you get together with a few close friends, have a meal, a few beers, perhaps watch a movie, before whiling away the rest of evening playing a board game. And as it\u0026rsquo;s in the UK, you only need a few guesses before you\u0026rsquo;ll stumble upon which game that will be.\nNow I don\u0026rsquo;t claim to be any kind of expert in the field of board games, but that serious lack of diversity in most UK households makes most games evenings feel like you\u0026rsquo;re stuck in the same old rut again. Take a look at Wikipedia\u0026rsquo;s list of popular games, and you might see what I mean. Ignoring those that aren\u0026rsquo;t easily or commonly played in groups, there\u0026rsquo;s Cluedo, Monopoly, Risk, and Trivial Pursuit. And let\u0026rsquo;s face it, if a household has anything, it\u0026rsquo;s probably one of those. Of course, there\u0026rsquo;s plenty of fun to be had there, but to be honest there just isn\u0026rsquo;t enough variety in what\u0026rsquo;s usually available.\nA lot of this comes down to British culture. There are in fact plenty of games available, and most families with young children will probably have a great many more board games specifically designed for the youngsters than those suitable for the whole family. One can only presume that board games are seen as belonging to the realm of childhood, but there doesn\u0026rsquo;t need to be a specifically adult genre of games to counter this. What should be avoided, however, is the mass-produced clone versions of the very same games, which add mere seconds of novelty value to the overworked formulae. Oxford Monopoly? Scotland Monopoly? Star Wars™ Monopoly?\nAnother key problem I have with the majority of the games mentioned above is the strong, pervasive element of luck. Since most adults are perfectly capable of deducing the murderer in a pretty efficient way in a game of Cluedo, the roll of the die and the luck of the draw come into play far too heavily for much enjoyment to be had. In a game of Risk, a strong strategy should triumph in an average night of dice rolling—but when everyone has a strong strategy?\nThe Escapist has summarised a number of key areas in which German-style games make an improvement over the typical offerings available in the UK, and just why they do so well. Some of these might be seen as undesireable, such as the inability to eliminate players, or the rather less open-ended scope of the games, but these factors together with the easy to pick-up rules, high level of interaction and more measured amounts of luck tend to make the games more appealing to that more grown up audience.\nCarcassonne\nCarcassonne\nTake a game like Carcassonne. You can learn to play it in minutes, involves plenty of player interaction, a splash of luck with drawing tiles, and yet has enough scope for developing tactics that the game has decent longevity about it. Players can\u0026rsquo;t \u0026lsquo;die\u0026rsquo; part way through, nor is the victor generally known long before the game\u0026rsquo;s end, and you can generally work out how much time to set aside for a game. Plus of course, there are a number of expansions and reinterpretations which can add even more variety to the basic game.\nBut who knows? Perhaps there\u0026rsquo;ll be something new on the table this year. Or maybe there\u0026rsquo;ll be enough alcohol to numb the pain of continually rolling snake eyes in my defence of Siam!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/12/13/playing-the-game/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Carcassonne","RelPermalink":"/tags/carcassonne/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cluedo","RelPermalink":"/tags/cluedo/"},{"LinkTitle":"Monopoly","RelPermalink":"/tags/monopoly/"},{"LinkTitle":"Risk","RelPermalink":"/tags/risk/"}],"title":"Playing the Game"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Team Fortress 2\nAfter playing Valve\u0026rsquo;s last flagship multiplayer game, Team Fortress 2, on and off over the past year, I\u0026rsquo;ve had some of my initial thoughts change since my post earlier this year. A raft of modifications, patches and packs have tweaked the game\u0026rsquo;s dynamics and bolstered its features such that the game now exudes a certain amount more polish than previously. My earlier speculation that Valve would not have the time (or eventually the inclination) to produce \u0026lsquo;service packs\u0026rsquo; for that other classes in the game, after the length of time the original Medic pack took to be released, seems to have been disproved, with two further releases in the intervening period. These packs not only added achievements and unlockable weapons to two further classes, the Pyro and the Heavy, but also added extra game modes and maps.\nI had originally written this post, long lingering in the limbo of the drafts bin, pointing out a number of weaknesses with the game as it stood. The most recent patch has done much to address those problems, and is a welcome and rather unexpected update, given Valve had denied there would be any releases for Team Fortress 2 until 2009 on account of the amount of work going into their latest release, Left 4 Dead . I\u0026rsquo;ve gone through and added some comments or changes where necessary, to reflect the recent update, though on the whole this post retains its original state.\nBalancing issues Whilst I stand by my initial view from earlier in the year that Valve have done a miraculous job when it comes to balancing the various classes, there are still some issues that need to be ironed out, hopefully in future edits and packs. Of course it would be impossible to make a truly level playing field without removing the many classes\u0026rsquo; uniqueness, and there will always be situations and maps in which one or another class will show a clear advantage. And it would be unfair to decry Valve\u0026rsquo;s efforts in creating a balanced game, since there are no classes which go unplayed, and each pack does a lot to reinvigorate them, as well as ironing out some of the more glaring inequalities between them. The welcome improvements to the Pyro class in fact led some players to argue that the Pyro was now overpowered, though the majority of these statements to my eyes came from those predominantly playing Soldier or Demoman, and thus are used to being in a more dominant role.\nEngineer has some sapping problems\nYet there are still some problems that need to be solved, and until the relevant pack arrives, can detract from game\u0026rsquo;s balanced playing field. Engineers in particular have a tough call. Whilst they are the backbone of many a successful team, their actions are rarely merited with just reward. I think it would be fair to say that a large proportion of Übers are used against Engineers\u0026rsquo; sentry guns, a worthwhile respite for many a team, yet the Engineers\u0026rsquo; reward is to have his hard work destroyed by something he can almost never avoid. Similarly Spies can often be the bane of an Engineers\u0026rsquo; existence, destroying his teleporter entrances with no one around to defend them, sapping his buildings and leaving them prone to attack from every other attacking class, and particularly if he\u0026rsquo;s the only Engineer on the team or in his area, killing him directly (even at the expense of the Spy\u0026rsquo;s life) and leaving all of his buildings unprotected for a period of time. Another source of grief for Engineers comes from the fact that one of his major sources of points, that is to say teleports, relies on his teleporters being in appropriate locations. Since many maps change spawn locations according to the state of play, Engineers often find themselves constantly shifting teleporter entrances/exits if they want to earn points, all the while neglecting their other sentry duties.\nThis particular point of contention will be a difficult one to solve, and it will be very interesting to see how Valve approaches the Engineer in its class update. One simple addition to the Engineers\u0026rsquo; current points source would be to award him for ammunition handed out by his dispenser. The tweaks made to the Soldier and Demoman classes in particular mean they are constantly needing a resupply, a fact that could be awarded in addition to the usual health bonus (taking into account of course the common occurrence of Pyros and Heavies standing beside dispensers and firing wildly). There are of course numerous new weapons with which the Engineer could be equipped, beyond alternatives to his regular weapons, such as decoy buildings that explode when sapped, or extra sentry guns of a smaller size, or perhaps even two-way teleporters, the possibilities are limited only by the developers\u0026rsquo; imaginations (and bravery). Yet one of the key problems with the Engineer class is its stacking effect. A single Engineer at the moment often has a terrible time dealing with Spies and Übercharges directed against his buildings. With each extra Engineer on the team, however, these problems diminish, as Engineers can help to check for Spies, remove saps placed on other Engineers\u0026rsquo; buildings, and generally provide backup that no other class can provide. A concomitant effect is that whilst a single sentry can easily be overcome (and takes time to be rebuilt), two sentries can not only be rebuilt faster (with competent teamwork between Engineers), but also provide greater firepower that may prevent certain classes being able to reach and destroy them even whilst Übercharged.\nOf course, this issue and many others might be addressed when the relevant class update arrives. Also, whilst certain classes find it difficult to do well in the open playing field of the public server, there are few that are not played in this basis, and the Engineer is a prime example of a class that is not underplayed despite its deficiencies, on the basis that it is an important constituent of a balanced team. Today\u0026rsquo;s update has certainly gone some way to improving the Engineer\u0026rsquo;s lot when it comes to supporting the team, though until the update arrives the points issue will probably remain. Whilst upgradable teleporters offer some scope for improvement, their use is still limited by the choice of map, still hampered by potential Spies destroying the entrance (who have also been given a great boon in this recent update), and their cost in terms of time and metal spent upgrading them might outweigh the benefits in most situations. The upgraded dispenser is of more obvious benefit to the Engineer and team in general, ((Particularly as ammunition now has a further heavy duty user in the form of the Spy.)) and becomes both a prized possession and greater target for the opposition team, though it would be nice to see points being given for dispensing ammunition to teammates. Hopefully this class will gain some further tweaks in a future pack.\nThe market for explosives The other obvious gripe in the game as it stands is the nature of the Demoman. As many players point out, the class is overpowered on a number of levels, particularly when compared to his nearest rival class, the Soldier. In large part this boils down to the class essentially having two primary weapons, in particular with the secondary being preferred by most players as the primary weapon, and in sum having thrice the explosive ammunition than the Soldier. In addition the Demoman can perform maneouvres similar to the Soldier\u0026rsquo;s \u0026lsquo;rocket jumps\u0026rsquo; enabling him to get into hard to reach places. The class is faster than the Soldier, and only marginally slower than the Pyro and Sniper classes, whilst losing little in terms of health points. With his sticky bombs, the Demoman has the ability to defend control points and particularly doorways and other bottlenecks, ((Although the recent update has given other classes at least some defence against laid traps, through having bullet projectiles able to destroy sticky bombs.)) or alternatively provide backup to a friendly Engineer through mining his buildings as a deterrent to enemy Spies. Against enemy Engineers the Demoman is a particularly bane, with the ability to lob grenades or sticky bombs from an angle out of range of his sentry guns, and with an Übercharge can generally cause more destruction of enemy buildings than any other class. This indirect fire can also be an advantage in normal combat, with the further benefit that the Demoman\u0026rsquo;s weapons are the only ones apart from the Sniper that do not suffer a decrease in damage dealt over distance. Thus although technically a defensive class, and particularly where maps have severe bottlenecks a very potent one, the Demoman is equally adept in an attacking role. At least at medium range, the Demoman is thus well equipped against the vast majority of classes, with the exception perhaps of the underplayed (and underpowered) Scout.\nCyclops survives again\nQuite how Valve will approach the Demoman issue remains to be seen. One thing is for certain, however, and that is that they are not short of options. Any number of alterations would help redress the balance, from changing the class\u0026rsquo; core statistics (i.e. reduced speed or reduced health), through alterations to the weapons (either changes in damage or ammunition levels), to giving other classes the boost needed to combat him. Personally, I feel one of the simplest modifications to the Demoman would be an increase in the delay that currently exists between firing a sticky bomb and detonating it - and in fact altering the delay such that it is one between the sticky bomb touching another surface and subsequent detonation. The purpose of the weapon is principally to lay traps for other classes to walk into, being a special secondary weapon, but instead is more commonly used as an offensive, primary weapon, with sticky bombs all too often being detonated as quickly as possible, often even in mid-air. His other core advantages described above would remain the same, but the alteration would force players to use the class\u0026rsquo; secondary weapon more intelligently, and the primary weapon more routinely.\nA critical issue A more open and contentious problem with Team Fortress 2 has to be the presence of \u0026lsquo;criticals\u0026rsquo;, regular shots that are by random chance upgraded to do double the damage of a regular one. With the increase in the number of unlockable weapons released by Valve that affect the generation of critical shots, it may be the case that in future criticals will become a factored feature of the game, rather than a purely (or at least predominantly) random one. For the time being, one of the most frustrating moments in the game can occur when you are killed by a \u0026lsquo;random\u0026rsquo; critical having just built up and used the charge on the Kritzkrieg which would give the person you\u0026rsquo;re healing a flurry of critical shots. Predictable beaten by random.\nIt\u0026rsquo;s certainly a good thing that Valve has listened to the community and allowed server admins the ability to turn off criticals without the need to resort to third party mods or plugins, and no doubt this would arguably increase the skill level of the game, though as I wrote in the previous post I still stand by criticals as an important element in levelling the playing field. Which is precisely why the other issue regarding their implementation remains a problem.\nHeavy like crits\nPredictable criticals obviously add an extra level of skill to utilise that is a welcome inclusion, I\u0026rsquo;m sure many would agree. The various trade-offs imposed on the weapons which bring predictable criticals to the fold are generally sufficient to prevent their overuse or abuse. Yet random criticals enjoy a sense of positive feedback, in the way in which the chance of firing a critical shot is determined by the amount of damage a player does in a given period of time. I have neither the time nor the inclination to investigate how exactly the statistics are determined, but the general sense is that certain classes benefit more from this effect than others (particularly those like Soldiers and Demomen who enjoy splash damage from their primary weapons), and in particular, players who are doing well are more liable to fire more criticals, leading to something of a runaway effect. There is a natural logic to this manner of execution - players are justly awarded for playing well, and in particular situations this idea is well vindicated. Take for example a situation in which a Soldier approaches a Heavy and Medic from an oblique angle: firing the first rocket at the Medic, who then takes shelter behind the Heavy, the Soldier would be able to fire all four rockets (probably more), dealing plenty of damage but without killing anyone. Yet the increased chance of criticals might just result in the Soldier being rewarded for his efforts. Unfortunately there are situations in which this system can look simply rediculous. Two Heavies with Medics at medium range will probably be able to fire at one another for upwards of 10 seconds before one or other finally succumbs to the onslaught: instead, a more common result is that one of the two is rewarded for the damage dealt in the previous seconds with a barrage of criticals, determining the winner of the encounter on a coin toss.\nA problem of attitude This last complaint is much more of a personal gripe than a complaint with any basis on the game\u0026rsquo;s mechanics. It\u0026rsquo;s more a question of players\u0026rsquo; attitudes to the game than a problem with the game itself, and TF2 is no more guilty of it than any other multiplayer game. Alongside the problems mentioned earlier about balancing issues is the number of players who don\u0026rsquo;t appreciate the efforts of their teammates. This link pretty much sums up the issue. I\u0026rsquo;m sure this is a small, vocal minority, but the fact is that basically every server has players who think that Engineers are only useful for building them dispensers and teleporters, that a Medic\u0026rsquo;s job is to heal them constantly and only ever use their Übercharges on them (as they are obviously going to be MVP) and generally every other class is either useless, overpowered, overplayed, or for noobs. These are the players that constantly mash the button to cry \u0026ldquo;Medic!\u0026rdquo; and even have the gall to demand someone else should be their (personal) Medic when the team doesn\u0026rsquo;t have any. ((Fortunately, today\u0026rsquo;s update has provided a simple yet effective way for Medics to filter out the demanding players, through indicators of a player\u0026rsquo;s health status when they call for a Medic.))\nIn summary then, since I can only think to elaborate on two major issues, both of which will probably be at least partially remedied in future updates, it seems fair to assume that Team Fortress 2 is a pretty well-rounded game. I can only comment on the game from a public server player\u0026rsquo;s point-of-view, and consider that this is probably the game\u0026rsquo;s mainstay anyway. Despite my complaints over balancing issues, there are no classes which go unplayed as a result, and all of the game\u0026rsquo;s nine classes are often employed, some being virtually essential to a team\u0026rsquo;s success. With such diversity in the classes, the game has an excellent longevity factor, and Valve\u0026rsquo;s continued improvements and additions only solidify that appeal. The recent update offers some welcome tweaks and additions that were quite unexpected, and with news that the Scout\u0026rsquo;s update is in the pipeline for next year, I wish the people at Valve a pleasant festive season and look forward to future TF2 updates in the coming year.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/12/13/return-to-team-fortress/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Team-Fortress-2","RelPermalink":"/tags/team-fortress-2/"},{"LinkTitle":"Valve","RelPermalink":"/tags/valve/"}],"title":"Return to Team Fortress"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"True to form, the WordPress team have brought out another much-improved version of their popular blogging software. Having just updated the blog, it\u0026rsquo;s clear to see the amount of work which has gone into this release, and how many feature enhancements and bug fixes have been rolled out over the course of last year. Whilst it\u0026rsquo;s normally difficult from an end-user perspective to see how much work has been done on the backend, this release provides such a clean, intuitive and flexible interface that it\u0026rsquo;s easy to see how WordPress can now move forward with other things. All of the project members and contributors should be rightly proud of their achievement.\nTo coincide with the update, as promised in a previous post , there\u0026rsquo;s a new theme compatible with the various comment improvements in WordPress 2.7, and I hope to do a bit more tidying and rearranging before the New Year, including posting a few of those unpolished drafts that are starting to gather dust.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/12/12/wordpress-2.7-update/","tags":[],"title":"WordPress 2.7 Update"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nTop 10 IT disasters of all time - Starting with an early warning system on the blink in September, 1983 (just a couple of months before the Able Archer incident), and running through such classics mix ups as the Millennium Bug and the Dell laptop battery inferno, this site lists some of biggest disasters in IT history (though omitting those which caused loss of life).\nAuction Bloopers - Find some ebay bargains by looking for common misspellings of items.\nSensible Units - Afraid of the onslaught of metric? Then measure length in albatross wingspans or weigh in terms of female lions or CRT monitors with this fun little website.\nEnigma - If you\u0026rsquo;ve an interest in cryptography, this little website allows you to use your very own Enigma cipher, and provides an inkling into just how complicated the mechanism can really be.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/11/21/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cryptography","RelPermalink":"/tags/cryptography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Metric","RelPermalink":"/tags/metric/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":" Moses and the Eleventh Commandment\nThe war against file-sharing that currently rages primarily over the Internet will ultimately be lost. That\u0026rsquo;s my prediction. I can\u0026rsquo;t support this argument with any authority, being no expert in the fields of law, politics or technology, but instead make my statement on the basis of many years\u0026rsquo; observation from the wilderness. But the trends all point to this being the case. File-sharing has become a mainstay of this new generation, a fact which has forced most corporations and organisations to rethink their strategies and come up with ways to stem the tide. We have already seen many changes in this direction, such as the explosion of digital content that is now available online from legitimate sources. But in addition to this carrot, the war is also being waged with a stick, as organisations set out to have legislation passed to clamp down on file-sharing activities, and new technologies are created to lock down digital content and prevent its spread. So what will the future bring?\nFile-sharing is usually portrayed as a new nefarious activity, something alien brought about by changes in technology and society that benefits no one and is an obvious criminal activity. Whilst there are some elements of truth to that charge, it\u0026rsquo;s not entirely accurate. Man is a social animal and has been sharing since the stone age. The only thing that\u0026rsquo;s new is that it now involves digitally stored media rather than pieces of sharpened flint, and problematically, it is now easier, faster, more accessible, more reliable and perhaps more inconspicuous than ever before. But this is merely the extrapolation of a phenomenon that is essentially part of man\u0026rsquo;s nature. Irrespective of the legality of the issue, people generally consider it fair use to lend books, albums, movies or software that they have purchased to their friends and relatives. It is generally considered reasonable use for people to record items broadcast on television or radio for later viewing, an act normally referred to as \u0026rsquo;time-shifting\u0026rsquo;, though these recordings may well be played back repeatedly, and of course lent and exchanged as with purchased items. And if anyone were to take a peek in many university libraries throughout the country, they would see the level to which the letter of the copyright law is upheld in the \u0026lsquo;fair use\u0026rsquo; rules of photocopying published articles. In each case, the law has either been adapted, or it has fallen into disuse. The latest developments must no doubt ultimately result in a similar reaction.\nThe similarity between online file-sharing and the typical state-funded public library system is perhaps more than a little unfair, but in theory shares similar features. That one is treated as a villanous scourge and the other as an equitable and fundamental public service is born not out of principle, but out of execution. Libraries are often restricted, under-staffed, under-funded, and under-provisioned, but most vitally, they are controlled. Online systems of file-sharing are none of these things, and the sheer scale of the problem provokes the reactions we see around the world. Quite what effect the rise of file-sharing has had on the many industries is difficult to tell, with arguments and statistics flying back and forth almost unceasingly. There is sadly no control experiment to substantiate the many arguments, whether they claim file-sharing has a negligible or positive effect, or that milliards have been written off the world\u0026rsquo;s economies. People who assert blindly that file-sharing boosts album sales are ignorant of the facts , whilst studio execs who believe that every downloaded track is a lost sale are plain wrong. Nevertheless, whatever the effects, this is a changing world, and every generation\u0026rsquo;s attempts to lay claim to that impalpable, fleeting sense of the status quo have failed. Whilst the majority of society morphs and adapts, there are always those who attempt to put the brakes on.\nVirtually every attempt, particularly in the mainstream, to prevent copyright infringement has met with resistance from the end-users, or has been circumvented to leave it essentially useless. The recent case of the Digital Rights Management (DRM) protection placed on a number of recent games released by publishing giant Electronic Arts has met with particular resistance from customers. Recent games like Spore, Red Alert 3 or Crysis Warhead all come equipped with SecuROM, a form of DRM which installs itself surreptitiously onto a user\u0026rsquo;s computer, and includes limits on how often the game me be installed amongst other features. After a certain number of activations the user has to call EA to have the limit lifted, otherwise the disc is unusable. Aside from the obvious problems for the customer, particularly in the longer term given that the servers which deal with the activations could easily be switched off at some point in the future, is the manner in which the relationship between the corporation and the customer becomes strained. This kind of copyright protection instantly treats customers with suspicion, even to the extent of criminality. Worse still for the company is that this kind of intrusive mechanism is stripped away in the illegal versions of the software which are produced almost as quickly as the mechanisms can be implemented. And this is well known to many customers, evidential in that Spore became probably ((Statistics in this area are notoriously difficult to confirm.)) the most downloaded game of the year, no doubt to a large extent based on the DRM issue. ((See many of the reviews at Amazon as an example of customer reaction.))\nAs has happened so many times in the past, the current furore over file-sharers is an example of a conservative heritage being challenged by the next generation with new technologies and ideas. Copyright laws are no longer able to cope with the situation, and whilst file-sharing undoubtedly infringes upon copyright law, the ability and the will to enforce the letter of the law is lacking, and to a large extent, essentially inappropriate. As I understand it, New Zealand has become the first country in the world to pass legislation to allow for a \u0026ldquo;three strikes\u0026rdquo; attitude to individual file-sharers, meaning that they should be cut off from the Internet if they are found to be responsible for file-sharing. All very well in theory, but in principle dealing with such scenarios is extremely tricky business: it is difficult to achieve from a technical point of view, it is difficult to enforce and prove from a legal standpoint, and in most instances it certainly infringes on personal freedoms and liberties. In this respect copyright laws are put on a pedestal above individual liberties. ((Typical in the democratic societies in which finance is so deeply entrenched in the political process.)) The attempts to equate file-sharing with theft in media propaganda ((As ridiculed here in the recent Futurama film.)) have met with very little sympathy from the general public, in part because the comparison illustrates how the law is no longer able to reflect reality. Stealing a car is not commensurate with making a copy of it, a blindingly obvious fact that is recognised by the general public, but not by the organisations and legal bodies, though there are signs that wheels are in motion in certain parts of the world.\nIt is difficult to predict what the precise outcome of the current war on file-sharing will be. Whilst repeated attempts will no doubt be made to plug the analogue hole , and increased powers are sought to enable authorities to control the public\u0026rsquo;s actions on the Internet, a few braver men are trying to find answers in fundamental alterations to copyright law and society\u0026rsquo;s view on file-sharing, and the new technologies and freedoms that have developed in leaps and bounds in the last few decades. Perhaps it is no surprise to see that Sweden is leading the charge. The potential pressure of the Piratpartiet caused a number of parties to rethink their stance on the file-sharing issue, particularly with regard to the statistics which highlight around 10% of the Scandinavian country\u0026rsquo;s population as potential targets for litigation. The Swedish Left Party , for example, has come around to the idea that copyright laws need amendment, and that file-sharing on a domestic basis is as legitimate an activity as lending libraries. Similar changes in policy may also affect the Moderate Party and the Green Party.\nIt may yet be many years before this issue sees a satisfactory resolution, and the market will adapt accordingly. With all likelihood a change in copyright legislation will be required that prevents leaving vast numbers of so many nations liable to prosecution, or it will it lay dormant like so many other vestigial and antiquated legal modes. The attempts to incriminate almost an entire generation cannot be in the best interests of either society as a whole, nor even its constituent parts, whilst the efforts to hunt down the technological cat and put it back into the bag are as futile as trying to turn back the clock. Whether a miraculous, ingenious solution will be found that satisfies everyone, or the weight of numbers fighting for change will affect a political reaction, or simply a piecemeal combination of political change, technological development and market mutation, the days of file-sharing as a nefarious phenomenon are numbered. The future is not set. But neither is the present.\nFor a future post in relation to this topic, I intend to conduct an interview with one of the founders of a leading Bittorrent tracking site. If anyone has any questions they would like to have posed, please feel free to leave a comment below.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/11/05/the-future-of-file-sharing/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Drm","RelPermalink":"/tags/drm/"},{"LinkTitle":"File-Sharing","RelPermalink":"/tags/file-sharing/"},{"LinkTitle":"Law","RelPermalink":"/tags/law/"}],"title":"The Future of File-Sharing"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"After more than two years at a temporary location, and in part to celebrate breaking the hundred post barrier (albeit almost unnoticed), this blog has \u0026lsquo;moved\u0026rsquo; to a new location. Whilst the hosting remains the same, the blog can now be found under the new domain name amindatplay.eu . There may be a few broken links around the place, but everything seems to be working well so far. With the amount of work being done to release WordPress 2.7 in November, it might also be time for a bit of a clean before winter hibernation, so perhaps expect a few tweaks and perhaps an experimental new layout or two in the next few of weeks.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/11/04/new-domain-name/","tags":[],"title":"New Domain Name"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"Whilst installing the latest version of Juice, a cross-platform podcast receiver on Windows Vista, I came across a rather simple error that prevented the program from functioning correctly on the first load, and then from loading thereafter. The error log generated the following output (where xxx indicates the username):\nTraceback (most recent call last): File \u0026#34;gui.py\u0026#34;, line 4, in ? File \u0026#34;iPodderGui.pyc\u0026#34;, line 3573, in main File \u0026#34;ipodder\\configuration.pyc\u0026#34;, line 468, in __init__ File \u0026#34;os.pyc\u0026#34;, line 154, in makedirs OSError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: \u0026#39;C:\\\\Users\\\\xxx\\\\My Documents\\\\My Received Podcasts\u0026#39; Fortunately the fix seems to be quite simple and pain free (though a bit of a hassle to implement manually), found courtesy of Randall\u0026rsquo;s Life .\nChange the compatability mode of the application to Windows XP SP2 mode. To do this, right-click the application file, or a shortcut to the program, select properties, click the \u0026lsquo;Compatability\u0026rsquo; tab and then tick the box to \u0026lsquo;Run this program in compatability mode for:\u0026rsquo; and select the appropriate option from the download menu. Locate the file Ipodder.cfg (normally found under C:\\Users\\xxx\\AppData\\Roaming\\iPodder) and edit it such that the line reading \u0026ldquo;download_dir = \u0026lsquo;C:\\\\Users\\\\xxx\\\\My Documents\\\\My Received Podcasts\u0026rsquo;\u0026rdquo; instead reads \u0026ldquo;download_dir = \u0026lsquo;C:\\\\Users\\\\xxx\\\\Documents\\\\My Received Podcasts\u0026rsquo;\u0026rdquo;. After that, the program should run normally.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/10/31/juice-on-vista/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Juice","RelPermalink":"/tags/juice/"},{"LinkTitle":"Podcasts","RelPermalink":"/tags/podcasts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vista","RelPermalink":"/tags/vista/"}],"title":"Juice on Vista"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Transport","RelPermalink":"/categories/transport/"}],"content":"We\u0026rsquo;ve had a pellet boiler installed at these premises for a number of years, and whilst generally pretty efficient and reliable, recently there were some problems which couldn\u0026rsquo;t be solved with the usual panache of just hitting it and telling it to work. The boiler, a 15 kW Künzel PL15 , had got stuck in a de-ashing cycle and would only intermittently fire up before returning to this cycle. Unfortunately, the firm which installed the boiler had in the meantime gone out of business, and our only option was to send for an engineer from a neighbouring county, which took several days, before the unit could be looked at. It turned out to be a problem with the microprocessor controller, the piece of kit which maintains the boiler\u0026rsquo;s high efficiency, though obviously beyond our capabilities to solve without sufficient technical knowledge (even the engineer who appeared on site had to call back to base for instructions that weren\u0026rsquo;t included in his handbook).\nUnfortunately there appears to be precious little information out there on the web. I spent some moments trying to find descriptions of problems similar to ours, or find a support forum for users of equipment such as ours where we could perhaps get some feedback, without success. That could of course come more as a result of my Googling skills than anything else. Do you know of any sites, forums or otherwise which deals with pellet boilers and their ilk? If not, is there enough call for one to be set up?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/10/31/support-for-renewables/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Kunzel","RelPermalink":"/tags/kunzel/"},{"LinkTitle":"Pellet-Boiler","RelPermalink":"/tags/pellet-boiler/"}],"title":"Support for Renewables"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"A recent Wired article has certainly provoked some controversy amongst bloggers. Claiming that blogs are history, and that Twitter, Flickr and Facebook are the future, the post\u0026rsquo;s author Paul Boutin recommends that anyone who\u0026rsquo;s thinking of starting a blog should stop, and anyone already writing one should pack it in.\nWhilst I wouldn\u0026rsquo;t normally comment on a post of this ilk (given my feelings about bloggers who blog about blogging) it seems pretty clear that unless Boutin is giving us a tongue-in-cheek excuse for a debate on web trends, he\u0026rsquo;s essentially wrong in his assessment. After all, it comes as no surprise that Boutin proclaims the fall of the blogosphere from the comfort of a blog entry, nor indeed that he rails against his own ilk in decrying the \u0026ldquo;tsunami of paid bilge\u0026rdquo; that ranks highest on the Technorati charts. The idea that blogs should be abandoned on account of the fact that personal blogs rarely garner any extended readership or popularity calls into question why authors set up their blogs in the first place, and why indeed they should switch to other means if popularity is their main objective. Boutin upbraids blogs for being text-only affairs, a charge which I daresay isn\u0026rsquo;t especially accurate, particularly since it is easily possible these days to integrate precisely those services that are supposed to supercede blogs, such as Flickr or Youtube.\nOf course, no one can deny that the nature of the Internet is constantly changing, so much the better, and whilst the blogosphere may start to shrink once the new wave of Web2.0 forms of communication become fully fledged, they will merely overlap and supplement the current crop of technologies available. The continued prominence of email, IRC, Usenet and web forums all point to this fact. So whilst I daresay the number of new blogs appearing on the web will start to slow as new users find outlet to their thoughts on other media, there may always be a place for the humble (and not so humble) blogs that litter the webscape today.\n[Via huffenglish.com ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/10/29/rise-and-fall-of-the-blogosphere/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Blogging","RelPermalink":"/tags/blogging/"}],"title":"Rise and Fall of the Blogosphere"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"}],"content":" logoleafy3\nI recently came across a wonderful idea for providing peer-to-peer lending to entrepreneurs in developing countries. The idea seems akin to the principles of the Grameen Bank, providing microcredit in this case primarily as a form of aid. The system allows people with spare cash to browse potential applicants and offer them money in the form of a loan. Kiva works with what they term experienced \u0026lsquo;field partners\u0026rsquo; to provide the loans, these bodies being established and recognised sources of finance (which may charge interest on the money to the borrower). Eventually the loans are repaid and the money can be withdrawn, redistributed or donated to Kiva to help cover their organisation\u0026rsquo;s costs. Of course the levels of finance are fairly miniscule on the larger scale, a far cry yet from providing the many milliards needed to create the level of sustainability needed in many parts of the developing world, through stability, infrastructure, education etc. Yet Kiva has plenty of room to expand, and importantly the principle behind the organisation is sound, in trying to create a direct link between people in the developing world who need capital (and know what they want to do with it) and those with the money and the conscience to try and help. Time will tell how effective Kiva\u0026rsquo;s mission will be.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/10/20/capital-for-the-third-world/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/tags/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Kiva","RelPermalink":"/tags/kiva/"},{"LinkTitle":"Microcredit","RelPermalink":"/tags/microcredit/"}],"title":"Capital for the Third World"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"I recently installed Ubuntu on a system with a slightly irregular hard drive configuration. Two SATA drives were running Windows on a mirrored (fake) RAID array, and a third SATA drive was ready to have linux installed. The Ubuntu installer recognised the drive as the third hard drive, and installed itself as expected, with Grub installed in the MBR of this drive, being first in the BIOS\u0026rsquo; boot queue. However, all references in Grub\u0026rsquo;s menu.lst for the Ubuntu installation pointed to (hd2,0), which resulted in an \u0026ldquo;Error 17: Cannot mount selected partition.\u0026rdquo; message from Grub. The solution was simply to edit the entries to read (hd0,0) for (hd2,0) as Grub now recognised the third drive as the first on account of its place in the boot order.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/10/16/ubuntu-grub-installation-errors/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Grub","RelPermalink":"/tags/grub/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linux","RelPermalink":"/tags/linux/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ubuntu","RelPermalink":"/tags/ubuntu/"}],"title":"Ubuntu Grub Installation Errors"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":" Free Gary McKinnon Campaign\nThis isn\u0026rsquo;t a case I\u0026rsquo;ve been following with any particular enthusiasm, but it would appear that Gary McKinnon is losing his battle against the extradition charges laid by the USA. Technically McKinnon was already arrested and prosecuted by the UK authorities prior to these extradition charges. In addition, the calls are made on the basis of a UK-US Extradition Treaty that was ratified after the events (and original prosecutions) and as such is being enforced retrospectively, allowing that the USA is not obliged to provide prima facie evidence for their claims. Whilst there are numerous issues regarding the Treaty that should already provoke concern, McKinnon\u0026rsquo;s case is clearly too small to spark a debate on the issue, and won\u0026rsquo;t involve politicians to the extent that extradition charges over a figure like Pinochet in previous years managed. Which of course, shouldn\u0026rsquo;t come as much surprise, since a man charged with torture of foreign nationals and assassination clearly has more to offer than a Weegie who crazily hacked into poorly protected foreign government computers on some wild conspiracy theory pursuing evidence of alien technologies and the secrets of \u0026lsquo;free energy\u0026rsquo;. It is therefore refreshing to see a campaign (see link above) organised to prevent the extradition proceedings, and guarantee McKinnon a trial on home soil. Unfortunately, the case looks liable to fail, however it can only be hoped that this failure will not prevent others from campaigning to stand up for those who lack the energies, finances and know-how to represent themselves and make an issue of their plights against large government and corporate bodies. ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/10/14/dont-extradite-gary-mckinnon/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Extradition","RelPermalink":"/tags/extradition/"},{"LinkTitle":"Gary-Mckinnon","RelPermalink":"/tags/gary-mckinnon/"}],"title":"Don't Extradite Gary McKinnon"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Business","RelPermalink":"/categories/business/"}],"content":" Costly pile\nAs an avid reader, it often occurs to me just how second-hand book retailers manage to turn a profit. Even assuming the raw stock can be acquired at very little cost, the vast majority of books can go unsold almost indefinitely, all the while occupying shelf or storage space that costs money to maintain. I read somewhere that on average a second-hand bookseller can expect a third of his stock to be sold within six months, another third to be sold on an indefinite timescale, and the final third to simply go unsold. Obviously this has a knockon effect where turnover is slow. On a recent trip to Wigtown , Scotland\u0026rsquo;s National Book Town, I came across plenty of bookstores that clearly have to elevate prices to remain profitable. No doubt in their case, the annual book festival and holiday season are a major source of revenue that would otherwise cause most to close their doors in an otherwise small and overcrowded market ecosystem.\nIn this matter, the Internet must have been a major boon to many sellers. By opening themselves up to such a vastly larger market, second-hand book stores can be guaranteed an extra income stream. But at what cost? How can resellers make themselves known on the Internet market, and whilst open to such massive competition, remain profitable? It\u0026rsquo;s pretty clear on the face of things that Internet prices for second-hand books are much reduced from their on-shelf equivalents. In Chapters\u0026rsquo; new premises in Dublin, the second-hand book section prices are so \u0026lsquo;astronomical \u0026rsquo; such that you can occasionally find copies of the books cheaper in their own new books section. The same book on Amazon\u0026rsquo;s marketplaces, Abebooks or eBay might technically be listed for as little as a penny.\nOf course, it would be folly to think that those prices are actual representations of the cost to the buyer. There may be many reasons for such low prices being on offer, one of which is clearly the threat of competition, as buyers generally list items by price and only buy those which top the list, but there are obviously other problems for the seller to overcome. The problem of putting themselves on the Internet market can to a large extent be negated by using services such as the ones I listed above - the problem however is being able to afford to do so.\nOn a recent purchase from Abebooks, I was dismayed to note that whilst there was technically a benefit to purchasing more than one book from the same seller in terms of postage costs, the reduction was clearly much smaller than what should be expected. One paperback cost £3.35 shipping, already a little extreme you might think, whilst eight paperbacks cost £16.00 - for roughly the same weight of parcel, Royal Mail quote a first class delivery (whilst the quoted price was for second class) at £8.22. This kind of price shuffling is fairly typical, which recently caused a fairly negative reaction from Abebooks through adding fees to the shipping prices. Whilst charging shipping at such high prices might seem unfair, however, it seems entirely just when considering the number of charges laid at the sellers door when dealing with the large marketplaces. I recently saw a sale via Abebooks wherein the total order amounted to £3.92 excluding shipping, and Abe\u0026rsquo;s commission was £2.10. Add to this the fees charged by Paypal (as that was the payment method) which could be as much as 20p plus 3.5% on the total amount including shipping, and it\u0026rsquo;s little wonder that book-sellers try to add extra to their shipping costs in order to maintain a sliver of profitability. For those that deal in rare books or expensive volumes, the smaller cuts that are made through listing and payment fees might be dealt with, but for smaller sellers just getting a foot on that ladder seems like a daunting prospect.\nUnfortunately, there would appear to be very few alternatives. Even Abebooks was recently acquired by Amazon, and no doubt their fees and market models for second-hand sellers will be homogenised further than they already were. Sites such as UKBookworld from The Clique offer no commission sales in return for annual listing fees (amongst other services), though leave sellers to handle credit card or other payment methods themselves (though thereby avoiding a \u0026lsquo;skim\u0026rsquo; from the host). The site of course suffers from a small number of participating shops, and tends to focus more on antique and out-of-print volumes than low cost second-hand paperbacks as a result.\nUnless bookshops can set up their own sites that are popular enough and large enough to attract customers and direct sales, is there any alternative for those needing to use one of the main marketplaces mentioned? Or is this just an example of the failure of the Internet to democratise finances as well as ideas?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/10/11/the-cost-of-reading/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Abebooks","RelPermalink":"/tags/abebooks/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reading","RelPermalink":"/tags/reading/"},{"LinkTitle":"Second-Hand-Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/second-hand-books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wigtown","RelPermalink":"/tags/wigtown/"}],"title":"The Cost of Reading"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Pet-Hates","RelPermalink":"/categories/pet-hates/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" Spam\nIf there\u0026rsquo;s one jargon term that every user new to the Internet soon becomes acquainted with, spam must near the top of the list. Its prevalence and virtual ubiquity through many forms of online communication have generated miniature industries devoted to dealing with it, and the science of spam detection, prevention and treatment almost resembles the tactical skirmishes of biological immune systems.\nSpam exists in many forms, from bogus guestbook entries to elaborate instant messaging robots, but the variety which prompted this post was that classic form - unsolicited email. The level of penetration of spam illustrates itself in the number of systems put in place to combat it as standard on the vast majority of websites, including of course authentication emails and the ever evolving captcha. I use a small combination of plugins on this blog to block out most of the spam, and given the extreme sparcity of genuine comments, the potential for inconvenient \u0026lsquo;false positives\u0026rsquo; is rather slim. Nevertheless, even the cursory inspection I tend to make over Akismet\u0026rsquo;s latest haul becomes tiresome for all the size of this blog - spam comments to date outnumber genuine ones by a factor of almost 500 (and that only counts those caught and tallied by Akismet). Quite how larger, more popular blogs deal with searching for false positives, I don\u0026rsquo;t know, but the task must be fairly time-consuming.\nYet even that abysmal ratio sometimes seems quite congenial next to the level of email spam I receive in its current state. Whilst the common techniques for filtering out spam emails have fairly high success ratios, the constantly evolving battle with the Bayesian filter can never ultimately separate emails, black and white, and sifting through the gray matter can be a painful experience, particularly when searching for unexpected false positives. Indeed with some of my emails going through multiple filters (before finally ending up in a Thunderbird client and getting filtered once more), I begin to wonder how many emails have simply drifted away in that black sea of jetsam.\nThe problems of course don\u0026rsquo;t stop there. In recent days I have been reminded of another serious gripe, when my inbox was flooded with bounced messages, evidence that my address was being used by spammers (and many of those were filtered as spam on account of their message contents, despite technically being genuine messages). Since very few strings at the associated domain are actually received by anybody, it stands that the deluge represents merely the tip of the melting iceberg. There are many tips out there to stop spammers from harvesting your email address, but very few to prevent them using it to spoof messages elsewhere (and even to yourself). The most common piece of advice is simply to wait it out - eventually the spammers move on and utilise a new address, and indeed the bounced messages seem to come in waves.\nOne of the methods used to reduce spam that was highlighted through these bounced messages is Sender Address Verification. As covered by this post , the method requires people sending email to an address for the first time to verify their authenticity by fulfilling a certain task explained in an automated email reply, before the message (and future messages) may be delivered to the recipient. This bears some resemblance to the automated email verification sent out by many online accounts. However, it is not without its weaknesses. After all, spam sent via spoofed, verified emails will still be delivered as genuine messages, and the potential for spammers to find methods to fulfil the authentication tasks is all too clear from the variety of methods already deployed to crack online captchas.\nUltimately I\u0026rsquo;m reduced to dealing with spam in the usual manner, relying on filters to do the heavy work and leaving me to occasionally label those messages not picked up, whilst occasionally doing my own filtering for false positives (and burying my head in the sand every time my addresses come up for spoofing duties).\nHow do others combat the spam plague? Are there other methods commonly available that I\u0026rsquo;m overlooking? And do people consider the possibility of false positives a necessary evil in the war against spam?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/09/18/dealing-with-spam/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Akismet","RelPermalink":"/tags/akismet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Email","RelPermalink":"/tags/email/"},{"LinkTitle":"Spam","RelPermalink":"/tags/spam/"}],"title":"Dealing with Spam"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Having recently set up some network storage, I came across a rather irritating problem mapping network drives in Windows XP. The basic setup procedure, as outlined here , worked perfectly on some systems, but failed to retain the stored username/password for network attached drives requiring alternative login details. The solution found, courtesy of this blog, is to map the drives using the following command (replacing U with the drive letter, and NETHOME\\LOCID with the relevant UNC network location):\nNET USE U: \\\\NETHOME\\LOCID /PERSISTENT:YES /SAVECRED The necessary username/password details can then be entered and should be stored, allowing the drive to be mapped automatically when the user logs on.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/09/10/mapped-drives-in-windows-xp/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Mapped-Drives","RelPermalink":"/tags/mapped-drives/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nas","RelPermalink":"/tags/nas/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows/"}],"title":"Mapped Drives in Windows XP"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Films","RelPermalink":"/categories/films/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" The Indiana Jones saga was complete. He had trumped the Nazis, saved his father\u0026rsquo;s life, solved one of the greatest archaeological mysteries, and ridden off into the sunset with his companions. At least, until now. The recent spate of late-coming sequels and series restarts no doubt to a large extent prompted Indy\u0026rsquo;s return to the silver screen, and whilst this is no bad thing by itself, it does however spoil the rather nice ending to the previous series finale Indiana Jones \u0026amp; The Last Crusade . Although Sean Connery declined to come out of retirement for the film, the late Denholm Elliott sadly missed, and there being no part for John Rhys-Davies, the film\u0026rsquo;s still alluring combination of George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, John Williams and Harrison Ford will no doubt kick this film to the top of the box office. The problem is that the potential for disappointment runs almost as high as it did for Lucas\u0026rsquo; own Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace, and one imagines that The Crystal Skull will only suffer as a result.\nWarning: possible spoilers ahead.\nThe Kingdom of the Crystal Skull isn\u0026rsquo;t as good as classic Indy, that\u0026rsquo;s for sure, and it does rather ruin the previously well-rounded ending to the series. The first thing that strikes is that Harrison Ford really is a lot older now. He has the charisma to pull the character off, and that counts for a lot, but when it comes to the action sequences it really shows that the reactions and flexibility of old simply aren\u0026rsquo;t there any more.\nOne thing that really seems to have griped a lot of fans is the realism factor. I imagine this partly comes since a lot of us just aren\u0026rsquo;t the youngsters we were when we first saw Indy. The original Raiders of the Lost Ark was released back in 1981, so even people currently in their 40s may have only been young teenagers when they first saw that absurdly clad archaeologist creating mayhem in the desert. That similar loss of magic no doubt dispelled a lot of Star Wars fans\u0026rsquo; hopes when the prequel trilogy was released. Yet where the recent Star Wars trilogy had a reason to be made—the episode numbers were blank and the story untold—The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull smacks much more of a cash-in. This financial incentive is another criticism many film-goers have, but making money is the point of most movies, so why should this Indy adventure be treated any differently. There were a number of scenes in the film which were blatantly unrealistic, but the previous films contained as many obvious impossibilities that were simply part of the magic of Indy. Jumping out of an airplane and sledging down the Himalayas in a dingy, sneaking onto a German submarine from the open sea (exactly where would you hide?), or diving under a burning lake of petrol are all part of an average day in the life of Indiana Jones.\nThe Kingdom of the Crystal Skull certainly delivers on the entertainment aspects, with so much happening in its 124 minute runtime that you barely have time to take it all in. The storyline is perhaps a little hit and miss, and many have remarked that they weren\u0026rsquo;t particularly impressed with the extra terrestrial aspect (no doubt more into the religious mysticism of the other films) though the oodles of action knitted the scenes together well enough. Shia LaBoef probably deserves an award for the least annoying new character of recent years. If there are future films planned it seems clear that LaBoef\u0026rsquo;s role in this film was fleshed out to provide a possible successor to the ageing Harrison Ford. The latter\u0026rsquo;s age is humourously dealt with, with Indy playing a far more conservative role in his older years, often times pointing out the dangers to his more impetuous companions. The film really grips its 1950s environment, something the other films largely glossed over, from the Fonzi-like character of LaBoef, to the nuclear tests and the cafe brawl set to the tune of Shake, Rattle \u0026amp; Roll. The music of course is first rate, which is little else we come to expect from John Williams, though as he himself admits, getting back to working on an Indiana Jones film was like wearing an old pair of gloves (i.e. he didn\u0026rsquo;t have to work too hard at it). It was also rather nice to hear some authentic Russian in a film for a change instead of the usual hashed attempts—and all credit to Cate Blanchett for trying.\nThere were however plenty of poor elements to the film. The promised CGI rebate wasn\u0026rsquo;t forthcoming, with many scenes obviously touched up and others overly reliant on the green screen. The ants scene in particular was virtual plagiarism of The Mummy . Mutt\u0026rsquo;s Tarzan-esque swinging through the jungle was more than a little on the childish side, and whoever dreamt up the atomic blast scene was clearly enjoying some illegal substance or other, although the humour just about made up for it. The film also suffered from a deluge of poor supporting characters. Sullah stand-in character \u0026lsquo;Mac\u0026rsquo; turned out to be more of a pointless confusion than anything else, given that he revealed himself to be a mole almost from the off (which the FBI confirmed), the unnecessary double-agent shenanigans did little to disguise the fact that he was the obligatory \u0026ldquo;moral death\u0026rdquo; character (see Elsa Schneider in The Last Crusade or perhaps Rene Belloq in Raiders of the Lost Ark). Marion Ravenwood\u0026rsquo;s return might tie up some loose ends but her demeanour made the whole jaunt down the Amazon seem more like a family vacation than a brutal race against time. In fact very little in the film smacked of danger, perhaps the key reason that the film really failed to live up to its predecessors. At no point did Indy ever look to be in any real trouble, even as a guest of the villain Irina Spalko. Whilst the Nazis had to be transplanted by the Soviets for reasons of chronology, the end result was a much more carnival atmosphere to the fight against evil and life and death situations of the earlier series.\nUltimately, your reaction to Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull depends mostly on your attitude and expectations. If you hope that this latest offering will enable you to relive those childhood memories and the magic of the earlier films, then you will only be disappointed to find that time has changed us no less than it has changed Indy. On its own merits, The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull delivers as an action movie but perhaps too much for its own good. Had the action been toned down a little and made more believable, and the script toughened up to make us will Indy to the finishing line (instead of merely willing it to finish) then the film would have been deserving of the box office receipts it will no doubt take. Harrison Ford deserves all the credit for reprising the role, and his on-screen charisma makes the film immensely more watchable than its constituent parts alone. It\u0026rsquo;s definitely Indy, but not as we knew him.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/31/indiana-jones-and-the-kingdom-of-the-crystal-skull/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Harrison-Ford","RelPermalink":"/tags/harrison-ford/"},{"LinkTitle":"Indiana-Jones","RelPermalink":"/tags/indiana-jones/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Valve\u0026rsquo;s Team Fortress 2 is already over six months old, so now might seem like an odd time to write a post on the games merits, but with the recent release of the Medic Achievement pack, and the rather surprising (though not unwelcome) news that Valve intends to integrate some of its popular features and improvements into the ageing Day of Defeat: Source, I decided I\u0026rsquo;d jot down a few of my impressions.\nThe release of Team Fortress 2 came as something of a surprise, after so little news about its development, with virtually nothing concrete after the initial revelations in 1999. The finished version bears absolutely no relation to those initial screenshots, instead maintaining much stronger links to the original modification Team Fortress Classic, with a strong glossy coat of The Incredibles style graphics and an uncut, Columbian-strength injection of humour.\nThe game relies strongly on teamplay, and one of the greatest assets in Team Fortress\u0026rsquo; arsenal is the balancing act Valve have worked between the classes. Many games with far fewer variables don\u0026rsquo;t manage to create as level a playing field as this. With nine different classes to play that was no easy feat, with each having different weapons, movement speeds, skills and strengths. That\u0026rsquo;s not to say it\u0026rsquo;s perfect—some classes enjoy obvious advantages with very few setbacks—but each one has its uses, and with some practice can be used to great effect. Some require a lot more fiddling and practice to master than the others, for example spying can be a deadly and irritating activity in the hands of those with an innate love of hide and seek. For those with an addiction to pressing \u0026lsquo;W\u0026rsquo;, however, it turns into more of a kamikaze class than anything of any particular use to the team. By contrast the role of sniper is much more intuitive, which as Yahtzee so brilliantly put it is reduced to the classic point-and-click adventure game style of “use gun on man.”\nCredit: Sam Kindler And teamplay is well featured in Team Fortress 2. Whilst other games in Valve\u0026rsquo;s arsenal purport to rely on the teamplay element, there are annoying aspects of these that their latest game has thankfully worked to eliminate. The classic public server \u0026rsquo;tactic\u0026rsquo; of many a Counter-Strike: Source player, that of hanging behind a doorway as your teammates are shot to ribbons, before charging in guns blazing to finish off the softened up enemies who are now busy reloading to claim all the glory simply doesn\u0026rsquo;t find a place in Team Fortress 2. This partly results from the fact that players can \u0026lsquo;assist\u0026rsquo; in killing enemies (and score points for doing so). Similarly the Medic class is poorly armed and weak when alone, but when backing up other classes automatically scores points for kill assists, and extra points for healing injured players, extra incentive for Medics to heal all of their teammates rather than follow the top scoring player around like a dog on a leash. The Engineer meanwhile finds a supporting role and scores points through building well placed sentry guns and teleporters, whilst to some extent relying on other teammates in dealing with spies attempting to destroy his buildings.\nAnother attribute of the teamplay incentive lies in the nature of defeat. The defeated team finds itself unable to shoot, reduced to a crawl, and opens up all of their safe zones (i.e. respawn points) to the enemy, leaving their enemies free to ritually hunt them down and massacre them. In comparison public server gamers in Counter-Strike: Source are free to ignore teamplay objectives and look after their own skins, and are even able to go \u0026lsquo;frag hunting\u0026rsquo; for some seconds after their team has lost the round. Day of Defeat: Source takes a middle ground between the two, with losing players unable to fire, but still able to move as normal and make use of the safety of their spawns, and it would be nice if those aspects could be made more like those in Team Fortress 2 as an encouragement to teamplay and a focus on objectives.\nCredit: roBurky One of the refreshing features of Team Fortress 2 is the great injection of humour. Released alongside the ravishingly humourous Portal, it is clear that Valve\u0026rsquo;s intentions with The Orange Box were to create a selection of games intended to make us laugh and enjoy gaming, rather than take it too seriously. The cartoonesque graphics provide a beautiful setting to the gaming mayhem, and whilst slightly limited in scope, the richness of the characters more than makes up for this. Each of the nine classes has a particular persona representing one or other stereotype. The Demoman is played by a black, Scottish cyclops, the Heavy by a simple Russian obsessed with his gun, and the Soldier a madcap American with more than a passing resemblance to George C. Scott\u0026rsquo;s Patton. Each has a large number of one liners that pop up during the game, such as the Sniper, after shooting someone in the head saying \u0026ldquo;Thanks for standin\u0026rsquo; still, wanker!\u0026rdquo; or the Heavy on hearing a dispenser being built exclaiming \u0026ldquo;I hear someone building diaper changing station!\u0026rdquo; Valve have created cute introductory videos for some of the classes, and of course the community have made many more. (Especially worth checking out is the gorgeous Ignis Solus from Lit Fuse Films .)\nCredit: Bryan Sutter A contentious issue that many criticise and which drives some players to distraction is the inclusion of \u0026lsquo;criticals\u0026rsquo;. These essentially give weapons a random chance to do triple the amount of damage normally dealt. This is often enough to kill a player outright, and can lead to many a frustrating situation where an evenly staged fight is determined by the random number generator. It\u0026rsquo;s almost akin to a gunfight in the wild west in which you suddenly find your gun was replaced with a water pistol. Whilst this can make many a pitched battle appear to be decided on a dice roll, in my opinion that element of luck means the game is ultimately more playable for players of different skill levels. A decent player in a competent team (and with a decent medic to back him up) could probably play many a map without dying, particularly if he outclassed his opponents. The random criticals to a large extent negate such domination, and enable poorly skilled players to have a chance to enjoy the game to a greater extent. However, the system is not without its problems. Given the variety between the classes, the critical hits manifest themselves in different ways: Spies and Snipers benefit from non-random critical hits from backstabs and headshots respectively, Medics can do \u0026lsquo;critical healing\u0026rsquo;, Engineers\u0026rsquo; buildings are resistant to critical shots (consolation for the fact that their sentries never fire criticals) etc. However, whilst Soldiers and Demomen can fire off critical shots and stand a fair chance of the explosion killing someone or causing major damage without hitting anyone in particular, classes like the Pyro in particular have little chance of doing mass damage with their critical flame except on more compact maps. The biggest gripe I have with that system, however, is the manner in which the random nature of critical shots can be affected by a player\u0026rsquo;s performance. In particular, as this forum post seems to demonstrate, players are rewarded with a higher percentage of critical shots for a limited time, the more damage they do. Of course since the better players tend to deal the most damage, this leads to a runaway effect, as they fire more criticals, dealing more damage, leading to yet more criticals. In defence of my previous statement I would consider a far better employment of that critical ramping to work in favour of those dealing the least damage, or being killed more times consecutively, or dominated by more players etc.\nCredit: Bryan Sutter One of the aspects of Team Fortress 2 that prompted this post was the recent release of the Medic Achievements pack. The game originally came with a number of fun achievements for players to unlock whilst playing, such as killing a certain number of people without dying, healing a certain number of health points, setting a certain number of people on fire and so on. With the latest addition, Valve clearly intended to cater to the more long-term gamers for whom the initial Medic achievement of 25000 healing points wasn\u0026rsquo;t challenge enough. By comparison, the new achievements included one for a million healing points, together with a much greater variety of odd rituals to perform. Unfortunately some do tend to detract from the gameplay and initially led to whole servers of medics running around attempting to gain one achievement or another, hopefully an ailment that will be avoided should future achievement packs be released simultaneously. The achievements have been given some purpose through the introduction of unlockable weapons, which slightly alter those the Medic is already equipped with. The changes are small enough that the unlocked weapons do little to alter the game\u0026rsquo;s balance, though add a further bit of variety and some small advantages. Given the length of time the Medic Achievement pack took to be released it is questionable whether Valve will ever finish what they\u0026rsquo;ve started, and indeed how they can introduce new weapons to the other classes without balancing issues, though that remains to be seen. In the recently announced update to Day of Defeat: Source, a similar set of achievements have been touted, though hopefully the unlockable weapons will be left to the Team Fortress 2 crowd.\nAnother feature that made the crossover to the new Day of Defeat: Source Beta is the so-called freezecam which leaves the player a freeze frame shot of the player who killed them. In Team Fortress 2, this is often humorously supplemented by little signs pointing to various giblets littered around the frame with indications such as \u0026ldquo;Here\u0026rsquo;s a little bit of you!\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;Another piece.\u0026rdquo; Whilst this feature adds to the ethos of Team Fortress 2, it could certainly prove to alter the game dynamics in Day of Defeat: Source, which already has the camera aim towards the killer on dying, but would not reveal a hidden sniper to the same extent that the zoomed in freeze cam does. However, it would be nice if that feature could be expanded, in a similar vein to the \u0026ldquo;Killcam\u0026rdquo; found in Call of Duty games—a five second replay of the killer\u0026rsquo;s last movements—a very nice way of seeing how you died, and indeed a great aid to identifying cheaters.\nInteresting though is the reaction of many regular Day of Defeat: Source players to the update news. Many have complained about the changes, claiming that it will only ruin the game dynamics, or that the game is becoming too much like Team Fortress 2. It appears to be a rather typical reaction to gamers who become accustomed to their particular niche and fear any changes that would upset their familiar skulking grounds. However as far as I can see, the changes bring welcome freshness to a game that was otherwise on the gradual decline, and indicates that Valve are committed to bringing fresh content and updated engine performance to games in their portfolio even a number of years after their release. Certainly welcome news, given that the touted changes are probably unlikely to improve sales figures in any significant way, beyond the reassurance that gamers may feel from knowing that the developer hasn\u0026rsquo;t given up on the game.\nOverall Valve really pulled off something brilliant with Team Fortress 2. The game is well balanced, despite the massive variety afforded through the class system, beautiful to look at, comical in more than just aesthetics, and most of all—fun! The news that Valve intend to overhaul their older multiplayer games with the tricks tried and tested in Team Fortress is welcome, and shows that they have given a commitment to these older titles that gives the gamer confidence. Who knows, may we even yet see the reintroduction of the British to Day of Defeat: Source? You almost feel like forgiving them for the constant delays to Half-Life 2: Episode 2! But let\u0026rsquo;s not get carried away\u0026hellip;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/29/assaulting-the-team-fortress/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Day-of-Defeat-Source","RelPermalink":"/tags/day-of-defeat-source/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Team-Fortress-2","RelPermalink":"/tags/team-fortress-2/"},{"LinkTitle":"Valve","RelPermalink":"/tags/valve/"}],"title":"Assaulting the Team Fortress"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nDe Radio 4 Top 400 - The favourite classical pieces as voted for by Dutch radio listeners. Certainly a handsome proportion of religious works in the list. (PDF)\n100 Best Last Lines from Novels - How great can a last line be? I\u0026rsquo;ve read some of the works on the list and can\u0026rsquo;t say any are particularly memorable, but here\u0026rsquo;s an arbitrary list of the top 100 anyway. (PDF)\nThe World\u0026rsquo;s Spookiest Weapons - Starting with the A-bomb and working through mind control, crowd control and animal manipulation, this little list illustrates some of the craziest weapons designed or researched in the years since the last war.\nBoxhead 2play - While away some moments (hours!) with this mad flash-based zombie fest. Can also be played cooperatively or in deathmatch mode from the same machine.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/24/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Classical-Music","RelPermalink":"/tags/classical-music/"},{"LinkTitle":"Flash-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/flash-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Weapons","RelPermalink":"/tags/weapons/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Oscar Pistorius\nHard to believe that Oscar Pistorius, the double-amputee sprinter, has won his appeal to trial for the upcoming Beijing Olympics. The Court of Arbitration for Sport overturned a ban imposed by the International Association of Athletics Federations, after the latter said his carbon fibre blades give him a mechanical advantage. Essentially the ruling rests on the fact that the IAAF did not prove sufficiently that Pistorius gains an advantage from the \u0026ldquo;Cheetah Flex-Foot\u0026rdquo; artificial limbs. Of course, Pistorius is allowed to compete in the Paralympics, and currently holds the world record in the 100m, 200m and 400m events. It would appear that he is looking for a chance to compete at a higher level, and many support his case as inspirational.\nBut therein lies the problem. As one Slashdot reader put it rather eloquently, \u0026ldquo;It might be inspirational to see a dyslexic child competing in a spelling bee with the aid of a spellchecker, but it\u0026rsquo;s hardly the point of the competition.\u0026rdquo; The decision is obviously a contentious one, and as someone who has no interest in the Olympics and very seldom sees an event, I would not normally have a point of view. However it seems that this decision places the Olympics in dangerous territory for the future. It may well be the case that the appendages offer Oscar Pistorius no advantage above what his normal capabilities might have been, however as no comparison is possible, that would be exceedingly difficult to prove either way. What is certain is that the decision opens the door to others in the future, who may well be afforded advantages above and beyond their natural capabilities. Athletes are made to perform within a fluid bubble of \u0026rsquo;natural conditions\u0026rsquo;, separated from drugs that would enhance their performance, and divorced from technologies in sportswear and sports gear that would give them that unfair edge, yet these rules exist to keep the playing field level, whilst this latest decision clearly attempts to level a different field. Mechanical advantage or no, Pistorius will have to train hard simply to qualify, and one can\u0026rsquo;t help but feel that were he already faster than the able-bodied competition his appeal would have failed. Instead this decision allows everyone to feel the cushy \u0026lsquo;aww\u0026rsquo; factor of seeing someone disadvantaged compete in the Olympics, but the real result of this ruling, after Pistorius\u0026rsquo; name is long forgotten, will be the precedent which allows athletes with mechanical replacements into the competition. There\u0026rsquo;s a future yet for the cyborg olympics.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/23/in-preparation-for-the-bionilympics/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Athletics","RelPermalink":"/tags/athletics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Beijing-Olympics","RelPermalink":"/tags/beijing-olympics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Olympics","RelPermalink":"/tags/olympics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Oscar-Pistorius","RelPermalink":"/tags/oscar-pistorius/"}],"title":"In Preparation for the Bionilympics"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Remarque\nAll Quiet on the Western Front is one of those classics more often referred to and talked about than read. It\u0026rsquo;s one of those books which doesn\u0026rsquo;t require reading to know the plot, and skimming through the book it almost feels like familiar territory. The book is eminently readable, and despite its brevity, deals with a wide variety of aspects of wartime life, both specific to the Great War and in general. Despite its age, the book has lost none of its meaning, and whilst it proves to be an important work historically, in dealing with everyday German experiences in the Great War and reactions to it during the Weimar years, it is also an enjoyable read and one that should certainly be read more often. It is a simple story told through the eyes of a lad only nineteen years old, pressured into signing up by a jingoistic schoolmaster, who is hardened, desensitised and churned up by the horrors of trench warfare in the Great War.\nWarning: spoilers ahead.\nIt is precisely that simple point of view that makes the book so brilliant. The war experience is palpably retold through the mundane everyday occurrences. The constant search for food and provisions, the tedium of life during the quiet moments, dealing with lice and rats, the pressures of bombardment and the psychological reactions to sleeplessness and the constant threat of death. Scenes from the dressing stations are vividly retold, as are the effects of dysentery, or the aftermath of gas attacks. The novel\u0026rsquo;s narrator, Paul Bäumer, finds himself constantly searching for the answers, the reasons, the logic behind it all, and often relates conversations with his companions over why the war started, why it goes on, will it ever end, and how life can possibly continue after it all.\nOne of the novel\u0026rsquo;s greatest strengths is its personality, its identification with the individual and the individuals as part of a collective in the great overall theatre of the war. Bäumer\u0026rsquo;s experiences throughout the war are his own, but at the same time it is only through camaraderie with those in his regiment that he is able to function, able to keep his nerves calm and endure the deadly randomness of life in the trenches. Any moment might be his last, but knowing that there are others there around him with the same thoughts and feelings allows him to stand through it. Indeed the war changes him such that he almost fears the life back on the home front, where no one can possibly understand his experiences, when all that classical liberal education instilled into him before the war has lost all shred of meaning and credibility.\nAt the same time, the book\u0026rsquo;s other great strength is its imprecision. Paul Bäumer, Stanislaus Katczinsky and the others might be people we are to identify with, yet at the same time they are merely shadowy figures in a much larger play. Remarque makes few references to their real identities, although we know they come from a variety of backgrounds, whether farmers, cobblers or locksmiths. Perhaps one of strongest criticisms of All Quiet On The Western Front is that the focus lies on those from poor backgrounds and the suggestion that they alone served in the fighting. Nevertheless the novel gives little intimation about the nationality of these soldiers; they could just as easily be from \u0026rsquo;those over there\u0026rsquo; as Remarque often refers to the enemy. The Hollywood film adaptation of 1930 highlights this even more, as Germans with thick American accents whoop and cheer as their schoolmaster persuades them to enlist, before marching off singing \u0026ldquo;Die Wacht am Rhein\u0026rdquo;. In essence the book\u0026rsquo;s strength is its portrayal of war as an abstract concept, and featuring people of indeterminate origins who are tormented, tortured and killed under its weight.\nThe novel ends with the reader being told that Paul Bäumer died only a month before the Armistice, almost as if the journalistic memoirs of a soldier at war had been cut short before they could be finished. Bäumer had considered the record of his time in the war a possible source of meaning in his life after being demobbed, something which Remarque himself clearly enacted. Ultimately however, the juxtaposition of this sudden curtailment of a young man\u0026rsquo;s life, a hero\u0026rsquo;s life which the reader has shared and empathised with from the first page, with the military dispatch which can report \u0026ldquo;Im Westen nichts Neues\u0026rdquo; (more literally \u0026ldquo;Nothing new on the Western front\u0026rdquo;) leaves the reader completely unable to answer Bäumer\u0026rsquo;s searching questions, deafened by the sickening irony.\nThis last scene is depicted brilliantly in the film version, in a manner not described in the novel. This adaptation certainly deserves a quick mention as it is a true masterpiece of cinematography. The film still seems fairly fresh given its antiquity, and one easily forgets the primitive nature of film making at the time. In 1930 such \u0026rsquo;talkies\u0026rsquo; were sufficiently new that whole apparatus had to be built around the great clunking cameras to prevent their mechanical whirrings from being recorded on tape. As already mentioned, the fact that the actors are quite blatantly American robs the adaptation of none of its truth, whilst the script stays largely true to Remarque\u0026rsquo;s original.\nThe book was harried by Hitler\u0026rsquo;s NSDAP as being a crime against every German who fought in the war, and naturally banned on their coming to power. Remarque himself was forced to flee the country, first to Switzerland and then on to the United States by way of France, after the Nazis revoked his German citizenship. The film adaptation even had to be withdrawn from German cinemas, after Goebbels managed to whip up such a storm of protest and disruption at the Berlin screening, and the ban was only lifted as late as the 1960s. Whilst there were many who enjoyed the war for all its glory and adventure (epitomised by books such as In Stahlgewittern by Ernst Jünger, translated as Storm of Steel ), one might presume the vast majority shared Remarque\u0026rsquo;s sentiments about the war years, which leads one to query why this book was not more staunchly defended, and why so many found it abhorrent. The answer may even lie within the book itself; Bäumer finds himself on leave during one section of the book, unable to come to terms with the home front, with those untouched by the horrors of war beyond food and labour shortages. For these members of society the war is ethereal and fantastic, especially for those too young to participate (for example, see Sebastian Haffner\u0026rsquo;s Defying Hitler: A Memoir ) or too old. For them it becomes all too easy to believe in the Dolchstoßlegende, the \u0026lsquo;stab in the back\u0026rsquo; myth of Germany\u0026rsquo;s loss in the First World War. For us it becomes all the more important to remember the book\u0026rsquo;s message, and to appreciate it as a masterpiece of anti-war literature.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/18/all-quiet-on-the-western-front/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Erich-Maria-Remarque","RelPermalink":"/tags/erich-maria-remarque/"},{"LinkTitle":"Germany","RelPermalink":"/tags/germany/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"War","RelPermalink":"/tags/war/"}],"title":"All Quiet on the Western Front"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nIf it\u0026rsquo;s good enough for Shatner - Old school computer advertising, as dug out of the back issues of vintage computer magazines. William Shatner, Roger Moore, and the cast of M*A*S*H all offered their images to promote various relics of the golden era of computing.\nIs black the new green? - Do websites with black backgrounds use less energy than bright ones? The team from Dialogue Box tackle the issue of green web design and attempt to explode the myths surrounding energy usage and website colours.\nSmaller than mp3 - Not content with shrinking music down to mp3 size, researchers at the University of Rochester have formulated a solution to recreate sounds through recreation of the physical attributes of an instrument and its player to store the sounds in files 1,000 times smaller than current mp3 standards.\nTen stupid ideas that earned a million - From pixel advertising to vegetarian wishbones, through HIV-positive dating and glasses for dogs, here\u0026rsquo;s a list of some of the most stupid ideas to have earned a fortune for their creators. (Russian)\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/18/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Advertising","RelPermalink":"/tags/advertising/"},{"LinkTitle":"Audio-Standards","RelPermalink":"/tags/audio-standards/"},{"LinkTitle":"Business-Ideas","RelPermalink":"/tags/business-ideas/"},{"LinkTitle":"Green-Web","RelPermalink":"/tags/green-web/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"A friend of mine was having a strange problem with her Dell XPS system, whereby the active area of the mouse cursor would move with apparent randomness, occasionally being located as it should be at the arrow\u0026rsquo;s point, sometimes at its middle, other times half an inch below. This post led us to the solution that a simple graphics driver update was required, coincidentally for the same ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT card.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/17/strange-mouse-cursor-issues/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Dell","RelPermalink":"/tags/dell/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vista","RelPermalink":"/tags/vista/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows/"}],"title":"Strange Mouse Cursor Issues"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Came across this rather useful little mobile phone hack on AfriGadget some while ago. Nice to see ideas from the end-user finally working their way into the manufactured product. Whilst there are dual-SIM phones now available, hopefully such ingenuity may find its way into the mainstream. With the benefit of being able to seamlessly switch between two (or more) SIM cards for better price tariffs etc., and until such time as there is a true European provider, it would be rather nice to be able to use a \u0026rsquo;local\u0026rsquo; number on one\u0026rsquo;s travels without having to carry about a collection of assorted SIMs that have to be swapped and changed every time you cross a border.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/14/african-ingenuity/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Mobile-Phones","RelPermalink":"/tags/mobile-phones/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/tags/technology/"}],"title":"African Ingenuity"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nPlugoo - Talk with your site visitors through your favourite instant messenger with this blog plugin. The idea\u0026rsquo;s a nice one, though there would appear to be plenty of potential for abuse.\nSpheers - Fancy downloading your brain? Alright, that\u0026rsquo;s not quite the idea, but spheers.com, currently in beta, seems to be offering a way of keeping tabs on all that digital information which passes our eyes so we can come back to it later.\nSuper Cook - A site which offers almost exactly what I wrote about in this post . A few features they could yet implement, but overall a pretty decent site for checking recipes and getting new ideas.\nTypeRacer - Nice little game to improve your typing skills. Practice on your own or go head-to-head in a race with other players.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/06/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cookery","RelPermalink":"/tags/cookery/"},{"LinkTitle":"Instant-Messaging","RelPermalink":"/tags/instant-messaging/"},{"LinkTitle":"Typing","RelPermalink":"/tags/typing/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" WordPress\nPlugins can be a major boon. They can add variety to a site, integrate third party software, collect feedback, improve navigation, or add features. Occasionally they may become integral to the way a blog is run. But they can also become a burden or a major stumbling point. The recent WordPress 2.5 release made a large of plugins for the software incompatible, and outright broke a few. In those cases where plugins simply provide some added extraneous functionality, such breakages might not be a problem, but where they form an integral part of a blog the potential changes can bring a site to a halt.\nYet some downtime during a WordPress update is not the only worry when it comes to plugins. Whilst major updates often accentuate the problems, there is no guarantee that plugin authors will continue their work to cope with bugs and software changes. The small WPPA plugin currently used on this blog was recently broken by the WordPress update, but the author considered that the features introduced in the recent version might make his plugin obsolete, and only touched up the plugin to work with 2.5 (so far). Since I hardly post any photographs, such a change makes little difference to this site, but for many others migrating to another plugin could prove a major job if automated tools aren\u0026rsquo;t available. Others may have experienced such changes when moving between multilingual plugins as the features and support changed, from Language Picker , through Polyglot , to Language Switcher or WP_Multilingual . Such a migration might involve moving media around, altering themes, or having to change tags or syntax within WordPress posts.\nHow do you approach using plugins on WordPress? Do you consider WordPress should avoid leave extra features to the plugin authors rather than implementing features already well covered (e.g. tags, photos)? Should plugin authors attempt to implement migration tools or leave it to end-users to do the necessary conversions?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/05/06/relying-on-plugins/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"Relying on Plugins"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Polish","RelPermalink":"/categories/polish/"}],"content":"Kiedy byłem w Polsce pierwszy raz, mieszkałem z przyjaciółką w Olsztynie. Rano matka mojej przyjaciółki zapytała mnie, czy chciałbym kawę lub herbatę. Wtedy jeszcze prawie wcale nie rozumiałem po polsku, tylko piąte przez dziesiąte - \u0026ldquo;dziękuję\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;proszę\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;przepraszam\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;nie rozumiem\u0026rdquo; - ale dlatego, że jestem z Wielkiej Brytanii, oczywiście chciałem herbatę! Odpowiedziałem po prostu \u0026ldquo;proszę\u0026rdquo;, ale jak już napisałem, tylko trochę mówiłem po polsku, tak więc naprawdę powiedziałem \u0026ldquo;prosię\u0026rdquo;.\n- \u0026ldquo;Czy chcesz kawę albo herbatę?\u0026rdquo; - \u0026ldquo;Tak, prosię!\u0026rdquo;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/04/29/ma%C5%82a-anegdota/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Polski","RelPermalink":"/tags/polski/"}],"title":"Mała anegdota"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Spotting the pink\nThe World Snooker Championship this year has certainly been entertaining. Newcomer Liang Wenbo\u0026rsquo;s marathon 13-12 victory over Joe Swail proved to be a tense finish after the youngster made a number of rash errors (deserved of his \u0026ldquo;Kamikaze Kid\u0026rdquo; nickname) to allow Joe Swail to creep back from 12-8. Should he win the competition he may vie with Stephen Hendry for the title of youngest player to win the title, though it seems unlikely that he will overcome his erratic and gung-ho moments in time. Hendry, however, certainly seems to have found some new form of late. He currently leads comfortably over Ryan Day in the quarter finals, and would face either Liang Wenbo or Ronnie O\u0026rsquo;Sullivan in the semis, currently level at 4 frames apiece. Nevertheless, yesterday O\u0026rsquo;Sullivan pulled out a maximum break to set the competition alight, his record ninth career maximum, and third at the Crucible.\nIn response, today saw maximum attempts from Stephen Hendry, ending at 112 after some tricky shots to keep the break going, Peter Ebdon, who missed the fifteenth black for a 113 break, and Ali Carter, whose first career maximum makes this the first time two have been scored in the same tournament. With six days still to go the potential is there for a third maximum in the tournament, which sponsors 888.com had originally offered odds of 200:1 - these have dwindled down to 7:4!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/04/29/pursuing-the-fabled-maximum/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Maximum-Break","RelPermalink":"/tags/maximum-break/"},{"LinkTitle":"Snooker","RelPermalink":"/tags/snooker/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"}],"title":"Pursuing the Fabled Maximum"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Ranković, Tito and Đilas\nRanković, Tito and Đilas\nIt\u0026rsquo;s probably about time I got around to finally writing about some of the books that I read, a little in the vein of the 52-in-52 meme. This probably won\u0026rsquo;t start a trend, but Milovan Đilas\u0026rsquo; Conversations with Stalin is full of sufficient tidbits to make it worth writing about, albeit unfortunately a little on the short side.\nĐilas (pictured, right) was one of the key figures in the Yugoslavian Partisan movement during the Second World War, and maintained an influential position in the post-war government alongside Josip Broz Tito (centre), Aleksandar Ranković (on the left), and Edvard Kardelj. He started to write his memoirs in the mid-50s and decided to set his encounters with Stalin aside for separate treatment, but his outspoken criticism of the Yugoslav system resulted in his arrest and imprisonment in 1956. He restarted this work in 1961, which eventually brought about his re-internment.\nThe book details relations between the Yugoslav Partisans and later government and the Soviet Union during the Second World War until the eventual rift between the two states in summer 1948. On account of his position and his command of Russian, Đilas was chosen for a number of visits to the Soviet government, in 1943, 1944 and 1948. Đilas remains quite frank about his own limitations in perception, particularly in his first trip to the Soviet Union during the height of the war. He openly describes his naïve views regarding the west, the perfidious nature of British Intelligence, and his reverence of the Soviet lands as both leaders in the Communist world, and as the spiritual home of pan-Slavism.\nGeorgi Dimitrov\nGeorgi Dimitrov\nNevertheless, Đilas makes numerous important observations, doubtless with the benefit of many years\u0026rsquo; hindsight, from his early meetings with Stalin, and the men who surrounded him. He notes the description of the morale boost Stalin\u0026rsquo;s continued presence in Moscow made during the Battle of Moscow in late 1941, in a meeting with Georgi Dimitrov (pictured), the Bulgarian Communist leader and head of the Comintern until its disbandment in mid-1943. Đilas also pointed out his surprise at the influence of Russian Orthodoxy, no less than pan-Slavism and Russian nationalism, as a motivating factor in the pursuit of the war against Nazi Germany.\nOf the figure of Stalin, Đilas illustrates his early reverence for this figure of genius in the Communist path, but confirms many of the facts revealed elsewhere about the pursuit of Soviet policy and the workings of the upper echelons of the Soviet hierarchy. He remarks on Stalin\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;Kremlin complexion\u0026rdquo; (of pale skin and rosy cheeks), the copious drinking habits of many of the key figures in the Politburo, ((Vyacheslav Molotov was one to \u0026lsquo;drink hard\u0026rsquo;, whilst Lavrentiy Beria was \u0026lsquo;practically a drunkard.\u0026rsquo;)) the excessive meals undertaken from late evening into the small hours (and the subsequent shift in time of the bureaucracy\u0026rsquo;s operations to account for the late rising of many department heads), and the associated requirement of a weekly day\u0026rsquo;s разгружение or \u0026lsquo;unloading\u0026rsquo; - a governmental detox programme if ever there was one. Also interesting was the mention of Stalin\u0026rsquo;s penchant for watching films, a detail that Nikita Khrushchev struck upon in his memoirs. ((Published in English as Khrushchev Remembers.))\nĐilas makes clear recognition of the influence of imperialism in Stalin\u0026rsquo;s deliberations and in Soviet policy as a whole. His private recognition of the action of British socialists within the British democratic framework lay in contrast to the public differences, which Đilas maintains came as a result of their differences in foreign policy. Stalin apparently expounded his views in terms of the unity of Slavs as being vital to success, and predicted that Germany would rise within a dozen years on account of her educated and industrious proletariat. Perhaps more intriguing is Đilas\u0026rsquo; report that Stalin predicted the \u0026rsquo;next war\u0026rsquo; to occur within 15-20 years, and that at a time when the current war was still raging.\n\u0026ldquo;This war is not as in the past; whoever occupies a territory also imposes on it his own social system. Everyone imposes his own system as far as his army has power to do so. It cannot be otherwise.\u0026rdquo;\nThis clear imperialistic mentality is further expanded in the last portion of the book, when Đilas traveled to Moscow again in 1948 on account of relations between Yugoslavia and Albania, and the foundation of the Cominform. ((On the latter point, Đilas remarks that it was Stalin himself who came up with the name for the Cominform\u0026rsquo;s organ \u0026ldquo;For a Lasting Peace - For a People\u0026rsquo;s Democracy\u0026rdquo; on the basis that it would be quoted as such in the Western press.)) Albania and Yugoslavia had been the only eastern European nations to free themselves from the Nazi yolk without decisive intervention from the Red Army, and as such lay beyond the mental grasp of the Soviet system as the above quote suggests. The cooperation between these two states, particularly in terms of economic development and the potential integration of Albania into the Yugoslav federation brought opposition from Nako Spiru within the Albanian Communist Party, and fierce resistance to his opposition particularly from the likes of Koçi Xoxe and Enver Hoxha ((Đilas wrote that Stalin described Hoxha as a petty bourgeois, inclined towards nationalism.)) resulted in his eventual suicide. Đilas points out that the issue of Albanian-Yugoslav cooperation and integration was not one of major concern for the Soviets, but that the Yugoslav government could provide support, aid and most particularly advice to the Albanian regime, despite itself requiring these things of the Soviet government was hypocritical. \u0026ldquo;We agree to Yugoslavia swallowing Albania,\u0026rdquo; Stalin is quoted as saying. Incidentally, this period clearly strikes as being of particular interest in light of today\u0026rsquo;s Balkans, Đilas writing that \u0026ldquo;its [the potential Yugoslav-Albanian union] particular importance, in my opinion, lay in the fact that it would make possible the amalgamation of our considerable and compact Albanian minority with Albania as a separate republic in the Yugoslav-Albanian Federation.\u0026rdquo;\nThis dispute over Yugoslav-Albanian relations was to be solved through the integration of these two states into the Soviet dominated east European framework. At a meeting with the key figures of both the Yugoslav and Bulgarian Communist parties, Stalin and his associates openly derided the Bulgarian attempts at creating a customs union with Rumania without prior Soviet consultation. Soviet policy rather demanded the union of Bulgaria with Yugoslavia (and subsequently the union of Albania with this new federation), no doubt on the basis that the Bulgarian Communists relied on Soviet support, still being under the Red Army\u0026rsquo;s occupation. Dimitrov himself had been prevented from returning to Bulgaria immediately after the war, no doubt on account of his position and potential independence of Soviet aims.\nThese final meetings with Stalin strike as the most revealing into the degeneration of the Soviet state, and the first seeds of the gerontocracy which plagued the later Soviet years. Pointing to the vitality of Stalin\u0026rsquo;s mind during the war, Đilas remarks on his creeping senility, his increasingly gluttonous habits, his reliance on older memories and anecdotes, a more banal sense of humour, and the attitude of those who paid court to his actions. Stalin\u0026rsquo;s position was as much self-created as it was required by those very forces who surrounded him, and the rot in this symbiotic relationship strikes out particularly in the later section of Đilas\u0026rsquo; memoirs. Đilas provides some tidbits which unfortunately aren\u0026rsquo;t fully expanded upon, such as the appearance of open anti-Semitism in the Soviet hierarchy (Stalin boasting that none of its Central Committee members were Jewish), the mysticism and religiosity surrounding the Lenin Mausoleum, returned from its wartime hiding place in the Russian interior, and the now famous account of Stalin maintaining that Benelux involved only Belgium and Luxembourg and was no real example of a working customs union, no one in his presence willing to correct him.\nOne should also point out Đilas\u0026rsquo; impressions of Khrushchev on his meeting with him in 1945. Đilas noted the marked Russification of life in Kiev, ((For more on this subject, see Ivan Dzyuba, Internationalism or Russification?, 1974.)) despite the relative leniency of regional policy in the late war years: at this time, Ukrainian party officials sought the establishment of separate diplomatic relations with the various people\u0026rsquo;s democracies. Khrushchev himself certainly straddled the line of Russo-Ukrainian. Khrushchev impressed Đilas as being of limited classical education, but more importantly self-made and experienced beyond the normal limits of the bureaucracy, \u0026ldquo;a man of the popular masses,\u0026rdquo; well acquainted with the actualities of the Soviet system (e.g. experiences and limitations on the Soviet collective farms), and interested in modifying and reforming from within said system. Of course as Đilas was able to point out, these impressions came from a Khrushchev of a different era to the one who assumed control of the Soviet Union in Stalin\u0026rsquo;s wake.\nFinally, Conversations with Stalin includes a couple of rather amusing anecdotes worth relating about Soviet views on Winston Churchill. Certainly he was well-respected within higher circles as a ruthless politician, and thus a dangerous one. Stalin had reputedly warned Đilas to be wary of British aid, explaining that it was they who had shot down Władysław Sikorski\u0026rsquo;s flight leaving no evidence behind. Đilas argues that his warnings passed on to Tito inspired the latter to leave his base at Vis for Soviet occupied Rumania in September 1944. It was this reputation which resulted in Stalin\u0026rsquo;s following remark:\nPerhaps you think that just because we are the allies of the English we have forgotten who they are and who Churchill is. There\u0026rsquo;s nothing they like better than to trick their allies. During the First World War they constantly tricked the Russians and the French. And Churchill? Churchill is the kind of man who will pick your pocket for a kopeck if you don\u0026rsquo;t watch him. Yes, pick your pocket of a kopeck! By God, pick your pocket of a kopeck! And Roosevelt? Roosevelt is not like that. He dips in his hand only for bigger coins. But Churchill? Churchill - will do it for a kopeck.\nNevertheless his respect was well earned; during a trip to Moscow, Churchill apparently remarked that he should be awarded for his services to the Red Army, since it was his call for intervention at Archangel that had trained them so well.\nConversations with Stalin offers an interesting insight into the inner workings of the Soviet system, and their relations with the eastern block in the immediate aftermath of the war, in particular of course with Yugoslavia. Đilas marks the start of the deterioration of Soviet-Yugoslav relations with his inquiries into the actions of the Red Army in Belgrade, though points out earlier examples of differences between the two existed even from 1943, quoting Tito as having said \u0026ldquo;our first duty is to look after our own army and our own people\u0026rdquo; over the issue of not informing the Soviet Union of their parley with the Germans regarding the treatment of POWs. His style is readable and littered with interesting asides which unfortunately are all too often left unexplored, and one certainly gets the impression that the amount of retouching with the benefit of hindsight is at least more limited than might elsewhere be found. Despite his recognition of Stalin\u0026rsquo;s growing senility and the blatant imperialism of Soviet policy, Đilas nevertheless continued to respect Stalin, for his abilities, his accomplishments and his drive, despite the horrors that lay in his wake. Đilas describes him as a man who would destroy nine tenths of humanity in order to make the remaining tenth \u0026lsquo;happy\u0026rsquo;. But a man who was as much driven by his own demands as by the men around him, to drag the Soviet Union into the future.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/04/24/conversations-with-stalin/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"Josef-Stalin","RelPermalink":"/tags/josef-stalin/"},{"LinkTitle":"Milovan-Djilas","RelPermalink":"/tags/milovan-djilas/"},{"LinkTitle":"Soviet-Union","RelPermalink":"/tags/soviet-union/"},{"LinkTitle":"Yugoslavia","RelPermalink":"/tags/yugoslavia/"}],"title":"Conversations with Stalin"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" andrzejgolota\nCaught a replay of Andrzej Gołota\u0026rsquo;s title fight with Mike Mollo from back in January last night on Eurosport. The derby (both boxers Chicago residents) went the distance, with Gołota taking some punishment from Mollo\u0026rsquo;s right hand leaving him with an eye that always looked like it could cause the fight to end. Nevertheless, Mollo looked to have blown it towards the end, being twelve years Gołota\u0026rsquo;s junior his game plan clearly relied on the fight not going the distance. After 12 rounds Goota was awarded a unanimous decision, and the WBA Fedelatin heavyweight title, yet appears not to want to take this opportunity to retire. Indeed as Geoffrey Ciani reports , Gołota looks set for a match with Shannon Briggs, another aging veteran, though both with the potential for a crack at the title, something which has evaded the Polish emigré despite his technical abilities. Given the two boxers\u0026rsquo; varied styles, perhaps another hare versus tortoise race awaits in the near future.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/04/24/go%C5%82ota-back-on-form/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Andrzej-Golota","RelPermalink":"/tags/andrzej-golota/"},{"LinkTitle":"Boxing","RelPermalink":"/tags/boxing/"},{"LinkTitle":"Mike-Mollo","RelPermalink":"/tags/mike-mollo/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"}],"title":"Gołota Back on Form"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":" Krystyna Janda\nOn Saturday I went to a meeting with Krystyna Janda presented by The National Creativity Centre Foundation , in the National Gallery in Dublin. The meeting principally took the form of a questions and answers session, conducted by the famous Polish director Krzysztof Zanussi, ahead of the Irish première of Krystyna Janda\u0026rsquo;s monologue adaptation of Vedrana Rudan\u0026rsquo;s Ear, Throat, Knife.\nWhilst the interview was pretty interesting, given Janda\u0026rsquo;s extremely busy and varied career, the translating at the event was a little under par. The predominance of Polish speakers in the audience meant that the poor translator didn\u0026rsquo;t always get a say until after a few questions had been asked or answered, and her pretty difficult task of translating her own shorthand wasn\u0026rsquo;t helped by Mr Zanussi interrupting occasionally to demonstrate his own knowledge of English, and I was frankly embarrassed for the poor translator. Most questions focused dealt with Janda\u0026rsquo;s career in acting, both on stage and on the silver screen, from her early roles in films such as Andrzej Wajda\u0026rsquo;s Człowiek z marmuru (Man of Marble) or working alongside Klaus Maria Brandauer in Mephisto, to her more recent work with the Polonia Theatre in Warsaw. Many of the audience\u0026rsquo;s questions focused on her family life, work in politics and music, and just where she finds the energy to keep it all going. Not sure if she answered that sufficiently, but she did suggest that there would be more going on in her blog in the future.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/04/21/krystyna-janda-in-dublin/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Andrzej-Wajda","RelPermalink":"/tags/andrzej-wajda/"},{"LinkTitle":"Krystyna-Janda","RelPermalink":"/tags/krystyna-janda/"},{"LinkTitle":"Krzysztof-Zanussi","RelPermalink":"/tags/krzysztof-zanussi/"},{"LinkTitle":"Poland","RelPermalink":"/tags/poland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Polish-Director","RelPermalink":"/tags/polish-director/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vedrana-Rudan","RelPermalink":"/tags/vedrana-rudan/"}],"title":"Krystyna Janda in Dublin"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Just a little character development from a recent Russian class:\nЛет 30 назад он пользовался уважением, и это несмотря на то, что он был низким и хрупким. Он сверкал харизмой и его глаза светились силой молодости, его ум работал замечательно когда он красноречиво и убедительно представлял свои страсти и мечты: воплощение юношеского идеализма.\nСегодня, та же самая фигура почти вызывает жалость, или даже гнев. Его иссохшое и морщинистое лицо скрывает ум извращенный заблуждениями. Его маленькие, чёрные глаза все ещё искрятся, но и самой малейший проблеск надежды давно уже изчезнул. Тот голос, когда-то сильный и уверенный, сейчас перерывистый и пустой. Тонкие усы, имеющие нездоровое сходство на усы Гитлера, вызывают осмеяние.\nСегодня, Роберт Мугабе стал воплощением пословицы: власть развращает, а абсолютная власть развращает абсолютно.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/04/15/%D0%BE-%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%BC/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Robert-Mugabe","RelPermalink":"/tags/robert-mugabe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Русский","RelPermalink":"/tags/%D1%80%D1%83%D1%81%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9/"}],"title":"О ком?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Memes","RelPermalink":"/categories/memes/"}],"content":"Courtesy of Caro , here\u0026rsquo;s my contributory few lines from The Lives of the Great Composers by Harold C. Schonberg, page 123, three sentences from the fifth one on:\nAnd, indeed, the coda of the first movement, with its slippery, chromatic bass and the awesome moans above it, remains a paralyzing experience. That is the way the world ends. It is absolute music, but it clearly represents struggle, and it is hard to hear so monumentally anguished a cry without reading something into it. The trouble is that face with such music, all of us tend to become sentimentalists, reading into it the wrong message.\nSo he sums up the Ninth Symphony of that \u0026ldquo;Revolutionary from Bonn\u0026rdquo; as the chapter title has it. A pretty decent book on the whole. And yes I realise that was four sentences.\nNow the bigger question of who to pass this on to. Let\u0026rsquo;s see if and how Steffi, Heliologue and Rob respond.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/04/11/words-from-the-page/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Classical-Music","RelPermalink":"/tags/classical-music/"},{"LinkTitle":"Meme","RelPermalink":"/tags/meme/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reading","RelPermalink":"/tags/reading/"}],"title":"Words from the Page"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"},{"LinkTitle":"Music","RelPermalink":"/categories/music/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science","RelPermalink":"/categories/science/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nBeethoven\u0026rsquo;s Symphony No. 3 \u0026ldquo;Eroica\u0026rdquo; - A wonderful website devoted to one of the most important pieces in Beethoven\u0026rsquo;s career, and the history of the symphony. Courtesy of Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, the website also features works by Copland, Tchaikovsky and Stravinsky.\nFlash Earth - View the Earth using Google Earth, Microsoft Virtual Earth, Yahoo! Maps and more, and switch between them. The site claims to be experimental and works without official consent, so will not necessarily be around for long. Tenth Dimension - Confused by string theory? Watch this simple and fascinating video explaining the ten dimensions—but be prepared to have forgotten it all inside of two minutes!\nZamzar - Convert between a good variety of audio, video, image, document and storage file types online for free. This includes videos available on a number of popular websites (e.g. YouTube, Metacafe and the like). The paid for version offers a number of improved features, but even the basic free version allows files of up to 100Mb to be converted, plenty adequate for most file types, though the result is emailed to an address of your choice, which could prove problematic for certain inboxes. ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/04/09/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Classical-Music","RelPermalink":"/tags/classical-music/"},{"LinkTitle":"File-Conversion","RelPermalink":"/tags/file-conversion/"},{"LinkTitle":"Google-Earth","RelPermalink":"/tags/google-earth/"},{"LinkTitle":"Beethoven","RelPermalink":"/tags/beethoven/"},{"LinkTitle":"Physics","RelPermalink":"/tags/physics/"},{"LinkTitle":"String-Theory","RelPermalink":"/tags/string-theory/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" Windows Vista\nIt seems that occasionally, Windows Vista users can encounter a rather nasty bug which leaves them unable to log in to their system. If this is their only user profile, this can leave for a very distressing moment, particularly if the user is unfamiliar with Windows\u0026rsquo; Safe Mode or various options available on the Vista DVD. The user is confronted with an error message such as the following:\nThe user profile service service failed the login. User profile cannot be loaded.\nOr in German versions:\nDie Anmeldung des Dienstes \u0026ldquo;Benutzerprofildienst\u0026rdquo; ist fehlgeschlagen. Das Benutzerprofil kann nicht gestartet werden.\nFrom what I can gather, it appears that this problem occurs during Vista\u0026rsquo;s attempt to create a restore point. The user profile is backed up but no replacement is made. Thus these errors are most often seen after the installation of some new software or drivers, or after a Windows update, which may occur in the background with many users unaware of its activity.\nFortunately, some solutions are available, although not all appear to work in certain circumstances. Nigels blog offers a solution to restore the backup profile by editing the Windows registry. To do this, users need to:\nStart the machine, and press F8 before Vista begins to load, choosing Safe Mode. Search for the programme \u0026lsquo;regedit\u0026rsquo; from the Start menu. On opening this programme, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindows NTCurrentVersionProfileList Affected profiles can be located by the extension \u0026lsquo;.bak\u0026rsquo;. This extension should be deleted, the RefCount value should be 0, and the State value should be 0. Change accordingly and reboot the system. German readers may also refer to this forum post.\nUnfortunately this solution appears not to work in all cases. Since this problem generally appears to occur following a Windows Update or other software installation, however, it is equally possible to restore the system to a prior state and restore the working profile(s) to how they were before the incident. This might result in some strange behaviour or odd errors in some programmes, but these problems should only be minor ones. To do this\nStart the machine in Safe Mode (hitting F8 before Vista loads, as above) Search for the programme \u0026lsquo;rstrui\u0026rsquo; in the Start menu. On running the programme, the user should be presented with the option of restoring the system to the most recent restore point (recommended). Restore and restart. Should the recommended option fail to solve the problem, follow the same procedure but use an older restore point. Hopefully one or other should do the trick. Hopefully with the gradual rollout of Vista Service Pack 1, this type of problem will become less frequent.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/03/25/windows-vista-user-profile-issues/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Benutzerprofil","RelPermalink":"/tags/benutzerprofil/"},{"LinkTitle":"Benutzerprofildienst","RelPermalink":"/tags/benutzerprofildienst/"},{"LinkTitle":"User-Profile","RelPermalink":"/tags/user-profile/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vista","RelPermalink":"/tags/vista/"},{"LinkTitle":"Windows","RelPermalink":"/tags/windows/"}],"title":"Windows Vista User Profile Issues"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" Wordpress\nWordPress Plugins\nWith the news that WordPress Photo Album plugin potentially contains a security vulnerability , I decided it was probably time that I took stock of my increasingly long plugins list and removed some of the outdated and superfluous items. One of the greatest improvements to WordPress of late has been the automatic update checks provided for plugins listed on the official site , which whilst by no means universal does at least mean that updates for many popular plugins will automatically be reported without the need to check up on each one manually. This little list of what remains represents some of the better plugins I\u0026rsquo;ve encountered.\naddons\nArticles - This plugin allows a list of \u0026lsquo;articles\u0026rsquo; to be maintained, to keep a list of the most commonly read or best written posts in one place. The author also has a number of other handy plugins on his site. Currently disabled on this site since well written or popular posts are few and far between.\nDemocracy - Adds that little widget on the sidebar to run a poll. Great functionality, employing AJAX to make it speedy and fun to use.\nFootnotes - Tiny plugin that allows style syntax to insert footnotes in posts. ((Such as this one. Now powered using WP-Footnotes )) From the author of the brilliant Now Reading plugin.\nLanguage Switcher - Not actually used on this blog since it is written almost exclusively in English, but the author illustrates how to create a multilingual blog, and with a little help from this plugin enables authors to create multiple entries in different languages.\nNow Reading - Well designed plugin that integrates well into WordPress, displaying those current books on the sidebar, with those planned and previously read available on the library page.\nQuotes Collection - One of the more recent additions, this plugin allows you to store a database of favourite quotes and have them displayed randomly in the sidebar or wherever else the user wants within the WordPress loop.\nShareThis - One of the more ubiquitous plugins out there, this plugin allows readers to easily shares posts with others via the many social networking bookmark sites. Probably extraneous on this site, but a decent plugin nevertheless.\nViper\u0026rsquo;s Plugins Used - Not actually employed on this site, the plugin offers a list similar to the one I\u0026rsquo;m writing here.\nViper\u0026rsquo;s Video Quicktags - An excellent plugin, allows for easy integration of videos from a variety of different sources, including YouTube/Google Video as well as local files in the usual formats.\nWP/GeoTrack - Neat little plugin which provides the output shown on the Visitors page.\nWP Dash Note - Ever find yourself needing to leave yourself notes on your blog? This plugin adds a tiny post-it note to the Dashboard of WordPress. Useful for those little remembers to finish writing your post on plugins.\nWP Photo Album - Very well written and simple little plugin for integrating a photo album into your site. Whilst the WPG2 plugin which works with the Gallery2 software obviously provides more functionality, for adding a few photos to WordPress with the minimum of fuss, this plugin certainly cuts the mustard, though note the recent security concerns.\nextra functionality\nAdvanced TinyMCE Editor - A fully featured addition to the standard WordPress editor, making it easy to format posts exactly how you need them. Unfortunately there still appear to be some compatibility issues with the aforementioned WPG2 plugin.\nCategory Order - Installed this one a while ago when I had some issues getting all of the categories to appear on the WordPress sidebar, this might now have been superseded by inbuilt WordPress options, but for now it\u0026rsquo;ll stay put. Allows you to arrange the Categories in the sidebar exactly how you want.\nGet Recent Comments - Allows you to display the recent comments in the sidebar using your own preferred formatting.\nGoogle XML Sitemaps - To quote from the blurb \u0026ldquo;This plugin will generate a sitemaps.org compatible sitemap of your WordPress blog which is supported by Ask.com, Google, MSN Search and YAHOO\u0026rdquo;.\nImageManager - Very handy little extension to the WordPress repertoire, allowing simple manipulation of imported images using ImageMagick amongst other things. Unfortunately seems to have some issues with one or other of my Firefox plugins and leaves some functions unusable, as the popup windows are badly sized, but works fine under Opera.\nPhoto Dropper - Another new plugin undergoing a trial, this one offering to import Creative Commons licensed images from flickr.com directly into the current post, and attribute the necessary details.\nSimple Tags - Successor to the great Simple Tagging plugin of previous WordPress versions, this offers greater flexibility and functionality with WordPress 2.3\u0026rsquo;s inbuilt tagging feature. One of the must-haves.\nTiger Style Administration - This plugin simply alters the look and feel of the WordPress admin section. Unfortunately looks slightly broken with recent WordPress or Firefox updates, not really sure which is causing the problem.\nTinyMCEComments - Provides a small TinyMCE WYSIWYG editor for the comments section.\nWP-Lytebox - Neat little plugin to implement the typical Lytebox system in WordPress, and can easily be fit to work with the WP Photo Album, amongst other things.\nsecurity\nAkismet - Simply a must-have, even on this small blog Akismet has managed to block over 10,000 spam comments of various kinds. Used in conjunction with the Bad Behaviour plugin below, I\u0026rsquo;m left only needing to review those comments left in the spam queue in case of false positives, which to date I don\u0026rsquo;t believe there has been.\nBad Behaviour - Works on a number of other systems, purports to block robot-based spamming on WordPress, and at least according to the statistic printed at the bottom of the current theme, seems to be doing a good job.\nstatistics\nFeed Statistics - Neat little plugin to keep track of those feed subscribers without using an external service like FeedBurner. Also counts post views and outgoing links.\nGeneralStats - This small plugin counts up numbers of users, posts, comments, words in posts amongst other things. Does its job and satisfies some idle curiosity.\nStatTraq - A bit out-of-date now but still quite useful for checking page views and search criteria. Might replace this with the WordPress.com Stats plugin as I test that out over coming weeks.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/02/24/another-day-another-plugin/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Blogging","RelPermalink":"/tags/blogging/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Vulnerability","RelPermalink":"/tags/vulnerability/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"Another Day, Another Plugin"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":"Three games in and this is looking to be one of the worse Six Nations competitions of recent years. Wales\u0026rsquo; table position is rather flattering, and with France and Ireland yet to play the big games are still ahead for them. And once again Scotland will be vying for the wooden spoon with Italy. But all is not lost. England\u0026rsquo;s performances have provoked some of the finest examples of impartial commentating from the BBC, including this \u0026lsquo;special\u0026rsquo; moment from Brian Moore.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTQWT-B0EBw ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/02/24/weak-six-nations/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"England","RelPermalink":"/tags/england/"},{"LinkTitle":"France","RelPermalink":"/tags/france/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ireland","RelPermalink":"/tags/ireland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Italy","RelPermalink":"/tags/italy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rugby-Union","RelPermalink":"/tags/rugby-union/"},{"LinkTitle":"Scotland","RelPermalink":"/tags/scotland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Six-Nations","RelPermalink":"/tags/six-nations/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wales","RelPermalink":"/tags/wales/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Weak Six Nations"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Films","RelPermalink":"/categories/films/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":"Caught Andrzej Wajda\u0026rsquo;s Katyń this week as part of the Jameson Dublin International Film Festival and have to say I was fairly impressed. It will probably be the only film I\u0026rsquo;ll see since the prices go up at this time of year, and indeed I was quite lucky to catch this one since the first showing sold out with over a week to go, no doubt in large part due to the significant number of Polish people living in Dublin. Sadly, being sat right at the front didn\u0026rsquo;t give a particularly good vantage point for flicking between the pictures and the subtitles, and this is one film I\u0026rsquo;ll have to watch again on DVD before I can fully make up my mind, but the screenplay was well written and easy to follow despite the amalgam of different plotlines. Unfortunately, some of the character portrayals were rather wooden and to some extent detracted from the film\u0026rsquo;s message, if there is one beyond the plain Rankean historical analysis.\nNevertheless, Krzysztof Penderecki provides a beautiful score to underline the images, with a smattering of Tchaikovsky and Chopin thrown in during some of the propaganda scenes. As a piece of cinematography the film probably deserves its Oscar nomination, though it is difficult to tell whether it will be remembered more for that or its political implications . That the film does not get caught in a loop of nationalist propagandism is important in light of the tendencies in Moscow and elsewhere. Power is not what comes from the end of a gun but the ability to make people believe ones lies. Certainly disturbing news from Putin\u0026rsquo;s Russia.\nThe film\u0026rsquo;s climax is a rather visceral, and to some extents shocking visual of what the film is after all about. However it does offer an interesting juxtaposition for those taken by the irrationality of mankind—as officer after officer is dispatched in the name of political idealism, these same go to their deaths with a prayer on their lips. Absurd or simply tragic? One thing however is for certain, and that is that my quest for the non-melancholy Polish film continues\u0026hellip;\nKatyn\nFor a brave new future.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/02/22/katy%C5%84/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Andrzej-Wajda","RelPermalink":"/tags/andrzej-wajda/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"History","RelPermalink":"/tags/history/"},{"LinkTitle":"Katyn","RelPermalink":"/tags/katyn/"},{"LinkTitle":"Poland","RelPermalink":"/tags/poland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Katyń"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Daily-Links","RelPermalink":"/categories/daily-links/"}],"content":"A handful of random links discovered on the interwebs.\nBook Glutton - Another social internet site, this time designed around the premise that it\u0026rsquo;s good to read together. The site offers members a chance to form and join reading groups, enabling them to discuss and annotate the book while they read.\nControlC - This website provides a way to save a copy of everything its users \u0026lsquo;copy\u0026rsquo; on their own machines, as a way of safeguarding against losing links and information they accidentally overwrite. Not sure how this works with files rather than text being copied, but it claims to be compatible with most major operating systems.\nVisible Body - A fascinating look at human anatomy. Free 3D model illustrating the various systems of the body. Sadly currently only works with Internet Explorer.\nWhat Should I Read Next? - Rather limited in scope, it simply does what it says on the tin, suggesting further reading to entered titles. It offers little more than you might get being an Amazon customer, and since this website relies on a small selection of registered users to provide its suggestions, it\u0026rsquo;s hard to imagine its current database of around 50,000 titles growing too considerably.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/02/09/daily-links/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Biology","RelPermalink":"/tags/biology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"}],"title":"Daily Links"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"Although it may be customary for resolutions to start after New Year\u0026rsquo;s, most things surrounding this blog and its author work in a slightly different time zone to everything else. Nevertheless, it was my intention to make an effort to post more on this blog, partly since it might otherwise fall into disuse, partly in order to stretch these fingers more and let a little blood into parts of my brain that are getting a little dusty. The content will be much the same—i.e. as random as ever—but the aim is to post something once a week, albeit supplemented occasionally by interesting links and silly YouTube videos. That might also include some crazy literary wonderings. We\u0026rsquo;ll see.\nBut to kick start February, vaguely akin to the peacekeepers , here\u0026rsquo;s the THX lemur:\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkqqMPPg2VI ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/02/04/late-resolutions/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Blogging","RelPermalink":"/tags/blogging/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Late Resolutions"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Environment","RelPermalink":"/categories/environment/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science","RelPermalink":"/categories/science/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Finally some sense from the government on Britain\u0026rsquo;s energy problems. Of course, I\u0026rsquo;m a complete cynic when it comes to discussing \u0026lsquo;carbon footprints\u0026rsquo; and \u0026lsquo;global warming\u0026rsquo;, but there can be little denying the potential problems facing Britain\u0026rsquo;s energy industry if nothing is planned to replace the current collection of ageing and decommissioned nuclear facilities. Many cite the inherent dangers of nuclear energy and point to the potential for a repeat of Chernobyl or Three Mile Island, and the issue of dealing with the radioactive waste materials. But since these issues affect the entire planet, it seems a rather moot point to debate whether nuclear energy is \u0026lsquo;safe\u0026rsquo; to be used in Britain, since its nearest neighbour is a predominantly nuclear powered nation. Aside from promoting micro-generation and energy efficiency in the home, the idea of building a green energy economy principally based on wind power seems frankly absurd.\nSadly, the news doesn\u0026rsquo;t come without other considerations, since the government refuses any public funding to new nuclear plants except in cases of dangerous emergency.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2008/01/12/government-verbal-backing-for-nuclear/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Britain","RelPermalink":"/tags/britain/"},{"LinkTitle":"Global-Warming","RelPermalink":"/tags/global-warming/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nuclear-Power","RelPermalink":"/tags/nuclear-power/"}],"title":"Government Verbal Backing for Nuclear"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Business","RelPermalink":"/categories/business/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"}],"content":" Supermarket\nSupermarket\nThere are very few today who would deny that the quality of our food has dropped, partly as a result of the change embodied by the death of the local shop and the rise of the supermarket. Where once the only change was that our food was pre-grown, now we find it has been pre-grown, pre-made, pre-cooked, pre-packaged, pre-distributed, and often find our purchases are precluded by lack of choice for good measure. Of course, supermarkets are the just one example of today\u0026rsquo;s monopolies, that much should be clear. Enter the store at one end, and you can start your purchases with your baby food at one end, and walk all the way through life till you need find a buy-one-get-one-free headstone and a \u0026ldquo;Value\u0026rdquo; lawyer to deal with your wills and probate. Plus the stores are so big these days that you might in fact need the coffin by the time you finally leave.\nOf course, the supermarkets can hide behind their names, disguising the fact that the economies of scale have destroyed the vagaries of the market and left us with these abominations. There may appear to be some jostling at the top, but the same essential products are on sale in essentially the same way in every one of their stores. Of course, the true competition goes on behind the scenes, out of sight of the consumer, to keep the prices down and keep the margins up. But the other competition goes by on the very shelves, as the supermarkets surreptitiously promote their own brand goods above third party offerings. Who can deny that the sliding scale of quality runs from Tesco \u0026ldquo;Value\u0026rdquo;, through Tesco \u0026ldquo;Finest\u0026rdquo; to the majority of third party products? Whilst their lower end products capture the price conscious element of the market, the better quality products attempt to undercut the price of the third party products whilst offering at least a competitive level of quality. That\u0026rsquo;s not to say this is a policy actually pursued by the chains, but it is certainly within their power to do so, and the fact that they can simply stop stocking third party brands makes such a goal all the easier to achieve.\nThe problem is that whilst the supermarket has altered the way we buy food, it has also destroyed the competition and rivalry which kept food quality up. Whilst the corner shop has evolved and taken on a new role in the marketplace, backed by the big names of Spar or Londis, the butchers, bakers and greengrocers have been confined to those areas the supermarket cannot yet penetrate. Since this very basic competition is now out of the public sphere, it is little surprise that food quality has dropped over the years.\nWhat is needed is a true incarnation of the super_market_. It cannot be denied that the modern day supermarket provides many conveniences that critics often ignore. Convenient parking, bulk purchases, single transactions, a wider selection of food, competitive prices, are all benefits that the modern consumer will not give up for the sake of better produce. A true supermarket could and should, of course, maintain these benefits, by providing exactly the kind of infrastructure found in today\u0026rsquo;s behemoths. Everything from site maintenance and in-store facilities, to marketing and financing, through to storage and distribution, would all be handled by the overall supermarket organisation. The store itself, however, would comprise market stalls of all varieties, rented or leased to producers and distributors, organised exactly as might be found in a modern supermarket. Of course, such a layout would limit the scope of individual suppliers to sell a wide variety of products, but the consumer\u0026rsquo;s demands must be catered to if such a system were to compete with the established giants. Similarly, with today\u0026rsquo;s technology, a system could easily be established to allow all financial transactions to be made by the overarching supermarket edifice, skimming profits from the sales of individual retailers.\nBonne Maman\nBonne Maman\nWhilst more rural markets could integrate local producers akin to the farmers\u0026rsquo; markets, the demands of the city would continue to rely on the methods of today. Yet even in the urban environment, consumers would be free to choose based not only on price, but on what they can physically see, smell, and should they be a regular customer, taste. Of course these rules could not apply to many items stocked in today\u0026rsquo;s stores, and perhaps these areas would be taken up by the supermarket edifice itself, but the space for competition in fruits, vegetables, meats, dairy, baked goods, preserves etc. is overwhelming. Potentially, of course, the supermarket could also serve to change food production patterns, as local producers bring their products to market locally, reducing the need for long distance deliveries and longer term storage, and contributing to a more environmentally friendly outlook. The success of a product such as Bonne Maman preserves to some extent illustrates the subconscious level of desire for high quality, locally produced foods. Their determined efforts to improve quality, and their deliberate marketing image replete with labels printed to resemble handwritten equivalents, and patchwork lid designs, have seen tremendous market gains in recent years.\nUltimately, of course, the supermarket in its present form is here to stay, and having already cornered the food market, giants such as Tesco have already found their only avenues open for continued expansion lie in the non-food section. With food prices seemingly set to rise, after years of underpricing and the effects of the world\u0026rsquo;s burgeoning population starting to take effect in combination with the backlash against technological and intensive farming, it would appear that the supermarket focus on good value for money will continue to take priority over food quality, a fact we can only learn to accept, with no alternative in sight.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/12/07/market-games/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Business","RelPermalink":"/tags/business/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/tags/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Food","RelPermalink":"/tags/food/"},{"LinkTitle":"Supermarkets","RelPermalink":"/tags/supermarkets/"},{"LinkTitle":"Tesco","RelPermalink":"/tags/tesco/"}],"title":"Market Games"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" University Challenge\nA confused Paxman\nAnother blunder on the prestigious UK quiz show University Challenge yesterday, as Birmingham took on Magdalen College, Oxford in a very close contest. The question went something like this:\nJeremy Paxman: \u0026ldquo;Which hydrated ferrous salt used to be known as green vitriol?\u0026rdquo;\nAnswer: \u0026ldquo;Iron sulphate.\u0026rdquo;\nJeremy Paxman: \u0026ldquo;No, just sulphate.\u0026rdquo;\nThat\u0026rsquo;s akin to asking who composed Eine kleine Nachtmusik, and rejecting the answer \u0026ldquo;Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart\u0026rdquo; because the card read \u0026ldquo;Just Mozart.\u0026rdquo; Of course, everyone makes mistakes, and it should be no surprise that the question master makes a few given the breadth of subjects on display, but Paxman\u0026rsquo;s general manner makes it difficult to forgive him on this account. Paxman quite happily berates students for not knowing things in his particular field, or indeed for having any knowledge of popular culture, God forbid. In addition, as most people know, the show is filmed and edited in one continuous performance, and might last an hour rather than the televised half an hour. Plenty of time for someone to prevent such rediculous answers from being aired. As someone has already commented, this isn\u0026rsquo;t the first time such a poor mistake has been made, and no doubt neither will it be the last, until someone finally stands up for themselves or Paxman is brought down a peg.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/11/27/universally-challenged/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Chemistry","RelPermalink":"/tags/chemistry/"},{"LinkTitle":"Jeremy-Paxman","RelPermalink":"/tags/jeremy-paxman/"},{"LinkTitle":"Quiz-Show","RelPermalink":"/tags/quiz-show/"},{"LinkTitle":"University-Challenge","RelPermalink":"/tags/university-challenge/"}],"title":"Universally Challenged"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Business","RelPermalink":"/categories/business/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" foods_1.jpg\nThis idea is one which keeps popping up from time to time, normally on those occasions when it would actually come in useful, only to be thrown on the backburner for another time or a more talented author. Well this time I\u0026rsquo;ve decided just to throw the idea down on electronic paper for anyone with the skills and the time to make it work have a go. Of course, it\u0026rsquo;s quite likely that such a website already exists and that I just haven\u0026rsquo;t yet been able to find it, but if anyone knows of such a place, let me know!\nOstensibly the website is aimed at those allegedly few remaining people who cook, though it would appear equally useful to people planning dinner parties, students looking for something to go with their pasta, or just about anyone curious enough to experiment with a few different ingredients. In its essence, the website would be nothing more than a large recipe repository, with everything from snacks and sandwiches to stews and casseroles, with anything in between. Recipes would be submitted by users, moderated and standardised, but the slightly clever part is that these recipes would not be displayed as flat text files—it\u0026rsquo;s 2007 after all—but would be cross-referenced in such a way as to make the whole collection completely accessible.\nThe aim would be to create a database that would not only allow users to find a recipe for chocolate sponge cake (although this would of course be possible), but would be able to input a short list of ingredients and find suitable recipes based on what they have, and what they could easily acquire. Not got much time to prepare your meal? Limit the search by selecting a suitable preparation time. Found a recipe which works well for your dinner party but want to push the boat out? Check the recommendations for slight modifications to your meal, and other dishes that complement your main course. Each recipe entered would include relevant information pertaining to ingredients, preparation time, required utensils and serving suggestions. The database could also be expanded to include drinks and cocktails.\nOf course, the website should be open to infrequent and regular visitors alike, offering daily dishes of the day or perhaps cooking tips for beginners. The site\u0026rsquo;s contents should be easily adapted to suit those on a tight budget financially, as well as those with little time to spend in the kitchen. Perhaps members could keep an updated pantry of what vegetables, meats and spices they have in stock, and get offered meal ideas based on this list. And of course there\u0026rsquo;s plenty of scope beyond this—with enough exposure the site might generate sufficient advertising revenue, there are enough people preparing their own meals still to warrant it. But then again, perhaps this site already exists somewhere?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/10/16/ideas-for-the-web2.0-generation/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Business","RelPermalink":"/tags/business/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cookery","RelPermalink":"/tags/cookery/"},{"LinkTitle":"Food","RelPermalink":"/tags/food/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"}],"title":"Ideas for the Web2.0 Generation"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Zebras\nNoble—but undomesticable?\nHow do you domesticate a zebra? You can\u0026rsquo;t, or at least that\u0026rsquo;s the justification put forward by Jared Diamond in his Guns, Germs and Steel for why these wild beasts were never used as draught animals or cavalry in sub-Saharan Africa. Much of what Diamond writes has a logical ring to it, and whilst the evidence is sparse and in places contradictory, his conclusions fit the necessarily teleological approach. Others have accused him of too much geographical determinism, and perhaps they have a point, but the one thing which struck me as being peculiarly out of place in Diamond\u0026rsquo;s writing was his treatment of Africa\u0026rsquo;s wild animals as being unsuitable for domestication. He argued that it was only by chance that Eurasia benefited from having suitable species such as goats, sheep, cattle and horses, and that the native varieties of these animals in sub-Saharan Africa were inherintly unsuitable.\nTo be domesticated, animals must meet certain criteria. For example, they must have a good disposition and should not panic under pressure. Zebras\u0026rsquo; unpredictable nature and tendency to attack preclude them from being good candidates for domestication.\nDespite the lack of a \u0026lsquo;good disposition\u0026rsquo; however, this same link illustrates that zebras have on occasion been tamed and hybridized with other ungulates to produce zorses and zonkeys. So zebras can be ridden, they can be used to pull carriages but are nevertheless somehow unsuitable for domestication. Diamond argued that the proof lay in the continued inability to domesticate the zebra in modern times, but just how much effort has gone into such endeavours? The argument just doesn\u0026rsquo;t seem persuasive enough. Wolves don\u0026rsquo;t tend to make great pets, yet they have produced man\u0026rsquo;s best friend, and presumably the common ancestor to the horse and zebra would have been a challenge to train.\nThat isn\u0026rsquo;t to say that Diamond\u0026rsquo;s logic is entirely flawed. Whilst the idea of Europe being overrun by the deadly llama cavalry of the Incans is rather appealing, llamas simply aren\u0026rsquo;t comparable to horses in size or strength. And whilst elephants can be tamed, the idea of truly domesticating them would be challenging to say the least. But simply because zebras haven\u0026rsquo;t been domesticated doesn\u0026rsquo;t seem a strong enough argument to say they couldn\u0026rsquo;t be. Take a litter of kittens and socialise them, and you\u0026rsquo;ll probably find even within that small genetic sample, some are bolder and more malleable than others, whilst others are consumed by a fear of humans. Over time, such traits can be developed within a particular species, as modern day domestic animals surely attest to. With creatures like horses, the task of domestication is much greater than with many other species perhaps, and building in a genetic predisposition to being handled takes much longer.\nWhilst Diamond may have been motivated by an anti-racist polemic in his defence of sub-Saharan Africa\u0026rsquo;s lack of domesticated species, his geographic determinism might once more be closer to the truth in that the sheer size of the Eurasia landmass offered greater scope for the domestication of horses. Cultural influences must be taken into account of course, and comparing Native American horsemanship to the lack of zebra riding Zulus seems quite out of place. Whatever the reality turns out to be, I doubt we\u0026rsquo;ll be seeing zebras running the Derby any time soon.\n[Zebras photo courtesy of Birger Kühnel ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/10/01/domesticating-zebras/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Biology","RelPermalink":"/tags/biology/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Guns-Germs-and-Steel","RelPermalink":"/tags/guns-germs-and-steel/"},{"LinkTitle":"Jared-Diamond","RelPermalink":"/tags/jared-diamond/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Zebras","RelPermalink":"/tags/zebras/"}],"title":"Domesticating Zebras"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Company of Heroes\nCompany of Heroes\nWith some of the highest scores awarded for a real-time strategy, being one of the Top 20 Metacritic All-Time High Scores , Company of Heroes ended up being one of those games I had little excuse not to try out, given that my PC could (just about) run it. Admittedly I\u0026rsquo;m unable to comment on the graphical splendour which seems to have charmed so many gamers\u0026rsquo; hearts, as every setting on my screen reads either \u0026rsquo;low\u0026rsquo; or \u0026lsquo;off\u0026rsquo;, but I\u0026rsquo;ve played a fair few strategy games over the years, and despite my early cynicism, Company of Heroes has warmed to me after a little experience on the online battlefields.\nWhenever a game is released with a major historical theme, such as the ever popular World War II era, cries go up about the loss of realism to the gaming gods. Such and such would never happen, this and that never existed. Of course, many strategy games don\u0026rsquo;t even attempt to pander to the pedants of realism, and have been all the more successful for it (take the recent Supreme Commander, or any in the Command and Conquer series). Company of Heroes is no saint in this regard either, but its efforts to create a game at once realistic and fun have to be admired. There will always be players who complain about how developers could have stayed truer to real life, but Relic have done a good job in creating a game which at least seems realistic enough, and in ways which make the game fun to play. Shells fired at tanks have a chance of only glancing off the armour, and depending on the situation might even miss altogether; units under heavy fire become surpressed, limiting their movements and actions, or even pinned, leaving them helpless unless pulled out or relieved; and the variety of weapons and vehicles keep the tactics fresh and varied.\nCompany of Heroes: Screenshot 1\nInfantry suppressed by tank and artillery fireIn truth, Company of Heroes might best be considered a game of tactics than strategy. The population limit keeps the action low key, making each encounter all the more important, and shifts the focus from great numbers of units, to how those units are used and combined. The key resource of \u0026lsquo;manpower\u0026rsquo;, used pricipally for bringing units into the field, goes largely undetermined by the course of the battle, i.e. despite territorial domination, the number of units available to either side should only marginally favour the attacker. The other resources, all of which are collected by capturing and holding points on the map, increase the number of options available to the player, but the staple diet of infantry, machine guns, snipers and mortars are available on just the basic resource. The requirements for these other resources, however, force the players to take and hold key map locations, and some multiplayer game modes go beyond this to include specific capture-and-hold objectives. However, the game is designed so that individual points produce no benefit unless they are connected to the \u0026lsquo;base\u0026rsquo;, a welcome variation on Relic\u0026rsquo;s earlier Dawn of War engine, allowing wiley players to \u0026lsquo;cut supply lines\u0026rsquo; and force breaks in the enemy front lines.\nThis focus on squad-based combat does run the risk of having the key moments in a game hinge on that little bit of luck and making the early openings seem all the more important. Yet the openness of the maps generally serves to ensure that victories are warranted, with players able to pull out and redeploy as necessary, and at least in my experience avoids that seemingly autistic level of control required to play to any decent level in WarCraft III et al. The two sides also seem fairly balanced, which is no doubt a key benefit of excluding any other factions.\nCompany of Heroes: Screenshot 2\nInfantry capturing a Victory Point\nThe game\u0026rsquo;s single-player campaign is perhaps the biggest disappointment, being at once too short, and too one-sided. The storyline follows the typical pattern one comes to expect from the American campaign in Europe, but it feels somehow empty, given the ample scope for including other Allied forces and theatres, or even simply a German/Axis campaign to complement the fairly short Allied one. However, that being said the AI can be a decent opponent, even on the skirmish maps, combining their troops well, flanking your positions, and pulling back if the pressure gets too hot. Of course it is not without its flaws, and will often get what a friend of mine terms \u0026lsquo;a hard on\u0026rsquo; for a specific point on the map, and repeatedly rush headlong into disaster. That being said, the campaign is entertaining whilst it lasts, and in combination with the skirmish mode, is ample preparation for the online game where there should be some decent longevity, particularly with the expansion due out later this year.\nCompany of Heroes: Screenshot 3\nFull-scale battle underway\nThe online experience seems to be a bit of a mixed bag, but thankfully doesn\u0026rsquo;t suffer from the same pitfalls that afflicted C\u0026amp;C Generals. Players get ranked separately according to the type of game they play - a 2v2 specialist might not have the same punch in a head-on meeting. In my very limited experience, there does appear to be a good mix of skill levels, plenty of scope for new players to learn the art, and the very mechanics of the game mean that few encounters feel so one sided as to make the experience joyless - though the better matched games probably feel quite stressful!\nIf there was one area in which I felt Company of Heroes truly fails, it would have to be the inclusion of a \u0026lsquo;base\u0026rsquo;. It would appear that the concept has become so vital to the real-time strategy genre, that developers can\u0026rsquo;t bring themselves to exclude it. Some have complained that the base element in the game is too lax, too incomplete, whereas I would argue its inclusion is entirely superfluous. In the multiplayer game, the annihilation mode requires the destruction of all enemy buildings, which often times comes as the final blow to an already defeated army. Otherwise, the base is simply an area for troops to arrive and heal, but the concept is open to being exploited by the trickier or less principled player. The game could simply rely on an area for troops to enter the battlefield, akin to that used in the Sudden Strike series, with an upgradeable technology tree behind the scenes akin to the building of separate structures for the different unit types.\nOverall though, Company of Heroes offers something we wish all RTS games could deliver - a well-balanced, good looking, fun, themed game, which awards merit in good tactics and clever troop movement. Whilst some players bemoan the fact that multiplayer games are always fought Allies versus Axis, the restriction does ensure that the designers had to ensure the teams were balanced. And although I can\u0026rsquo;t take full advantage of the game engine, the way troops make use of the terrain for cover, using fresh craters as foxholes, occupying houses and church towers, certainly does add a level of depth and detail lacking in most contemporary RTS games, so at least you have something fun to watch even whilst your troops are getting massacred and overrun.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/08/29/company-of-heroes-review/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Company-of-Heroes","RelPermalink":"/tags/company-of-heroes/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rts","RelPermalink":"/tags/rts/"}],"title":"Company of Heroes Review"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Pet-Hates","RelPermalink":"/categories/pet-hates/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"},{"LinkTitle":"Transport","RelPermalink":"/categories/transport/"}],"content":"This is one of those posts which makes it to the draught stage and never any further, but as I was tidying up my WordPress install, I decided with a bit of reworking it\u0026rsquo;s something I still feel strongly about. The original title had referred to British public transport in particular, but in truth there is very little specific to the British experience.\nvirgin_train\nVirgin Trains\nBefore I start my rant, let me plainly state that I am great supporter of the principles of public transport. That is not to say that I don\u0026rsquo;t see the use or take advantage of private transport, merely that I feel the balance in society is generally wrong, particularly in the first world, or whatever the preferred term is these days. These societies should be perfectly capable of providing for the vast majority of man\u0026rsquo;s annual miles, with our regular combinations of buses, trams, trains etc. and private transport being available to fill in the gaps where required. Being able to pack your bags, grab the kids and hit the road for a weekend away seems like a reasonable thing to do, but where is the logic of moving a ton of metal to work and back five days a week?\nFor probably the majority of the world\u0026rsquo;s population, public transport is the only option, certainly the only affordable one. In more privileged societies it seems, that logic is largely turned on its head, with many simple journeys costing as much as would the equivalent travelling via private transport, and indeed being more expensive if the journey is shared. Car pooling saves more money than bus pooling.\nYet some of the key problems afflicting these public transport services, is that having lost even the semblance of being a service (and who can deny that they are nothing more than businesses operating within a service field?), the companies involved only through obfuscation manage to run within the guidelines no doubt prescribed by governments. Planning a trip across the country, one could easily spend hours trying to find the cheapest combination or the quickest route. The privatisation of the industry has not exactly resulted in the competition of service and price that the government suggested, but a proliferation of competing and confusing systems which has resulted in a drop in passenger numbers, as a committee found last year . And the confusion, of course, isn\u0026rsquo;t restricted to the paying customer. Pensioners in the UK can now enjoy the benefit of free bus fares, but at least according to one relative of mine, this is restricted to the local borough, outside of which a mere discount is available partially due to the competing companies - after all, why should you wish to travel away from the one shoddy town?\nPaying customers, of course, have the hardest time of all. Unless you are a genius at figuring the ins and outs of the system, public transport never comes particularly cheap, what with all the advance, economy, super, mumbo, banana and toffee flavoured tickets, not to mention all of the student travel cards, young person cards, old person cards, gay person cards, regular user cards and drug abuser cards which can be used for discounts on most, but certainly not all services, particularly any of the ones you might be tempted to use in conjunction with the first. And of course, as there is rarely any integration in the transport system, you\u0026rsquo;ll probably need at least two varieties of discount card to cover your journey via bus and (shock horror) train, and these rarely come too cheaply. One begins to wonder who on earth was paid money to design the backend pricing systems to some of these services. I remember one particular journey using First North Western trains, where I was sold a Day Return ticket because it was actually cheaper than the single I required. Go fathom! Just how the train companies can manage to create something as complex as a train timetable, and yet can\u0026rsquo;t produce a viable pricing plan borders on the criminal.\nbeforeandafter\nBritish Train System\nIn fact, it gets to the stage now where I\u0026rsquo;m becoming suspicious that the baffling arrangements aren\u0026rsquo;t actually designed to confuse customers and reap the benefits of their lack of patience or lack of knowledge to find the right deals. There is no sense of service here, only pandering to government requirements for companies to create offers for the underprivileged. Take the various varieties of student travel card, and Britain isn\u0026rsquo;t alone on this account. Or click on the image and take a look at how asking for an earlier train on thetrainline.co.uk can result in a previously unavailable ticket magically appearing. Indeed, the manner in which such offers seem to disappear and reappear lends one to conclude that such websites are designed to hide offers from those who might actually take advantage of them. This screenshot even begs another question, that being of how the Value Advance tickets are still available whilst the Advance Standard C ((Slightly cheaper than the Banana and Toffee Mix I mentioned earlier.)) appears to have sold out - would some customers voluntarily pay almost thrice the price of the cheapest ticket for exactly the same service?\nOf course, the European dream of integration can\u0026rsquo;t even get a toehold when national systems aren\u0026rsquo;t even adequately in place. Experiences like this might leave us feeling embarassed, but why should the consumer have to work so hard to pay the best price for a service that the economy cannot survive without? Public transport is not perceived to be the vital economic keystone it really is, the likes of which education and health care are often fully or partially covered through public funding. Competition in the marketplace is the basic principle behind the diversification of the public transport system, but it doesn\u0026rsquo;t really take a genius to work out that competition cannot thrive in such a market. Go onto the high street to buy a television, and not only is there a variety of worldwide manufacturers to choose from, but there may be half a dozen shops eager to offer more competitive prices and accompanied services. In theory, the consumer can make an informed choice, and vote with his wallet to get the best deal.\nNow try to convert that situation into a public transport \u0026lsquo;market\u0026rsquo;. Queue for a bus on Manchester\u0026rsquo;s Oxford Road, pick a bus, and depending on your situation you might find yourself getting a 60p student ticket. Get on the wrong one, and he\u0026rsquo;ll tell you there\u0026rsquo;s no such thing as a student ticket, and the fare will be £1.20. So you either wait, and barge past the angry queue of people waiting to get on behind you, or more likely just throw the extra fare in the bin. And of course, just like when Dixons rip you off over that warranty on the television, you are just as able to boycott the train service which caused you to be 2 hours late for an interview, except that they\u0026rsquo;re the only train operator in the entire region.\nI often try to make a distinction between individual and social rights. By this I mean to highlight the difference between what each individual by virtue of his very existence has the right to, and those rights which are bestowed upon him by the society in which he lives. One example of this is the individual and personal right of movement. By his very being, man can relocate himself, using his own body, harnessing the power of the animals around him, and since early periods used his knowledge to craft certain forms of transport from the world around him. This does not, however, stretch to man\u0026rsquo;s ability to travel by any means possible; no single man built the Volkswagen Touareg, no number of harnessed animals would equal an Airbus A380. My point in this instance is that man has the right to travel, and our rich, modern states and societies should be enabling factors to his movements, not restrictions. In return, man must relinquish his demands for the right to travel how he wishes, for these are privileges empowered by his society. Yet society must also acknowledge that a transport service should not be marketed off in chunks to the highest bidder, since which modern economy could survive without it?\nIdeally, one should be able to get a route between two locations, across borders, boundaries or whatever divisions, using whatever forms of transport, for a single, logical price, without having to cross reference various travel cards and special routes. He might even be able to relax in the knowledge that his taxes or his annual, universal travel card has it all covered already. But such a dream is only possible with the enforced integration of the various transport systems, and some realistic and public oriented pricing models. Wouldn\u0026rsquo;t it be worth paying £500 a year to be able to travel anywhere in the country on any form of public transport at any time? And if that were the case, wouldn\u0026rsquo;t half of the other 60 million on the island find it equally useful? £15 milliard a year plus public subsidies says it\u0026rsquo;s not.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/08/29/finding-space-for-the-public-in-transport/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Britain","RelPermalink":"/tags/britain/"},{"LinkTitle":"Consumer-Rights","RelPermalink":"/tags/consumer-rights/"},{"LinkTitle":"Philosophy","RelPermalink":"/tags/philosophy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Public-Transport","RelPermalink":"/tags/public-transport/"}],"title":"Finding Space for the Public in Transport"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Settlers of Catan\nSettlers of Catan\nOccasionally there\u0026rsquo;s no better way to spend an evening than sitting down around a table with friends and family, having a few drinks and playing a board game. That stands particularly true when the game is something new. Every player goes into the game trying to learn, meaning everyone is that little bit more focused, that little bit more bewildered, and tactics have to be picked up along the way. Although I wouldn\u0026rsquo;t call any of us board game connaisseurs, this wasn\u0026rsquo;t the first time we\u0026rsquo;d learnt a game from scratch of an evening, nor presumably the last time we\u0026rsquo;ll be up past midnight trying to play one out!\nThe Settlers of Catan advertises that it can be picked up in fifteen minutes, and with a bit of concentration there really is nothing too complicated about it. The object of the game is to score 10 victory points, which can be gathered in a number of ways, but the key to all of them stems from the same basic root. The island of Catan is divided into various regions or \u0026lsquo;hexes\u0026rsquo;, each representing a type of landscape which will produce a certain variety of good. Precisely which of these regions will bear fruit on any one turn is determined by the throw of the dice, adding that little element of luck which thankfully doesn\u0026rsquo;t marr any feeling of player involvement in this game. Placing your settlements and roads wisely should ensure a decent windfall of the produce from the dice throws, and it isn\u0026rsquo;t necessary to be in control of the dice in order to profit from a roll. Using various combinations of goods produced, a player can expand his network, building more settlements and roads, and creep towards that victory point tally.\nSettlers of Catan 2\nBoard and pieces\nThese elements alone would make for a pretty decent game, as one which would require the triumph of strategy over the fortune of the dice. But designer Klaus Teuber adds an extra couple of aspects which add the icing to the cake. The various options open during the building phase of the game require various combinations of goods to be collected, as a result of which players often find themselves in a situation whereby they are short of one item or another. The game allows for a stage of open bartering between the players, akin to that which you might find used ad hoc in any other game, but which given the prevalence and even necessity for progressing in the game, opens it up to all sorts of swindling and conniving to get what is required. On top of all of that is the shady figure of the robber, activated on the play of a card or the throw of the dice, who not only decimates the supplies of anyone hoarding goods, not only prevents any hex he occupies from producing goods, but also enables players to literally steal cards from one another. No man is an iland, intire of it selfe!\nOverall, The Settlers of Catan is an excellent combination of luck, strategy and player interaction, which is neither complicated nor particularly time-consuming (typically the first attempt will no doubt be twice as long normal). It is perhaps unfortunate that one of our previous favourites has been Puerto Rico, a game that also comes highly rated (although not a winner of the prestigious Spiel des Jahres) and in many ways develops upon the elements involved in Settlers. But where Puerto Rico is a much deeper strategy game, requiring players to focus on their own \u0026lsquo;islands\u0026rsquo; and indeed on their own games, Settlers is at once less-involving through its simplicity, and more-involving in its player interaction. Whilst the former removes any real external elements of luck and places the onus on players to make their own, the dice in Settlers could have your strategy in tatters, as the little black figure makes his way over to your end of the island.\nThe Settlers of Catan is the extrovert\u0026rsquo;s Puerto Rico. If you prefer to be in control of your destiny and left to ponder your own strategy, then Puerto Rico is definitely the choice, but if you want a simpler, more involving and more vocal game, my suggestion would be that you really can\u0026rsquo;t go far wrong with The Settlers of Catan.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/08/07/the-settlers-of-catan-first-thoughts/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Puerto-Rico","RelPermalink":"/tags/puerto-rico/"},{"LinkTitle":"Settlers-of-Catan","RelPermalink":"/tags/settlers-of-catan/"}],"title":"The Settlers of Catan: First thoughts"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Environment","RelPermalink":"/categories/environment/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/categories/television/"}],"content":" Dolphins\nFeeding the dolphins\nThere are some pretty banal programmes on television at times, such is the role it plays, but Animal Park - Wild on the West Coast really caught my eye today. It served up the job of a nature programme from California, but it was a real eye opener to some of the ludicrous crap that gets spewed out, and of course funded, in the name of environmentalism. One segment showed how they looked after a sealion with some neurological disease, to the extent of giving the animal an MRI scan, ascertaining it wasn\u0026rsquo;t going to survive, and then putting it down. If anyone could explain the point of all that to me, I\u0026rsquo;d be impressed.\nYet the clip which really boiled my noodle was the one which showed how they were exercising bottlenosed dolphins in captivity, in order to measure their heart rates, and ultimately determine how many calories they needed whilst at rest and whilst active. They were then going to use this information to work out how many fish the animals required, and then pass this important information on to the fisheries in the region, essentially intimating that fisheries would be restricted or closed based on the feeding requirements of the dolphins. It really is amazing at times how random \u0026lsquo;research\u0026rsquo; can become. It would seem that as long as those cute little dolphins get enough to eat, no one particularly gives a rat\u0026rsquo;s arse about whether the ecosystem at large is suffering as a result of fishing policies. Plus, you can bet a pretty penny that with all the statistical horse shit they would have to utilise to make any sense out of those pretty useless collections of figures, there will be little correlation between what they would have to tell the fisheries and reality!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/07/31/fishing-the-planet-dry-by-saving-the-dolphins/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Environment","RelPermalink":"/tags/environment/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fishing","RelPermalink":"/tags/fishing/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/tags/television/"}],"title":"Fishing the planet dry, by saving the dolphins"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"There are times when I wonder how I ever survived without Knoppix as a tool for fixing PC problems on the fly. And give someone a CD and some basic instructions, and you can soon have a live terminal up ready to fix a whole host of problems. Yet I find being able to talk to the person on the other end often vital for solving problems, and more importantly, it can be a reassurance for when you make a cock up!\nNormally I just install the latest version of Skype, sadly however the latest Skype 1.4 beta doesn\u0026rsquo;t work on Knoppix 5.1.1, and owing to legal issues previous versions have been pulled and replaced. Skype are prevented them hosting these prior releases, which meant I had to dig around a bit before I could find a copy of Skype 1.3 , packaged for Ubuntu. Download this .deb package, and then run the usual command as root:\ndpkg -i skype_debian-1.3.0.53-1_i386.deb Voilà!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/07/28/skype-for-oldies/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Knoppix","RelPermalink":"/tags/knoppix/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linux","RelPermalink":"/tags/linux/"},{"LinkTitle":"Skype","RelPermalink":"/tags/skype/"}],"title":"Skype for Oldies"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"It\u0026rsquo;s been a full month since I last posted anything, which is a little too infrequent even for my liking. A combination of holidays, downtime and general idleness is to blame, but there are a few posts in the draft box which never quite got finished, and maybe one or two new things will crop up in the coming days. Also going to give the WPPA plugin a bigger trial and add a few more photos from around and abouts.\nIn the meantime, here\u0026rsquo;s something that\u0026rsquo;s been bugging me for a while. According to the UK\u0026rsquo;s highway code, and possibly many others, a vehicle overtaking a cyclist should allow the same distance as when overtaking a car, given the possibility that the cyclist might fall over, estimated at 2.0m or some such. But doesn\u0026rsquo;t that leave many cycle paths in the country technically in breach of this convention?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/07/27/quiet-moments/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cycling","RelPermalink":"/tags/cycling/"},{"LinkTitle":"Law","RelPermalink":"/tags/law/"}],"title":"Quiet Moments"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":" WordPress\nWordPress\nThat is the question; as the well known soliloquy roughly goes. A Mind @ Play is now a year old, and not a day wiser, as far its author is concerned. Courtesy of GeneralStats , I can see that in the past year (excluding this post) there\u0026rsquo;ve been 57 posts, 18 comments/trackbacks, together a total of 31,400 words, and over 8,000 spam comments caught by Akismet. But to what end?\nThis isn\u0026rsquo;t intended to be another one of those \u0026lsquo;blogging about blogging\u0026rsquo; posts, but occasionally one has to ask why we blog at all. I wouldn\u0026rsquo;t claim to be anything near an expert on the subject, but it would appear that the more successful blogs do just that: \u0026lsquo;blog about blogging\u0026rsquo;. Nor should that sound derogatory, some of them do an exceedingly good job of it, but there are only so many times you can read the \u0026rsquo;top 10 ways to get more readers\u0026rsquo; et al. But then these people tend to come from the professional end of the blogging community, those who aim to earn something through their work. There were and are no such intentions with this blog, and if there are any advertisements on this site I can only say they are unintentional.\nSometimes it helps to get some inspiration and direction for your blog from the ones you read. As a blog which aims to be aimless this might sound hypocritical, but it does mean that the impulse to post can come from unlikely sources. Naturally there are some famous bloggers\u0026rsquo; blogs on that feed list of mine, such as Lorelle \u0026rsquo;s blog, and others up there near the topspot like Nate Whitehill dot com . But whilst they make for interesting reading, they aren\u0026rsquo;t sites you would tend to read religiously.\nBut your feed list isn\u0026rsquo;t just for those placed in the upper echelons of technorati\u0026rsquo;s ranking system. Ignoring the feeds from sites that don\u0026rsquo;t count as blogs, probably the busiest on my list are those that are focused to reporting on certain subjects. The CinemATTIC , dedicated to good movies, freewaregenius.com , dedicated to reviewing only the best in computer freeware, and Xubuntu Blog (does what it says on the tin), all found their way onto that list for offering excellent, regular reads on their various subject matters.\nSo that just leaves the vast majority of the feeds on that list: personal blogs. Sometimes you wonder where they come from. Whether academics like Amardeep Singh , or students like p-Code \u0026rsquo;s author, or the occasional member of the real world™­ like Camden Kiwi , they\u0026rsquo;ve somehow ended up on that list. Not all additions come from unknown origins; originally added to keep tabs on updates to the Now Reading WordPress plugin, Roblog has become one of the few regular reads on the list. Others might come from those few online and offline acquaintances who keep blogs themselves.\nAll of these sources offer something of inspiration to me in what I write. But probably the biggest thing they lend to me is the knowledge that I read them. Having no reason to write beyond the will to do so can only sustain your drive for so long. Knowing that there are people out there reading just helps to keep things moving, and the knowledge that you are reading others for such a variety of reasons can help to assuage any fears you have that your blog might as well be offline. In recent months I\u0026rsquo;ve found it more difficult to come across topics that I feel worth writing about. Maybe this is more a reflection of my current state of mind than any particular lack of impetus. Of the few which I have written about, the surprise favourite has been the post about installing Altiris SVS , apparently an issue hardly covered elsewhere on the web. As many have pointed out, the popular posts are rarely those you personally feel are your best.\nDoes this mean I have any intention of closing down this blog? The answer to that would have to be \u0026lsquo;No\u0026rsquo;: even if I decided to give up writing, I\u0026rsquo;d leave the blog up for posterity\u0026rsquo;s sake if nothing else. But it might mean the end of the line then? Perhaps. I\u0026rsquo;ll just have to see what inspires me\u0026hellip;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/06/27/to-blog-or-not-to-blog/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Blogging","RelPermalink":"/tags/blogging/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"To Blog, or Not to Blog"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"}],"content":" Cash - An Expensive Commodity\nHow much does it cost to pay? That might appear to be an odd question, but it is a seldom acknowledged hidden attribute of the market economy. Paying costs. If one only imagines the contingencies required to handle the coin money which filters through any system of minor payments, such as a road toll booth, a system of parking meters or a public transport system, it becomes clear that dealing in such currency requires some not inconsiderable expenditure on the part of the service provider.\nThe key here of course is cash, that anonymous key to the monetary house. Some have pointed out that the age of using cash as a medium is gradually drawing to a close, and the establishment is beginning to see the benefits of expediting its demise. This includes the government, banks, financial markets and big corporations. For an example, we need only consider the recent charges introduced by BT.\nAccording to the government watchdog Ofcom , in recent years BT have had a residential market presence of 70-80%, with the latter figure roughly representing the number of residential lines. This totals roughly 20 million landlines, which using the traditional quarterly bill paying system makes 80 million payments a year. So how much does it cost BT to collect these charges? Well, consider the options.\nAn old-fashioned method such as paying your bills at the Post Office should involve little detriment, the money being transferred electronically into BT\u0026rsquo;s bank accounts, with presumably some small handling fee for the Post Office. A cheque made payable to the company, which given the scale of their operation should also be a simple matter for the giant to deal with. Online credit card transaction, which would incur charges from the credit card companies, though I\u0026rsquo;ll admit I don\u0026rsquo;t know if BT passes these on to its customers. Electronic Direct Debit payments direct from customers\u0026rsquo; bank accounts. BT\u0026rsquo;s preferred method is clear, and as their website points out:\nMany of our customers now pay by Direct Debit which is an ideal option if you find it difficult to get out or worry that you will forget to pay your bill on time.\nThe arguments are dressed up and sugar coated to make the idea of giving BT direct access to your bank account seem to be a rather agreeable proposition. The icing on the cake is that it costs customers less to pay via this method. BT have introduced a scandalous \u0026lsquo;payment processing fee\u0026rsquo; amounting to £4.50 (plus VAT) per transaction, paying via cheque or cash.\nNow one can understand the complexities of dealing with payment methods such as the cheque. Assuming BT have no automated procedures for dealing with cheques, manually inputting the figures, such as dates, sums, account numbers etc., requiring an hour\u0026rsquo;s labour for 100 payments, one can see how a wage of £500 per hour is justifiable. But to charge such extraordinary fees for cash payments that are dealt with by another body, where is the justice in that? The levy represents around a 10% increase on the average customer\u0026rsquo;s quarterly bill. Add to that the fines for late payment (which are avoided with Direct Debit by having your bank balance overdrawn instead), and it becomes clear how BT are dictating the payment methods of their victims customers.\nThis isn\u0026rsquo;t the first example of prejudice against traditional payment methods, nor is it a precedent for cash payments being made financially unsound. But it is surely an example of the way in which the demise of anonymous paper money is slowly being exacerbated by that interlinked establishment of government and big business.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/06/19/bt-and-the-cost-of-money/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Bt","RelPermalink":"/tags/bt/"},{"LinkTitle":"Consumer-Rights","RelPermalink":"/tags/consumer-rights/"},{"LinkTitle":"Currency","RelPermalink":"/tags/currency/"}],"title":"BT and the Cost of Money"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"Ever wondered what it\u0026rsquo;s like to see life through someone else\u0026rsquo;s eyes? We go through life as individuals, and whilst we might try to empathise with the people we meet in our lives, we can never truly see outside of the confines of our own identity. Of course, our identity changes as we develop, and that change gives us some ability to imagine how others are feeling. In particular, we believe it empowers us to imagine what those younger than us must feel. But just how true is that?\n\u0026hellip;to think of other people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys\u0026hellip;\nDickens\u0026rsquo; A Christmas Carol told us that Christmas was a time for the more fortunate in society to empathise with those below them, not to recognise the financial distinction but see them as fellow human beings. But such recognition can only be superficial. When we look through the eyes of another, we put ourselves in their shoes, as the saying goes. But we cannot hope to look through their eyes. Indeed, can we even imagine looking through eyes that are not our own? Just try to imagine seeing the world with eyes that were not your own; seeing for the first time the different hues and tones, different depth perception, an entirely different focus. Then extrapolate. New experiences, new thought processes, new emotions, new social background, new language, new religion.\nAs someone bound within the confines of rationality, I find it especially hard to empathise with those more influenced by emotions. When my dog died, my mind offered me a period of grief as it went through its processes. \u0026lt;\u0026gt; Kinda brief, huh? That isn\u0026rsquo;t to say I\u0026rsquo;m emotionless, nor to claim that I am incapable of irrationality. I\u0026rsquo;m always irrational to a rational degree. As an individual I know how hard it is then to empathise with another human being. That one extreme difference only hides a raft of other minor changes which make viewing life through another\u0026rsquo;s eyes almost impossible. What hope, then, does society have?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/06/15/life-as-an-individual/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Empathy","RelPermalink":"/tags/empathy/"}],"title":"Life as an Individual"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"}],"content":"As part of the British government\u0026rsquo;s scheme to tackle sex offenders, Home Secretary John Reid is introducing a raft of new measures for the further protection of children from known paedophiles. Dubbed \u0026ldquo;Sarah\u0026rsquo;s Law\u0026rdquo;, after Sarah Payne who was murdered in 2000 by a repeat offender. Fears that the law would provide powers akin to those in the United States guaranteed by \u0026ldquo;Megan\u0026rsquo;s Law\u0026rdquo;, which had the potential to drive sex offenders underground, have been assuaged by the limited scope of its provisions. The new measures include a voluntary drug treatment, often cited as \u0026lsquo;chemical sterilisation\u0026rsquo; in the media, as well as allowing parents to register their concern with the police should anyone be in a position to have unsupervised access to their children.\nYet these measures principally concern the prospect of repeat offences. The cases which sparked such legislation being called for in the first place so incensed the public on account of their being committed by known paedophiles. These measures, however, do not offer much in the way of dealing with the prevention of first time sex offences relating to children. Indeed, as others have said , these measures would also have done nothing to prevent Sarah Payne\u0026rsquo;s murder by a stranger, the very case which provoked calls for a change in the law.\nAny attempt to the tackle the issue of paedophilia must of course require some heavy and uncomfortable acknowledgements on society\u0026rsquo;s part. Paedophilia is contrary to the social and cultural mores of the country, yet in a population of millions it must be accepted that there is a statistical probability for some individuals to have tendencies deemed unacceptable in their community. If this fact is not accepted, the problem can never be dealt with. \u0026lsquo;Voluntary sterilisation\u0026rsquo; goes some way to offering a solution for those affected, to get their own issues under control. It was not a million years ago that homosexuality was deemed anti-social and indeed illegal; its suppression did not lead to its eradication, however. Whilst there is no intention for ethical comparison here, the fact is that paedophilia must firstly be given due acknowledgement if it is to be properly understood and neutralised. That is not to suggest there can be a cureall solution. But the focus can be shifted, from preventing reoffenders striking again, to suppressing potential offenders in the first instance.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/06/14/sarahs-law-is-no-megans-law/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Britain","RelPermalink":"/tags/britain/"},{"LinkTitle":"Crime","RelPermalink":"/tags/crime/"},{"LinkTitle":"Law","RelPermalink":"/tags/law/"},{"LinkTitle":"Paedophilia","RelPermalink":"/tags/paedophilia/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sarahs-Law","RelPermalink":"/tags/sarahs-law/"}],"title":"Sarah's Law is no Megan's Law"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"For those upgrading their WordPress powered blogs to 2.2, just a word of warning regarding the new character encoding options available in the wp-config.php file.\nThe standard file should have a section which reads:\n// ** MySQL settings ** // define(\u0026#39;DB_NAME\u0026#39;, dbname// The name of the database define(\u0026#39;DB_USER\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;dbuser\u0026#39;); // Your MySQL username define(\u0026#39;DB_PASSWORD\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;dbpassword\u0026#39;); // ...and password define(\u0026#39;DB_HOST\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;localhost\u0026#39;); define(\u0026#39;WP_HOME\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;http://www.yourblog.com/\u0026#39;); define(\u0026#39;WP_SITEURL\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;http://www.yourblog.com/\u0026#39;); define(\u0026#39;DB_CHARSET\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;utf8\u0026#39;); define(\u0026#39;DB_COLLATE\u0026#39;, \u0026#39;utf8\u0026#39;); Note the new options added at the bottom regarding the codepage used in the blog\u0026rsquo;s database. If these are set incorrectly they may make your blog unreadable, else prevent special characters from appearing correctly. I personally found that commenting these two lines out left the blog functioning as before, but for people wishing to change the codepage of their database, WordPress has a rough guide available, originally written for the beta testers.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/05/24/wordpress-2.2-database-character-sets/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Software","RelPermalink":"/tags/software/"},{"LinkTitle":"Unicode","RelPermalink":"/tags/unicode/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"}],"title":"WordPress 2.2 Database Character Sets"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Films","RelPermalink":"/categories/films/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/categories/television/"}],"content":" The Boys from Brazil\nI recently caught a TV screening of The Boys from Brazil, a film adaptation of Ira Levin\u0026rsquo;s novel, concerning the nefarious actions of Dr. Josef Mengele in South America, and his pursuit by a Nazi-hunter presumably modelled on Simon Wiesenthal. Certainly a rather motley cast, with Laurence Olivier showing why he is so often cited as amongst the highest echelons of English-speaking acting, whilst James Mason poorly attempts to cover up his stiff accent. Still not entirely sure what to make of Peck\u0026rsquo;s performance.\nRegardless, the film is entertaining, even if you\u0026rsquo;ve heard the twist previously as I had. Produced slightly before Mengele\u0026rsquo;s actual death in Brazil in 1979, it reminded me of a German film I\u0026rsquo;d read about entitled Nichts als die Wahrheit, which portrays the fictitious events of Dr. Mengele\u0026rsquo;s trial as he returns to German, a sick, old man. Sadly, I was unable to track the film down on the Internet, and at least according to this website the film is currently only available on VHS. Hopefully that situation will be rectified before too long, but if anyone knows where or when it might be published on DVD, please leave a comment.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/05/21/nichts-als-die-wahrheit/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Acting","RelPermalink":"/tags/acting/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Germany","RelPermalink":"/tags/germany/"},{"LinkTitle":"Josef-Mengele","RelPermalink":"/tags/josef-mengele/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nazism","RelPermalink":"/tags/nazism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nichts-Als-Die-Wahrheit","RelPermalink":"/tags/nichts-als-die-wahrheit/"},{"LinkTitle":"The-Boys-From-Brazil","RelPermalink":"/tags/the-boys-from-brazil/"}],"title":"Nichts als die Wahrheit"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Pet-Hates","RelPermalink":"/categories/pet-hates/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":" They all roll over. What else can they do in the dictatocracy? Smoking is bad for you. It kills! And according to recent adverts on British television, passive smoking is even worse, since the smoke comes from the \u0026lsquo;bad\u0026rsquo; end of the cigarette. Is it any wonder the state becomes nanny when society acts so wimpish?\nBut society\u0026rsquo;s seemingly burgeoning fear of death isn\u0026rsquo;t the issue here, at least not to me. That issue is freedom of choice. The ban on smoking in public places perhaps has a right to be enforced; there is no choice about which train or bus station you use, after all. But when it comes down to banning smoking in all bars, pubs and restaurants, one has to ask why we are no longer allowed to choose. Are we so incapable of rational thought? For a long time now, many restaurants have had exclusive smoking sections, and many bars too have proven capable of sectioning off areas for different clientele. One might question therefore, the need for a blanket ban.\nWhen smoking was banned in public places in California, Eddie Izzard remarked \u0026ldquo;Yes, no smoking in bars now, and soon there\u0026rsquo;ll be, no drinking and no talking!\u0026rdquo; ((Eddie Izzard, Dressed To Kill, 1999.)) It got laughs. Now, of course, the idea has spread so far as to become part of the accepted wisdom. But does anyone stop to question the accepted wisdom any more? The majority of people I\u0026rsquo;ve spoken to on the issue support the ban. Why? Because they won\u0026rsquo;t have to worry any more about getting that smokey smell out of their clothes. They aren\u0026rsquo;t worried about the health risks, and that probably shouldn\u0026rsquo;t come as a surprise when statistics appear stating:\nSmoking is said to cause 3,000 deaths in NI each year, with one death every fortnight due to second-hand smoke. ((NI smoking ban comes into force, BBC News , 30 April 2007.))\nBy my reckoning, and you\u0026rsquo;ll have to check that because I\u0026rsquo;m not too hot at maths, that\u0026rsquo;s just under 1% of \u0026lsquo;said\u0026rsquo; smoking related deaths caused by second hand smoke. All that from the \u0026lsquo;bad\u0026rsquo; end of the cigarette. A fantastic saving for the health service there, assuming of course that these people will then go on to live forever. If governments have decided that smoking is too expensive in terms of potential health service requirements, then they should legislate on that side of the wedge. But of course, denying even heavy smokers access to health care for respiratory or cancer related ailments would infringe upon their human rights, as any court worth its salt would testify. Which leaves the only liable course of action for eradicating this filthy habit that of working from the other end. Tobacco taxes (we\u0026rsquo;ve seen those), education campaigns (aplenty), support for anti-smoking groups, and now bans to take smoking further outside the public sphere.\nHowever, one swift aside here. We all know that the main beneficiaries of this blanket ban was designed to be those working in public places. Given that the alternative to such a ban could have been to allow premises to choose to operate as a smoking or non-smoking venue, or else section off areas for each type of customer, and staff the premises accordingly, it appears that a much more wide-ranging effect was sought. Which begs the question about what governments next plan to do about those who are most at risk from second hand smoke—young children and infants. An innocent baby brought up in the home of two smokers is at a much greater risk, and a much more unavoidable risk, than any publican employee or casual evening drinker. Is the next step then to legislate in the home?\nUntil that time, smoking in public places will now be illegal in Northern Ireland. The response there has been like that which occurred over the border when the Republic banned smoking in March, 2004, with special heated outdoor smoking areas being constructed in preparation. Goodness knows how much energy is wasted just to heat up a section of beer garden so clients can go and smoke outdoors in comfort. Of course, this now becomes an area of competition between the venues, as smokers and their friends choose establishments based on the comfort of their smoking areas. Previously, pubs on the border in Northern Ireland had seen a massive upswing in revenues, as pub-goers in the Republic voted with their feet. If ever there was evidence that freedom of choice is in demand, that was it. But they will roll over just the same. They all do.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/04/30/will-anyone-say-no-to-the-no-smoking-ban/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Britain","RelPermalink":"/tags/britain/"},{"LinkTitle":"Consumer-Rights","RelPermalink":"/tags/consumer-rights/"},{"LinkTitle":"Northern-Ireland","RelPermalink":"/tags/northern-ireland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Smoking-Ban","RelPermalink":"/tags/smoking-ban/"}],"title":"Will Anyone say 'No' to the 'No Smoking' Ban?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Book spines\nBook spines\nEver wondered why the spines on your books and DVDs aren\u0026rsquo;t all oriented the same way? Why some read top-to-bottom and others read bottom-to-top? Admittedly, this phenomenon is rare with books printed in the Anglophone world, where the top-to-bottom approach is preferable, but take a look at a bookshelf in continental Europe and you\u0026rsquo;ll probably find the titles read the other way (or both, according to Wikipedia ).\nThe two traditions arose at different times, states Art Lebedev , with book binders starting trends which gradually became standards in their respective regions:\nThe tradition to write on the spine top-to-bottom is older; its roots can be traced back to the time when books were few. The reasoning was that if a book is lying on the table (or in a small stack) face-up, reading its title should be easy.\nThe tradition to write on the spine bottom-to-top is younger; it’s more concerned with how easy it is for the bookshelf owner to handle the book. Reading bottom-to-top is easier, because this direction is more in keeping with the European left-to-right writing tradition, which is especially apparent when there are several lines of text on the spine (an urge to read the lines left-to-right is only natural).\nThe same rules apply to DVDs and presumably audio CDs, though in my experience the latter are more haphazardly labelled. As someone once noted, however, that when it comes to learning, those in the West tilt their heads to the right, and those in the East tilt theirs to the left. But whichever way you tilt your head, it\u0026rsquo;s worth remembering:\nGood and evil appear to be joined in every culture at the spine.\nFlannery O’Connor\n[Photo courtesy of CalEvans ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/04/20/spine-reading/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Bookbinding","RelPermalink":"/tags/bookbinding/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"}],"title":"Spine Reading"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"After reading a review over at freewaregenius.com, I thought I\u0026rsquo;d check out this neat little program, free for personal use. It offers a way to install programs as a \u0026rsquo;layer\u0026rsquo; on your system, transparently noting all changes and additions made in the installation, and enabling you to turn this layer on or off, or seamlessly delete it without worry. Although not limited to creating layers for installations, this would seem the perfect solution for people who wish to try out different versions of a software package without them interfering with one another, or simply test out some software without the hastle of worrying if its installer left anything behind.\nHowever, I came across a problem during the installation that seems, ironically, to be caused by things being left behind. The installer would fail and blurt:\nThere are file operations pending on this machine. The machine should be restarted, and setup can be run again.\nWhilst a reboot should fix the problem, this was not the case for me. Your natural recourse to a problem like this might be to delete everything in your C:\\Documents and Settings\\your username\\Local Settings\\Temp folder, as detailed here (in Chinese), however this brought no joy. Instead, some erroneous registry entry was to blame. ((Note that these entries are probably only erroneous if they are still present after restarting Windows. Ensure this is the case.)) The solution is to delete the entries and restart, thus:\nClick Start \u0026gt; Run\u0026hellip; and then type regedit. Find the following branch in the registry HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Session Manager. Double-click the PendingFileRenameOperations entry. Delete any entries and click OK. Close the registry editor and restart the computer. Run the installer again. If this does not work, another solution would be to export the above registry branch, delete the PendingFileRenameOperations registry entry altogether, run the installer, and then reimport the saved file.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/04/08/problem-installing-altiris-svs/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Altiris-Svs","RelPermalink":"/tags/altiris-svs/"},{"LinkTitle":"Freeware","RelPermalink":"/tags/freeware/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Software","RelPermalink":"/tags/software/"}],"title":"Problem Installing Altiris SVS"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":" As if holding the title for most spied upon nation weren\u0026rsquo;t enough, CCTV cameras in England are to be updated to add something of a bark, according to the BBC . Arguing the new cameras remonstrating with petty offenders will help to prevent problems before they really start and reduce bureaucracy (by magic presumably), Home Secretary John Reid also mentioned that competitions would be run in schools in local areas to provide a voice for the cameras, which if it is true would presumably mean that the \u0026rsquo;talking\u0026rsquo; ability would be limited to a choice of pre-set phrases. We can only hope that whilst these competitions are being carried out, it will be noticed how effectively such vocal coercion works in the classroom, without even a whiff of potential punishment to follow it up. After all, is that not where the problems of anti-social behaviour which these measures are designed to counteract originate?\nOf course the opposition, whose main argument against such measures at the moment is that it avoids the principle totem of getting \u0026lsquo;more bobbies on the beat\u0026rsquo;, should well bear in mind that the \u0026lsquo;Peelers\u0026rsquo; were no more popularly received on their inception either. Now they want more of them.\nBut wait—can anyone else hear something?\nSmith! 6079 Smith W.! Yes, you! Bend lower, please! You can do better than that. You\u0026rsquo;re not trying. Lower, please! That\u0026rsquo;s better, comrade.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/04/05/telescreens-hit-the-streets/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Britain","RelPermalink":"/tags/britain/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cctv","RelPermalink":"/tags/cctv/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"}],"title":"Telescreens Hit the Streets"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Pet-Hates","RelPermalink":"/categories/pet-hates/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"},{"LinkTitle":"Transport","RelPermalink":"/categories/transport/"}],"content":" Airport Security\nAirport Security\nIf there\u0026rsquo;s one thing that makes travelling by airplane an ordeal, it\u0026rsquo;s airport security. The fact that this is as oxymoronic as \u0026lsquo;British Intelligence\u0026rsquo; is only half of the story, for that part of your journey which entails walking through the little arch that goes \u0026ldquo;bing\u0026rdquo; largely accounts for all the rest of the misery surrounding airports.\nNow I can of course only pretend that this is a real \u0026lsquo;pet hate\u0026rsquo;—for starters, it is a pretty universal sentiment—since it serves its purpose pretty well. That of protecting innocent people? Oh no, there is no security at the airport per se! If you want to set off a bomb or open a phial of some contagious disease, in an area as crowded as the city centre, feel free. There are even bins provided for your convenience. But to make everyone feel safer about boarding the big bricks with wings, and of course for the protection of those big bricks with wings, passengers must arrive early, hand up their luggage for inspection, and file through security like cattle. Oh, and these days, of course you should throw away anything over 100ml!\nWell that\u0026rsquo;s all well and good, but does any of it actually work? Any small sharp objects taken through security will be quickly confiscated, just in case you are tempted to start trimming your nails in public (heaven forbid!), but they will happily provide with a can of beer or pop which any remotely enterprising villain could readily fashion into a very sharp implement to slash someone\u0026rsquo;s throat with. ((Albeit only something for the wealthy villain to contemplate.)) Of course, no billiard cues would be allowed on the plane, since we all know what a great swing you could take in the cabin, ((And after all every Hollywood bar room brawl has shown us how much damage one of those can do.)) but an extension cord or power cable for wrapping around that little girl\u0026rsquo;s neck and threatening to asphyxiate her unless they let you into the cockpit, well that\u0026rsquo;s just using your initiative.\nAnd what about that 100ml limit? It\u0026rsquo;s actually up to a total of litre in most places, which is probably, thank goodness, insufficient to blow a plane up in one go. Of course, those carefully prepared poxy explosives stored in a tube of mascara and a pot of lip gloss should be able to blow a nice hole in the fuselage. Who knows, maybe more if you sat in the right place!\nOf course, not everyone would be daring enough to try something so reliant on chemistry, which is where that little arch that goes \u0026ldquo;bing\u0026rdquo; might just do you a favour. In Kraków-Balice airport, a woman wearing a tight denim jacket with buttons to the brim unsurprisingly set off the pulse induction metal detector. A quick frisk and she was on her way. But this was in the days after the British airport security scare, so there was a second, more \u0026lsquo;personal\u0026rsquo; security checkpoint to go through. Her bag was searched, and her body checked over with a magic wand, which bleeped away merrily as if it had just discovered an android, and off she went on her merry way, with god knows what packed away in all those little buttons.\nLet\u0026rsquo;s face it, a lot of us have probably smuggled things through airport security, knowingly or otherwise, so just imagine someone putting some effort into it! And if all else fails, you could do worse than try it at a regional airport. That hand luggage you pass through a machine is scanned with X-rays to display a multi-coloured picture of the various frequencies of absorption, highlighting metal, inorganic and most importantly organic substances. ((Most common explosives are organic substances.)) Last week I managed to smuggle a few pounds of Lancashire hot pot through one of the regional airports of the British Isles, without a qualm or a query. Fortunately for them, there was only a flavour explosion at the other end!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/04/01/airport-security/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Airport-Security","RelPermalink":"/tags/airport-security/"},{"LinkTitle":"Pet-Hates","RelPermalink":"/tags/pet-hates/"},{"LinkTitle":"Public-Transport","RelPermalink":"/tags/public-transport/"}],"title":"Airport Security"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"This certainly isn\u0026rsquo;t my area of expertise, but I\u0026rsquo;ve been trying to figure out a way to integrate the Language Switcher plugin with a widget-enabled theme. As this hasn\u0026rsquo;t yet been implemented, I copied wrote the simplest of Widgets which will list the available languages on your blog in the sidebar.\nThere really isn\u0026rsquo;t anything special here, but for people even more hesitant with code than I am, pop this file into the wp-content/plugins/ folder of your WordPress installation, and then enable it via the Plugins admin page. You should then find the Widget available in the Presentation -\u0026gt; Sidebar Widgets admin page. At the moment, the Widget will display your available languages listed only by name. I\u0026rsquo;m still learning how to allow this to be changed from within the Sidebar Widgets page.\nClick here to download Language Switcher Widget v1.0.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/29/language-switcher-widget/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Language-Switcher","RelPermalink":"/tags/language-switcher/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Widgets","RelPermalink":"/tags/widgets/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"Language Switcher Widget"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"After a little more research and experimentation, I\u0026rsquo;ve updated the little Language Switcher widget to enable the user to choose whether to display flags and/or names for the available languages when setting up the widget, and change the heading in the sidebar if required.\nClick here to download Language Switcher Widget v1.01.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/29/language-switcher-widget-v1.01/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Language-Switcher","RelPermalink":"/tags/language-switcher/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Widgets","RelPermalink":"/tags/widgets/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress-plugins/"}],"title":"Language Switcher Widget v1.01"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" Happily, one of the best things about the Mozilla Foundation\u0026rsquo;s flagship browser Firefox, is the sheer breadth of additional functionality provided by an active development community in the form of addons or plugins. There\u0026rsquo;s a great range in terms of ease-of-use, function and stability, some which are so useful as to almost warrant standard inclusion, others merely worth playing with from time to time. It should be noted of course that adding plugins can cause problems with Firefox\u0026rsquo;s stability and security, though many of those listed are fairly mature projects and should not pose much of a risk. Here are a few I\u0026rsquo;ve dabbled with from time to time:\nAdblock or Adblock Plus - There\u0026rsquo;s fair advertising, and then there\u0026rsquo;s frankly unreasonable advertising. I can see the merits of allowing sites to earn funding through the placement of adverts related to their products, whether they come from Google or elsewhere, but some web adverts go too far. The popup plague of yesteryear might have been largely beaten back, but that doesn\u0026rsquo;t prevent wiley coders from placing wholly obtrusive flash adverts in every nook they can find. Unfortunately their actions can only serve to give web advertising a bad reputation, and drive people to finding ways of blocking adverts wholesale, obtrusive or otherwise. Of course there will always be a small minority of web users who cannot stand to see web adverts in any form, but for their purposes, and the folks seeking refuge from the advertising bombardment, Adblock/Adblock Plus will fulfil their every need.\nTo tell the truth, the history of these two projects confuses me, save to say that at one time or another one or both of these plugins has been under development. As I understand the current situation, Adblock Plus is the more highly recommended, as it\u0026rsquo;s more heavily featured, comes with some default filters to subscribe to which can get rid of most adverts with the minimum of fuss for the end user, and has a much reduced resource footprint to boot (pardon the pun).\nBugMeNot - It\u0026rsquo;s a bit of a misnomer to include this in the list, since as a plugin it merely allows Firefox to hook directly into a particular website. Nevertheless, the idea behind the project is sound - to get round all those niggling little registration requirements which many sites use to restrict access to content. You know the sort—\u0026lsquo;Register here - it\u0026rsquo;s free!\u0026rsquo; Which begs the question, if it\u0026rsquo;s free, why do I need to register? Bugmenot.com offers end users a way to take a stand against this requirement, allowing them to log in to sites using generic, registered accounts. It does not include paid sites, since the purpose is to simply avoid the need to register for further content. imdb offers a perfect example of this kind of behaviour—if you want to read comments about entries on their system, you need to register. As bugmenot.com explains , you might consider this compulsory registration a breach of privacy, if you even fill it in truthfully! This little plugin integrates bugmenot.com\u0026rsquo;s functionality into Firefox\u0026rsquo;s right-click context menu.\nClipmarks - Another website-based plugin, though this time the functionality is all that more apparent. Click a button and the Clipmarks plugin will allow you to highlight sections of a webpage that are of interest, be they sections of text, links, pictures or video. These clippings are then saved to Clipmarks \u0026rsquo; website, which requires registration and attempts to act like another social hub along the lines of StumbleUpon (featured later), although clippings can be saved both publicly and privately, and doesn\u0026rsquo;t require much information from the user. With all of these clippings fully searchable, the website offers to act as an online scrapbook, doing away with wholesale bookmarking to really collect only the most necessary scraps of information. The service also offers a way of sending clippings directly to a blog post, something I haven\u0026rsquo;t experimented with yet, although it might be worth exploring.\nCustomizeGoogle - If you use Google as your primary search engine, but sometimes find yourself wanting a second opinion, CustomizeGoogle might be the answer. The plugin will offer links to other major search engines directly within the Google search, allowing you to quickly check the other options. But that\u0026rsquo;s only the beginning! You can also remove adverts, filter out websites of your choice from search results, increase privacy by randomising your Google userid, have suggestions offered whilst typing out a search string, amongst others, and all options can be chosen from a simple menu. Extremely useful and well-featured plugin—I won\u0026rsquo;t use Google without it!\nDog Ears - A bit of a throwaway plugin, though could come in quite handy. Basically, Dog Ears allows you to leave little markers on web pages, particularly useful to mark your reading place on a long webpage, though it is open to other applications. Works best with Firefox 2.0 and above, as dog ears are saved by default even when you close or navigate away from that page.\nDownloadThemAll! - Probably the weakest link in Firefox\u0026rsquo;s armour at the moment is its default handling of downloads, which makes DownloadThemAll! a superb plugin to install for starters. Pausing and resuming are simply handled, as are multipart downloads to increase speeds (though this has always caused problems with certain websites). Probably its greatest strength is the ability to use it to glean links from a page, and filter out the ones to be downloaded to a location on your machine. All of this is of course fully customisable.\nFirebug - One for the developers, Firebug allows the end-user to view, edit and debug the CSS, JavaScript or HTML of the sites visited, allowing for on-the-fly updates and alterations, a handy way to test changes and isolate a variety of problems. An extremely handy yet unobtrusive tool for webmasters and designers alike.\nFireFTP - I\u0026rsquo;ll be honest, I haven\u0026rsquo;t actually used Internet Explorer 7 in order to tell how good its FTP functionality really is, but my experiences with previous incarnations of the browser put me off altogether! Its abysmal handling of this simple protocol put me off ever using a web browser to handle FTP again, instead opting for a standalone client (the current favourite in this regard being FileZilla ). Whilst I still rely on this program for most FTP stuff as the protocol seems to be quite susceptible to security risks, FireFTP offers a decent, secure (so far), and most importantly convenient client for those minor FTP needs, particularly for browsing repositories anonymously.\nFlashGot - If you want something like DownloadThemAll! (DTA) mentioned above, but already have a favourite download manager, FlashGot is probably the thing for you. With similar functionality to DTA, FlashGot allows for one, multiple or all links on a page to be downloaded quickly, fully integrated with a range of popular download managers. It also features an interesting gallery builder, synthesising media from scattered pages for easy downloading, though this is not something I\u0026rsquo;ve actually used.\nFoxmarks - For people who want to access their bookmarks, regardless of where they are or which computer they are using, Foxmarks has the answer. It works in the background to save all those favourite links on a central server, and by either logging in with the Foxmarks plugin or using the web interface, those links can be easily accessed, wherever the user. Of course, privacy might be of concern here, although it seems to be possible to use a 3rd party server for storing links. I normally just move the entire Firefox folder around between computers (including all plugins, cookies, links, the full shebang), but this plugin might just change my habits.\nGreasemonkey - Perhaps the most confusing and yet most useful plugin on the list, Greasemonkey takes a little explaining for non-technical users. Essentially, it allows users to write small pieces of script which can alter the appearance or function of a website or selection of sites. Whilst this might be beyond the average user, there is a nice repository of user-made scripts to browse and select from. There is a massive variety, but to give some simple examples from what I\u0026rsquo;ve sampled, the plugin can be used to alter currencies displayed on major websites, updated according to the exchange rate, change the display of images on websites or Google image search results, or add buttons to the display of a user\u0026rsquo;s profile on eBay to show highlight certain characteristics. A tweaker\u0026rsquo;s dream!\nSage - Probably one of the simplest and best plugins listed here, Sage is a lightweight RSS and Atom aggregator, which integrates nicely with Firefox\u0026rsquo;s Live Bookmarks facility. There\u0026rsquo;s not a lot to say beyond that, since it does what it says on the tin, and not a lot more. If I had one criticism, it would be the slightly clumsy method proposed for changing the way feeds are presented, although a nice little collection of styles is available , with instructions for using them.\nSearchStatus - This is only a small plugin and might be disappearing from my plugins list soon, but it offers a neat little summary of roughly how popular a website is based on its search scores in Google and Alexa, amongst others, although it is aimed more at the search engine market than the average end-user. Note that the current version (1.18) caused a problem for me, whereby popup windows were incorrectly sized, depending on where the SearchStatus toolbar was situated.\nSession Manager - If you\u0026rsquo;re always closing links accidentally, or shutting down Firefox without saving your bookmarks, Session Manager can act as your safety net. It will remember recently closed tabs and windows, and create a backup of your last Firefox \u0026lsquo;session\u0026rsquo; to be restored after a crash or otherwise, and of course both of these settings can be tweaked to allow for saving a greater or smaller number of tabs or sessions. A very handy tool for the clumsy browser.\nSmart Bookmarks - If you find you have too many bookmarks for Firefox\u0026rsquo;s Bookmark Toolbar, this simple little plugin has the answer. Put simply, Smart Bookmarks reduces the labels for bookmarks right down to their favicon.ico files, that little image which appears next to a web address in most modern browsers, with an option to have the bookmark name displayed when the mouse rolls over them. Although it isn\u0026rsquo;t universal, the plugin is compatible with a fair selection of custom Firefox themes, and this selection will no doubt expand. Using just a fraction of the size of an average bookmark name, that Bookmark Toolbar can now be comfortably home to a great many more frequently used bookmarks.\nStumbleUpon - Just one more plugin that\u0026rsquo;s about integrating website functionality into Firefox, and this time for entertainment. StumbleUpon offers a way for users to randomly discover new websites related to their fields of interest, rate them, and submit new ones for others to peruse. The plugin simply integrates this into Firefox\u0026rsquo;s casing, and although the default setup can make the browser look more than a little clumsy, that won\u0026rsquo;t be the only reason you\u0026rsquo;ll wish you never installed it—that Stumble! button is a productivity killer!\nWeb Developer - Similar to the Firebug plugin mentioned above, Web Developer offers a context menu to access all of the wires and workings behind your websites, find problems and test new code. Its documentation isn\u0026rsquo;t quite up to standard yet, but the functionality appears to be there.\nOf course, this is just a short sample of the plugins available, and Greasemonkey alone opens the door to thousands of others, not to mention the ability to integrate a variety of different search engines right within Firefox\u0026rsquo;s default context menus. Nevertheless, these are the ones I\u0026rsquo;ve come to have installed at this moment in time, some of which get installed by default whenever I install Firefox (such as Adblock, CustomizeGoogle and Sage)—others are merely enjoying their \u0026rsquo;trial\u0026rsquo; period, and with such an active development community, I\u0026rsquo;ve no doubt they won\u0026rsquo;t be the last!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/26/a-few-funky-firefox-plugins/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Advertising","RelPermalink":"/tags/advertising/"},{"LinkTitle":"Browsers","RelPermalink":"/tags/browsers/"},{"LinkTitle":"Firefox","RelPermalink":"/tags/firefox/"},{"LinkTitle":"Firefox-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/tags/firefox-plugins/"},{"LinkTitle":"Greasemonkey","RelPermalink":"/tags/greasemonkey/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sage","RelPermalink":"/tags/sage/"},{"LinkTitle":"Software","RelPermalink":"/tags/software/"},{"LinkTitle":"Stumbleupon","RelPermalink":"/tags/stumbleupon/"}],"title":"A Few Funky Firefox Plugins"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Matthew Hayden\nThat might just be a taster of the final to come. And if it is, what a treat that will be! Australia met South Africa for dominance of Group A, both teams already through to the Super 8s round, with the points from this game carrying through to that stage of the competition.\nAustralia opened the batting and immediately made it clear they meant business, clearing 50 inside 5 overs. Matthew Hayden looked to be on stellar form as he scored the fastest century in World Cup Cricket, off just 66 balls, a dangerous omen for the other Super 8 sides. Despite immediately thereafter succumbing, for a total of 101, Hayden\u0026rsquo;s tally was bolstered by near centuries from Michael Clarke (92) and Ricky Ponting (91) as well as a sound 42 from opening partner Adam Gilchrist, for a total of 377 for 6.\nAn impressive total no doubt, but Australia have had a reputation of late for being unable to defend their targets. South Africa looked to be up for the challenge, with an impressive opening partnership between AB de Villiers and Graeme Smith for 160, stopped only by an extraordinary run out, thrown directly from the outfield. The run rate slowed visibly after de Villiers\u0026rsquo; dismissal, and Smith eventually retired with cramp (albeit with a brief return to the field, only to be almost immediately caught behind in the later stages). Tait pulled an important haul for Australia to wrap some of the danger men, and put an end to any South African hopes of victory. But does anyone else wish he\u0026rsquo;d stop grunting?\nIf Hayden and co. can stay in the form they\u0026rsquo;re in, the latter stages of this competition can only go one way. South Africa are not out of it yet, of course, and both they and Australia will join the West Indies, Ireland, New Zealand, England, Sri Lanka and presumably Bangladesh for the Super 8s. A handy 2 points from this meeting will leave them in confident mood to face the hosts in Antigua next Tuesday.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/25/will-anyone-beat-australia/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cricket","RelPermalink":"/tags/cricket/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cricket-World-Cup","RelPermalink":"/tags/cricket-world-cup/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"}],"title":"Will Anyone Beat Australia?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" With only a few more games to play in each of the four qualifying groups, the Super 8 stage of the Cricket World Cup is almost here. In some cases, positions are already decided, and New Zealand for example can already guarantee taking 2 points through to the next stage.\nHaving seen most of the teams of the tournament in action, it would appear to me that there is as yet no clear favourite. The Super 8s stage of the tournament requires each team to play all of the other qualifying teams, apart from the qualifier from their group (the result of this match is carried forward into the Super 8s stage). This means some of the important matches have already been played. Tomorrow South Africa and Australia will face each other in their final group games, having both been eased into the competition with perfunctory matches against the Netherlands and Scotland, a big game which might even be a preview of the final.\nNevertheless, even without this result I would wager that both of them will be in the top four of the Super 8s, probably to be joined by Sri Lanka, who have looked mighty in their opening games (the result against India pending), New Zealand, who qualified from their group with a clean sweep, or hosts the West Indies who currently face Ireland in their first Super 8 scoring game.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/23/super-8s-stage-approaching/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cricket","RelPermalink":"/tags/cricket/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cricket-World-Cup","RelPermalink":"/tags/cricket-world-cup/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"}],"title":"Super 8s Stage Approaching"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"Where else would you find a sign like this in a major airport? (Excuse the blur)\nescalators.jpg\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/22/ireland-joins-the-developed-world/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Airport","RelPermalink":"/tags/airport/"},{"LinkTitle":"Dublin","RelPermalink":"/tags/dublin/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ireland","RelPermalink":"/tags/ireland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photograph","RelPermalink":"/tags/photograph/"}],"title":"Ireland Joins the Developed World"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"}],"content":"Another site for those lovers of audiobooks. Podiobooks offers a way for authors to showcase their talent for free, parcelling up their work into episodes which can be delivered via podcast or downloaded manually from the website. Whilst listening to the books is free, the website recommends users to donate, as 75% of donations goes straight to the authors themselves, which they regard as a much more equitable way for authors to market their abilities. It also offers something of a return to the serialisation of novels so popular in the past; subscribe to the book(s) of your choice via RSS and listen to the podcast via your favourite media player, or upload to an mp3 player to listen on the move.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/20/audiobook-showcase/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Audiobooks","RelPermalink":"/tags/audiobooks/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Audiobook Showcase"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Environment","RelPermalink":"/categories/environment/"},{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/categories/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science","RelPermalink":"/categories/science/"}],"content":" Biofuels\nWhere your next tankload is coming from?\nJust where is the EU going with its agricultural policy? With the European Commission endorsing a plan to up the previous goal of a 5.75% market share for biofuels in the overall transport fuel supply by 2012, to 10% by 2020, one has to wonder which part of the EU\u0026rsquo;s goals is being pushed hardest. From the EU website :\nThe EU is supporting biofuels with the aim of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, boosting the decarbonisation of transport fuels, diversifying fuel supply sources, offering new income opportunities in rural areas and developing long-term replacements for fossil fuel.\nCertainly all of these goals would be furthered by such a move by the EU, but which has prompted this raising of targets despite the estimate that most member states will not even achieve the original goal. As a long-term replacement for fossil fuels, the biofuels movement would appear to be unsustainable. Whilst it does offer a new \u0026rsquo;energy farmer\u0026rsquo; role to those particularly in the developing world, the biofuels movement will likely set back the move towards sustainable agriculture, and has the potential through furthering intensive farming and monoculture techniques of causing greater environmental damage than the potential harms of global warming. ((If these are indeed caused by carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels .)) Technically the move may ultimately reduce greenhouse gas emissions, at least insofar as it prevents the further introduction of carbon deposits in fossil fuels from being added to the atmospheric carbon cycle, yet at the moment many biofuels in the market are so inefficient as to be net pollutants. ((And quite what is meant by \u0026rsquo;the decarbonisation of transport fuels\u0026rsquo; is best left to the PR people.))\nAll of which leaves the diversification of fuel supply sources. For the greatest efficiency, there is little doubt that biofuels should be burned in power stations rather than mobile internal combustion engines, yet that would appear to be only a secondary aim of this directive. Perhaps the recent EU spats with Russia offer a greater clue to the hasty attempts to diversify fuel supply sources, and leading the charge in this regard is Sweden. Their aim , to make Sweden an oil free society, and to break their dependence upon it by 2020, may seem outlandish. But it is not motivated by the fear that oil is running out.\nIn the earth’s interior there are very extensive coal-based energy resources, from methane hydrates deep in the oceans and in northerly permafrost areas to unexploited deposits of oil sands and shale oils. The superficial deposits of coal, oil and gas that man makes use of today are the tip of the planet’s enormous energy pyramid. Thus, oil will never run out, neither in a theoretical nor a practical sense.\nSweden\u0026rsquo;s aims are very similar to those of the EU:\nTo reduce Sweden’s climate impact. To secure Sweden’s supply of energy in the long term. To become a leading nation in the development of new technology for sustainable use of energy and more efficient use of energy. To strengthen our international economic competitiveness. To use and develop the energy resources from forests and fields, “Sweden’s green gold”. ((Making Sweden an OIL-FREE Society , Commission on Oil Independence, 21 June 2006, p. 11. Highlights added.)) It would appear then that the true aim of this EU directive has less to with cleaning up the economy through greater reliance on renewable energies, than an attempt to reduce the EU\u0026rsquo;s heavy reliance on the volatile world oil market. Burning (inefficient) biofuels in combustion engines is not an answer to carbon emissions, long or short term. Will logic intervene and see support for the use of biofuels as petroleum replacements decline? Or will the EU continue to intervene in the hopes that the big buzzwords climate change will allow them to push through seemingly popular policies, ultimately in the name of power politics?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/17/biofuels-oil-for-votes/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Biofuels","RelPermalink":"/tags/biofuels/"},{"LinkTitle":"Environment","RelPermalink":"/tags/environment/"},{"LinkTitle":"Eu","RelPermalink":"/tags/eu/"},{"LinkTitle":"Global-Warming","RelPermalink":"/tags/global-warming/"}],"title":"Biofuels: Oil for Votes?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" RBS Six Nations Trophy\nIreland denied once again on points difference from their first Six Nations championship, and on St Patrick\u0026rsquo;s Day to boot, as France took the challenge set by Ireland in their 8 try victory over the Azzurri. With the unlikely Italian victory out of the picture, the French set to work against Scotland in Paris, with a target of 24 points. Although England playing in Cardiff would have a mathematical chance to clinch the title, a championship victory for them would be an incredible feat. The title was France\u0026rsquo;s to lose, and Scotland\u0026rsquo;s to deny.\nA dramatic start to the day in the Stadio Flaminio as Ireland looked to stretch a big point victory over Italy to put France in a difficult position later in the day. Italy started well, kicking penalties and a drop goal, and despite conceding two tries looked to be in a decent position at 12-13 until a controversial try to Ireland in the dying minutes of the half put them 12-20 ahead. The second half, however, was a one horse race, as Ireland put try after try past the Italian defence. The game opened up considerably as the scoreboard racked up a considerable points difference for Ireland, but a last minute decision to continue after the clock went red left Italy in a position to score a generously awarded second try to claw back 7 points before the final whistle. The final score of 24-51 left France needing a victory margin of 24 points to claim the trophy.\nKnowing what they had to do in Paris, the Scots ignited the game with an early try to put France on the back foot. From there France fully attacked the game, looking to be half way to their tally by half time, when Sean Lamont took a quick penalty to sprint for the line and spoil French hopes. Leading 20-14 going into the second half, France got the bit between their teeth and forced a 25 point lead with over 15 minutes to go. First half hero Lamont was bizarrely sin binned for an infraction by his younger brother Rory, and all looked to be going France\u0026rsquo;s way using all the strength, speed and skill they could muster. Yet a late try from the unlikely arms of Euan Murray put the championship just beyond France\u0026rsquo;s reach. As the BBC commentator put it:\n\u0026ldquo;He\u0026rsquo;s got a five yard run in, and like every good tight-head prop, he\u0026rsquo;s now got cramp!\u0026rdquo;\nPatterson\u0026rsquo;s failed conversion left France needing a try to win. The clock went red, the French pushed for the line, pushing on, penalty after penalty. With the ball over the line, the referee went to the television referee asking for any reason not to award the try—and who other than an Irishman to be occupying that position! The try awarded. France triumphant. Ireland beaten on points difference for the second year running.\nAlthough Wales will play host to England shortly, the required margin for England (victory by 57 points) to claim the championship essentially confirms France\u0026rsquo;s championship.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/17/france-crowned-again-on-six-nations-super-saturdayprobably/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"France","RelPermalink":"/tags/france/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ireland","RelPermalink":"/tags/ireland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Italy","RelPermalink":"/tags/italy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rugby-Union","RelPermalink":"/tags/rugby-union/"},{"LinkTitle":"Scotland","RelPermalink":"/tags/scotland/"},{"LinkTitle":"Six-Nations","RelPermalink":"/tags/six-nations/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"}],"title":"France Crowned Again on Six Nations Super Saturday—Probably!"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Herschelle Gibbs\nIn typical fashion, England underwhelmed in their first game of the tournament losing to a solid New Zealand performance. A major hiccough during their innings in which England lost 4 wickets for 5 runs left the Kiwis with an mediocre target of 210 to reach. Despite the new ball putting New Zealand in a precarious position on 19 for 3, an excellent partnership by Scott Styris and Jacob Oram saw them through to what was ultimately a tidy victory. The result puts New Zealand in a strong position to progress through the group, and leaves England needing results against both Canada and Kenya in their last two games.\nIn the second Group A game, the Netherlands were soundly crushed by a mighty South African performance, epitomised by Herschelle Gibbs\u0026rsquo; record setting six 6s in an over, a feat never before achieved in international cricket. Despite rain forcing the match to be reduced to 40 overs apiece, South Africa posted an impressive 353 for 3, including the fastest half century, on top of Gibbs\u0026rsquo; unique achievement. South Africa have to face Scotland before their big game in Group A against Australia, though by then both teams may have already qualified.\nAnd in the second game from Group D, Ireland managed to ease past Zimbabwe, leaving them in a stronger position to take on group favourites Pakistan tomorrow, who will be looking for a victory following their first defeat at the hands of hosts, the West Indies.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/17/latest-from-the-west-indies/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cricket","RelPermalink":"/tags/cricket/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cricket-World-Cup","RelPermalink":"/tags/cricket-world-cup/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"}],"title":"Latest from the West Indies"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"As I found recently, if you\u0026rsquo;re planning on moving your WordPress blog around on your server or domain there are a few things to be aware of. Most importantly, do not move the blog before setting up the WordPress for the new location!\nGo to the admin section of your blog, select and find the Options \u0026gt; General panel. Change the WordPress address and Blog address entries to reflect the new location of your blog. Update your blog, and do not worry if there appear to be problems, simply log out. Delete the wp-content/cache folder from your WordPress installation (if it exists). Move the WordPress files to their new location, including all subdirectories. If you use Permalinks, update them via the Options \u0026gt; Permalinks panel. Update the settings for any plugins which require addresses which have changed. Navigate to your new blog address and check everything is working. Whilst this should update most of your settings to reflect the blog\u0026rsquo;s new location, some problems might arise with links and images, particularly relative links if you have changed the blog\u0026rsquo;s location within a single domain. If this is the case it would be easiest to edit the links en mass via the SQL database, however if this affects only a small number of posts it could prove simpler to edit these manually.\nNote: WPG2 users might find the WPG2 Plugin page on their WordPress page reports everything successful, yet their embedded gallery page attempts to find images under the old structure. In this case, Show/Hide Manual Configuration Form will display the entries which need manually updating to reflect the blog\u0026rsquo;s new location.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/17/moving-your-wordpress-blog/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wpg2","RelPermalink":"/tags/wpg2/"}],"title":"Moving Your WordPress Blog"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Environment","RelPermalink":"/categories/environment/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/categories/television/"}],"content":"Global warming has become something of a fashion. To gainsay it is a political cyanide pill akin to older variants of the likes of \u0026lsquo;abolitionism\u0026rsquo; or \u0026lsquo;free trade\u0026rsquo;. The climate is changing, and it\u0026rsquo;s all our fault. One need only look at the success of a film like Al Gore\u0026rsquo;s An Inconvenient Truth to see how this basic principle has become an accepted fact. Recent films like The Day After Tomorrow illustrate how mainstream such ideas are. It\u0026rsquo;s a big issue, it\u0026rsquo;s an important issue, and it\u0026rsquo;s politically and financially loaded. Which is why it is all the more important it isn\u0026rsquo;t swallowed wholesale. A recent Channel 4 production hoped to show just how deceptive the issue can be.\nglobalwarming_1.jpg\nUnfortunately, it is very easy in this \u0026lsquo;information age\u0026rsquo; for facts to become distorted and blown out of proportion, particularly by the mainstream media. On a daily basis, news programmes bring us the latest breakthroughs from the cutting edge of science. In Britain this is concomitant with a constant tugging on our heart strings to force the NHS to accept the latest miracle cure for cancer, Alzheimer\u0026rsquo;s or any other myriad diseases. Of course, the problem is that breakthroughs at the cutting edge of science have a tendency to go wrong, the results of surveys tend to be disproved by later surveys, and false conclusions tentatively fed to the public with phrases like \u0026lsquo;scientists believe\u0026rsquo; and \u0026lsquo;recent surveys have shown\u0026rsquo; in fact get swallowed as gospel fact.\nSuch is the problem with the current furore over global warming. Whilst there are some essential facts which can be agreed upon by all parties, the basic link between carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels and the warming climate has been virtually set in stone in people\u0026rsquo;s minds. Yet the evidence is neither conclusive, nor necessarily indicative of human involvement in the current warming climate. Which is what Channel 4\u0026rsquo;s The Great Global Warming Swindle set out to illustrate. Whilst it is undeniable that the climate is always changing, it is also undeniable that the climate has changed without our interference. The programme points out that within our written history, the climate has been both much cooler and warmer than it currently is. Documentaries of the sixties and early seventies talked more about the threats of global cooling than global warming, with the potential for another mini-Ice Age should trends continue.\nYet looking further back in history, there have been periods when the climate has been warmer than it is now. The programme pointed out that evidence for this remains with us in the number of wine-related place names in the United Kingdom, the Vine Streets of its towns. This leads us to ask, why are we so sure that climate change is being caused by our activities? The assumption seems to be that the planet\u0026rsquo;s carbon cycle acts like some giant thermostat to the global climate—turning up the atmospheric carbon content through deforestation and the burning of fossil fuels will cause the climate to warm. Of course, there is no chicken and egg situation in the fossil fuels stakes, which means that when our imaginary thermostat is on full, then life must have found a happy equilibrium in which to sequester itself in pockets which man is today uncovering.\nThat carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas is undeniable. That it is the main cause of the global climate, however, is a pretty big jump in logic. The show pointed out that whilst CO2 levels have risen pretty constantly through the past two centuries of human industrial activity, temperatures have fluctuated much more erratically. In particular, the post-war boom years of industrial activity saw a drop in temperatures which seems to go against the accepted trend. Of course, as a proportion of Earth\u0026rsquo;s atmosphere, CO2 accounts for a miniscule proportion, usually measured in parts per million, which is generally considered to have risen around 40% as a result of man\u0026rsquo;s actions. Yet these levels have fluctuated even without man\u0026rsquo;s interference, according to the data we have available, and on an annual basis man\u0026rsquo;s contribution to the atmospheric CO2 content is far outweighed by natural processes, largely as a product of respiration (coming particularly from the oceans) or from volcanic eruptions. According to the figures available, the correlation between temperature and carbon dioxide levels is indeed linked, but the pattern shows that carbon dioxide levels actually follow changes in temperature by a lag of around 800 years. ((This was suggested to be the length of time it takes the world\u0026rsquo;s oceans to react to changes in temperature, for the same reasons which make maritime climates much less extreme than continental ones.)) Furthermore, carbon dioxide is one of the weaker \u0026lsquo;greenhouse gases\u0026rsquo;, both methane and water vapour for example have a more potent effect. And how much faith can we take in ice cores for giving accurate atmospheric CO2 levels and temperatures in the first place?\nThe Great Global Warming Swindle does offer some alternatives to the greenhouse gas theory. Essentially all of the suggestions boil down to fluctuations in the sun\u0026rsquo;s activity, giving the programme the unfortunate appearance of a reassuring panacea. Fluctuating solar activity not only changes the amount of energy being received by the Earth, but can also affect the reception of cosmic rays via so-called solar winds. The programme played upon the suggestion that these cosmic rays are in part responsible for cloud formation, which blocks out solar radiation and cools the atmosphere; more solar winds result in fewer cosmic rays reaching Earth, fewer clouds forming, and therefore a warmer climate. All interesting theories, but these suggestions only detracted from the programme\u0026rsquo;s important message, that the global warming theories that are today largely accepted as facts need questioning. Combined with a focus on the politics of scientific financing (although arguably an important issue to raise), the programme unfortunately smacked of \u0026lsquo;conspiracy theory\u0026rsquo; far more than it probably should. Here\u0026rsquo;s to hoping that it got at least a few people thinking.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/16/the-global-warming-debate-heats-up/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Climate-Change","RelPermalink":"/tags/climate-change/"},{"LinkTitle":"Global-Warming","RelPermalink":"/tags/global-warming/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/tags/television/"}],"title":"The Global Warming Debate Heats Up"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Rory McGrath\nGlenn McGrath\nThe World Cup is truly underway now in the West Indies, with the hosts hopefully recovered from their opening win against Pakistan. Yesterday the defending champions Australia took on minnows Scotland in a one-sided game which showed a return to form for Ricky Ponting\u0026rsquo;s side, whilst later the 2003 semi-finalists Kenya took on Canada.\nThe Scots played admirably against their determined opponents, although a few fielding errors cost them the initiative in the opening stages, and they were unable to do anything against Australia\u0026rsquo;s last gasp efforts in the dying overs to bring their tally to 334 for 6. Australia then proceeded to show how it\u0026rsquo;s done, punishing a jittery Scotland in the early stages of their innings, Glenn McGrath showing why he\u0026rsquo;s the best in the business at World Cup level, taking 3 for 14. The Scots can certainly feel proud about their performance, and Majid Haq looks to be a promising all-rounder for the side, despite his unnecessary run out in the early stages.\nWhether Australia are back to form after their recent spate of losses is hard to tell, and it won\u0026rsquo;t be until they play South Africa on the 24th of March that we\u0026rsquo;ll see them really tested. Kenya put in a solid performance to push past Canada by 7 wickets, with several overs spare after Canada set the modest target of 199. One wonders whether the West Indies should feel too confident having only set a target of 241 in their opener against Pakistan.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/15/cricket-world-cup-2007-gets-underway/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Cricket","RelPermalink":"/tags/cricket/"},{"LinkTitle":"Cricket-World-Cup","RelPermalink":"/tags/cricket-world-cup/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"}],"title":"Cricket World Cup 2007 Gets Underway"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"}],"content":"Just a late addition to the recent list of book-related websites, for those who enjoy audiobooks the LibriVox website offers readings of books in the public domain, read by volunteers. A few problems with the online catalog system when I checked it meant that it was difficult to simply browse for titles, but there appears to be plenty of variety in what\u0026rsquo;s available, and probably most of what\u0026rsquo;s available on Project Gutenberg will end up there.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/15/other-ways-to-read/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Audiobooks","RelPermalink":"/tags/audiobooks/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Other Ways to Read"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Wales v Italy\nWales v Italy\nAnother busy weekend for the Rugby Six Nations which saw Ireland win the Triple Crown for the third time in four years after beating Scotland 19-18 in a stiffly fought match which left Ireland\u0026rsquo;s points scorer Ronan O\u0026rsquo;Gara breathless . Some tremendous tackles from the likes of Sean Lamont prevented the scoreline really opening up, and a few flare ups on the pitch illustrated the tension between the teams. A flat Irish performance kept their championship hopes alive, whilst Scotland\u0026rsquo;s comeback after such a downheartening result against Italy a fortnight ago illustrates the importance of Chris Paterson to the side (statistically the best kicker in the world at the moment).\nLater in the day, Italy pulled out a well deserved 23 - 20 victory over Wales to beat their previous record in the Six Nations championship. With ten seconds left on the clock, Wales forewent a penalty to tie the game in order to push for a win by kicking to touch. Perhaps time they included some rudimentary arithmetic with the training. Disappointing for the Wales team, but an important step forward for Italy in the Six Nations championship.\nAnd in a strange game a Twickenham, the championship was really carved open as England edged out a lacklustre France with a nervous start to a game plagued with basic errors from both sides. The result leaves France in top spot on points difference, but denies them a Grand Slam victory, and opens the championship up to four potential victors—France, Ireland, England or Italy, the first three in charge of their own championship hopes. All will be decided on St. Patrick\u0026rsquo;s Day—perhaps it will finally be Ireland\u0026rsquo;s year!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/11/france-flooded-ireland-crowned-italy-arrive-wales-go-back-to-school/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Italy","RelPermalink":"/tags/italy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rugby-Union","RelPermalink":"/tags/rugby-union/"},{"LinkTitle":"Six-Nations","RelPermalink":"/tags/six-nations/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"}],"title":"France Flooded, Ireland Crowned, Italy Arrive, Wales Go Back to School"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Films","RelPermalink":"/categories/films/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-l93gltkCc For anyone who recently enjoyed Hot Fuzz, this new film looks like it will carry the torch where Shaun of the Dead previously led the way. 28 Days Later meets Dog Soldiers?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/11/violence-of-the-lambs/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Black-Sheep","RelPermalink":"/tags/black-sheep/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Violence of the Lambs"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"No doubt this news will be all over before the day is out, but it is worth spreading this announcement all the same.\nLong story short: If you downloaded WordPress 2.1.1 within the past 3-4 days, your files may include a security exploit that was added by a cracker, and you should upgrade all of your files to 2.1.2 immediately.\nWhilst the news is that the hacked changes were installed after the 2.1.1 release, since the new version includes an unrelated security patch it is probably worth everyone upgrading their WordPress files to 2.1.2 regardless. A sad occasion for WordPress, but the exact details are as yet unknown, and hopefully this release will be dilligently applied to prevent any serious damage being done.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/03/wordpress-2.1.1-vulnerability/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Security","RelPermalink":"/tags/security/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wordpress","RelPermalink":"/tags/wordpress/"}],"title":"WordPress 2.1.1 Vulnerability"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"}],"content":" Books\nAmongst the plethora of new and interesting websites which crop up every month, there were a few which caught my eye recently that weren\u0026rsquo;t related to the usual photos, videos and blogs. Instead they were related to books, and whilst no doubt most of the websites won\u0026rsquo;t take off, there were some interesting ideas among them.\nBritish Library - Alright, so the first link isn\u0026rsquo;t exactly a new idea, but the British Library have recently unveiled their new website , with a particular emphasis on its new search capabilities to retrieve results from its increasing online resources.\nWhat Shall I Read Next - This website does exactly what it says on the tin. Type in a book title or author you read recently, and up comes a list of recommendations based on what titles others have read together. However, the system relies on a wide range of users for offering recommendations beyond the most popular titles, and as is mentioned here , the chances of catching up with the years of data a website like Amazon have accumulated in order to provide reading recommendations is quite slim.\nBookMooch - BookMooch offers a different approach to \u0026lsquo;peer-to-peer sharing\u0026rsquo;, and takes what some might consider a logical step. The idea is that readers can swap titles they\u0026rsquo;ve read with other users, paying only the cost of postage, whilst simultaneously being able to search for titles they would like to receive. A points system is in place to assure the credibility of its users, and to help readers find worthy homes for their old books. Whilst there is still room for abuse, the system employs some safe guards regarding ratios and feedback comments to prevent fraud. Overall a pretty interesting idea, the basis for a small book-bartering economy.\nFull Books - On the other hand, if you can\u0026rsquo;t wait for the postman to deliver your next read, you could always head here for something to tide you over. The listed titles are quite varied, some might say even random, and the website seems quite sparse otherwise, with titles published in standard HTML format. Probably not the best place to go first if you\u0026rsquo;re looking for a work that\u0026rsquo;s out of copyright.\nBookalizer - The final site on this list isn\u0026rsquo;t technically to do with reading, but instead a method for making a little money out of readers! Essentially it offers an easy way to generate Amazon book adverts for your website according to either page content or your own criteria, by specifying key words or product IDs. Using Amazon\u0026rsquo;s associates programme, the clicks generated can give your website a little bit of income, or else go to some predetermined \u0026lsquo;good cause\u0026rsquo;.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/03/02/new-ways-to-read/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Internet","RelPermalink":"/tags/internet/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"New Ways to Read"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rants","RelPermalink":"/categories/rants/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"As a pacific type, I like to feel that there are few things that can get me enraged. Whilst I may oft quote the remark attributed to Voltaire, ((See this link.)) \u0026ldquo;I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it,\u0026rdquo; you\u0026rsquo;d have to be saying something pretty damn meaningful. Indeed, being brought up as an Englishman, not only am I likely to stand and suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, I\u0026rsquo;m liable to apologise for getting in the way of said arrows, and offer them back at the end for good measure!\nYet over the years I\u0026rsquo;ve discovered a couple of things in life that I\u0026rsquo;d be willing to bear arms for. The British Isles are not renowned for their cuisine, but some things have been honed to an art there. One of these is the pie. Now quite how the humble pie could come to be threatened is quite a stretch of the imagination. If something so base could be in danger of disappearing, then there are probably problems for its basic ingredients, in which case there are much greater issues to be worrying about. Yet the prospect of a pie tax or some other form of rationing has me sharpening blades in preparation for the event, a veritable cataclysm by any standards! But this is nought compared to my second item.\nCup of Tea\nA lovely cuppa\nTea. Of such basic necessity and ubiquity, it was named after a letter of the alphabet. To think of the inordinate amount of pleasure I derive from a cup of tea is to think me more than just a brick short of a load. If you were to tell me that all of the people I know and cared for had been killed in a plane crash, sitting me down by the fire with a cup of tea would make the whole situation seem visibly improved. The prospect of a tariff on tea keeps me awake at night; the scarring memories of the Boston Tea Party still leave me prepared to wage a second War of 1812 in retribution. To secure that supply of tea leaves, I would enrol to invade small countries, reinstitute slavery, perhaps restore the British Empire\u0026hellip; but until then I\u0026rsquo;ll just pour myself another cup. Ahhh!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/02/28/ferra-cuppa-char/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/tags/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Tea","RelPermalink":"/tags/tea/"}],"title":"Ferra Cuppa Char?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybVb3t560oY ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/02/28/the-un-peacekeepers-of-ianimal-farm/i/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"The UN Peacekeepers of \u003ci\u003eAnimal Farm\u003c/i\u003e"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Six Nations 2007\nHell of a day for rugby fans, as all of the Six Nations sides saw action, and what action there was to behold! An historic victory in an historic venue, as Ireland romped over England 43-13 at Croke Park. Meanwhile earlier in the day, Italy celebrated their first Six Nations away win with a decisive result against Scotland at Murrayfield 17-37. Finally, France came from behind to keep their Grand Slam hopes alive with a 23-14 victory over Wales. The results leave the competition open, with plenty to play for in the final two games, France will be looking to retain the title, and Ireland will surely want to finally make their mark on the Six Nations Trophy. Today, with a total of sixteen tries across the three games, there was a true feast for the neutral spectator, and plenty for the passionate fans of three nations to celebrate besides!\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/02/24/six-nations-triple-decker/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Rugby-Union","RelPermalink":"/tags/rugby-union/"},{"LinkTitle":"Six-Nations","RelPermalink":"/tags/six-nations/"}],"title":"Six Nations Triple-Decker"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Talk about learning the hard way! Accidentally deleting files on an ext3 partition is not quite so the reversible process it was on ext2, as explained here .\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/02/22/deletion-ext3dents/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computers","RelPermalink":"/tags/computers/"},{"LinkTitle":"Ext3","RelPermalink":"/tags/ext3/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linux","RelPermalink":"/tags/linux/"}],"title":"Deletion ext3dents"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" All About H. Hatterr\nIt\u0026rsquo;s difficult to know what to make of G. V. Desani\u0026rsquo;s ludicrous autobiography, All About H. Hatterr. As a pure work of literature, the confusing employment of language has led to its comparison to Joyce , and as an author Desani has been compared to the likes of Joseph Conrad and Vladimir Nabokov for his use of English instead of a maternal tongue. Yet it is also a work of continued interest to the post-colonialist in its epitome of cultural interchange, Desani being described erroneously as a métèque author.\nHowever it is telling that the book is sporadically out of print, ((Although it is reported that the book will be reprinted next year.)) despite acclaim by such luminaries as Salman Rushie and Anthony Burgess, who wrote a preface to the 1969 edition of the novel. This should not be seen as a reflection of the work\u0026rsquo;s growing inaccessibility; many terms and phrases used were probably much more understandable in 1948 than they are now, but it does not suffer from the overt use of Indian words which course through many other literary works of the period.\nWhile the key motifs of the book can be interpreted as the exploration of dislocation, loneliness and the search for meaning in life, of much more interest to the colonialist are the references and allusions to relations between British and Indian, cultural, real or hidden. There are innumerable references to the English literary canon, the most obvious of which is the comical Shakespearean portage of Hatterr’s trusted friend Bannerji, presumably symptomatic of a literary heritage that does not fit the user. Bannerji represents the very finest satirical embodiment of Macaulay\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;brown Englishman\u0026rdquo;, and his frequent expounding of facts reminds us of a student of Mr. Gradgrind. Yet Desani seems to avoid any such criticism being weighed upon himself. In his preface, Burgess decried any labelling of Desani as a métèque author (derived from μέτοικος—the immigrant); he should rather be placed alongside the ranks of Conrad and Nabokov as authors with a remembrance of learning English, but who were not in the act of learning when writing—his English therefore, \u0026ldquo;gloriously impure\u0026rdquo;.\nIndeed Desani’s novel therefore offers a staunch alternative to the English literary tradition that had progressed through Kipling (who indeed gets a mention) to Forster in the shadow of the Great War, no better illustrated by the eloquent portrayal of the absurdities of English society and culture in English from a foreign voice. ((Desani, G. V., All About H. Hatterr, (London, 1970), p. 106.)) The language of the oppressor then, can not only be appropriated but can be employed so eloquently and so satirically to the detriment of the former.\nThe novel is also riddled with the theme of illusion, deception and imitation. This is most pointedly directed at the sahib Anglo-Indian of the Club. The “wish man…must master the craft of dispelling credible illusions” teaches one of the sages in Hatterr’s travels, ((Ibid., p. 41.)) perhaps the greatest of which is the power of the British overlord. Indeed great fun is made at the expense of the Scot from Dundee, who infers the secret of acceptance in British society—the necktie! The employment of Faust in the illustration that deception and imitation are evil things suggests some moral judgement of Macaulay’s brown Englishmen. ((Ibid., p. 200.)) Yet one wonders what alternative there could be to the solidification and codification of what it means to \u0026ldquo;be\u0026rdquo; British within the context of the Empire. There can be little doubt that the need to export British culture only required that it was very much more concrete in form, and there is no better example of its existence than in the bastion of etiquette witchcraft, the Club!\nInterestingly, Desani\u0026rsquo;s investigations into imitation lead to further insights into the very meanings of Truth ((Ibid., p. 283.))—with interesting legal implications—perhaps best illustrated by the Sage of Delhi’s wise words for Hatterr “all Appearance is false. Reality is not Appearance.” ((Ibid., p. 198.)) And of course who can forget Desani\u0026rsquo;s thoughts on language itself as a means of communication, and with it translation—will you aa or baa? ((Ibid., p. 284.))\nConfusing perhaps, All About H. Hatterr offers some interesting insights into the cultural ramifications of colonialism. Further, its autobiographical nature lend some insight into the character of its author, who went on to travel widely in India, investing time distilling Truth from Hinduism and Buddhism—attend! a very mad-as-a-hatter, Mr. H. Hatterr kind of thing to do. We can only hope that as a work of literature it will not be consigned to complete oblivion. And there is hope after all—it is listed in the 1001 books to read before you die meme.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/02/22/the-indian-ifinnegans-wake/i/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/tags/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Desani","RelPermalink":"/tags/desani/"},{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/tags/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"India","RelPermalink":"/tags/india/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/tags/literature/"}],"title":"The Indian \u003ci\u003eFinnegans Wake\u003c/i\u003e"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZPOfwVhokI ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/02/15/qu%C3%A9becois-prepare-to-fight-for-their-independence/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Québecois Prepare to Fight for their Independence"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"Travels","RelPermalink":"/categories/travels/"}],"content":"Morgen fliege ich nach Karlsruhe-Baden. Es wird mein erster Besuch in Deutschland seit der Wiedervereinigung sein. Letzes Mal habe ich noch vor der Berliner Mauer gestanden und mein Reisepass trug einen Stempel der DDR. Die Zeiten haben sich geändert!\nIch werde dort bei meiner wunderschönen Freundin in Freiburg bleiben, so dass dieser Blog Eintrag für einige Zeit der letzte sein wird.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/01/19/in-den-schwarzwald/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Germany","RelPermalink":"/tags/germany/"},{"LinkTitle":"Holidays","RelPermalink":"/tags/holidays/"}],"title":"In den Schwarzwald"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Europe","RelPermalink":"/categories/europe/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":" EU Flag\nThe EU\nOn January 1st of this year, under the continuing enlargement plans, Romania and Bulgaria acceded to the European Union. At the same time, the number of official EU languages was enlarged to 23, now including Romanian, Bulgarian - and Irish. The inclusion of the latter might seem to come at an odd time, given that the Republic of Ireland has been a member since January 1st, 1973, and Irish is its official language. Yet it was through English that the Republic handled its application to the Union.\nTo take some basic figures, Irish is spoken by less than half of the Republic\u0026rsquo;s population, whilst it is in daily use by only 5% ((A generous assessment, since this figure appears to include schoolchildren who use the language in class on a daily basis.)). To put this in some perspective, there may be more than twice as many Welsh speakers, while both of these Celtic tongues pale in comparison to Catalan, for example, with more than 7 million speakers. Ireland\u0026rsquo;s European commissioner, Charlie McCreevy, insists that Irish is central to Irish cultural identity, and its acceptance into the European fold has prompted calls for the inclusion of other minority languages ((Spain has already requested semi-official status for Catalan, Galician and Basque.)).\nThe inclusion of Irish in the European family has been seen as a major boon to the preservation of this minority language, and in this regard can only be lauded, yet its inclusion comes with some rather unnecessary attachments. In 2005 the EU spent roughly €1.1 billion on translation and interpretation. The addition of Irish to the list of languages is estimated to cost €3.5 million annually in the hiring of 30 translators to handle the significant legislation. Being an initial estimate, we can only assume that it has been conservatively made, and the possibility that the translation requirements expand to include more than simply the \u0026lsquo;significant\u0026rsquo; documentation will further revise this estimate upwards. Whilst the figure of €3.5 million might seem paltry in reference to the total spent on translation, when we take into consideration its unnecessity, it might seem expensive lip service to the support of minority tongues.\nYet whilst the EU diversifies linguistically, it is increasingly coming under Anglophone domination in its general operation. \u0026lsquo;In a union of many languages, increasingly there is but one language.\u0026rsquo; ((\u0026ldquo;Babelling on\u0026rdquo;, The Economist, 8508, (16th December, 2006), p. 24.)) The proportion of documents published in English has risen to around two-thirds, to the detriment of the other agreed working languages of the Union, French and German. This in itself comes at little surprise as English increasingly strengthens its position as the world lingua franca, from its de facto rule in highly specifised areas such as air-traffic control, to its increasing proliferation in the business world, and spreading popularity across parts of the globe hitherto unassociated with English.\nThe global strength of English has unfortunately, though not unnaturally, led to a decline in numbers of English students of foreign languages. Almost in the same breath politicians, news reporters and the like often point out that whilst many more foreigners are learning English, fewer English-speakers are reciprocating. Lord Dearing is due to issue his final report on the state of language teaching in English schools by the end of February, but the interim report of 14th December 2006 laid the ground for the promotion of language teaching from a younger age, and for incentives for students to continue language subjects at least to GCSE standard. The key question many young people will no doubt ask therefore: why? Beyond all the standard reasons for studying any subject at school, and the obvious benefits of lingual ability both at home and abroad, the simple fact of English dominance in the world serves to increasingly devalue language skills in the eyes of many young people. Indeed, one of the biggest problems posed when considering a second language is simply, which to choose? Those who deplore the falling numbers of language students often point to other growth languages such as Spanish, or to those of possible importance in the future such as Arabic or Chinese, all of which suffer from poor coverage in the English education system.\nThere is of course an alternative to the seemingly vacant choices available to today\u0026rsquo;s students, and one which has been proposed by those on the fringe of society, like this author, for many years. That the dominance of English gives the native speaker unfair advantage in situations where non-native speakers must acquire a working knowledge of the language is obvious; that the dominance of English further inhibits the study of foreign languages in English school is becoming increasingly clear; that the appropriation of English by non-native speakers might also in the end work to the detriment of the native ((In the example of \u0026ldquo;Globish\u0026rdquo;, identified by Jean-Paul Nerrière, a subset of roughly 1,500 English words, simplified and devoid of idiomatic phrases and alike, which was more mutually intelligible to non-native English speakers than native Anglophones.)) might follow as a future possibility.\nIn all ways, the dominance of one language over one or more others is only likely to become harmful to the relations between the two communities (native and non-native) and have certain unpleasant side-effects on the native community (predictable, like the declining interest in foreign language study in England, and others yet to be seen). Meanwhile, the protection of minority languages, and the increasing marginalisation of the other major languages in the EU might in the end only propagate a message of bureaucratic waste rather than cultural utility. The obvious answer should lie in the utilisation of a common medium for communication in the European Union, and one that need not necessarily benefit any one nation or tongue over another. The example of Esperanto is sometimes cited as an ideal candidate, being based upon a Romance vocabulary, with smatterings of Germanic origin, Slavic semantics, and an overall basis in western Indo-European languages. It might not be pretty or poetic, but it serves the purpose of official communication, is of some relation to many of the major language families in the Union, and promotes the study of foreign languages with no bias towards any other nation or language.\nAfter all, there may be other benefits to speaking a second language which even the English would find it difficult to refute. Apparently recent studies suggest it can prevent cancer! Or at least delay dementia , whatever.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/01/17/failte-go-dti-an-taontas-eorpach/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Eire","RelPermalink":"/tags/eire/"},{"LinkTitle":"Eu","RelPermalink":"/tags/eu/"},{"LinkTitle":"Gaeilge","RelPermalink":"/tags/gaeilge/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"}],"title":"Failte go dti an tAontas Eorpach"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Transport","RelPermalink":"/categories/transport/"}],"content":" Student Card\nExample student card\nHow do you identify a student? Sounds like the opening to a joke, and in many ways this isn\u0026rsquo;t far from the truth. A great number of services and products come with discounts to students, and discerning who is eligible therefore requires a little more care and attention than simply looking out for tousled hair, hangovers, piercings and berets. Most higher education institutions produce student identification cards, which might double as library cards, security cards and/or university credit cards, amongst other things. However, the vast range of designs and stamps means that identifying a student card could prove as difficult as trying to identify a student by the first glance rule.\nOr at least, that is essentially the only excuse applied by the transport authorities of the UK and Ireland in the use of discount travel cards to recoup some of the losses incurred by students availing of discounted services. In Ireland, despite the much reduced number of higher education establishments, the lack of any body similar to the UK\u0026rsquo;s NUS to provide an all-encompassing identification card allows CIE to demand that students buy a €12 student travel card ((Generally at a cost of €15 to the student, to avoid having to take passport photos and post the application form.)) to avail of their discounted student tickets.\nThat should surely leave UK students in a much stronger position, since the availability of an NUS card and its associated entitlement to numerous other discounts should surely prove sufficient to identify students as being eligible for student prices for public transport services. Surely. But then it would be folly to forget the twisted logic of the islanders - particularly where red tape and money are concerned.\nAs a rule, there simply aren\u0026rsquo;t any student discounts available. Since there is already a suitable national student card available ((Already at such a cost to the beholder that any hike in price might cause some level of protest from the student bodies.)), which covers 98% of all UK students, and already includes a flurry of other discounts on goods and services, there would appear little reason to demand an entirely separate card which qualifies the holder for student travel fares. Hence the discounts offered are in the form of Young Persons\u0026rsquo; Railcard , and in the case of London\u0026rsquo;s Student Oyster photocard are limited to certain establishments and cost £5. Whilst this approach to providing a catch-all discount using age as the discriminating factor is perhaps more logical, and can be found across the continent, the relation born to age actually becomes disconnected by the fact that proof of age is no longer proof of eligibility.\nSo how do you identify a student then? Does it have anything to do with them actually being a student, or being able to manifestly prove the fact? Where the discounts are available to young persons, does identification bear any relation to them being under the allotted age, or able to prove it? Not where the transport services are concerned.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/01/09/when-is-a-student-not-a-student-when-theres-money-involved/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Public-Transport","RelPermalink":"/tags/public-transport/"}],"title":"When Is a Student Not a Student? When There’s Money Involved!"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"}],"content":" Zool\nZool: An early example of in-game advertising\nWe should be clear about one thing. In-game advertising isn\u0026rsquo;t new. And not just the self-effacing, tongue-in-cheek form of advertising epitomised by the Loom™-toting pirate in LucasArts\u0026rsquo; The Secret of Monkey Island. Anyone who remembers Zool from the early 1990s might recall the Chupa Chups sponsorship deal, and the FIFA series has been using advertising on their billboards for many years, though what with \u0026lsquo;image rights\u0026rsquo; being big money for clubs and players alike, the football genre could be said to have entrenched itself in the realm of \u0026lsquo;reverse\u0026rsquo; advertising.\nNevertheless, the presence of advertising in games has been pretty low key, considering the industry\u0026rsquo;s growth over the past decade or so. Advertising is not usually so slow to find its way into new forms of media entertainment, Internet advertising being the biggest example of recent times. So the news that in-game advertising rights for Counter-Strike (the \u0026lsquo;big one\u0026rsquo; as far as non-MMORPGs is concerned) have been sold to IGA should only come as expected. Previously adverts for Valve\u0026rsquo;s flagship had been reserved for brief loading screens, an idea which apparently never took hold. Where Internet advertising has had much reaction to the point where many people block out adverts as a matter of course, this will be more difficult to achieve in such a gaming environment, and should it succeed, might result in future games featuring truly hard-coded advertising avenues.\nCounter-Strike\nCounter-Strike: Soon to feature advertising\nWhat will the gaming community\u0026rsquo;s reaction be? Many gamers defend the principle of advertising in games on two counts. Firstly, the revenue generated for the developers and publishers can only help improve their gaming experience through improved financing support services and providing more money for future game development. Secondly, the adverts themselves improve the gaming experience. Advertising is a massive part of our everyday lives, and their inclusion is seen as natural, helping to improve the general immersive gaming experience. Yet for some, whether blended into the environment or not, the very presence of adverts will be seen as an incursion into their territory, just as web adverts are perceived as intrusive and unnecessary. An issue of perhaps greater contention in the Counter-Strike case, is that whilst gaming servers are run at much cost by their owners, Valve will be earning advertising revenues based on these servers\u0026rsquo; continued operation and popularity, and generating these extra revenues from a product that has already been purchased by the end-user.\nBut do gamers even take notice of the adverts? A recent survey suggests that current in-game adverts are failing to garner the recognition expected. Sadly, this survey is unrepresentative of the gaming community as a whole, and its sample size is bordering on frivolous. It might indeed only be expected that in racing titles the gamer will take less notice of the surroundings as the focus is on reaction speeds and racing skills, with a constantly changing reference point in the virtual world. In comparison, Counter-Strike\u0026rsquo;s gamers often have to spend idle minutes between rounds in \u0026lsquo;spectator mode\u0026rsquo;, leaving them essentially free to explore the environment as they choose, whilst the game does not rely on fast-paced action and constantly changing environments as a racing title does.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/01/07/advertising-takes-the-logical-next-step/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Advertising","RelPermalink":"/tags/advertising/"},{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Counter-Strike","RelPermalink":"/tags/counter-strike/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/tags/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Zool","RelPermalink":"/tags/zool/"}],"title":"Advertising Takes The Logical Next Step"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Environment","RelPermalink":"/categories/environment/"},{"LinkTitle":"Science","RelPermalink":"/categories/science/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/categories/television/"}],"content":" Forest\nA forest. Not Dennis'\nA programme on the beeb yesterday dealing with Britain\u0026rsquo;s economy, entitled What\u0026rsquo;s Britain Worth? and hosted by Peter Snow and his son, featured a short interview with one of the nation\u0026rsquo;s wealthiest men, Felix Dennis. Aside from the rather astute observation he made about the wealthiest members of society (\u0026ldquo;They\u0026rsquo;re all shits!\u0026rdquo;), Dennis talked about the creation of his legacy, the self-named \u0026ldquo;Forest of Dennis\u0026rdquo;.\nDennis\u0026rsquo; plan is to create a 25-30,000 acre broadleaf forest in the British Midlands. Buying up land, often under aliases, he estimates the project to cost in the region of £200-300 million of his private estate, plus an equal amount in donations over a period of years through a charitable foundation. Said to be the largest forest plantation in 500 years, as Dennis stated his reason for going ahead with this project beyond the simple ego-trip, is that in his happy financial position he is able to put capital behind an initiative like this which neither private finance nor government is prepared to do, and yet his gift to the community is something many can appreciate and all will benefit from ((If we take as gospel some basic assumptions about carbon trapping in reforestation, and the effects of CO2 on the climate. Whether the planting of forests can be seen as sustainable (it is only the outsourcing of agriculture which allows such reforestation initiatives) is yet to be seen)).\nAs one of those \u0026ldquo;shits\u0026rdquo; of the upper echelons then, it might well be regarded that Dennis\u0026rsquo; project is the result of an ego-trip from a man with no offspring or family to leave his millions to. Some cynics might even suggest it is an attempt to atone for his previous excesses of drugs, alcohol and women. And both might be true. But in the end this wayward form of philanthropy can do little harm and might do a fair bit of good. As for the forest\u0026rsquo;s name, as Dennis himself says, the forest will be known by what the people who walk there call it. Or perhaps it will stick, like an early 21st century Saltaire?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/01/05/forest-of-dennis/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Environment","RelPermalink":"/tags/environment/"},{"LinkTitle":"Felix-Dennis","RelPermalink":"/tags/felix-dennis/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/tags/television/"}],"title":"Forest of Dennis"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"}],"content":"That seasonal reminder that time waits for no one and you\u0026rsquo;re only growing older has been again. At least this year was a little different. The family left early to plan their various parties and nights out, leaving me to think up some bold plans for enjoying the evening, when the winds whipping in over the Irish Sea knocked out the electricity in the region just before sun down. And there\u0026rsquo;s no better time to find out that the stove in the lounge really was only installed for ornamental purposes than on a cold, blustery evening.\nStill, there is something vaguely romantic about being wrapped up indoors, reading by candlelight whilst the ill-designed stove pours smoke into the room, and this by 5pm. And the power did come on by midnight, allowing us to enjoy that beautifully crafted comedy Still Game, and watch £1 million explode over London to herald Ne\u0026rsquo;erday 2007. Nothing wrong with being reminded every once in a while how utterly reliant we are on electricity for our every day existence.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2007/01/02/hogmanay-2006-7/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Hogmanay","RelPermalink":"/tags/hogmanay/"},{"LinkTitle":"Holidays","RelPermalink":"/tags/holidays/"}],"title":"Hogmanay 2006-7"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Films","RelPermalink":"/categories/films/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Casino Royale\nCasino Royale\nSo they\u0026rsquo;re silly. So they\u0026rsquo;ve been going since the \u0026rsquo;60s. So this is the twenty-first (official) outting of the sixth incarnation of a spy who has survived promotion, demotion and the Cold War. It\u0026rsquo;s a Bond film, and one purporting to go \u0026lsquo;back to basics\u0026rsquo; with a new face and a general overhaul for the series. As one of those heretics who preferred the slightly heightened realism of the Timothy Dalton era, this film showed plenty of promise with a conspicuous absence gadgets, a somewhere near realistic plot, and nary a nuclear device in sight.\nIt\u0026rsquo;s been compared to the series reboot that Batman Begins provided, and for all its grittiness and mortality of the main character, has been lauded by the critics, whilst simultaneously pleasing fans for remaining true to the Bond brand. Daniel Craig proved to be a controversial choice, but from his experience behind the lines in Archangel and some technical bomb-making expertise in Munich, he came well prepared to play the UK\u0026rsquo;s most dangerous export.\nWarning, possible spoilers after the break!\nSo it is with some disappointment that I say this film wasn\u0026rsquo;t quite all I\u0026rsquo;d hoped it might be. The opening scenes proved Bond is still bulletproof, even if he struggles a bit more in the hand-to-hand business, he\u0026rsquo;s still happy to kill and injure innocents, he can still outrun even the fastest of adversaries, and they will still only shoot him point-blank when their clips are empty.\nNevertheless, at least the plot shows some logic to it this time; Bond gets reprimanded for his actions in the opening scene, the plot surrounding the poker game is reasonably well thought through and generally entertaining. It can be forgiven for its fairly wooden characters, this is a Bond film after all, and should be lauded for at least breaking the mould in depicting the main characters outside of the stereotype (Le Chiffre and his Ugandan clients, Bond and his, ehm, chair). If anything, unfortunately, the main plot suffers because it is all over a little too quickly, leaving the remaining hour to seemingly endless double-crossing. And I hope I\u0026rsquo;m not alone in finding the line \u0026ldquo;It\u0026rsquo;s the tell! Bond was right\u0026hellip;\u0026rdquo; distinctly cringe-worthy.\nHowever, Craig puts in another admirable performance in his new role. Perhaps it is unduly harsh to criticise the plotline when there is much to be thankful for in this remake of the series. Even the opening titles offer something a little novel (a distinct lack of women, for starters), and the reliance on overt action scenes and futuristic gismos has been at least partially shelved for something more akin with the public\u0026rsquo;s imagination of the secret services. Bond is still adept at handling his gear, but it\u0026rsquo;s more in the line of laptops and mobile phones than remote controlled cars and laser-equipped watches. Apparently the film forms something of a two-parter with the upcoming Bond 22, and Casino Royale certainly offers much for the series to build upon. Here\u0026rsquo;s to hoping they stay aloof of the sort of tripe which the franchise resorted to with Brosnan as the lead.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/12/05/casino-royale-back-to-basics/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Casino-Royale","RelPermalink":"/tags/casino-royale/"},{"LinkTitle":"Film","RelPermalink":"/tags/film/"},{"LinkTitle":"James-Bond","RelPermalink":"/tags/james-bond/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Casino Royale: Back to basics?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Transport","RelPermalink":"/categories/transport/"}],"content":"This weekend a radio talk show in Ireland was lamenting the state of the Irish road network, in particular focusing on the state of her road signs. Anyone that has driven through the country will understand how this seemingly trivial matter could be focus for an entire discussion. The cause of the problem was perceived to be the decentralised system of transport regulation, the result being a wide disparity between different parts of the country, and a generally poor system compared to European standards. The show received numerous SMS messages and emails highlighting more extreme examples, from road signs incorrectly directing traffic, through long stretches of road with nary a road-sign or indication of turnings, to the example of sections of road with conflicting speed limits, no doubt compounded by some complications in the changeover from miles to kilometres per hour.\nYet what was only mentioned in passing was that government initiatives to improve the transport network in the country can only be spent once, and ultimately further improvements to the road network must necessarily mean public transport receives less funding. One of the interesting statistics cited was that in Dublin, the only large urban centre, around 70% of commuters travel to work by private transport. Although unduly unfair, for the sake of comparison just consider the figures for the centre of London, which show the figure to be as low as 10%. Is Ireland\u0026rsquo;s public transport system underperforming?\nPublic transport Let us limit ourselves to a consideration of the public transport services in the Dublin area, and exclude those varieties either non-terrestrial or unshared (i.e. planes, ferries, taxis \u0026amp;c.). If we were being unduly critical, the very constitution of the services in this area could be called into question, but in truth the combined services provided by Dublin Bus , the DART and in recent years the LUAS offer in most cases a decent coverage, reasonably rapid transit and under normal circumstances a regular service. Just where then is there a problem in the government and CIE \u0026rsquo;s attitude to public transport.\nFor this we need only look at the price. If we assume an average car achieves 35 miles per gallon, (it can be conceded here that this figure is not representative of general urban driving conditions) and using a price of 105 cents per litre we get an average price per mile of 13-14 cents. Now taking an average annual mileage of 12,000 miles, if we then add on to this price per mile figures for insurance, tax, NCT and servicing, some sundries and double this figure for vehicle depreciation, we come to a figure of approximately 40 cents per mile travelled. Think you could get that kind of value for money on Dublin Bus? An average 3 mile journey on the bus would cost €1.55 i.e. just over 50 cents per mile; a shorter journey would probably be even less value for money.\nOf course comparing the value of public and private transport side-by-side is a difficult task, but as the above little calculation shows, public transport is certainly no cheaper than owning a car, and in fact might be a good deal more expensive. Consider the added convenience of owning a car, being able to nip in to the shops or take a detour, without needing to wait for another bus, and worse, buy another ticket to continue on the same journey. Perhaps most importantly of all, take a passenger on your journey and you virtually double the economy, something you can\u0026rsquo;t do on a bus. Certainly there are disadvantages as well, such as that the bus often avoids the rush hour traffic to some extent using their dedicated lanes, or that there is a matter of parking space in the city centre, but as soon as you take the car outside of these confines these disadvantages soon evaporate. For example, Dublin Bus has an extensive network, but as soon as you operate outside these limits, cars again show their advantages. Further if you want to travel out of peak hours or on the weekends, you may find the journey by car more direct, comfortable and just as fast, and all this with a saving to boot.\nWhilst price might not necessarily be the main reason for the prevalence of private transport in the capital, it certainly illustrates a disregard for the ideal of public transport. The institution of bus lanes and the so-called \u0026ldquo;Quality Bus Corridors\u0026rdquo; (QBCs) are obvious physical manifestations of the government\u0026rsquo;s commitment to quality public transport services. Unlike for instance the London congestion charges, however, this does not necessarily imply a real commitment; in fact Dublin Bus\u0026rsquo; own findings in 2004 showed that only in 75% of the QBCs was the average bus journey at rush hour quicker than the same journey untaken by car. At any other time this benefit is negated, and fully a quarter of the time this benefit does not even apply at the busiest time.\nGovernment policy appears to be ignoring the Lewis-Mogridge Position, something like transport\u0026rsquo;s answer to Parkinson\u0026rsquo;s Law: that traffic expands to meet the available road space. Take for example the Dublin Port Tunnel , due to be opened in December this year; designed to free up HGV traffic from the city centre, and in particular from the narrow Quays, this long vehicle amnesty will only be replaced by private vehicles in the heart of the city. Whilst the benefits of the tunnel should not be understated, the full ramifications of the government\u0026rsquo;s policy do not seem to have been considered. The implementation of the LUAS might similarly be criticised, in the nature of its overlapping, not necessarily complementary services with Dublin Bus, and that under separate governing bodies. The results of the Dublin Metro are, of course, yet to be seen.\nStudent fares Of course, in terms of offering value for money, the government and associated bodies must always be seen to make concessions to those fringe groups, such as students and the elderly, and public transport is no different. CIE produced an advert in recent years which went along the lines of \u0026ldquo;You asked for more - and we listened\u0026rdquo;. Which begs the question - what exactly were they listening to? The playful crash of the euros as they collect in the bottom of the piggy bank? Students represent a significant proportion of public transport users, a fact reflected by the building of the LUAS line in close proximity to Trinity College\u0026rsquo;s residence buildings at Dartry, the number of Dublin Bus services terminating or servicing UCD\u0026rsquo;s Belfield campus, and the future extension of the LUAS to Grangegorman, the site of the new DIT campus.\nBut let\u0026rsquo;s just consider the economy of a student ticket. For €64 students can enjoy 30 days\u0026rsquo; travel on all Dublin Bus and LUAS services, for example. Essentially this benefits heavy users of the service, but given that an average student might make the back-and-forth journey to college during the week and wish to make use of the Nightbus service at the weekends, the fact that this isn\u0026rsquo;t included in the ticket only adds insult to the injury that paying the fare box rate of €1.35 each way would in fact be cheaper. And we must not forget that in the eyes of Ireland\u0026rsquo;s transport network, students are not students because they are students but because they hold a €12 card which indicates the holder is in fact a student. Such a system would appear abhorrent on the continent; only the balmy Brits would also consider implementing such an abomination.\nPublic transport for the public What, then, does this critic propose? As one of those scary proponents of free public transport, that would be seen as the ultimate goal in an \u0026lsquo;ideal world\u0026rsquo;. Nevertheless, the more immediate aim should be seen by everyone to institute a fair system of tariffs for the public, and that to mean everyone. The systems in place offer a service which whilst purporting to be a real alternative to the world of private transport actually offer a convenience for those with money to spend. The figures can obviously be twisted to support any viewpoint, but when we consider that the government subsidises public transport by only 25%, one of the lowest rates in Europe, the facts illustrated here are no longer much of a surprise.\nThe Irish nation is in a strong position to deal with the issue of public transport, particularly in the Dublin area, given its geographical benefits and the lack of significant vested interests in the petroleum or car manufacturing industries. In terms of the Dublin area, the economies are greatest of all; consider that a car with one occupant can average 35 miles per passenger per gallon, whilst a bus carrying just 9 passengers can achieve the same efficiency.\nIf the government wishes to improve the public transport system therefore, it must penalise those using private transport and simultaneously offer incentives to use the systems in place. No matter how good the service is, if it simply does not offer value for money for the consumers, they will look elsewhere. This can happily be achieved in a number of ways, and the QBCs are at least on the right lines here. Better value tickets covering longer durations would prove an incentive for many more people, and offering greater incentives to younger people can only improve the public perception of the service in the next generation.\nSo until the Irish government and the CIE holding company can improve upon their act, bring that dusty bike out of the garage and do your health a favour at the same time, or put that loose change for the bus aside for petrol money and take the car to work. Hell, at least that way you can have a smoke on the way.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/11/19/ireland-avoids-the-burdens-of-public-transport/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Eire","RelPermalink":"/tags/eire/"},{"LinkTitle":"Eu","RelPermalink":"/tags/eu/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Public-Transport","RelPermalink":"/tags/public-transport/"}],"title":"Ireland Avoids the Burdens of Public Transport"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/categories/television/"}],"content":"Although its development has been in no small part prompted by the awful rampancy of HIV in Africa, the product exhibited in this cheeky little advert could soon be found on sale in chemists worldwide if the makers get the right offers. If this company floats, you know where to put your boats.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcqRSfYUfYI And for you smart cookies out there, that\u0026rsquo;s right, Jacob is meant to represent a certain Mr Zuma .\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/11/07/investment-opportunity/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Investment Opportunity"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/categories/economics/"}],"content":"A visit to Threave Gardens near Castle Douglas in Dumfriesshire, one of the National Trust for Scotland\u0026rsquo;s many well-kept properties in the south of Scotland. Beautiful weather, the height of the summer, and the chance to explore a well-kept garden and the fully restored Threave House. As the NTS website even offers:\nVisit the Countryside Centre to find out more about the estate\u0026rsquo;s wildlife and conservation work before setting off to explore, perhaps to Threave Castle or the bird hides overlooking the River Dee and Black Park Marsh, a Special Protection Area for breeding waders and wintering wildfowl. If you\u0026rsquo;re lucky you may even see otters and osprey fishing in the river. Just make sure you leave enough time for a cup of tea and a slice of home-made cake.\nSound wonderful? A perfect day out for the family, wouldn\u0026rsquo;t you say? That is, until it comes to paying entrance fees. Bearing in mind the respectable discounts offered for families, simple admission to the gardens costs an impressive £5 per adult. Access to Threave House in addition (by guided tour only) brings the ticket price up to £9. In order to visit the nearby Threave Castle a further £3.50 need be added to the day\u0026rsquo;s toll.\nOf course, these are more extreme price figures, and some people may even consider these prices to be good value. Indeed for families of the just the right proportions, the discounted family ticket prices offered by the Trust do make travelling with a family much more affordable. But that\u0026rsquo;s besides the basic principle. According to the National Trust\u0026rsquo;s annual review financial summary for 2005-2006, admission fees account for just £12.4 million of the £337.2 million total revenues - just under 4%. This proportion is not as low in the case of the NTS, but the figure begs the question: how can they be so low? The answer is simple; the prices are set to make the costs of membership all that more inviting. The National Trust boasts of membership exceeding 3.4 million. From the NTS\u0026rsquo; website:\nThe National Trust for Scotland is the conservation charity that protects and promotes Scotland\u0026rsquo;s natural and cultural heritage for present and future generations to enjoy. With over 270,000 members it is the largest conservation charity in Scotland and it depends for its support on donations, legacies, grants and membership subscriptions.\nThat massive membership cries testament to the injustice of the National Trusts\u0026rsquo; admission fees. Claiming to be an organisation run for the benefit of everyone, in truth the Trusts offer the preservation of the nation\u0026rsquo;s gardens, collections, stately homes, castles and sundry for the benefit of those who can afford the membership costs. In principle, through the National Trust Acts 1907-1971 which grant the singular right of the charities to hold lands in perpetuum, by declaring them inalienable, every member of the nation has paid their dues to the Trusts, by the foregoing of the inheritance taxes on National Trust lands which often directly precipitated their acquisition in the first place.\nWhilst few would quibble with the way in which the National Trust and the National Trust for Scotland conduct their business, the issue of funding is in need of some redress. The Trusts\u0026rsquo; current position on admission fees actually limits access to certain sections of the public, for the sake of gaining increased revenues through membership fees. Although membership offers good value for money for the regular daytrippers, it does little to assuage the image of elitism the Trusts project to the poorer sections of society.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/11/02/whose-national-trust-is-it-anyway/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Consumer-Rights","RelPermalink":"/tags/consumer-rights/"},{"LinkTitle":"Environment","RelPermalink":"/tags/environment/"},{"LinkTitle":"National-Trust","RelPermalink":"/tags/national-trust/"}],"title":"Whose National Trust is it Anyway?"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Real-Life","RelPermalink":"/categories/real-life/"},{"LinkTitle":"Travels","RelPermalink":"/categories/travels/"}],"content":"Despite it feeling like almost yesterday, a fortnight has already passed since I returned from this year\u0026rsquo;s travels. With the jet-set revolution in full swing, and RyanAir\u0026rsquo;s European footprint under continuous eastward expansion, I took the opportunity this year to expand my own carbon footprint and head to the east. Armed with a smattering of Russian, an able German companion and a small roll of banknotes, this year\u0026rsquo;s travels took me to Riga, third largest industrial city of Imperial Russia, and capital of one of the more vibrant economies in Europe today. After five days in a bed \u0026amp; breakfast there, it was followed by a stay in probably the most famous cultural and historical city in Poland: Krakow.\nThe history of Latvia is almost inextricable from the history of her powerful neighbours. Sandwiched between Russia and Germany in more recent memory, and looking further back Sweden and Poland-Lithuania in addition, the country\u0026rsquo;s history is often brushed over as historians try to paint \u0026rsquo;the bigger picture\u0026rsquo;. The city of Riga features many hints which point to a rather colourful history; from becoming a member of the Hansa in the late thirteenth century, through embracing the Reformation in the sixteenth century, to its position between the vying powers in the Thirty Years\u0026rsquo; War, the Russo-Swedish and Great Northern Wars, eventually becoming pride of the Russian Empire towards the end of the nineteenth century.\nMuch of what is visible in Riga and Latvia today, however, points to her more recent history, under Soviet (i.e. Russian) domination. Whilst the reassertion of her national identity harks back to her shortlived independence between the World Wars, Latvia has assumed a more western-oriented outlook, aiming to \u0026lsquo;rejoin Europe\u0026rsquo;, and many gains have been made in this direction. Obviously EU accession comes high on the list, and before that acceptance in NATO and the WTO, with the uptake of the Euro planned for 2008-9. Yet there seems to be plenty under the surface in Riga which hints at greater underlying tensions.\nWhat is striking about arriving in Riga is the discrepancy between the visible and theoretical economic position. Apparently basking in one of the highest GDP growth rates in Europe, there appears to be little external activity in the city which is typical of a European growth area. Survey the horizon in Dublin, Figueres or even Krakow (see later), and the first thing that is usually noticeable is the number of cranes in operation. Further investigation usually finds the projects are in large part funded by the EU directive. In Riga this is distinctly lacking, and whilst construction is underway around the city, it feels to be on a much smaller scale.\nCertainly the prices in Riga appear to be much more comparable to places in western Europe, at least where they aren\u0026rsquo;t subsidised. Public transport in Latvia might seem like something out of the past, but it is sturdy, reliable and extremely affordable. Despite this service, evidence of Riga\u0026rsquo;s wealth (or at least of some of her populace) is manifested in the great density of her high-powered, expensive motorcars. Some streets read more like car showrooms, with many examples of today\u0026rsquo;s VW Touaregs and Audi Q7s.\nA trip on one of Riga\u0026rsquo;s trams, however, reveals a more interesting Latvian characteristic than the rustic nature of her public transport system. Often attributed to any form of totalitarianist society, inter-personal relations in Latvia are, shall we say, Spartan. You are generally more likely to catch the eye of a passing dog than a stranger; buying a ticket on a tram requires not a word, not a smile, not a single acknowledgement of the conductor\u0026rsquo;s existence. This kind of behaviour tends to be more prevalent amongst the older generations, suggesting that Latvia\u0026rsquo;s youth is at least softening, but it nevertheless seems much more evident in Riga than Krakow, for example.\nLatvia\u0026rsquo;s history of recent external domination lies heavy on the hearts of its masters. The capital\u0026rsquo;s Museum of Occupation (Latvijas Okupācijas Muzejs ) enjoys a central location and free admission, and focuses on the invasion of her sovereignty during the Second World War, and her implied subservience thereafter. Yet despite the long history of a multi-ethnic population, and the present proportion of non-Latvian speaking peoples in her borders, Latvian policy has been extremely nationalist (or at least, anti-Russian) in outlook. Riga was founded by German-speaking merchants, and the German language continued to dominate until enforced Russification in the late-nineteenth century. Even today, with the great upheavals of twentieth-century warfare, over 40% of the population speaks a first language other than Latvian, yet this remains the only official language.\nWhilst it seems to be perfectly possible to survive in Riga speaking only Russian, with enough people speaking it as their mother tongue, and newspapers and other media available in Russian, the ludicrous lingual bigotry of officialdom prevents Russian appearing on many official signs and notices. Indeed if there were a second official language in Riga it would be English, which appears (occasionally in a rather haphazard form - boiled cancer anyone?) on all manner of menus and signs. This form of lingual persecution only perpetuates the necessity of the nation state and fuels the animosity between them. Whilst this may not prove as dangerous as it happened to be in the past, this policy when taken in context illustrates an almost petty level of nationalist government, with naturalisation laws that despite relaxation leave almost one in five of Latvia\u0026rsquo;s population as non-nationals.\nThis hidden policy of de-Russification, perhaps better classed as the more palateable policy of de-Sovietisation, can be seen almost anywhere one chooses to look. The Art Nouveau architecture which perhaps makes Riga so worthy of its place on UNESCO\u0026rsquo;s World Heritage Site list is well marked on the tourist guides, but a rare guide indeed mentions the Stalinist architecture of the Academy of Science (Latvijas Zinātņu Akadēmija ). Whilst some landmarks were removed outright, others have been simply brushed over. A trip to the Soviet memorial at Salaspils, built on the site of a German wartime KZ, is symbolic of this break with the past. A quiet aside in a German guidebook mentioned its whereabouts. Whilst the nearest train station was reportedly at Dārziņi, the poor sign posting in the region meant we ended up trying to reach the memorial from Dole, but the difference between the two for ease of access is almost negligible, as the only signposts remaining were old Soviet-era ones. Little wonder then that despite the beautiful weather, and aside from a few people gathering mushrooms, the site was virtually deserted.\nThis kind of begrudging respect for the past is exhibited in other formerly occupied territories. In Dublin for example, Nelson\u0026rsquo;s Pillar which symbolised the greatness of Britannia, the pomp and ceremony of the British navy during the Napoleonic Wars, was blown up by the IRA in 1966. Yet the Fusilier\u0026rsquo;s Arch on Stephen\u0026rsquo;s Green, a memorial to the casualties of the Boer War, a much more emotive subject in Irish history, remained intact. It is barbaric to destroy a monument to the fallen, but perfectly legitimate to hide its existence.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/10/03/travels-in-the-shadow-of-the-curtain/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Eu","RelPermalink":"/tags/eu/"},{"LinkTitle":"Holidays","RelPermalink":"/tags/holidays/"},{"LinkTitle":"Latvia","RelPermalink":"/tags/latvia/"},{"LinkTitle":"Poland","RelPermalink":"/tags/poland/"}],"title":"Travels in the Shadow of the Curtain"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"It\u0026rsquo;s been a while since the last post, but the holidays are over, even if the summer months seem adamant to stay. Expect a post (or two) on my recent trip to Latvia and southern Poland in the coming days, and hopefully some more time to keep active over the coming months.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/09/27/back-to-the-blog/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Holidays","RelPermalink":"/tags/holidays/"}],"title":"Back to the Blog"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/categories/television/"}],"content":"This cute little programme appeared on Channel 4 television on Saturday evening, featuring Benn posing a short number of questions to TV and radio noteables John Humphrys, Jon Snow, Nick Robinson and Jeremy Paxman. Whilst it probably didn\u0026rsquo;t receive the kind of attention it deserved, and no doubt was shorter than Tony Benn would have liked, the programme elicited some interesting points of view from the various high profile interviewers.\nAll defended their often belligerent approach as being necessary to get their job done, Humphrys even admitting that the added side-effect of the interview becoming something of a spectator sport was a necessary evil if viewers and listeners were to remain involved. Similarly, most seemed to be reading from the same hymnsheet when it came to the other questions Benn posed, as regards what they saw as the principle motivation behind the interviews they conduct, and the use of adjectival introductions and blanket phrases like \u0026rsquo;the international community\u0026rsquo; (which all claimed to deliberately avoid using).\nThere was certainly a sense of idealism in the way each viewed their rôles, feeling that they were at least in some way responsible to the viewer, who was the ultimate master. Additionally, it was commonly claimed, somewhat optimistically, that despite the fact that the interviewees more often than not came from a selected group of MPs, ministers and experts, were were there to be an opportunity to interview someone from outside the fold, away from the conventional, accepted wisdom of current society (examples such as the Suffragettes, Gandhi and Mandela were given), that opportunity would be taken.\nWhether these rather optimistic appraisals of the job of the political interviewer were justified, perhaps a more interesting point was revealed when Benn asked questions about the length of time of interviews. Whilst all bemoaned the limits placed upon them by the broadcasters, and many used this to justify the use of flippant short-hand introductory phrases (which Benn correctly pointed out might offer colour to the interview before it has even started), Jon Snow came up with a rather different interpretation. Claiming rather modestly to be a man of \u0026rsquo;limited intellect\u0026rsquo;, he offered that \u0026ldquo;If you can\u0026rsquo;t say it in 30 seconds, it isn\u0026rsquo;t worth saying,\u0026rdquo; a statement that suggests a much greater understanding of his average viewer than his rather modest claim intimates.\nFinally some mention should be made of the answers offered by Jeremy Paxman, who Benn appears to have given much more leeway and less guidance in his interview. In many respects, Paxman seemed unable to justify what he did, his comments on the place of the interview very washy compared with the almost textbook answers from his peers. Claiming to be \u0026lsquo;straightforward\u0026rsquo; rather than aggressive, he had little idea of what to make of a term such as the \u0026lsquo;international community\u0026rsquo;, avoiding the typical post-Cold War explanations offered by the others. Nevertheless, Paxman seemed to acknowledge to a greater extent the influential position he held, candidly pointing out that unless his ratings literally flatbottomed, he is not directly accountable in any way to the viewers, instead feeling that his was a job as any other, and he was primarily responsible to his bosses. And a statement such as this provokes more questions than it answers\u0026hellip;\nTony Benn\u0026rsquo;s alternative to the typical current style of political interviewing will no doubt fall by the wayside, as the rules of the game have as much if not more to do with broadcasting format and media presentation as the material contained. Of course, Benn belongs to an age and a society which has slowly transformed by seemingly organic forces, and these old world ideas were evident in the interviews. Nevertheless, Benn alighted on some interesting points of view from some of the kingpins of the world of the political interview about their own rôles in the media and society in general, and it would be heartwarming to believe that Benn\u0026rsquo;s friendly but thought-provoking style might cause them to think more seriously about their methods and responsibilities in conducting what they do.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/08/14/tony-benn-interviewing-the-interviewers/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Television","RelPermalink":"/tags/television/"},{"LinkTitle":"Tony-Benn","RelPermalink":"/tags/tony-benn/"}],"title":"Tony Benn: Interviewing the Interviewers"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Red Orchestra Box\nRed Orchestra\nWell the Steam trial of Red Orchestra\u0026rsquo;s standalone game is over now, it\u0026rsquo;s time to take stock and wonder if it\u0026rsquo;s worth buying. And what\u0026rsquo;s the first word which springs to mind when reviewing this game? It\u0026rsquo;s \u0026lsquo;different\u0026rsquo;. Whether that is a good or a bad thing is difficult to decide. The pointed devotion to realism in the game generally outweighs anything we\u0026rsquo;ve seen before, perhaps going so far as to outweight Bohemia Interactive \u0026rsquo;s Operation Flashpoint of old, the game which brought us a realistic portrayal of the speed of sound. But certain problems with the game engine, and the way the \u0026lsquo;realism\u0026rsquo; factor affects players\u0026rsquo; approach to the game at times detract from what the game\u0026rsquo;s authors have been trying to achieve.\nIt is important to bear in mind that the game is built on an aging engine, and as a result the graphics cannot compare with some of the more recent offerings. Nevertheless, the game looks decent enough, actions are well modelled, and aside from the occasional invisible wall there is little in this department to detract from the gaming experience. The most important feature in this regard must be the realistic viewpoints available to tank and vehicle crews. With no out-of-body viewpoints available, players will find their visibility restricted as real life crews, and the alternative of opening the hatch and taking a broader sweep only makes them a bigger target to the enemy around them.\nro-stormbrewing\nMoody skies over Europe\nIn a similar vein, the lack of any crosshairs on the game force players to generally rely on their weapons\u0026rsquo; iron sights for any accuracy in shooting, bringing a real test to the most basic of skills in any \u0026lsquo;shooter\u0026rsquo;. Unfortunately, however, this feature which offers a much improved reward for the skilled aimer has a number of side effects which can detract from the realistic feel the creators were trying to develop. The necessity of using iron sights means that the up close battles can feel extremely clumsy and unrealistic. Often is the case where a perfectly poised player will miss a shot with his rifle from 2 feet, because he wasn\u0026rsquo;t using iron sights. Furthermore, the length of time it takes to enter and leave the iron sight \u0026lsquo;mode\u0026rsquo; means players often feel unrealistically exposed, as this mode restricts their movement to a virtual crawl. The more experienced players therefore can often be seen using the game\u0026rsquo;s lean feature, but in such a manner that it seems like the front line troops have learned more from the contortionists than the drill sergeants, as they lean over backwards whilst aiming their rifles and walking around a corner.\nro-2\nIn-game shot\nNevertheless, this feature does allow the game some realistic balance in the manner in which the different weapon types excel in their own fields. This is particularly enhanced by the standard of the level design in the game. Whilst not particularly mind-blowing or inventive, and there are of course the obligatory few terrible ones (ro-baksanvalley springs to mind), the maps are pretty solid and interesting to play, with multiple routes, objectives and plenty of scope for the different infantry classes. Whilst some maps are limited solely to tank or infantry combat, the combined arms maps offer a further dimension of play.\nro-1\nFields of battle\nIn so short a trial, however, it was difficult to see the game\u0026rsquo;s merits beyond the novelty factor. The realism of the vehicle\u0026rsquo;s viewpoints and compulsion of iron sights for infantry certainly adds to the realism, but certain other factors (such as the indication of kills in the top right of the game\u0026rsquo;s HUD) remind that this is a game like any other - it has its tricks and its weaknesses, and these will be exploited by the experienced players. A few personal gripes with the engine (TAB is not for say) and a strange bug with the sound system further detract from making this a worthwhile purchase.\nOverall then it is still difficult to find any other word to sum up the game than \u0026lsquo;different\u0026rsquo;. Whilst no revolution in shooter or soldier titles, the game does what it says rather well, the size of the maps suites the number of players on most servers, the vehicles are not allowed an overwhelming dominance (except on the tank maps, of course), and the system is much more meritocratic then many other currently popular titles (although the scoreboard could offer a breakdown of a players\u0026rsquo; performance instead of a mere score). Perhaps another trial will persuade more players\u0026hellip;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/08/10/red-orchestra-fun-while-it-lasted/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Fps","RelPermalink":"/tags/fps/"},{"LinkTitle":"Red-Orchestra","RelPermalink":"/tags/red-orchestra/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"}],"title":"Red Orchestra: Fun While it Lasted"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":"As everyone is no doubt aware, the investigation into match fixing allegations in Italy\u0026rsquo;s Serie A led to the punishment of the top four clubs, Juventus, Fiorentina, Lazio and AC Milan, with the league title being given instead to Inter Milan. The punishments for the clubs varied, from Juventus\u0026rsquo; severe reprimand of 2 previous league titles, demotion to Serie B and a 30-point deduction in the upcoming season, to AC Milan\u0026rsquo;s 15-point penalty and ban from the UEFA Champions\u0026rsquo; League. However, following the various clubs\u0026rsquo; appeals, some reduction in penalties have been awarded, with AC Milan not only having their penalty slashed to 8 points, but also being reinstated in the Champions\u0026rsquo; League . If the BBC are watching closely, in line with their generous resurrection of previous cult classics a la Doctor Who, perhaps they should consider a resurrection of another famous \u0026rsquo;70s Saturday evening show: Silvio\u0026rsquo;ll Fix It?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/08/03/ac-milan-to-play-in-champions-league/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Football","RelPermalink":"/tags/football/"},{"LinkTitle":"Italy","RelPermalink":"/tags/italy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"}],"title":"AC Milan to Play in Champions League"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":" Zandros\nZandros\nReliable old DEFRA have managed to do it again. As related in a previous post , anyone hoping to export an animal to Russia will find that the government has failed to maintain a recognised agreement with their Russian opposites (Министерство сельского хозяйства ), and as a result all import agreements need to be made on an individual basis. So when Korshki Bengals arranged for an import permit to Russia, it came as some surprise that it was DEFRA which threw a cog in the works. After all, they didn\u0026rsquo;t even have an agreement with the Russians in the first place, and a glance at their official documentation for the export of animals to the country illustrates a refined degree of incompetence, with seemingly no ability to reproduce Cyrillic script, nor any understanding that cats are rarely brought down with African swine fever.\nNevertheless, DEFRA rules for DEFRA\u0026rsquo;s rules. With the cat vaccinated, microchipped, import permits signed, and a flight arranged with Lutfhansa, the only thing missing was a final veterinarian\u0026rsquo;s signature on the health certificate, which DEFRA had demanded could not be signed any earlier than 10 days before flying. The reasons behind this were only revealed on the day. The only unusual request from the Russian government as far as cats are concerned, was that the animal was foot and mouth free. Despite the fact that the animal was being exported from the UK, DEFRA regardless felt it was necessary that the animal be vaccinated against rabies. This vaccine, however, prevents the animal from flying within 14 days - so why then was the information only passed on within 10 days of flying? The vet, of course, didn\u0026rsquo;t know. The local DEFRA officer, naturally, didn\u0026rsquo;t know. In fact DEFRA\u0026rsquo;s office itself in London, didn\u0026rsquo;t know. It had to be followed up to DEFRA\u0026rsquo;s office in Lincoln, now responsible for all exports of cats (amongst other things) for a vociferous and rather peripatetic answer. In fact, to call it an answer seems too strong a word, for it was more of a comment. What the argument essentially boiled down to was that the vaccinations the cat requires can only be revealed within such a timeframe that the legislation will not change between the time the animal is signed for and the time it leaves the country.\nYet where is the logic for this argument? Not only is rabies one of the older and more documented diseases, not only are the rules regarding rabies unlikely to change in such short notice in either the UK or the EU, but the responsibility lies with the Russian department on how it deals with animals coming into the country, something DEFRA would do well to remember given their lack of any formal agreement with the country.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/08/02/bureaucrats-legislate-for-the-fun-of-it/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Bureaucracy","RelPermalink":"/tags/bureaucracy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Defra","RelPermalink":"/tags/defra/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"}],"title":"Bureaucrats Legislate for the Fun of It"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/categories/technology/"}],"content":" iiyama ProLite E435S-B\niiyama ProLite E435S-B\nSearching the Internet for a comparison of CRT and LCD monitors will soon find numerous assertions that the lifespan of an LCD monitor exceeds that of a CRT. Just take one such example from Matrox Graphics\u0026rsquo; website :\nLonger monitor lifespan: Generally, LCD monitors last longer than CRTs. A typical LCD lifespan is 50,000 hours of use compared to 15,000 to 25,000 for a CRT. A longer monitor lifespan can provide a better return on investment.\nThere we have it, a rationalising argument for purchasing the more expensive LCD model. Indeed that 50,000 hours works out to be almost 20 years at 8 hours a day, quite an impressive statement. In my experience, aside from those which fail unnecessarily early (and usually, therefore, still under warranty), a CRT monitor usually lasts a long time indeed, and to claim that LCDs are expected to outlive these by anything up to 3 times as much on average would certainly make them worth the extra cost.\nSadly, however, this has not been the case. The first LCD I purchased failed 12 months out of warranty, whilst my mother\u0026rsquo;s failed with 12 months coverage to run. Of course it appears that when an LCD monitor fails, there is no working around it. CRTs gradually lose their sharpness or fade in luminance, which obviously becomes a problem at some point depending on what the monitor is used for, but does not make the monitor unusable for certain functions and short periods of time (indeed, one might even see the benefits of a bit of free anti-aliasing). The LCD monitors on the other hand had no such gradual decline; the first, an Eizo FlexScan L365, suddenly failed outright refusing to power on; the other, an iiyama ProLite E435S-B eventually stopped producing any blue colours, resulting in an increasingly irritating pink-tinged display.\nBut this is where credit must be given to the customer support services of both of these companies. iiyama\u0026rsquo;s monitor was covered by 3 years\u0026rsquo; warranty, and true to the agreement a replacement was sent, the old monitor taken away for repair or disassembling. Simple, no hastle, and a fresh display within a week of the problem being reported. The case of the Eizo monitor is a little more complicated as it was out of warranty when the fault developed. Of course without being able to even turn it on, the problem went undiagnosed until it could be returned to base. An estimate of £75 + VAT was offered to fix the monitor and return it, with us being given the option of cancelling it should the repair turn out to require a more expensive part. Given the monitor\u0026rsquo;s quality, and the fact that the price was very reasonable to at least save on waste, it was sent back. In the end, however, Eizo deemed the faulty part to be so small as to not be worth charging for, and the monitor was repaired and sent back without charge. And all this out of warranty!\nUltimately the lifespan of LCD monitors has yet to be properly tested, and it will only be in coming years whether we find the initial estimates to be accurate or not, as many of the original buyers of LCD monitors may already upgraded to take advantage of improvements in refresh rates and contrast ratios, not to mention falling prices and larger screens. Nevertheless, we can rest assured that if companies are willing to offer the kind of customer support seen here, our investments may go the distance, even if the monitors don\u0026rsquo;t.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/07/28/lcd-monitor-lifespan-saved-by-customer-services/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computers","RelPermalink":"/tags/computers/"},{"LinkTitle":"Consumer-Rights","RelPermalink":"/tags/consumer-rights/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/tags/technology/"}],"title":"LCD Monitor Lifespan Saved by Customer Services"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Games","RelPermalink":"/categories/games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Generals Deluxe Box Cover\nGenerals Deluxe\nObviously C\u0026amp;C Generals and her Zero Hour expansion pack are neither new nor even current titles, so this review comes rather late in the day. Nevertheless, with the next generation of titles in the pipeline from EA (in the guise of C\u0026amp;C3) and Chris Taylor\u0026rsquo;s Supreme Commander (spiritual successor to Total Annihilation), it might be worth highlighting a few of the problems with this older incarnation of the RTS genre. Whilst the genre was built on the single-player campaigns of the original C\u0026amp;C and co., it lends itself beautifully to the world of multiplayer, and this is where the focus of this little review lies. First of all, it is only fair to point out that EA have managed to create an untypically balanced game out of the three very varied factions. When one counters in the major differences attributable to the \u0026lsquo;Generals\u0026rsquo; of the game\u0026rsquo;s expansion pack, it is surprising that, at least to a mediocre standard of play, the game offers twelve competitive teams and therefore plenty of diversity in tactics, as teams try to exploit one another\u0026rsquo;s weaknesses. Of course, this is not to say that certain combinations of opponents do not bias the outcome of the game, and at the top level of the game it should not normally be possible, for example, that a China Infantry team will beat a GLA Toxin enemy. Yet simply by looking at the daily win percentages produced on the game\u0026rsquo;s online service, one can see that although one or two teams generally have a slight advantage statistically, in general the spread between the twelve factions in terms of victories is very close.\nIt should be pointed out that these observations take into account only a low-to-medium standard of play. Naturally at the top end of the game, the rules change almost beyond comparison. But the basic point is that C\u0026amp;C Generals still has regular players of all standards, and as a result, gamers can expect a wide variety of different tactics being produced on the field. The closer one gets to the top, of course, the more emphasis on the \u0026lsquo;real-time\u0026rsquo; strategy elements of the genre, i.e. time management - the rush. Getting troops onto the field, micromanaging them, and using them to the greatest effect is the essence of the game, and new players will often find a number of variants in this line being used against them. But to make comparison with WarCraft 3, where nearly every game for the beginner will end in a high-level undead hero and an army of crypt fiends storming into their base, whilst they are yet fighting some local creeps, new C\u0026amp;C Generals/Zero Hour players can expect to at least put up a fight, even where this may sometimes feel to be completely ineffectual.\nMultiplayer Muddles But here is where we find some of the biggest problems with the game. Simply organising a multiplayer game can be a feat in itself. Leaving issues to the game\u0026rsquo;s netcode aside for the time being, mention has to be made of the deplorable state of C\u0026amp;C Generals\u0026rsquo; multiplayer lobby. Whilst in principle everything a gamer could need is in place, simple and easy to use, there are simple too many \u0026lsquo;minor niggles\u0026rsquo;. Focusing on the game\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;custom game\u0026rdquo; option, all of the rooms a player could want are present, and whilst a number of these are for the most part empty, this can only reflect the game\u0026rsquo;s declining status and the natural tendency for gamers to set up games in the busier rooms. The problem comes when setting up a game: the length of time between a game being created and players subsequently being able to join it can vary from a matter of seconds to sometimes over a minute in length. When attempting to coordinate a game with friends therefore, this can be a painstaking process. If the game should fail to work, for whatever reason (more on that later), the players will be exited back to the lobby screen, occasionally into a completely different room than the one they created or joined the game, adding another delay should the player fail to notice and go on creating a new game.\nWhich brings us to the game\u0026rsquo;s built in buddy list. Aside from an unconfirmed bug regarding the number of \u0026lsquo;buddies\u0026rsquo; a player can safely have before it introduces problems starting games, this has to be one of the most ineffectual implementations of a feature of this kind since Steam\u0026rsquo;s permanently workbench-bound Friends. Whilst the system works beautifully to allow players in different lobbies to find one another, and indeed to chat with players currently playing a game, the list maddeningly allows users to see when their buddies are hosting games - but not join them! It does not even indicate which lobby room the game is hosted in, forcing players to either search the various rooms (hoping the game has already appeared) or else ask.\nUnfortunately, at times one of the game\u0026rsquo;s major flaws can mean that the game is only ever fun if one has similarly skilled friends to play with, namely the difficulty which arises trying to find suitable opponents. Trying to tag up games based on players\u0026rsquo; skill levels is all very well, but what lies between the well defined \u0026rsquo;noob\u0026rsquo; and \u0026lsquo;pro\u0026rsquo; levels? Would that be \u0026rsquo;noobish\u0026rsquo;, \u0026lsquo;semi\u0026rsquo;, or simply \u0026rsquo;not pro\u0026rsquo;? Ultimately these labels require players to exude a modicum of honesty and decency in their play. Whilst EA cannot be blamed for the immaturity of a large number of players, they should be apportioned at least some of the blame for the difficulty of judging a player\u0026rsquo;s skill level. Many players on their introduction to multiplayer Generals will no doubt find themselves crushed comprehensively in what they believed to be a beginners\u0026rsquo; game by a skilled veteran, only to then be jeered as a \u0026rsquo;noob\u0026rsquo; or some other insult thrown before the final volley artillery barrage ends the game. But didn\u0026rsquo;t the game say that was his first game? Sadly there is nothing to prevent players creating new \u0026lsquo;accounts\u0026rsquo; using a new name and then tricking their way into games below their standard. Fortunately this applies to only the most unscrupulous and immature of players, but that is only the most extreme example of problems in the ranking system. In judging a player\u0026rsquo;s skill there is only the barest of information to go on; how many games they\u0026rsquo;ve played under that name (in wins, losses and disconnects), and any hints they can glean surreptitiously from their name or choice of team. Why is this insufficient? Because even as one gains more experience in the game, the win/loss statistics give no representation of how those results were garnered. Has the player been playing only against strong opposition to accrue so many losses? Perhaps the player is a master of the 1v1 rush, but will be lost in the greater scale of a 3v3 battlefield. These amongst other issues often result in it being difficul to find adequately skilled opponents for a game, problems which do not dissipate as a player gets more results under the belt.\nOptions, options, options! With the RTS species advanced as far as it has, it seems crazy that such a representative of the genre should come with many of the default options available to the gamer removed. Of course, there are meritted arguments to removing some of the features common to the game\u0026rsquo;s ilk, such as making for a much simplified interface, allowing the game to be picked up much more easily, and rewarding the better players for micromanaging their troops. But is this any reason to remove the options altogether? Why could they not be hidden not unlike the rarely used \u0026lsquo;guard\u0026rsquo; and \u0026lsquo;formation\u0026rsquo; features? Changing a unit\u0026rsquo;s in-game stances, for example, has been a common features since the days of Total Annihilation - Generals makes do with a catch-all \u0026lsquo;retaliation\u0026rsquo; button in the options menu.\nC\u0026amp;C Generals 1\nThe vultures are circling\nThis endemic lack of options extends further into the multiplayer game. It seems reasonable that to play a customised game, players should not be able to record the result in their statistics, but this largely ignores the fact that the game can hardly be altered anyway. Aside from a few general options as regards starting money, and severely restricting team options or superweapons, there is nothing a player can do without using a mod. This results in players making informal decisions before the start, often writing rules in the titles of their games which to players new to the game often seems at first glance to be some sort of insider code. Yet due to limitations in the game\u0026rsquo;s design, these informal rules can never be anything more than gentleman\u0026rsquo;s agreements, and are often quibbled over mid-game. Indeed with no solid game restricted definitions, some rules seem widely open to interpretation. Does \u0026ldquo;no superweapons\u0026rdquo; mean they cannot be built at all, thereby removing certain upgrades, or does it merely restrict their being used? Does \u0026ldquo;no rush\u0026rdquo; include building offensively placed structures? Indeed one other key issue with the game\u0026rsquo;s design means that when an informal agreement is made dictating how long a moratorium on offenses should last, this cannot hope to take into account any slowdown in the game caused by one/more slow computers amongst players, as there is no time feature built into the game.\nBugs and coding C\u0026amp;C Generals 2\nThe all-powerful quad cannon\nSome final mention should be made to the game\u0026rsquo;s few remaining bugs, particularly as regards netcode. To EA\u0026rsquo;s credit the game generally runs quite bug free, thanks to the fixes included in the expansion pack, and other subsequent patches. The few that remain, such as an unconfirmed bug in the total length of players\u0026rsquo; names prevented a 4v4 game from starting, are relatively minor annoyances which do not detract from the gameplay (the difficulty of getting a 4v4 in the first place negates the effect of this added potential bug). However, there are still a few which gameplay bugs and exploits which should have been fixed by EA in what would probably prove to be a final patch.\nAs regards the game\u0026rsquo;s netcode however, problems would appear so deeply ingrained as to be insoluble. For anyone who has enjoyed the ease of playing a WarCraft 3 multiplayer game, a few clicks away from the main screen, the difficulty of getting a system successfully set up for Generals might seem more complicated than it is worth. Indeed it often appears that where a system has been correctly configured, it might only work in certain situations: often a player will find 1v1 games work a charm, whilst games requiring a larger number of connections (2v2 etc.) might faulter. Were it easy to distinguish which player is incorrectly configured, this would not be much of an issue, but as the game often will not load if a single connection is not made, this can be a frustrating experience (worse is when the game does load, only for a player to subsequently be eliminated as certain connections have not been made). And yet the number of ports apparently required for multiplayer Generals play would seem quite overkill, as a quick search on the Internet suggests the following: TCP ports 80, 6667, 28910, 29900 and 29920, plus UDP ports 4321 and 27900. Why any game should require port 80 to be open is unfathomable.\nOverall then this game has offered a fairly balanced experience to the RTS genre, and its longevity is only evident from the number of players still to be found on its online system. This is despite the number of problems and poor design features of the online system which detract from playing quick, decent games. The problems of player skill levels could easily be remedied using any number of available models from other ranking systems, and whilst preventing players creating new accounts is perhaps to be avoided, allowing different people to play on the same account (albeit not simultaneously), some form of limit to the number of accounts allowed might deter skilled players from creating new accounts purely for the purposes of \u0026rsquo;noobie bashing\u0026rsquo;. Of course, before one can even get this far, it is often necessary to have set up some port forwarding or firewall rules to allow the game to even connect to online multiplayer games, which works contrary to what has obviously been an attempt to create an easily playable game. Whilst the purest in me demands options, we can always look to Gas Powered Games\u0026rsquo; Supreme Commander for that, but the numerous problems associated with Generals\u0026rsquo; online system and netcode are unforgiveable. Some may blame the corporate centralisation within that EA monolith, and if they are right, we can only hope that distribution platforms such as Steam will redress that balance. It may be too late (and no doubt too uneconomical) to fix the problems which hound Generals. We can only hope for better in the future.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/07/25/cc-generals-a-late-appraisal/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Computer-Games","RelPermalink":"/tags/computer-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Generals","RelPermalink":"/tags/generals/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Rts","RelPermalink":"/tags/rts/"}],"title":"C\u0026C Generals: A Late Appraisal"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Criticism","RelPermalink":"/categories/criticism/"}],"content":"Apparently, getting what you paid for isn\u0026rsquo;t necessarily the name of the game any more. Although I was well aware of it at the time of purchase, no niggly smallprint or obligatory T\u0026amp;C which no one reads hid this caveat, it still comes as something of a surprise to be informed that something I paid for disappeared if I don\u0026rsquo;t use it. In my personal experience, Skype hasn\u0026rsquo;t done itself many favours in terms of maintaining a decent service. Certainly, it \u0026lsquo;does what it says on the tin\u0026rsquo; the majority of the time, indeed it was only as I decided to test Skype\u0026rsquo;s SkypeOut feature (which worked handsomely, to the company\u0026rsquo;s credit) that I came across this email. This quote, in particular, amused:\nYou\u0026rsquo;re receiving this email around 30 days before your Skype Credit balance expires. Skype Credit expires 180 days after your last purchase or SkypeOut call. If you\u0026rsquo;re not using your balance we need to expire the credit sooner or later to comply with normal business accounting rules. Not very exciting, but true.\nEven in today\u0026rsquo;s confused business world, where caveats and charges are hidden inexplicably from view, the very idea that Skype feels it obliged to rip its customers off in order to comply with \u0026rsquo;normal business accounting rules\u0026rsquo; is staggering. From my meagre experience with mobile phone companies, this would appear to be anomalous to their standard practice. I have never been informed by PayPal that my account would be emptied because I haven\u0026rsquo;t used my funds, nor indeed have I come across such a statement from any of the other myriad of online services who use an online account system such as theirs.\nPerhaps Skype would be well advised to comply with normal business operating rules instead of focusing on using cunning and thievery to earn themselves a few dollars. Take the much maligned Linux version of their program; the current official release still stands at version 1.2.0.18, released October 25, 2005. To their credit, the 8 months spent working up to the release of version 1.3 BETA on June 28th was not wasted, with full ALSA support, better chat features and numerous bugfixes, but this has not prevented issues with the ALSA sound system causing lockups: this is still just a BETA release. To suggest that this is symptomatic of Skype\u0026rsquo;s overall work ethic would be unfair; the Windows version of the program has come on leaps and bounds over the past 12 months, though it should be mentioned that many bugs at times seemed to have been put aside (such as memory leaks in the program, particularly in multi-user chats, or users in a person\u0026rsquo;s contact list disappearing sometimes at will) whilst new features such as video calls were scripted in.\nNo doubt being the most famous name in the game, Skype have found it difficult to maintain a lead, with sustained efforts to introduce all the features users demand whilst ensuring the package is solid and generally bug-free, and the service has maximum availability and quality. Nevertheless, it seems Skype\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;not very exciting\u0026rdquo; excuse for some small scale pilfering is an unnecessary blemish on the company\u0026rsquo;s otherwise fairly decent track record. Now, time to make some long distance calls to Tristan de Cunha\u0026hellip;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/07/22/skypes-revealing-customer-policy/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Consumer-Rights","RelPermalink":"/tags/consumer-rights/"},{"LinkTitle":"Economics","RelPermalink":"/tags/economics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Skype","RelPermalink":"/tags/skype/"}],"title":"Skype’s Revealing Customer Policy"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/categories/general/"}],"content":"This new weapon developed jointly by the Israelis and Americans purports to be a revolutionary new idea, but firearms afficianados will no doubt remember the \u0026ldquo;Krummer Lauf\u0026rdquo; modification to the German Sturmgewehr 44 of some sixty years previous. With seemingly questionable construction, the weapon would suit only the most specialised of tasks, and without decent training and experienced handling could easily result in costly errors, which the weapon is designed to avoid.\nPerhaps the most controversial point surrounding this weapon\u0026rsquo;s development, however, has to be the video released to promote it. Reminiscent of the parodic advertisements of a Paul Verhoeven science fiction film, the choice of music for the video suggests farce not future. Indeed many of the features of the film highlight the weapon\u0026rsquo;s unsuitability to certain situations: one can imagine its utility in the street level fighting which prompted the development of the Wehrmacht\u0026rsquo;s \u0026ldquo;Krummer Lauf\u0026rdquo; system, but the video highlights the clumsiness of rotating the weapon through angled and forward-firing modes. Indeed this important drawback to the Cornershot system is even more blatant if one considers its use in an environment such as the hotel seen in the video. These buildings are notorious for their paper-thin walls, easily penetrable by most calibre weapons; if one were to study the execution of such building sweeping maneouvres, from the London Iranian embassy siege of 1980, to the Nord-Ost Moscow opera house siege in 2002, one is more likely to find that speed is of much more importance, and the forces would always prefer the use of gas to disorientate hostile targets.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhjOOkm-9z0 Furthermore did anyone spot the deliberate mistake illustrated in the weapon\u0026rsquo;s closing \u0026ldquo;paintball\u0026rdquo; scene? Two accurate splats from a paintball gun onto the wood directly in front of the carrier\u0026rsquo;s arm; you might be around the corner, but that doesn\u0026rsquo;t make you unreachable.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/07/21/revolutionary-cornershot/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun","RelPermalink":"/tags/fun/"},{"LinkTitle":"Weapons","RelPermalink":"/tags/weapons/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"\"Revolutionary\" Cornershot"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Italy\nThe Italian team celebrate victory\nSo Italy have taken the title for a fourth time, bringing their tally to four, edging them out as the best in Europe, and ending what should be acknowledged as one of the worst tournaments in recent memory. For the second time in its history, the final was settled on a penalty shoot-out, the feeling of the fans towards the end soured by a red card for Zinedine Zidane for headbutting Marco Materazzi.\nThere can be little doubt that the tournament was marred by some dire games, poor refereeing decisions, strange FIFA interference, and a generally lack-lustre performance from many of the teams, particularly towards the end of the tournament. Can any blame be apportioned for this? Or was it simply the luck of the draw that this tournament was destined to be poor viewing for the spectators? Of course, credit should be apportioned where it is due, and both the hosts and the fans did an excellent job in ensuring the tournament was shrouded in a carnival atmosphere, and the focus for the media could be left to the football.\nFIFA Interference Certainly the influence of FIFA in the running of this and other tournaments should not be underestimated. Right from the start of this tournament there has been an eye to changing the way the rules are interpreted, for example in the vain attempt at eradicating time-wasting. Yet the result was plain for all to see: confusion amongst the referees. The interpretation of FIFA\u0026rsquo;s new legislation caused a great deal of inconsistency in the decisions, players getting unwarranted yellow cards that then contribute to sendings off or suspensions. This ultimately led to that calamitous match between Portugal and Holland, adjudicated by the Russian Valentin Ivanov, in which the first yellow card was shown inside of 2 minutes, and four players were eventually sent off (a new record for the World Cup finals). In the aftermath, the referees seemed to show a modicum of independence from the governing body, and the majority of the latter matches of the competition were diligently mediated.\nThe question is why FIFA deem it necessary to change the rules of the game at all. The traditionalists are naturally inclined to resist any change to the letter of the law, yet it should be pointed out that not only do we see evolution in all of the major sports, but this has also in the past been of demonstrable benefit to the game. In the 1998 World Cup, FIFA deemed tackles from behind to be worthy of a straight red card. Whilst this appears to have been relaxed to a yellow in this tournament, it has generally been accepted to have been an improvement, as players and commentators alike will admit that a clean tackle from behind is nigh-on impossible. Nevertheless, going back to Zizou\u0026rsquo;s sending off in the final against Italy, obviously motivated by something said to him by the Italian defender, one is reminded of the similar incident in the 1998 World Cup finals in which he was sent off in a game against Saudi Arabia, on a day in which FIFA officials found their calls for more red cards suddenly oversubscribed .\nRules of the game So where have the rules of the game gone astray? Certainly there seems to be, and has generally been, a different slant on the rules of the game at the pinacle. If one takes a glance at FIFA\u0026rsquo;s official rules, one can clearly see that the letter of the law is not only bent, it is plainly broken. Yellow cards are warranted for the following offences:\nis guilty of unsporting behaviour shows dissent by word or action persistently infringes the Laws of the Game delays the restart of play For the sake of comparison, let\u0026rsquo;s take two of the tournament\u0026rsquo;s key players, England\u0026rsquo;s current villain of the hour , Portugal\u0026rsquo;s Christiano Ronaldo, and his now all-time high scoring namesake from Brazil, Ronaldo. Whilst it would be no surprise to find an English blog criticising C Ronaldo\u0026rsquo;s performance in the World Cup, it seems to have been pretty universally acknowledged that his attempts at diving have brought embarassment upon himself and the Portuguese team. Despite being one of the most tallented, and certainly more inspiring players at this World Cup, his cross-discipline diving has been rewarded with neither yellow cards, nor the 9.5 average it deserves. C Ronaldo ended his World Cup with a single yellow card earned for a challenge in the match against Angola. His Brazilian namesake, on the contrary, could barely move fast enough to challenge someone, and yet earned himself two yellow cards, one for kicking a ball into the back of the net when the referee had already blown for offside, and a second for deliberate handball in the wall of a free kick, though the replays suggest he knew little about it and was trying vainly to protect his innocent good looks.\nThe laws of the game have changed such that the game itself is perceptibly different from what it was in previous decades. One very infrequent spectator of the game commented on the amount of fouling that takes place, asking which part of \u0026rsquo;non-contact sport\u0026rsquo; did the players not understand? And frankly, with the way the referees acted in some of the games in this competition, it is understandable that this contact sport could be so disguised.\nOf course, there are other rules that provoke debate, particularly when they are seen to prevent flowing, attacking football. How many times did we see a player kick a ball between someone\u0026rsquo;s legs and run into him, only to earn his team a free kick for \u0026lsquo;obstruction\u0026rsquo; or impeding the progress of an opponent? Yet running behind a ball, with no intention of playing it, and using your body to shield away any opponent, as it runs out of play or into the possession of the goalkeeper is phrased as \u0026lsquo;shepherding\u0026rsquo;. There is certainly some merit in the latter; can we see the folly in the former?\nWhich brings us to every man\u0026rsquo;s favourite: the offside rule. Whilst this competition was no different to its forerunners, and in fact should be upheld as a pretty decent example of how the rule can be used to good effect, this does not prevent mistakes being made. By this, I do not refer to occasional goals being allowed/disallowed when there is a blatant mistake by the linesman. More importantly, it seems that should the defence appeal and stop running, it takes a very brave linesman to keep his flag down, and only in the most clearcut of situations does this occur.\nWorld Cup 2006 So was there more to just FIFA interference and poor interpretation of the rules of the game which prevented this World Cup being one of the more memorable ones? The dire refereeing decisions can only truly count for spoiling a small percentage of the games, and indeed in the second half of the competition they should be given much credit for taking the game back into their hands. Perhaps we can apportion more blame on FIFA for their insistence on introducing a \u0026rsquo;new ball\u0026rsquo; to the competition. No, it doesn\u0026rsquo;t have a microchip installed which will clearly show when it crosses a line, rather it has more panels and as a result \u0026lsquo;really flies\u0026rsquo; as many commentators have informed us. And we didn\u0026rsquo;t really need them to tell us that, as shot after shot went sailing into the back rows. To take one of the more prolific strikers of the ball, Frank Lampard hit 96 shots in the competition, more than any other player, and very few of those hit the target let alone rippled the net. That is not to say that the atmosphere and the nerves of the big stage did not get to him, or he simply wasn\u0026rsquo;t on his game, but it certainly begs the question.\nYet it does appear that some blame must be apportioned to the teams themselves. We need only take a look at the \u0026lsquo;best goal of the tournament\u0026rsquo; on the BBC, as 9 of the 10 shortlisted came from the group stages, to see how the teams changed their actions in the later stages. It could be argued that the teams simply came up against better opposition in the later stages, but any spectator would be able to confirm that the performances of the latter stages often lacked in quality. Nevertheless, the final teams were representative of the game\u0026rsquo;s great names, as all of the previous winners present in the competition reached the quarter-finals (only Uruguay was missing, knocked out by Australia in the qualifiers). And there was some possibility to rekindle the spirit of the \u0026rsquo;80s, as for the first time since 1982 all of the semi-finalists were European teams, and for the first time since 1986 did both teams score in the final. Yet it ended on that rather sour note and a penalty shoot-out for only the second time. This competition did set a few records for the World Cup finals, but it will probably be remembered for those which did the game a disservice - the first team to get knocked out of the competition despite not conceding a goal (Switzerland), the first team to get knocked out of the competition without scoring on a penalty shootout (Switzerland), equal most disciplinary cards and most red cards in a match (Netherlands v Portugal), most red cards in a tournament - rather than the few for which the game is lauded - the tournament\u0026rsquo;s 2000th goal (Marcus Allbäck vs England), Ronaldo\u0026rsquo;s record-breaking 15th goal in the World Cup finals, and Zidane\u0026rsquo;s record-equalling 3rd World Cup final goal in a record-equalling two World Cup finals.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/07/10/italy-triumph-but-something-ails-our-beautiful-game/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Football","RelPermalink":"/tags/football/"},{"LinkTitle":"Italy","RelPermalink":"/tags/italy/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"},{"LinkTitle":"World-Cup","RelPermalink":"/tags/world-cup/"}],"title":"Italy Triumph: But Something Ails Our Beautiful Game"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/categories/sport/"}],"content":" Portugal v England\nRicardo saves a penalty\nAs is perhaps to be expected in this day and age, everywhere you look at the moment there\u0026rsquo;s football, football, football. The World Cup is more than just a spectacle, it\u0026rsquo;s a regular event and therefore presents an opportunity. An advert which doesn\u0026rsquo;t in some way link the Beautiful Game to washing powder, mortgages or anti-wrinkle cream is almost refreshing. Of course, the World Cup would not be so all-pervasive without the weight of corporate advertising and media on the bandwagon, but there are some underlying psychological effects, which are being harnessed as only corporate business knows how.\nJust think how many millions view the games, particurlarly of the home nation; viewing figures suggest around 19 million households tuned in to watch the England v Portugal match, and that number masks the people watching with friends, at home or in public. Of course, cutting away the naturally avid football fans leaves a significant number simply watching to support their national side, but how does this turn into something of a fever? The rampant nationalism provoked at times staggers belief, and often goes far beyond the football itself. Finding sensible criticism of England\u0026rsquo;s performance at the World Cup is some achievement, whilst in the immediate aftermath of England\u0026rsquo;s exit, jingoistic slurs against Portuguese players and Argentine referees were on the tip of many tongues.\nThis form of English nationalism is so deep that not even the other home nations are spared its often abrasive and provokative forms. But why does it exist in the first place? It is clear that the fortunes of the England team ultimately have no relevance on the lives of the vast majority of the population, and yet somehow this has been linked in their minds such that England\u0026rsquo;s success gives rise to feelings of joy. The effects a victory can have on the supporter have been studied , with the release of serotonin causing pleasure through victory. This is more than just pride in one\u0026rsquo;s nation of birth, or a strong case of empathy. England\u0026rsquo;s dismissal caused a great deal of anguish for many supporters: the fact that it was once again on a penalty shootout only heightened the sensation. As if to soften the blow, ITV\u0026rsquo;s commentator Clive Tyldesley reminded viewers a number of times during the Germany v Italy semi-final match that at least there was still an Englishman in the World Cup, albeit under the name of Simone Perrotta, born in Ashton-under-Lyme (coincidentally the birthplace of Geoff Hurst).\nFirst it is me and my clan against the world, then me and my family against my clan, then me and my brother against my family, then me against my brother.\nSomali Proverb\nIt would appear then that support for one\u0026rsquo;s national football squad might aptly demonstrate one of mankind\u0026rsquo;s vestigial \u0026lsquo;pack\u0026rsquo; instincts. As the Somali proverb illustrates the various levels of a man\u0026rsquo;s supposed priorities in life, so we must understand how through association with a greater whole, an individual can hope to benefit. This might be interpreted as a behavioural imprint, as an individual learns that what is good for his family is good for him and so on, yet its wide presence in the animal kingdom can only suggest this is an \u0026lsquo;instinctive\u0026rsquo; characteristic. Assuming this natural neuro-chemical reward system were still present in the human species, is it possible that it makes its appearance unacknowledged, yet slightly altered from its natural designs? Is empathy itself an expression of our ability to mould this built-in system and produce a sense of symbiosis with other individuals and groups? People rarely question why individuals choose to support their national football team, and obviously patriotism plays a large part in this, yet it is commonplace to find people who support football clubs different from the places they work, live or grew up in. In the case of many Irish people, for example, these are clubs in an entirely different country from the one they live in.\nThis form of association or \u0026lsquo;support\u0026rsquo; is by no means isolated to football, being seen in some form or other in many of the other walks of life, as people buy a certain brand or read a certain author. Of course in these instances there is a large case to suggest that this support is very calculated and personalised. Yet this does not prevent glimmers of an underlying associative instinct shining through; the normally shrewd \u0026lsquo;intel\u0026rsquo; supporter buys a chip from his corporation despite the universally acknowledged benefits of its cheaper and technically superior rival. Why? For the simple reason that he has unknowingly linked the fortunes of the intel corporation to his own life, and what\u0026rsquo;s good for them will be good for him.\nFootball jingoism could of course simply be a case of societal patriotism combined with a heightened sense of empathy for the players, yet their performance seems irrelevant to the feelings held by many of the supporters. Victory is the goal, the only source of the \u0026lsquo;feel-good\u0026rsquo; factor, and the Beautiful Game can suffer at its synapses.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/07/05/football-fever/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Football","RelPermalink":"/tags/football/"},{"LinkTitle":"Nationalism","RelPermalink":"/tags/nationalism/"},{"LinkTitle":"Sport","RelPermalink":"/tags/sport/"},{"LinkTitle":"World-Cup","RelPermalink":"/tags/world-cup/"}],"title":"Football Fever"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/categories/politics/"}],"content":"The recent furor over Avian Flu has no doubt led many of us to believe that a dangerous worldwide pandemic looms on the horizon. There is little doubt in the scientific community that should the H5N1 strain of the virus mutate into a form easily communicable between humans, the virus will show much greater potency than current pathogenic influenza viruses, owing to the lack of immunity within the population of this new \u0026lsquo;avian\u0026rsquo; form.\nYet just what can governments and scientific bodies do to allay fears and combat the disease? In the latter regard, there is precious little which can be done beyond monitoring the condition in the bird populations. So why then is the disease so readily in the popular news? Are we seeing the same variety of overhyped scare-mongering that accompanied the BSE/vCJD crisis of the previous decade? In 2000, the BBC used the headline CJD deaths \u0026lsquo;quadrupled since 1995\u0026rsquo; to illustrate a meagre rise in the real term numbers of cases (unfortunately the page can no longer be found on the BBC website, the link uses Google\u0026rsquo;s cache). Of course, given the way that particular disease manifested itself there was every chance that should an epidemic result, the clock would already be ticking for a vast section of the population.\nAnd so it seems with the case of avian flu. We are all well-informed by the media about the progress of the virus as it works its way around the globe from its origins in south-east Asia. There have already been cases of the disease as far west as France and the Côte d\u0026rsquo;Ivoire. The response from DEFRA, the successor incarnation of MAFF which so beautifully handled itself during the \u0026lsquo;foot and mouth\u0026rsquo; crisis of 2001, has been to act in the only way it knows how: to legislate.\nRacing pigeon\nThe humble racing pigeon: new harbinger from the Plutonian shores?\nTake the impact on pigeon racing. Until recently all pigeon races were banned on the grounds that they would increase the potential for the H5N1 virus to enter the country. This decision has recently been recinded pending further investigation, with of course added restrictions . For example, races taking place further than 400 miles from the south coast of England have been prohibited - this includes many of the major races from Marseilles or Barcelona. Furthermore DEFRA insists that all birds returning from the continent should be quarantined for a seven day period. Of course, if the bird dallies about and doesn\u0026rsquo;t return for 72 hours, this quarantine period is required to rise to three weeks!\nThe question begged is just what the utility of all this legislation really is. Anyone who has raced pigeons will realise that quarantining a returning bird could be nigh-on impossible; to do so for seven days might mean it missing the next race, to do so for three weeks and you might as well not bother at all. Clearly these restrictions have been arbitrarily dreamt up by bureaucrats, but will they even make a difference? Of course, the whole thing seems pretty pointless unless DEFRA are also considering producing passports for seagulls and migratory birds - no doubt legislation for this is already in the pipeline. Essentially then, this legislation is being put in place to give DEFRA the appearance of doing something. The fact that this will have no affect on halting the spread of avian flu (which has already reached the UK regardless), and merely disrupts the flow of life for the pigeon fancier amongst others seems irrelevant. MAFF\u0026rsquo;s mistakes will be avoided this time around.\nBut the problem of DEFRA\u0026rsquo;s overdiligence in pointless legislation would not be so bad were they capable of doing their job properly where it is needed. If you ever have to deal with exporting an animal to Russia , that tiny, backwater nation and member of the G8, you will find that DEFRA request you to make contact with the Russian authorities yourself, since the 2926EHC animal import form was allowed to lapse two years ago and no replacement has been agreed upon. Perhaps DEFRA should spend more time doing their job and maintaining worthwhile legislation than dreaming up fanciful, unmanageable and unpoliceable restrictions for the sake of public exposure.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/2006/06/28/defra-defers-to-popular-policing/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Defra","RelPermalink":"/tags/defra/"},{"LinkTitle":"Politics","RelPermalink":"/tags/politics/"}],"title":"DEFRA Defers to Popular Policing"},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/manifest.json","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.de/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.en/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.es/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.fr/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.hi/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.jp/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.nl/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.pl/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.ru/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/search/_index.zh-cn/","tags":[],"title":""},{"categories":[],"content":"About the site This site is powered by the excellent, free, open source blogging platform WordPress. As this software continues to go from strength to strength it seems unlikely that there will be any change in this regard in the near future. There are a variety of plugins installed, mostly for novelty effect, though some have become quite integral. The theme employed on the site changes from time to time, and any relevant information can usually be found in the footer. The occasional minor alteration to the style and look of the site might be made by me, but on the whole if you like what you see, follow the link in the footer to find where all the hard work was put in.\nOn the off chance that any of the posts on this site should become ‘popular’, then a little list will go up somewhere to get to those most often viewed. In the meantime, there are tags and categories galore to get lost in. Feel free to peruse, comments are always welcome, and there’s always an RSS feed to subscribe to if you find that any easier.\nAbout the author What I am I am an individual, and an individualist. I stand for everyone’s right to be different, and relish in the differences between people. I consider who I am to be my identity, not any piece of paper or plastic with an official stamp on it, and feel this is proof enough. Names are unimportant, but I post here under the soubriquet Fips.\nWhy I write These pages are more of an experiment than a conscious effort at a blog. Chances are these pages will rarely be updated, and might fall into disuse before the year is out. Nevertheless, I write for the sake of writing, for getting ideas into words. Perhaps over time this will change, or develop reasons of its own. Until then to write remains the end in itself, a voice left unheard amongst that baying, blogging community.\nWhat I write As this blog is merely an experiment, there is as such no determined agenda or type of content. Most posts will be spur of the moment ideas that strike the author at inopportune moments. Occasionally there will be posts on real life experiences, life on the llama farm, or travels through the British Isles and Europe, but most of what I write is impersonal, provoked by the media or the world which envelops all of us. There will be nothing eloquent or revolutionary about this blog, indeed the style and content will probably end up a complete mish-mash, but beauty was never the intention. As a cynic many of the ideas posted will run counter-establishment; as a blog, this should come as little surprise.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/about/","tags":[],"title":"About"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/translation/"}],"content":"Die Übersetzungssoftware memoQ verfügt über eine nützliche Funktion als teil des QA-Checks, wodurch in der Zielsprache nach verdoppelten Wörtern geprüft wird. In meinem Fall hat es schon mehrmals auf kleine Tippfehler hingewiesen, wo ich versehentlich ein „and and“ oder ein „to to“ geschrieben habe. Dennoch bleibt der Vorteil dieses Checks etwas eingeschränkt, wenn man in seiner Sprache regelmäßig solche Formen hat, die diese Verdoppelung verlangen. Im Deutschen denkt man an Sätze, die die Wörter „die die“ verlangen. Der französische Übersetzer wiederum rauft sich die Haare, als ihm memoQ zum zigsten Mal ein „nous nous“ ankreidet.\nDoch mithilfe der relativ neu eingebauten Regex-Funktion kann man dieses Problem tatsächlich beheben. Editiert man seinen Regelsatz für die Qualitätssicherung , kann man den Standardcheck unter dem Konsistenz-Reiter ausschalten, dafür unter dem Regex-Reiter eine neue Regel erstellen, die diesen Check ersetzt aber Rücksicht auf Ausnahmen nimmt. Für Französisch zum Beispiel kann man die folgende Regel als Forbidden regex match in target((Leider sind die Hilfsseiten von Kilgray auf Deutsch nicht aktuell, daher hier die englischen Namen.)) eingeben:\n(?i)(?![nv]ous\\b)(\\b\\S+\\b)\\s+\\b\\1\\b Wenn aktiviert, prüft diese Regel weiterhin nach doppelten Wörtern in der Zielsprache, einschließlich üblicher Interpunktionszeichen wie bspw. Apostrophen, ignoriert jedoch jeder Fall von „nous nous“ oder „vous vous“. Die Ausnahmen in der Regel vorne kann man dann beliebig erweitern, je nach Bedarf. Die Regel ist bestimmt nicht fehlerlos, aber sie kann die Anzahl der falschen Warnungen enorm verringern, ohne dass man auf diesen Check komplett verzichten muss.\n[Foto von Ilya Pavlov auf Unsplash ]\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2017/02/18/ein-kleiner-kniff-f%C3%BCr-die-qualit%C3%A4tssicherung-bei-memoq/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Memoq","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/memoq/"},{"LinkTitle":"Regex","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/regex/"},{"LinkTitle":"Software","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/software/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/translation/"}],"title":"Ein kleiner Kniff für die Qualitätssicherung bei memoQ"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Wenn unsere Welt nur von seltsamen Sprachen wimmelt, welche ist die seltsamste? Ersetzen wir das Wort „seltsam“ durch „schwierig“, dann haben wir eine der Kernfragen, die sich jeder Sprachlernende irgendwann stellt: „Welche Sprache ist denn die schwierigste?“\nOft spitzt sich die Diskussion rund um die schwierigsten Kandidaten in einer Schlacht zwischen ungleichen aber bekannten Sprachen zu. Aufgrund ihrer geheimnisvollen Schrift, zungenbrechender Aussprache, verzwickter Grammatik oder befremdlichen Struktur ringen die Anwärter um die Krone. Töne, Klicklaute und Ideogramme werden als Trümpfe ausgespielt. Doch sollte man die Vernunft bewahren und der Alkoholpegel nicht zu hoch steigen, endet die Diskussion mit der gängigen Annahme, dass die schwierigste oder seltsamste Sprache immer die ist, die der/den eigenen am unterschiedlichsten erscheint. Spricht man Englisch, muss man sich weniger Mühen geben, eine germanische oder romanische Sprache zu lernen. Eine andere Sprache der indoeuropäischen Familie wäre dahingegen etwas schwieriger, doch trotzdem viel einfacher, als sich einer Sprache einer völlig anderen Sprachfamilie anzueignen.\nDoch fragen wir uns wirklich, wie wir die Seltsamkeit einer Sprache verstehen, sehen wir die Vielfalt aus einem englischsprachigen oder mindestens abendländischen Blickwinkel an. Dadurch, dass sich die europäischen Sprachen auf dem Kanonenboot und dem Ross des Missionars in jede Ecke der Welt ausgebreitet haben, sehen wir auf jedem Erdteil Sprachen, die ähnliche Charakteristiken aufweisen und von Milliarden Menschen gesprochen werden. Auf genau diesen Säulen bauen wir unsere Definition der „Normalität“, die wir überall vorfinden und wegen der Verbreitung und Häufigkeit für üblich halten.\nWie sähe unser Verständnis aber aus, wenn wir unsere Messgeräte neu eichen? Eine Gruppe von Idibon hat eine interessante kleine Studie ((Seitdem ich diesen Beitrag ursprünglich geschrieben habe, ist die Website nicht mehr erreichbar. Wahrscheinlich sollte ich keine zwei Jahren mehr warten, bevor ich meine Einträge veröffentliche!)) mit den Daten des World Atlas of Language Structures durchgeführt. Der Atlas beinhaltet Datensätze über insgesamt 192 phonologische, syntaktische und grammatikalische Strukturen und Merkmale von 2.679 unterschiedlichen Sprachen. In ihrer Studie hat die Gruppe sich auf 21 Charakteristiken beschränkt, in denen Daten für mindestens 100 Sprachen vorhanden waren, und schlossen dabei zusammenhängende Merkmale aus, die die Gewichtung bestimmter Aspekte sonst verfälscht hätten. Da die WALS-Datenmenge trotzdem etwas spärlich ist, erscheinen in ihrem Bericht lediglich 239 Sprachen, die über mindestens zweidrittel der Kriterien miteinander verglichen werden konnten.\nDas interessante, was aus ihren Ergebnissen herauskommt, ist genau wie seltsam die Sprachen sind, die wie eigentlich sonst für normal halten. Deutsch, Tschechisch und Spanisch erscheinen alle in den ersten 25 auf der Liste nach Seltsamkeit; Englisch nimmt den 33. Rang. Aber was macht sie so sonderlich? In dem Artikel heben die Autoren zwei Beispiele hervor, die die Seltsamkeit der indoeuropäischen Sprachen verdeutlichen. Dass wir in unseren Sprachen das Subjekt mit dem Verb vertauschen, um eine Frage zu stellen, scheint in der Tat eine große Seltenheit zu sein. Nur 1,4% der Sprachen in der Studie weisen dieses Merkmal auf. Von insgesamt 955 Sprachen , für die dieser Datensatz ausgefüllt ist, benutzen die meisten eine Fragepartikel, während in 13 Sprachen die Satzstruktur bei Fragen unverändert bleibt. Die in den germanischen Sprachen üblichen Subjektpronomen sind anscheinend auch etwas speziell, und werden in nur 82 der 711 Sprachen benutzt. Am unteren Ende der Seltsamkeitsskala erscheinen Sprachen wie Baskisch, Kantonesisch, Türkisch und Hindi (letzteres mit nur einer auffälligen Eigenschaft ).\nDieser Studie kann man natürlich nur soviel Bedeutung beimessen. In vielen Bereichen mangelt es an festen Daten, dazu sind extrem viele Sprachen der Welt kaum dokumentiert und in dem Atlas gar nicht erst erfasst. Man könnte auch die Tatsache bemängeln, dass die Kriterien der Datenbank auch die Erwartungen, Interessen und Erfahrungen Sprecher abendländischen Sprachen widerspiegeln. Nichtsdestotrotz bleibt es ein interessantes Fazit, dass Englisch trotz seiner Verbreitung in jedem Winkel der Erde und seiner scheinbar globalen Allgegenwart eigentlich zu den seltsamsten Sprachen der Welt gehört.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2017/01/11/seltsame-sprachen/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/linguistics/"}],"title":"Seltsame Sprachen"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Eines Morgens sitze ich am Frühstückstisch, eine warme Tasse in den Händen, ein köstlicher Kaffeegeruch in der Luft. Durch das Fenster scheint die Sonne auf einen neuen Tag, während das Vogelzwitschern dem sonst unbeschriebenen Tagesblatt eine Melodie verleiht. Plötzlich ertönt und vibriert es auf dem Fenstersims: Vater ruft an.\n„Der Akku im Autoschlüssel ist leer.“ Anscheinend steht er vor seinem Wagen auf dem Parkplatz und drückt verzweifelt auf die Fernbedienung. „Rufst du mal den Autodienst an? Ich komme nicht rein.“\n„Benutz doch den Schlüssel.“\n„Wie, den Schlüssel?“\n„Schlüssel rein, drehen, Tür öffnen.“\n„Und das geht?“\nMir ist dieses kurze Gespräch, das sich schon vor vielen Monaten ereignete, wieder in den Sinn gekommen, als ich einen ähnlichen aber wenig heiteren Bericht aus Neuseeland gelesen habe. Dort hat sich ein älteres Ehepaar in seinem Wagen ohne Schlüssel eingesperrt. In dem Glauben, es säße jetzt in der Klemme, versuchte das Paar durch Hupen die Aufmerksamkeit der Nachbarn zu erregen, sowie das Fenster mit einem Wagenheber einzuschlagen. Doch der Versuch, die Tür durch bekannte Methoden zu öffnen, blieb außen vor.\nSchließlich wurden die beiden nach 12 Stunden in dem Fahrzeug von den Nachbarn gerettet, wobei die Frau bereits ohnmächtig und der Mann in Atemnot geraten war. Wahrscheinlich ein wenig dramatisch eingekleidet, sei den Rettungsdiensten zufolge dieses kleine Missgeschick beinahe mit Todesfolgen verbunden.\nWie können manch unserer elementarsten Werkzeuge so schnell in Vergessenheit geraten, wenn sie ersetzt werden? Warum werden wichtige Ideen und Methoden, die unser tägliches Leben so prägen, so einfach verdrängt? Obschon leicht amüsant oder tödlich, stehen sich diese zwei Geschichten im Hinblick auf ihre Auswirkungen an zwei entgegengesetzten Polen gegenüber. Doch auch wenn die meisten von uns über die scheinbare Ahnungsloskigkeit und Dummheit der Anderen nur den Kopf schütteln oder hämmisch lachen können, befinden wir uns wohl leicht in dieser und anderen ähnlichen Situationen, seit wir uns zunehmend auf die Geräte der modernen Technik verlassen, um einfach durch den Alltag zu kommen. Seit die mechanische Welt durch die digitale ersetzt wird, weiß überhaupt irgendeiner noch, wie man die Dinger repariert, wenn die Maschine versagt?\nIm Leben vergleichen wir viele Aspekte mit dem Fahrradfahrenlernen: Das vergisst man ja nie. Zumindest nur so lang das Fahrrad nicht angeschlossen ist. In dem Fall muss man bloß hoffen, man weiß noch, wie das geht.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2015/04/12/schl%C3%BCsselkompetenzen/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Car","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/car/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/technology/"}],"title":"Schlüsselkompetenzen"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Technology","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/technology/"}],"content":"Zwar ist Lazarus damals von den Toten auferstanden, doch nun muss er wieder endgültig in Frieden ruhen. Dieses praktische Zusatzmodul für Firefox speichert all die in den Eingabefeldern einer Seite eingetippten Daten, während man arbeitet und schont man dadurch von der möglichen Katastrophe, sollte der Browser abstürzen. Leider scheint es nun von seinem Autor aufgegeben worden zu sein, denn seit einigen Monaten gibt es keine Aktualisierungen mehr und mit jedem Firefox-Update geht es ein wenig mehr kaputt, bis ich nur noch das Symbol in meinem Fenster sehe, mit dem Vermerk „Lädt \u0026hellip;“.\nZum Glück gibt es noch Alternativen, wie zum Beispiel den Alleskönner Form History Control .\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2015/02/26/lazarus-bei-firefox/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Firefox","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/firefox/"},{"LinkTitle":"Firefox-Plugins","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/firefox-plugins/"},{"LinkTitle":"Lazarus","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/lazarus/"}],"title":"Lazarus bei Firefox"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Fun-General","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/fun-general/"},{"LinkTitle":"Music","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/music/"}],"content":"Wir befinden uns in einem Zeitalter, in dem es fast als eine Tugend gilt, unserer Ungeduld und unserer mickrigen Aufmerksamkeitspanne verfallen sind, in dem das Fernsehen durch Zappen verdrängt wurde, in dem wir unserer Musik nicht mehr zuhören, sondern zu den Refrains vorspulen und zwischen den Liedern springen, in dem unsere Aufmerksamkeit gleichzeitig in Tausend Richtungen von unserer vernetzten Welt gezogen wird.\nDaher sollte es uns nicht überraschen, wenn der Erfolgsweg genau diese Rastlosigkeit ausnutzt. Man nehme eine Jahresprise der erfolgreichsten Lieder, entsaftet sie, seziert sie, destilliert deren Einprägsamkeit ab. Die rohen Zutaten werden verschmolzen, verdichtet, miteinander geschickt neu kombiniert, und man erschafft durch diese Veredlung eine völlig neue Spezies, einen Überohrwurm, der die reinste Verkörperung von alldem, was man aus der Popmusik hören will, darstellt.\nDies ist keine Danthologie. Es ist die reinste Popnographie.\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOHYCZLmbyc ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2015/02/14/popnographie/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Music","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/music/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Popnographie"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"German","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/german/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Short aside. Teaching English in Germany, I often hear the mistake in comparative forms where Germans use a similar-sounding conjunction to their own:\nDie Grünen sind beliebter als die SPD.\nThe Green Party is more popular as the SPD.\nCuriously, where speakers use an alternative colloquial or dialect form of the comparative, it sometimes results in similar \u0026lsquo;mistranslations\u0026rsquo; in English:\nEs ist schneller mit dem Zug zu fahren wie mit dem Auto.\nIt\u0026rsquo;s faster to go by train like with the car.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2013/06/10/bigger-and-better-like/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Comparative","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/comparative/"},{"LinkTitle":"English","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/english/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Grammar","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/grammar/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/languages/"}],"title":"Bigger and better, like"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"General","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/general/"}],"content":" Sir Humphrey Appleby : Minister, seit mindestens 500 Jahren strebt Großbritannien in seiner Außenpolitik nach demselben Ziel: der Zerstrittenheit Europas. Zu diesem Zweck führten wir mit den Holländern Krieg gegen die Spanier, mit den Deutschen gegen die Franzosen, mit den Franzosen und Italienern gegen die Deutschen und mit den Franzosen gegen die Deutschen und die Italiener. Teilen und herrschen, verstehen Sie? Warum würden wir das jetzt alles über den Haufen werfen wollen, wo es ja so brillant funktioniert hatte?\nJames Hacker : Das ist doch alles Schnee von gestern, oder nicht?\nSir Humphrey Appleby : Ja, und noch der Schnee von heute. Wir haben das System durchaus stürzen wollen, deswegen mussten wir Mitglied werden. Von außen hatten wir bereits versucht, Unruhe zu stiften, das hat aber nicht geklappt. Jetzt von drinnen können wir unseren Unsinn betreiben und alle gegeneinander aufhetzen: die Deutschen gegen die Franzosen, die Franzosen gegen die Italiener, die Italiener gegen die Höllander. Das Außenministerium ist ganz entzückt, es bleibt endlich doch alles beim alten.\nJames Hacker : Aber sicherlich sind wir doch alle dem europäischen Konzept gewidmet?\nSir Humphrey Appleby : Kommen Sie, Minister.\n[lachend]\nJames Hacker : Wenn nicht, warum befürworten wir eine Erweiterung der Mitgliedschaft?\nSir Humphrey Appleby : Aus demselben Grund. Es ist eigentlich genauso wie bei der Uno. Je mehr Länder dazu gehören, desto häufiger treten die Streite hervor, je sinnloser und machtloser das ganze Projekt wird.\nJames Hacker : Welch schrecklicher Zynismus!\nSir Humphrey Appleby : Haargenau. Wir nennen es „Diplomatie“, Minister.\nYes, Minister: The Writing on the Wall (1980) ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2013/05/28/die-europapolitik-gro%C3%9Fbritanniens/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Quotation","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/quotation/"},{"LinkTitle":"Yes-Minister","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/yes-minister/"}],"title":"Die Europapolitik Großbritanniens"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Asides","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/asides/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Als ich das Erwerben einer Fremdsprache zum ersten Mal wirklich ernst genommen habe, ist es mir aufgefallen, dass mein Gehirn neben den Fortschritten mit der Sprache selber auch eine Art Käfig für meine Gedanken erschaffen hat. Es war als wäre der Wortschatz in meinem Kopf so kategorisiert und gestaltet, dass ich meistens instinktiv gewusst habe, ob ich bereits wüsste, wie ich meine Gedanken auf „fremdisch“ aussprechen konnte, bevor ich überhaupt mal den Mund geöffnet habe. Ob ich das Wort „Baumrinde“ kannte, war sozusagen genauso wichtig als zu wissen, das ich das Wort kannte.\nIn der Tat wurde es aber dann schwierig, meine verrosteten Sprachkenntnisse aus der Schulzeit anzuwenden. Französisch habe ich leider seit über einem Jahrzehnt nicht mehr gesprochen, aber neulich auf Reise durch Frankreich fand ich, dass ich oft versucht habe, Dinge zu sagen, die weit über meine Kompetenzen hinaus gingen. Dabei war mein Kopf sich recht sicher, ich wüsste wie das sagen könnte. Irgendwo steckte die Anmerkung, das Wort sei auf „fremdisch“ bekannt, nur auf welchem fremdisch war dabei nicht erwähnt. Wie man es sagt scheint hier zweite Geige zu spielen hinter was man sagt.\nJetzt wo ich es vorhabe, eine zweite Fremdsprache anständig zu lernen, merke ich wie mein Hirn versucht, einen zweiten Zaun um meine Fähigkeiten in der neuen Sprache zu bauen. Ich frage mich welchen Einfluss dies auf meine erste Fremdsprache haben könnte. Wird der Kopf die erste Fremdsprache in den engeren Raum einpferchen wollen? Oder wird der alte Zaun abgebaut und diese Fremdsprache behandelt wie meine Muttersprache? Werde ich zünftig über meine eigenen Gedanken stolpern, wie jetzt auf französisch? Oder muss ich mich über die selbst auferlegten Hindernisse meines Geistes quälen, um mich auszudrücken?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2013/05/14/der-zweite-spracherwerb/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/languages/"}],"title":"Der zweite Spracherwerb"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/languages/"}],"content":"https://twitter.com/cryptopix/status/166513079880912896 Es ist also so weit. Nach der anrüchigen Auszeichnung als Anglizismus des Jahres 2011 ist der Shitstorm salonfähig geworden. Laut der Jury:\nShitstorm füllt eine Lücke im deutschen Wortschatz, die sich durch Veränderungen in der öffentlichen Diskussionskultur aufgetan hat. Es hat sich im Laufe des letzten Jahres von der Netzgemeinde aus auf den allgemeinen Sprachgebrauch ausgebreitet und gut in die Struktur des Deutschen eingefügt.\nAnglizismus des Jahres 2011 Trotz der kindlichen Konnotation auf englisch ist das Wort angemessen genug auf der Tagesschau Verwendung zu finden, ohne dabei eine Miene zu verziehen:\nhttps://twitter.com/sebastian _nell/status/326761134621331457\nDes Shitstorms oder des Shitstorm? Und würde man sich nur fragen, ob sich das Wort bereits etabliert hat, verleiht ihm die Grammatik eine Art bürokratischen Stempels, denn der Genitiv mit „s“ ist anscheinend ein Zeichen der Übernahme in die deutsche Lexik.\nHandelt es sich um englische Wörter, die (noch) nicht Teil des deutschen Wortschatzes sind bzw. nicht als solcher empfunden werden – also nicht im Duden zu finden sind –, wie etwa das Brainwashing (im Gegensatz zum o.g. Brainstorming), dann heißt es im Genitiv auch die schlimmen Folgen des Brainwashing, also kein eingedeutschter Genitiv mit „s“, sondern das Wort wird dann wie ein Eigenname aufgefasst, der ja im Genitiv auch kein „s“ erhält: die Kriege des Cäsar.\nKorrektur + Lektorat Hier der Duden-Eintrag . Ach, du Land der Dichter und Denker \u0026hellip; wo sind sie nur alle hin?\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2013/05/13/in-schei%C3%9Fgewittern/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Denglish","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/denglish/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/linguistics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Loanword","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/loanword/"}],"title":"In Scheißgewittern"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/languages/"}],"content":"In Language as a Window into Human Nature erklärt Steven Pinker, wie wir in unserem Hirn die begrenzte Menge an Sprachbausteinen in eine unbegrenzte Vielzahl an Bedeutungen umwandeln. Dabei bedient er sich des Fluchens, der Metaphern und des Allgemeinwissens. Dieses Video ist nur ein von RSA schön illustrierter Ausschnitt der gesamten Vorlesung.1\nhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-son3EJTrU Das Video in voller Länge findet man auf YouTube hier .\u0026#160;\u0026#x21a9;\u0026#xfe0e;\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2013/03/11/die-sprache-als-fenster-zur-menschlichen-natur/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Steven-Pinker","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/steven-pinker/"},{"LinkTitle":"Video","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/video/"},{"LinkTitle":"Youtube","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/youtube/"}],"title":"Die Sprache als Fenster zur menschlichen Natur"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Wenn man sich für kooperative Spiele interessiert, bietet das kartenbasierte Der Herr der Ringe: Das Kartenspiel ein bestechendes Erlebnis für zwei Spieler, welches sich auch allein oder zu viert spielen lässt. Im diesem Grundspiel findet man alles nötige, um sich zu zweit durch drei Abenteuer steigender Schwierigkeiten durchkämpfen zu können. Im Grunde genommen heißt die Bezeichnung „Living Card Game“, dass die Geschichte durch eine Vielzahl an Erweiterungspaketen fortgeführt wird, und somit bietet das Spiel einen anhaltenden Spielspaß.\nAuch für die, die mit dieser Art von Spiel nicht vertraut sind, bleiben die Grundlagen relativ einfach. Jeder Spieler wählt von einer Auswahl bis zu drei Helden aus, und stellt sich aus den dazugehörigen Karten ein Deck zusammen, mit dem er spielen möchte. Eine Anzahl vorgefertigter Decks sind für das erste Spiel empfohlen. Während des Spiels erzeugen die Helden Ressourcen, anhand von denen man die weiteren Karten ins Spiel bringen kann. Diese bestehen aus Kampfeinheiten, Waffen und Ausrüstungsteilen für die Helden, sowie nützliche Ereigniskarten. Dagegen verfügt das Abenteuer selbst über ein eigenes Deck, welches die Hindernisse und Gefahren für die Spieler darstellen: Feindliche Truppen zu bekämpfen, Ortschaften zu erkunden, sowie fiese Ereigniskarten, die den Spielern teilweise Tränen in die Augen treiben. Jede Runde darf der Spieler Ressourcen erzeugen, damit Karten aus seiner Hand ausspielen, sich dem Abenteuer stellen, zu einem neuen Ort reisen, die Angriffe des Feindes wehren und deren Truppen auch selber angreifen.\nDen Spielern obliegt es ständig zu entscheiden, wer wann was machen soll, wodurch die kooperativen Elemente dieses Spieles zur Geltung kommen. Eines der größten Probleme mit vielen kooperativen Spielen liegt darin, dass ein bestimmter Spieler zu einer Art Dirigent wird, nach dessen Taktstock die anderen Spieler antanzen müssen. Obgleich er vielleicht der Erfahrenste ist, oder bloß der Lauteste, bekommen die Anderen irgendwann den Eindruck, sie schauen ihm lediglich bei einem Einsiedlerspiel zu. Bei „Der Herr der Ringe“ müssen die Spieler ihre Karten geheim halten, und auch wenn sie zusammen eine Strategie schmieden können, bleibt die Wahrscheinlichkeit gering, dass ein Spieler die Geschehnisse eigenhändig bestimmt. Damit sorgt das Spiel für ein wahrhaftigeres Kooperativerlebnis.\nIm Vergleich zu einem Spiel wie Pandemie liegt „Der Herr der Ringe“ natürlich ein Stück höher auf der Schwierigkeitsskala. Doch das Regelwerk ist gut organisiert und mit vielen Beispielen versehen, so dass einem die einzelnen Spielschritten nach nur wenigen Runden bekannt sind. Nichtsdestotrotz wohnt dem Spiel eine große Vielseitigkeit inne, denn viele Karten verfügen über Besonderheiten, die die Grundregeln umgehen oder gar außer Kraft setzen. Auf der einen Seite trägt dies dazu bei, dass keine zwei Spiele gleich sind. Mit jeder Erweiterung erhöhen sich auch die Komplexität und die Menge an Besonderheiten, und damit dem Spiel stets etwas Frisches hinzufügt. In dem einen Abenteuer muss man eine besonders gefährliche Kreatur zur Strecke bringen, in dem nächsten einen Gefangenen befreien, oder einen Verbündeten auf einer brenzligen Mission begleiten. Doch diese Vielseitigkeit ist nicht ohne Probleme. Erstens führt die reine Menge an regelumgehenden Karten dazu, dass man die eine oder andere Besonderheit übersieht oder vergisst. Oft muss man danach seine Schritte zurückverfolgen, damit hoffentlich alles seine Richtigkeit hat. Zweitens kommt es häufig zu Situationen, in denen die Regeln auf verschiedenster Weise interpretierbar sind. In diesen Fällen kann man natürlich auf Anhieb eine Entscheidung treffen und weiterspielen, aber im Internet findet man einige Ressourcen, wie zum Beispiel BoardGameGeek.com oder die offiziellen FAQ , die in diesen Randfällen endgültige Entscheidungen bieten.\nAbgesehen von der gelegentlichen Regelfrage gibt es mit dem Spiel doch leider andere Probleme, die einige Kunden abschrecken. Erst einmal vermittelt dieses Grundspiel den Eindruck, man würde wenig für sein Geld bekommen. Das Spiel ist nicht überteuert, doch es scheint vom Umfang her relativ mager ausgestattet, es sei denn, man ist bereit, das Spiel durch weitere Abenteuerpakete zu erweitern. Nur drei Abenteuer sind in diesem Spiel vorhanden, und im Hinblick auf den Schwierigkeitsgrad sind sie weit auseinander gespreizt: Das erste Abenteuer (Schwierigkeitsgrad 1) hatten wir nach nur wenigen Versuchen besiegt, mit dem zweiten (Schwierigkeitsgrad 4) mussten wir länger kämpfen, wogegen wir das dritte (Schwierigkeitsgrad 7) fast unbesiegbar fanden und nur mit etwas Glück bezwingen konnten.\nDies ist eine offensichtliche List seitens des Verlages, die Spieler dazu zu ermuntern, weitere Abenteuer zu kaufen, um sowohl ihre Decks zu verstärken als auch mehr Spaß aus dem Spiele zu holen. Doch obwohl man sich über diesen perfiden Versuch berechtigt ärgern kann, den Spielern weitere Käufe aufzuoktroyieren, finde ich die Erweiterungen im Allgemeinen sehr kostengünstig. Für gegen 10 € bekommt man ein Szenario, welches gut 5 Stunden Spielspaß anbietet, angenommen, dass man es erst nach 2-3 Versuchen überwindet. Selbst dann ist es nicht ausgeschlossen, dass man sich dem Abenteuer noch einmal mit anderen Karten oder einem anderen Spielpartner stellt.\nEine kleinere wenn auch für manche sehr wichtige Beschwerde betrifft die Spielbox an sich. Auch wenn man die ersten Inhalte drin gut aufbewahren kann, taugt die Schachtel nach dem Erwerb nur weniger Erweiterungen überhaupt nicht mehr. Viele Spieler haben ihre selbst gebastelten Lösungen im Internet veröffentlicht. Ähnlich sieht es auch mit den Karten aus: Da sie durch das häufige Mischen und Schieben der Karten über Tisch strapaziert werden, bietet es sich an, die Karten durch Hüllen zu schonen, wie zu Beispiel die von Fantasy Flight Games oder Mayday Games.\nWem wird das Spiel gefallen:\nAllen, die ein reichhaltig detailliertes Kooperativerlebnis suchen. Spielern, die bereitwillig sind, mehr Geld für Erweiterungen auszugeben. Zwei-Spieler-Partnerschaften (auch Paaren); das alleine Spielen macht auch Spaß, ist jedoch anspruchsvoller. Wem das Spiel nicht gefallen wird:\nSpielern, die ungern verlieren. Die Herausforderung ist oft sehr groß, so dass man die meisten Abenteuer nur nach einigen Versuchen besiegt. Spielern, denen das Zufallselement zuwider ist. Auch mit einem ausgeklügelten Plan kann manchmal eine unglückliche Kartenkombination selbst die feinste Strategie zunichte machen. Spielern, die ungern ihre eigenen Decks zusammenstellen. Dieser Aspekt entspricht einem wesentlichen Teil des Spielspaßes. Zwar kann man diesen schlechthin ignorieren, doch damit wäre das Spiel nur noch schwieriger. Kurz zusammengefasst lädt dieses gelungene Kartenspiel in eine abenteuerreiche Mittelerde ein. Die Regeln gehen nicht immer sehr reibungslos vonstatten, doch man begreift schon nach einigen Runden die Grundlagen. Mit ihren oft kniffligen Listen fordern die Abenteuer die Spieler so heraus, dass man einen guten Plan schmieden und einen Hauch von Glück haben muss, um sie zu überwinden. Und wenn einem dieses Grundspiel gefällt, kann man es mit vielen Erweiterungspaketen günstig und bequem erweitern, die dem Spiel mit ihren oft einzigartigen Noten einen neuen Geschmack schenken.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2013/02/26/der-herr-der-ringe-das-kartenspiel/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Board-Games","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/board-games/"},{"LinkTitle":"Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Living-Card-Game","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/living-card-game/"},{"LinkTitle":"Lord-of-the-Rings","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/lord-of-the-rings/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/review/"}],"title":"Der Herr der Ringe: Das Kartenspiel"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" In der Regel interessiere ich mich nicht für Autobiografien, aber da dieses Buch so stolz auf dem Bibliotheksregal da stand, habe ich es einfach aus der Laune heraus mal mitgenommen. Es ist eine relativ kurze und einfache Lektüre, im Grunde bestehend aus Bruchstücken aus dem Leben und der Karriere Bransons mit einigen interessanten Ideen und unterhaltsamen Anekdoten, verstreut mit allgemeinen Ratschlägen. Die autobiografischen Stücke sind wohl am interessantesten, aufgrund des Buchformats sind sie jedoch oft wiederholt oder in einer komischen Reihenfolge präsentiert.\nWesentlich vorhanden sind Kommentare über Bransons Vorgehensweise in Bezug auf den nachhaltigen Kapitalismus und seine humanitäre und ehrenamtliche Arbeit. Leider gibt es aber einige Kapitel, die von Themen wie der globalen Erwärmung handeln, die sich wie Wort für Wort aus einem anderen Buche abgeschriebene Diatriben lesen und hier ziemlich fehl am Platz sind. Es hätte genügt, wenn Branson erklärt hätte, er nehme die globale Erwärmung als eine ernste Bedrohung für den Planeten und engagiere sich deswegen mit seinem Virgin-Imperium, diesem Problem ohne Umschweife entgegenzutreten, ohne so ins Detail gehen zu müssen, um seine Leser davon zu überzeugen, die Firmenzahlen gehen auf.\nEin letztes Wort über die Übersetzung: Obwohl ich das Original „Screw It, Let\u0026rsquo;s Do It“ nicht gelesen habe, sehe ich ein, dass es schwierig sein musste, dem Original treu zu bleiben und gleichzeitig das Argument zu überliefern. Deshalb bieten viele Anmerkungen des Übersetzers wertvolle Hintergrundinformationen oder erklären Wortspiele, die auf Deutsch einfach nicht funktionieren. Dennoch wimmelt das Buch von typographischen und anderweitigen Fehlern, die den Lesefluss stören und teilweise ein wiederholtes Lesen verlangen, um den Fehler zu entdecken.\nAls schnelle, leichte Unterhaltung bietet das Buch genügend Anekdoten und Informationsleckerbissen für die, die für die Erfolgsgeschichte und Geschäftsphilosophie Bransons interessieren. Jedoch stört die planlose und teilweise wiederholte Darstellung der Firmengeschichte, und die übertriebene Belehrung über die globale Erwärmung gehört eigentlich auf einer anderen Bühne. Wahrscheinlich wäre seine Autobiografie die interessantere Lektüre.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2012/04/24/geht-nicht-gibts-nicht/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Branson","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/branson/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/review/"}],"title":"Geht nicht gibt's nicht!"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Diesem Buch nur drei Sterne zu geben, kommt mir selber ein bisschen ungerecht vor. Während ich das Buch gelesen habe, gefiel mir ziemlich viel, aber als ich mir dann ein paar Tage „Verdauungszeit“ erlaubt habe, fand ich es immer schwieriger zu rechtfertigen, was genau ich an dem Buch so verlockend fand.\nUm zuerst das gute an dem Buch zu behandeln: „Kafka on the Shore“ ist auf Grundebene ein fesselndes Buch. Zwei verwandte Geschichten werden Kapitel für Kapitel ineinander verflochten, und obwohl sie sich am Ende nicht ganz einigen, bleibt die Erzählung spannend. Einige Themen treten in der Geschichte auf, wie die Ödipale Tragödie, die Reise zum Erwachsensein, sowie komplexere Fragen von Zeit und Realität und noch weitere metaphorische und surreale Elemente. Wenn Sie der „magische Realismus“ nicht reizt, sollten Sie lieber die Finger davonlassen.\nWo manch andere Rezensenten auf Amazon.co.uk sich darüber beklagt haben, die Prosa oder die Übersetzung sei gestelzt, fand ich das Buch meistens gut geschrieben. Zugegeben die Übersetzung ist amerikanisches Englisch, was mich als britischen Leser gelegentlich irritiert hat. Es gibt auch Momente, wo der Dialog besonders unrealistisch und gezwungen wirkt, vielleicht aufgrund Murakamis Versuch, viel Diskussion über das Metaphysische/Philosophische einzuquetschen. Dies ist ein Buch, in dem ein 15-Jähriger über Interpretationen von Schubert diskutieren kann und ein Buch über Napoleons russischen Feldzug aus einer Laune heraus zur Hand nimmt. Das wird nicht bei jedem Anklang finden, dennoch liefern die Diskussionen und Ideen, die in dem Buch herumschweben, interessante Unterbrechungen in der Geschichte.\nNachdem ich das Buch zu Ende gelesen hatte, fing meine Bewunderung für das Werk leider an zu schwinden. Wie Andere bemerkt haben, bietet das Buch kein zufriedenstellendes Fazit. Allein stellt das kein Problem da, eher, dass keine der verschiedenen Fäden der Geschichte Antworten geben. Alle interessanten und kitzelnden Diskussionen und metaphorische Ereignisse entpuppten sich als hängende Fragezeichen über dem geschlossenen Buchumschlag. Der Autor selber schlägt seinen Lesern vor, für die Rätsel des Buches eigene Lösung zu finden, und empfiehlt ein mehrfaches Lesen, aber dazu habe ich weder Zeit noch Lust.\nFür mein Gefühl bietet „Kafka on the Shore“ eine recht schöne Unterhaltung, die auf einigen Ebenen als fesselnde Geschichte funktioniert. Aber wenn es versucht, an tiefer Bedeutung zu gewinnen, liefert es lediglich unzusammenhängende Ideen, die der Leser erst zusammensetzen muss, wenn er darin ein Teil des Gesamtbildes sehen will. Dies war mein erstes Buch von Murakami, und obwohl ich noch kein Fan bin, wird es mich auch nicht davon abhalten, mir einen weiteren Roman von ihm zu ergattern, sollte sich die Gelegenheit bieten. Wäre es nicht für den sauren Nachgeschmack, gäbe ich dem Buch sogar einen vierten Stern, für die erfreuliche Art, in der es uns ein modernes Märchen darstellt.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2012/03/07/kafka-on-the-shore/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/review/"}],"title":"Kafka on the Shore"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Literature","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/literature/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Trotz meines Alters hatte ich, bis ich dieses Buch als Weihnachtsgeschenk bekam, noch nie etwas von Wodehouse gelesen, obwohl man mir als Kind ein paar Ausschnitte vorgelesen hat. Mit Wodehouse besteht das Problem natürlich darin, dass es schwierig ist sich zu entscheiden, wo man anfangen sollte, da der Mann so produktiv war. Dazu haben die meisten Wodehouse-Leser ihre Lieblingscharaktere schon ausgesucht, also sie um einen Rat zu bitten, ist ähnlich wie danach zu fragen, welche Fußballmannschaft man unterstützen sollte.\nDemzufolge eignet sich dieses Kompendium als erster Schritt in Wodehouses Welt. Der Neuling findet hier eine Kostprobe von Jeeves, Blandings, Ukridge, Mr Mulliner, The Drones, Psmith und Uncle Fred. Es gibt sogar eine Auswahl Golf-Geschichten und als Anhang eine Sammlung Briefe und allerlei andere Schreiben.\nDie bisher einzige andere Rezension auf Amazon.co.uk warf dem Buch eine nachlässige Qualität vor. Hier stimme ich nur teilweise zu: Obwohl ich an der Anfertigung nichts zu meckern finde, gibt es dennoch eine überraschende Menge an Druckfehlern, obschon nur belanglose Kleinigkeiten. Trotzdem ist dieser Buchband für den Preis ein absolutes Schnäppchen, und ein Muss für jeden, der sich einen ersten Blick in die Wodehousesche Welt verschaffen will.\n(Und jetzt, da ich das Ganze gelesen habe, kann ich erklären, dass mein Jersey mit dem Blandings-Wappen beschmückt ist!)\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2012/02/01/what-ho-the-best-of-wodehouse/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Humour","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/humour/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Wodehouse","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/wodehouse/"}],"title":"What Ho!: The Best of Wodehouse"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Arts","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/arts/"},{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/reviews/"}],"content":" Als jemand der sich erst kürzlich mit der digitalen Fotografie befasst, nahm ich dieses Buch zusammen mit dem von Bryan Peterson „Understanding Exposure “, um einen Einstieg zu finden und mich inspirieren zu lassen. Keines der Bücher enttäuschte mich. Petersons Buch bietet eine hervorragende Einleitung in die Welt der Fotografie. Dagegen geht Freemans Buch vielmehr ins Detail über die einzelnen Techniken der Bildgestaltung.\nDas Buch gliedert sich in 6 Kapitel, wobei jedes Kapitel in weitere Abschnitte unterteilt ist, die von bestimmten Aspekten des fotografischen Designs handeln. Obwohl teilweise aufeinanderaufbauend ist es gut möglich, die einzelnen Kapitel dieses Buches stückchenweise zu verzehren: Man kann sowohl uninteressante Teile völlig überspringen, als auch auf informative Abschnitte zurückkommen. Jedes Modul ist gut mit Beispielfotografien ausgestattet, die die Argumente und Informationen des Autors verdeutlichen.\nWie andere auf Amazon.co.uk schon geschrieben haben, ist die Schreibart teilweise relativ akademisch, und gleicht dem, was man von einem Fotografiekurs erwarten würde, dennoch sollte der Durchschnittsleser das Enthaltene gut verstehen können. Freeman zitiert eine Anzahl Fotografen, um seine Worte zu bekräftigen, und nimmt Beispiele aus anderen künstlerischen Bereichen, um den besonderen Herausforderungen der Fotografie einen Vergleich zu bieten. Meines Erachtens liegt ein wahrer Mangel des Buches darin, dass Freeman manchmal die Besonderheiten einer (zugegeben berühmten) Fotografie aufzählt, ohne dass das Foto im Buche erscheint, wohl aus finanziellen oder rechtlichen Gründen. Trotzdem, obwohl die Bilder mit einer Suchangabe im Internet mühelos zu finden sind, beeinträchtigt dies die Lesbarkeit, besonders für den Fotoanfänger, der ganz klar als Zielperson dieses Buches gilt.\nUm zwei der in den negativen Rezensionen am häufigsten auftauchenden Kritiken aufzugreifen:\n* die Fotos seien schlecht – persönlich finde ich diese Meinung schon harsch, aber dazu finde ich es von Vorteil, dass nicht jedes Foto ein atemberaubendes Meisterwerk ist. Seien sie bloß alltägliche Fotografien, aber indem man sie unter die Lupe nimmt und hervorhebt, wieso sie gelungen sind, kann man sich umso besser auf die Einzelheiten konzentrieren, sei es Perspektive, Zeitgefühl oder Belichtung. Zum Beispiel gibt es in einem Kapitel ein handelsübliches Bild von einem Haus und einem Baum, ein absolut stinknormales Bild, dem man in der Regel keine zweite Sekunde Achtung schenken würde. Aber das Foto eignet sich als perfektes Vorbild für den Einsatz von den vorhandenen Elementen eines Bildsubjekts als Rahmen.\n* das Buch enthalte keine Lektionen und beschreibt lediglich, wieso manche Fotos \u0026lsquo;funktionieren\u0026rsquo; – ich finde diese Kritik berechtigt, wenn es auch auf den Geschmack des Lesers ankommt. Für mich war das Buch exzellent strukturiert, indem es das Foto als Konzept in die einzelnen Bestandteile zerlegt und dies anhand von Beispielen untersucht, um zu erklären, wie man diese Ideen einsetzen kann, und wieso diese Bilder \u0026lsquo;funktionieren\u0026rsquo;, wo ein anderer Winkel, eine andere Belichtung, eine andere Gestaltung fehlgeschlagen hätte.\nMit dem niedrigen Preis und mithilfe von Amazons „Blick ins Buch“ kann der Käufer schließlich keinen großen Fehler machen. Wenn Sie auch der Meinung sind, dass man nur anhand von fesselnden Meisterwerken lernen kann, suchen Sie sich lieber ein anderes Buch aus. Trotzdem liefert dieses Buch dank einer guten Zusammenstellung von gutem Schreiben und ausgiebigen Beispielen ein hervorragendes Anfängerbuch, das einem klar macht, was hinter dem Objektiv alles möglich ist.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2012/01/23/the-photographers-eye-composition-and-design-for-better-digital-photos/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Photography","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/photography/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/review/"}],"title":"The Photographer’s Eye: Composition and Design for Better Digital Photos"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"Books","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/books/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/languages/"},{"LinkTitle":"Reviews","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/reviews/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/translation/"}],"content":" Indem er sein Buch „Is that a fish in your ear?“ genannt hat (bzw. hat nennen lassen), hat David Bellos es schwierig gemacht, dieses Buch zu kategorisieren. Vom Aussehen her scheint das Buch definitiv dem populärwissenschaftlichen Bereich anzugehören, jedoch wie andere klar gemacht haben, liegt die Schreibart entschieden in einer halbwegs akademischen Kategorie. Trotzdem sollte das erfasste Material für eine große Bandbreite von Interesse sein, da sich das Buch in kurze und zum größten Teil in sich abgeschlossene Kapitel aufteilt. Man kann dadurch leicht eintauchen, bestimmte Kapital auswählen oder uninteressante Teile völlig überspringen. Das Buch weist einen sehr großen Umfang von Themen auf und der Autor spricht eine Vielfalt an Themen aus verschiedenen Disziplinen an, einschließlich der Philosophie, der Biologie, der Religion und natürlich der Linguistik.\nMir ist beim Betrachten des Werks in seiner Ganzheit aufgefallen, dass Bellos hiermit die Gelegenheit nutzt, für seinen Beruf bzw. die Art, in der er seiner Arbeit nachgeht, zu plädieren. Es handelt sich in vielen Kapiteln um einen Vorwurf gegen oder gar einen Angriff auf Übersetzung und Übersetzer, hauptsächlich in der Form einer tagtäglichen Plattitüde, die er dann unter die Lupe nimmt, prüft und im Großen und Ganzen glaubhaft widerlegt. Auch wenn ich seinen Meinungen nicht immer zugestimmt habe, stellt Bellos seine Beweise und seinen Denkvorgang sehr offen dar, damit der Leser meist seine eigene Schlüsse ziehen kann. Trotzdem kommen im Buch einige Widersprüche zum Vorschein und die Argumente scheinen teilweise überzogen. Zum Beispiel kritisiert er eine Behauptung Nabokows in Bezug auf die Lyrik Puschkins, dass es mathematisch unmöglich sei, gleichzeitig den Reim und das Gedicht wortgetreu zu übersetzen („to reproduce the rhymes and yet translate the entire poem literally is mathematically impossible“). Dann erklärt er wie sich die puschkinsche Gedichtform zum Übersetzen gut eignet und dass die Ursache Nabokows Behauptung in dessen mangelnder Bereitschaft dazu lag. Vielleicht entspricht das der Wahrheit, aber weder das, noch die Aussage, es gebe andere begabte Übersetzer, die eine „gute Annäherung von Puschkins Gedichten“ übersetzt haben, beeinträchtigt die ursprüngliche Behauptung über die Unmöglichkeit der gleichzeitigen Übersetzung von Form und Inhalt. Wenn überhaupt, bestätigt Bellos\u0026rsquo; eigenes Kapitel über Lyrik Nabokow in seiner Meinung.\nIn seiner Verteidigung der Übersetzung behandelt Bellos eine Vielfalt von Bereichen und Epochen, von Sumer über die Bibel bis hin zur EU, darunter auch der Humor, der Juristenjargon und das Dolmetschen. Er schildert die Schwierigkeiten, die dem Übersetzer gegenüberstehen, wie wenn es am Platz mangelt (z.B. Comics), an Zeit (z.B. Filmuntertiteln oder Synchronisation), fehlende grammatikalische Aspekte in der Quell- oder Zielsprache, oder einfach der Bedarf nach Erklärungen, wenn es keine gibt (z.B. wenn der Autor schon tot ist). Vom besonderen Interesse sind die Kapitel, die von den Arbeitsweisen der EU und UNO handeln, sowie die wiederkehrenden Gedanken über die dominante Rolle der englischen Sprache und dessen potenzieller Einfluss auf andere Sprachen durch die Arbeit von Übersetzern. Außerdem zu den Stärken des Buches zu zählen sind die vielen Beispiele und Anekdoten von Schwierigkeiten und Erfolgen, die Bellos beifügte, um seinen Argumenten Glauben zu schenken.\nZwar gibt es in dem Buch ein paar Aussagen, die ich als \u0026lsquo;Fehler\u0026rsquo; betrachten würde, aber die sind nebensächlich und lenken nicht von dem Hauptargument ab. Ansonsten ist dieses Werk äußerst gut recherchiert und detailliert. Bellos schreibt als Fachmann und wirkt trotz seiner zum Teil sehr festen Meinungen aber nie herablassend. In der Tat erblickt man flüchtig eine gewisse Bescheidenheit, insbesondere wenn er von Arten der Übersetzung redet, die nicht zu seinen Stärken zählen.\nLetzten Endes ist dies ein Buch, dass dem richtigen Leser recht gefallen wird. Obwohl ich von einigen seiner Argumente nicht überzeugt wurde, stellt Bellos ausreichende Informationen und Beweise dar, wodurch der Leser zu einer eigenen Meinung kommen kann. Als Überblick und Einleitung in die Welt der Übersetzung muss man das Buch als Erfolg erkennen, vor allem für diejenigen, die Sprachen studieren, die sich überlegen, Übersetzer zu werden, und vielleicht auch die, die eine bloße Neugier haben, mehr von den Übersetzungen zu erfahren, die sie selbst lesen. Leider, wie andere hervorgehoben haben, lässt sich der Zweck des Buches von seinem Titel und Klappentext nicht leicht enthüllen, also lohnt es sich auf jeden Fall kurz per Amazons „Blick ins Buch“ reinzuschnuppern, bevor man sich entscheidet, es zu kaufen.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2012/01/11/is-that-a-fish-in-your-ear-translation-and-the-meaning-of-everything/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Book","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/book/"},{"LinkTitle":"Language","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/language/"},{"LinkTitle":"Linguistics","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/linguistics/"},{"LinkTitle":"Review","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/review/"},{"LinkTitle":"Translation","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/translation/"}],"title":"Is That a Fish in Your Ear?: Translation and the Meaning of Everything"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"German","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/german/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/languages/"}],"content":"This entry is also available in English .\nNoch eine Kleinigkeit , die mir über den Weg gelaufen ist, während ich Kafkas Der Prozess lese, sieht man im folgenden Zitat:\nAußerdem schien es der Maler mißzuverstehen, warum K. nur am Bettrand blieb, er bat vielmehr, K. möchte es sich bequem machen und ging, da K. zögerte, selbst hin und drängte ihn tief in die Betten und Polster hinein.\nFranz Kafka, Der Prozeß Mal abgesehen von der Rechtsschreibreform und dem heute so ungewöhnlichen Gebrauch des ß, würden die meisten Studenten der deutschen Sprache anhand dieses Beispiels sofort annehmen, das Verb missverstehen müsse ein trennbares Verb sein. Der Maler schien es ja misszuverstehen, nicht zu missverstehen. Anders geschrieben, würde man einen Satz wie folgenden erwarten:\n*Der Maler verstand ihn miss.\nDoch ein Faden im WordReference Sprachforum klärt die Situation ein wenig auf:\nDie Verwendung von missverstehen ist schwankend bezüglich der Trennbarkeit (der Duden charakterisiert das Verb als unregelmäßig). In finiter Form wird es in der Regel untrennbar verwandt: Er missverstand ihn Die Variante *Er verstand ihn miss ist ungewöhnlich und gilt meines Wissens auch als standardsprachlich inkorrekt.\nDer Infinitiv mit zu wird aber von vielen Sprechern so gebildet, als sei missverstehen trennbar aber von nicht wenigen Sprechern auch so, als sei das Verb nicht trennbar. Entsprechend ist sowohl zu missverstehen oder misszuverstehen anzutreffen.\nMeines Wissens ist misszuverstehen die standardsprachlich vorgezogene Form; die Variante zu missverstehen würde ich aber ebenfalls als standardsprachlich korrekt ansehen.\nMissverstehen ist also einfach unregelmäßig und weist sowohl trennbare als auch untrennbare Verbeigenschaften auf.\nZu guter Letzt ist hier der Eintrag des Duden , der auch ein Beispiel der umgangssprachlich scherzhaften Variante aufführt.\nmiss­ver­ste­hen Wortart: unregelmäßiges Verb\neine Aussage, eine Handlung [unbeabsichtigt] falsch deuten, auslegen\nBeispiele jemanden, etwas missverstehen sie missversteht mich absichtlich du hast mich, meine Frage missverstanden die Bemerkung war nicht misszuverstehen er fühlt sich missverstanden (umgangssprachlich scherzhaft) verstehen Sie mich bitte nicht miss (verstehen Sie mich nicht falsch) eine nicht misszuverstehende (eine eindeutige) Handbewegung ","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2011/05/24/nicht-misszuverstehen/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Franz-Kafka","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/franz-kafka/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/languages/"}],"title":"Nicht misszuverstehen"},{"categories":[{"LinkTitle":"German","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/german/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/categories/languages/"}],"content":"Während ich neuerdings Kafkas Der Prozeß gelesen habe, bin ich über eine interessante und mir bis dato unbekannten Satzstruktur gestolpert.\nTrotzdem K. gerade jetzt nicht daran gedacht hatte, sagte er sofort: \u0026ldquo;Gewiss, ich muss fortgehn. Ich bin Prokurist einer Bank, man wartet auf mich, ich bin nur hergekommen, um einem ausländischen Geschäftsfreund den Dom zu zeigen.\u0026rdquo; Franz Kafka, Der Prozeß Als Student der deutschen Sprache war mir das Wort trotzdem nur in Hauptsätzen bekannt, nie als Einleitung eines verbvertreibenden Nebensatzes. Ich hielt es anfänglich für einen Fehler seitens des Buchverlags, denn immerhin war meine Ausgabe eine ziemlich billige. Da hätte an der Stelle wohl obwohl stehen müssen. Doch die Konstruktion wiederholte sich mehrmals in Buch.\nNach einer Google-Befragung also stellte ich fest, dass diese Form tatsächlich in den Randregionen der deutschen Sprache sehr verbreitet sei. Vor allem in den Alpen und Böhmen sei diese Form gängig, daher versteht es sich von selbst, dass Schriftsteller wie Kafka, Stifter und Dürrenmatt von ihr Gebrauch machen. Ein etwas älterer Faden auf wer-weiss-was.de bietet eine tolle Erklärung, dass dieses Wort als eine zusammengezogene Form des nun altmodischen „trotz dem, dass“ zu verstehen ist und hebt hervor, dass die Betonung in diesem Falle auf der zweiten Silbe liegt.\nDer diesbezügliche Eintrag im Duden :\ntrotz|dem Bedeutung obwohl, obgleich\nBeispiel er kam, trotzdem (standardsprachlich: obwohl) er krank war\nHerkunft entstanden aus: trotz dem, dass …\nNun muss ich nur noch herausfinden, warum die Ausgabe des Textes hier dieses trotzdem durch obwohl ersetzt. Und warum in meiner Ausgabe Kafka das Wort gewiss nie groß schreibt, selbst wenn es am Anfang eines Satzes steht.\n","permalink":"https://amindatplay.eu/de-de/2011/05/23/trotzdem-als-nebensatz/","tags":[{"LinkTitle":"Franz-Kafka","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/franz-kafka/"},{"LinkTitle":"Deutsch","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/deutsch/"},{"LinkTitle":"Languages","RelPermalink":"/de-de/tags/languages/"}],"title":"Trotzdem als Nebensatz"}]