8 posts tagged “internet”
I will begin by saying I'm not one of your hardened shoppers who stalks and waits for the deals and such... I just went mainly as I wanted to gift Sol and Aurelia their presents early for Christmas. The line was terribly long... We all waited in line by the loading docks at about 4:45am in the chill cold. Personally, I regretted not wearing my wool coat out as I froze pretty quickly. We all were talking about some of the old times in our lives and trying to laugh to forget the bitter cold. Once 5:00am hit, the store opened the flood gates... What I witnessed was pure animal-like shopping chaos. People shuffling, mass hoarding items, waiting like cattle to get claim checks for high demand items... It was something that would get companies like OSHA concerned.
The art of Black Friday shopping has seriously evolved since the advent of new consumer technologies. I saw many people with mobile phones trying to have other family members triangulate items together to rendezvous at a central point to ensure they would get the best sale items. Some power shoppers had their Bluetooth headsets on so both hands could focus on grabbing items... Of course with human nature, you had people yielding to their territorial instincts of hoarding items and fighting with others over a single material item because it was the last one on sale. The local police were on hand to handle things like major riots, which I didn't see any of those luckily.
My main purpose was to try picking up a 4GB Memory Stick Pro Duo ($29.99) for my PSP for movie purposes but well, that was a failure as they changed the deal to a 2GB model for $17.99. Though my main purpose was to to get Bluetooth headsets for cheap to give to Aurelia and Sol for an early Christmas. They are two people who are on the phone quite a bit with their friends and complaining about how their hand or neck hurts from all the talking they do. Sol ended up getting the exact same model Bluetooth headset as me for his phone. He was a bit limited in his choices due to his phone being an older model Sony Ericsson P910i, so I got him the HBH-V705 which is a nice, sleek model with a very professional polish to its look. I managed to snag that for 50% off which was an awesome kill! Aurelia was hoping for the slick Jabra headset she had her heart on, but well she found a Plantronic MiX tower that had more female oriented headsets there. She would get the MiX 330 which is a remix of the original Plantronics Explorer 330 with a white and silver body color and adorned with Swarovski crystals. The MiX 330 ended up being $20 off so it was not too bad. They both were stoked for me to front for their gifts, which ultimately made me happy.
I was not about to leave empty handed, I wanted to see if I could pick up a PSP title for cheap. I found the last copy of Guilty Gear Judgment (with the bonus Guilty Gear XX #reload) and a screen protector for normal price, but it should be plenty fun for when I need my "fighter" or "beat-em-up" fix. While the game was not popular, it beats the imported edition from Japan where Judgment and Guilty Gear XX #reload were both separate game UMD's at $30 - $40 a disc.
Everyone walked out happy, which I was thankful for. Sure, we waited in bitter cold for about close to an hour to get in the shop, but the "spoils of war" were grand. The expensive part of my gifting is done, but the last will come in 2 weeks when I go shopping at Strapya World for everyone else. I just want to put some good karma in the pool for all of those who've supported me when I was down. Not all things can be had at Black Friday, however...
This year, I have noticed that the deals were mediocre rather than spectacular in the paper/in-store ads. The online shops are finally getting better with their "ads" or Thanksgiving sales. Apple did their sale online with slashing prices about $300 here and their on their machines. Newegg has continued on with their tradition as usual. Some shops like Best Buy and Target has some "ONLINE ONLY" specials that you simply couldn't rush to the store for. I feel the next step forward will only be a fusion of both sorts of sales for places that have a physical store front... But at the same rate, they need to make sure the servers can handle the loads of shoppers pounding the servers. I was unable to get in on a deal at Frys.com for the 4GB Memory Stick Pro Duo as the server kept timing out, but on finally being able to... the server had a MySQL error preventing the transaction from going on any further. Oh well, there's always next time.
From the last 3 years, there's been a progressive explosion of social networking sites popping over the place. From those years, you have had minor players fall while the "giants" just kept growing. The big giants are now MySpace and Facebook... but the original purposes of each were totally different from my observations.
MySpace started off like a place to network with friends and maybe join groups to promote musicians that used it as a place to spread word about their music. It grew with a very rapid pace mainly due to how customizable the personal web pages could be fixed up. But with lack of "control", you'd have some devious people who'd find exploits to do things like read passwords to even cause domino effect cases where one compromised user would essentially spread their embedded virus to any visitors to their MySpace to another. This was before Tom sold the site to News Corp (aka Fox) and the management finally tightened things up. Sure, you still have occasional compromises from some customization site eventually showing their intentions of stealing passwords or doing something malicious... but the current MySpace administration does a pretty good job squashing those before they get widespread.
Facebook conversely started off more like an academic social network/online yearbook. So it was very locked tight. You couldn't join unless you had a college e-mail address and verified your account creation from that e-mail address. After that, the network was pretty dull or docile... You weren't able to peep into profiles, because you had to be in Facebook in order to do that. There was less customization, but the networking was real tight... You couldn't randomly browse through profiles unless the person consented to being your "friend". Eventually, they would open enrollment to about anyone who had an e-mail address. At this point, search engines were pulling snippets of profile information here and there. Facebook would finally open up their API to users to develop applications, that's when profiles would get colorful with customizations. Microsoft finally got interest and even decided to buy into Facebook's stock from how the social network has exploded from growth with users. For the most part, Facebook has had the least problem with compromises due to how tight they have controlled the network.
With social networks, they have allowed people to find long-lost friends and find out connections to who all they know. Of course, this causes the phenomenon that some have informally termed as being a "frend whore". The informal definition of a "friend whore" is a person who randomly adds people in social networks all on meaningless significance. Examples would be things like meeting a person once or just because they may have dated and broke up with someone in a span of 24 hours. Social networks are not without their dark side... They can serve to be a double edged sword. Employers have found out how powerful Google is and have taken full advantage of it. Google is pretty aggressive and can pick up on MySpace profiles and even some snippets of Facebook profiles. Potentially applying for a job that advocates a drug free environment and you're under the legal age to be drinking while smoking some quality hash from a water bong and have pictures of doing those things at a party? Don't be surprised if your future employer decides to decline hiring you. I actually got to see this happen with the Human Resources division when they were shooting a candidate's name into Google and... lo and behold... they found him bonging a beer at a party and he was not of legal drinking age.
Privacy now becomes an issue. How much should the world know about us? When people hit the age of 18, the number of organizations who keep tabs on people is astounding. You have corporations who represent the major credit tracking companies monitoring your credit, then you have ones monitoring your record with writing checks, ones who observe your ability to pay rent or mortgages on time. At the same right, some of these very corporations have not had the best luck with securing their data dossiers on people or they have even been leaked from crackers and cyber criminals breaking in to steal confidential information to those who could use a new "identity". So compromises are one thing that is somewhat an uncontrollable factor... but what about personal privacy? Most people are unaware of how much information they publish about themselves online. Surprisingly, a Google search can find quite the list of information on people. Things like full, legal names, exact birth dates, home addresses, place of employment, and on very rare occasions (due to poor securing of data) social security numbers can be found by simple Google searches. You have interesting little start-up companies popping up all over the place harvesting cached web pages and ripping information from them into a compact page with just about everything they can dig up on you. Check out sites like Spock, where they aggregate as much information about you and stick it all into one concrete page.
Luckily, the two giants of social networking have given users the power to control who gets to see their information and who does not. MySpace has an option to make the user's profile private and then even make it harder for people to find you by adding criteria before they have the permission to add you. Criteria can be things like knowing your exact contact e-mail address or even your real name. MySpace has also been cooperating with state and federal laws with regards to making under-aged users profiles to be locked to private by default to protect children from pedophiles and sexual predators. Facebook has given the users control of whether they want their profiles made public or private since they had opened up enrollment to everyone. But the future of everyone's privacy is still at stake...
I am not trying to create an image from an Orwellian novel like 1984 with the threat of "Big Brother is Watching You", but rather that the newer generation of online users should have a right to know where their information is going to. If users feel that a company turning a profit on how much information they can dig up on them is in ethical, they should speak now and get the government involved rather than let the country fail on protecting the liberty of privacy. These companies that passively watch... they don't even have to tell people that they are observing them or creating a "file" of what all they monitor.
A few folks have brought up that Google's lack of privacy leaves them liable to be the biggest perpetrator of invasion of privacy. This has been brought up in courts around Europe to the point that Google has had to make a defined limit of how long they are allowed to hold on to your information. Take into mind that Google just started their Open Social platform with sites like Friendster, MySpace, PayPal all joining in the mix to try to bully Facebook. At the same time with the Open Social network, it acts as a "consent" contract allowing any one within the Open Social platform to collect as much information on you as they desire with out necessarily telling you what the purpose of their existence is.
If you don't want the world knowing everything about you but you want to keep a life online to keep in touch with friends... Lock up your profiles and even make aliases to scramble the trail. If you're truly afraid to the point of paranoia, there is the option of being a Luddite and not allowing "The Machine" to collect a byte of information on you. I don't mind sharing information that I consent to, but data mining must stop somewhere.
Let's get some background on Flock and it's relationship with Mozilla Firefox.
Firefox was the original browser that broke the mold from Internet Explorer basically crushing browsers like Netscape Navigator and even the early Opera browser. It was a fresh change of pace from the closed source principle of Internet Explorer as it allowed anyone to view the entire source code of the browser to make plug-ins and modifications to improve the browser. But due to the Mozilla Corporation blowing open a free browser to the market place and including the ability to even giving the world the source code for free... This would make a world where even the online experience could be changed and custom tailored for the end user.
Flock's principle that differentiates itself from a standard Firefox installation in one way... Rather than having to download and install things like specialty blogger, RSS, media, account integration plug-ins and applets, they are all built in to the browser. From the Flock "About Us" Page, they say that how people use the modern day web browser is basically that of a nerve center to the online world and we have regular habits or accounts that we just have to check out.
I am not much of a social person online, but I do like blogging and reading RSS streams quite a bit... So I figured I'd give myself a challenge: Use Flock for one week and then do a comprehensive review. I can say that I am actually a bit shocked at how the week has turned out.
I would pull a pre-compiled version of Flock for Ubuntu Linux from GetDeb.net, as I am not much into trying to compile from source unless I absolutely have to. For users of other operating systems, there are versions for Mac OS X and also Windows folks too. I don't feel secure on my Windows box so I have not installed it there. For the OS X end, I don't have a machine set-up for testing... If you want to review it, I will gladly hot-link your review to mine in exchange for the same.
The install was rather painless. It performs like a regular install of Firefox, but it was able to copy my settings, preferences and bookmarks from Firefox on a click. After the details finalized, the installer asks if I want to lock in Flock as the default... but for all intents and purposes, I would say "No" because Firefox is customized for secure items and questionable websites much better than Flock currently is.
The experience is quite unique... the "Home" page is called "My World", the default "nerve center" for your browsing experience. There's a set of links to do things like post to your blog direct from the browser, upload videos to YouTube or images to Flickr/Photobucket, or check out your bookmarks in del.icio.us, provided you have logged into those services. On the top right are tiny icons to indicate which services have integrated with the browser and another set of services that have not been linked to Flock. On the main page are links to your most recently visited book marks, the top 3 newest RSS feeds from each site you have a RSS session with, and then the latest media from your favorite links in another column. Other than that... the browsing experience is much in the same vein as Firefox as far as stability goes.
The difference with Flock is that if you log into your media services such as YouTube, Photobucket, and Flickr, the button for the "Media bar" will pop up a bar on the top that will contain streams with a thumbnail of an image that link to the respective image or YouTube video. The image uploader is nice as it will do batch uploading to Flickr or Photobucket natively in the browser, rather than having to go through the web based uploaders of the sites which typically limit you to a max upload of 5-6 images a session, unless you subscribe for the premium member services. The blog client works well and there is not much to write about... The blog compatibility is hopefully getting bigger, because I can't quite blog to Vox from it yet, but I can only hope that it will be addressed in the 1.0 Final build.
Security is a big thing that needs more revamping with Flock, in my personal opinion... I mean, it's fine for minor things like social use of social networking sites, but I wouldn't dare to say it could replace my stock Firefox install. With things like more network integration (like Facebook is coming with the 1.0 Final build) and more security issues to be addressed, Flock will be a browser to watch for development.
Overall, if you like being networked to everything and see the use of the web browser much like the folks of the Flock Development Team... you will be very pleased! If you are more of a blogger and news reader, Flock does a great job at what it does for helping you keep track of things. I can recommend this browser to folks who love the connectivity but also want the stability of the Firefox engine.
For a good while, someone passed a rumor to Ars Technica about the possibility of the newest update (I think it's 10.3, correct me if I am wrong - Zero) will brick unlocked iPhones. Of course, there were skeptics as it was possibly Apple propaganda, but well, it would be confirmed yesterday by Ars Technical here. This is interesting as many proponents of the hacking community even laid claims that Steve Jobs was "one" of "them" from his past and making blue boxes to make illegal free phone calls. If Jobs is "part" of the hacker creed then one would assume he would not lay a hand on the community, right? Well, apparently fame has some part to due to the fact that Ars Technica has confirmed that the new update will brick unlocked iPhones. The official statement from Jobs in the article can be roughly paraphrased as "The corporation is going to undo your work, but have fun fighting back".
There are a few legal critics that have commented that Apple's stand on making expensive paper weights in defense of the corporation (bricking) and even voiding warranties on any third party programs even being installed is possibly against the law as cited by Slashdot. It really has to make you wonder though if the corporations can just buy their way out of any laws. Knowing Apple who's basically in bed with AT&T, they will no doubt fight to protect the phone's proprietary lockdown (in America) and limit its use on T-Mobile USA and other local American based SIM networks. I even dare to ask the legality of them voiding warranties for something as simple as unlocking the phone, as there was a law or legislation that had passed saying that unlocking cellular phones is a protected right for consumers for 5 years (with 2009 being the final year) and then the policy is up for debate for renewal or to challenge it. Rendering of the warranty also applies not only with unlocking your phone, but installing third party applications. Want that Tetris or NES emulator on your iPhone, but later your vibrate module dies... Apple just says "Sorry, you installed games that do not come with the iPhone, so SOL on you." In this case... Software wouldn't kill a vibrating motor and I could definitely see an issue with that logic.
On a personal observation, what will this battle bring to the table? The iPhone itself isn't subsidized like the RAZR2 or Blackberry Curve with discounts, you're paying the whopping $399 (and via Apple's store, the 4GB is no longer for sale). I could understand the reason for the fight to lock down the phone for the full ride of the 2 year contract, but you're not getting $250 off of the purchase price or $500 in rebates for a 2 year hitch. You buy the iPhone for $399, then with a Windows or Mac with iTunes you then unlock your phone to purchase a contract plan with AT&T. Those who wish to use it outside of AT&T have to rely on programs that perform a "jailbreak" on the iPhone and then after that fact, the phone is then exploited to install a third party program to give the iPhone the ability to install programs onto it. From there you're able to load the exploit to unlock the phone for private use with your provider of choice. I mean, in retrospect, you don't see Apple fighting to keep the AppleTV from being able to load a full OS X system on it and other off label uses for it. I will say one thing... I look forward to the ending of this story with Apple killing unlocked iPhones.
With school this semester, I have never thought to see book expenses get dramatically higher with the passing days. It was nice in the early days, but now, it gets more and more pricey with school expenditures. Some classes require additional texts to supplement the learning and even some classes require gadgets. I'll talk on gadgets later on... Some folks are more fortunate to get student loans, others even more so with scholarships and other awards from private organizations or the government. There are also the younger folks who are privileged to have their parents foot the bill without even seeing a dime come to their own pocket books...
For most of my college life, I have footed the bill for my textbooks but at a sacrifice to something I own or possess. Sure, there was the time my family even believed in my education... but even then it was question of sacrifice.
That was always the "rules of engagement". My family never believed in loans and my luck wasn't too great with scholarships save for only one time. So I would just begin selling memories of my childhood off one-by-one. Things like rare games begin to fade from my collection, all just to fund a book that I would use once and possibly never get near the desired street value again. Once that bastion was exhausted, my last bastion was invaded... My electric guitar. Once I sold that, pretty much most of my childhood relics had finally been lost. Sure, my childhood wasn't too great, but I wish that I never had to lose those pieces of my life. Now, I have had to put aside my commitment to pay off the IRS and another debt... why? I paid $700 to get back into school and I still need to make a "contribution" to my family, before my book expenses...
You can keep your games and fail or you can sell your possessions and learn... Choose!
But let's get down to the cost and tactics for books...
With the modern era, textbooks for classes can easily reach $300 - $500 depending on the required curriculum's requests. There are some instructors feel that the textbook is only an additional "tool" and not a necessity, so that leaves a student to invest time to be in class or the lack of investing in a book becomes the sword that cuts a GPA asunder all from skipping class. There are some which endorse getting the previous edition, prior to the newest printing which is a great way to save some serious cash from the hard depreciation of an older edition. Last way to save a buck or two is just to hit up your local craigslist site and just try searching for the books there... With the advent of social networks, Facebook even has a marketplace where you can plug up ISBN's and they will filter local sales to find local deals. If you're unlucky to be stuck with no one local selling... You have two options:
- Buy from an online vendor and play the waiting game (I got unlucky once and had my book delayed for an entire month once...)
- Buy from the unofficial off-campus bookstore
- Buy directly from the school bookstore.
The first can be a godsend, as there are merchants like abebooks which sells some books for a significant fraction off of the street price. The main caveat is that some of the books are "International Edition" meaning that they were initially sold in other countries, but are still the same book. Which leads me next point, because of the international editions, the books could ship from (for example) Germany. The books are not from abebooks, but they are "marketed" there via third party, much like how Amazon had their "marketplace" set up if you want a used copy of something. Caveat Emptor. (Buyer beware for those not Latin initiated.) The last two can be a bit painful as used can range from $47 - $85 and new from $160 - $200+. The good part is that you are picking up the book in person... so there's no question if you have the wrong book or one that's not compatible with the course.
Of course... now there are the wacky gadgets that instructors require you to buy to get through class. electronic clickers and remotes to electronically respond to pop-quizzes. Those can range from $15 - $20, despite a few teachers saying "A used one should run you a couple bucks in an off-campus book shop." I would hate to be the unfortunate soul who signs up for 2 classes with a requirement to get a JoinIn remote ($20 new) and an iClicker ($20). I was unlucky to be drained to $0 after mine and I still don't have enough money for my books.
Personally, if teachers could say "Log on to my site and you can read the book on my Flash applet" or the school tuition fee could encompass for downloadable books, it'd be great! We should be making use of technology to make education cheaper for the masses. Hell, an e-book device issued out and then "docked" in a class terminal to get a copy of the book would be a great idea. The in-class responders aren't too bad... But why not make the books digital? A few schools are doing this in response that heavy books are hurting the backs of children... Why can't college students get the same deal?
Remember how I had made mention that the iPhone's battery replacement policy would soon come under question? Well, check this article out "2 of our 3 iPhones have faulty batteries". I have 2 links below as the main page may not be up on the original site, but the content has been mirrored.
"2 of our 3 iPhones have faulty batteries" at WirelessInfo.com
"2 of our 3 iPhones have faulty batteries" at DiggMirror.com
Apparently, Wireless Info was not the only group to be in this situation, check out this MacRumors forum thread!
MacRumors Forum - iPhone sub-forum - "Battery Issues"
A point that my friend JJNova had brought up to me on our Ubuntu Dallas meeting was, what will Apple do when people buy the AT&T phone insurance and chalk up a defective battery to AT&T? AT&T will dump the phones off to Apple and say something along the lines of "Phone insurance... you all can refurbish these." Now, if Apple happens to refuse AT&T's recognition of phone insurance, that could end up very sour. Another scenario that could be detrimental is telling AT&T to "fine tune" its insurance policy that faulty batteries are not qualified for a reason for phone insurance. How Apple and AT&T handle this situation could mean big things as well as the future reputation of the iPhone itself.
There are even journals, blogs and news bytes just now sifting through the muck that is the AT&T terms and conditions of the iPhone. Check out the brief summary here at this link. The kicker is how the end user is tracked and limited to how much you can use the wi-fi at your personal leisure. I'll quote it out of the summary link:
To ensure that the Wi-Fi Service is not being used fradulently, AT&T limits your usage of the Wi-Fi Service to 150 uses per month.
So... In the case of a very "connected" college student who may have the following example schedule below:
Breakfast + Wi-Fi iPhone to catch up on the news
Go to class
Connect to hotspot at school a few times to check e-mail and the web at lunch time and breaks
More class
Go home, check up on the wi-fi and dock iPhone for charging
(Optional) Hang out with friends at coffee house with a hotspot and check the web.
That could easily be almost 4-5 connections per day, and over a 30 day span, that could easily be 150 or more connections. In the terms of the AT&T contract, that could be grounds for termination, correct? So users could potentially get slapped a $175 termination fee for excessive freedom of being able to connect to hotspot? What next? AT&T planning to expand their unlimited service plans to an extra $20 just so you can connect to hotspots without limitation? They have to be joking! The last I remembered when I owned a custom unlocked T-mobile MDA, I don't remember Cingular tracking my wi-fi usage or sending me a letter saying "cease and desist your use of your personal network at home or we will terminate your contract immediately" so why start now? It's almost immature to even try suggest that now. I don't see Sprint, Verizon, or Alltel saying you can't use their Pocket PC #6700 on personal wi-fi hotspots. You definitely don't hear T-Mobile or AT&T saying you can use wi-fi on a limitless basis on the T-mobile MDA/Cingular 8125, Cingular 8525, Cingular 3125, T-mobile SDA, T-mobile Dash. That brings the question of: Why bother targeting the iPhone? The business devices have enjoyed unlimited connection to hotspots in addition to crisp calls... Why start now? They knew full and well what they were bringing in with the iPhone...
This stupid wi-fi battle was the main reason that Nokia had an issue with releasing their N91i phone over, all because Nokia did not want their wi-fi feature removed, unlike what happened with the Nokia E62 which is simply a Cingular crippled E61 with no wi-fi. If their excuse to targeting the iPhone's market is "because we want them to use our premium services" then that's a failed point, as the iPhone lacks in 3G technology and Cingular's 3G just got boosted around the time of the iPhone's release to lay claims that they have "fast" 3G speeds. Let's briefly examine the speed standards from the Wikipedia article: "Comparison of Wireless Data Standards"
GSM GPRS: Max Downlink speed - 0.080 mb/sec (80 kb/sec), Max Uplink speed - 0.040 mb/sec (40 kb/sec), Average Downlink: 0.014 mb/sec (14 kb/sec) [Zero's note: Think dial-up]
GSM EDGE: Max Downlink speed - 0.474 mb/sec (474 kb/sec), Max Uplink speed - 0.474 mb/sec (474 kb/sec), Average Downlink: 0.034 mb/sec (34 kb/sec) [Zero's note: Comparable to a great cable internet connection]
UMTS W-CDMA HSPDA (aka 3G): Max Downlink speed - 14.4 mb/sec, Max Uplink speed - 0.384 mb/sec (384 kb/sec), Average Downlink: 0.75 mb/sec (750 kb/sec)
CDMA EV-DO Rev. 0: Max Downlink speed - 2.458 mb/sec, Max Uplink speed - 0.153 mb/sec (153 kb/sec), Average Downlink: 0.75 mb/sec (750 kb/sec)
CDMA EV-DO Rev. A: Max Downlink speed - 3.1 mb/sec, Max Uplink speed - 1.8 mb/sec, Average Downlink: Not available at this time [Zero's Note: It's not implemented by Sprint/Nextel yet, but phones like the HTC Mogul will have an upgrade when it's officially rolled out.]
For those who don't know what the standards go to, I'll give a crash course on which belongs to their appropriate owners.
GSM and UMTS are technologies used by popular American providers like AT&T and T-mobile. While CDMA is used by Sprint/Nextel, Alltel Wireless, and Verizon Wireless.
With the average speeds of 14 kb (GPRS) to 34 kb per second, I really don't see what the harm is with this whole restriction mess. I mean the wi-fi 802.11g standard sees average connections of 10 mb/sec and it's not like AT&T is offering that much in terms of service on the iPhone. Something just isn't adding up right and from a consumer standpoint, it just makes me angry. It would be understandable if they added 3G and wi-fi on the iPhone while selling goods (ringtones and images) and services (Answer Tones) then I could sympathize with their concerns.
If AT&T thinks that they are "fast"... They have probably never even heard, much less experienced the WiMAX standard with a max downlink and uplink rated at 70 mb/sec and average downlinks are rated at less than 10 mb/sec. It's still under experimentation, so don't expect it to hit our shores first. Asia will probably get it first...
Let's take a time-warp back to the days of my youth. Back when 33.6k dial-up was probably some of the fastest and blistering speeds ever experienced in the year 1996. What was popular then? id Software's line up of Doom engine games, 3D realm's famed Duke Nukem 3D, and most of all... door RPG's. A door RPG is one that's simple in concept... Your character is created through some web forms. After creation, you are then given a set of "turns" which are actions you may perform. When you participate in battle, you expend these turns. Turns are then "regenerated" in a real-time conversion (depending on games, it could be an actual 24 hours for new turns or a turn every 5 minutes).
My biggest time sink back in 1996 was a game managed by a Korean internet company trying to it it big with a game titled: "Archmage: Reincarnation from Hell". The plot was simple... The land of Terra is one of death and rebirth. Some are born with the power to destroy the world, the power of the Armageddon Spell. Which on casting it, the mage is vulnerable to attacks while the incantation is being used... The spell takes 10 "days" which on a successful casting, destroys the entire realm of Terra, ending the game. The game lasted for a long while and then eventually development ceased...
What made Archmage so special? It was free and the story was well crafted. Back in the era of 33.6k or 56k dial-up loading extensive images was a death wish. So a game minimal on images and text heavy was essential to craft a successful web game. Archmage did just that. It didn't have fancy graphics, but the competitive game play made for a fun experience. Unfortunately, games had to "move on" with "killer 3D graphics". From there, the debauchery of gaming began. Games where the focus on was making them pretty with the computer generated stuff, but lack of a great story. Don't take that as me referring to all modern day gaming... After all I respect some of the well crafted modern day gems.
Let's return to the era of today: 2007. My buddy Noirsword recommended me to check out a funny game called "The Kingdom of Loathing". The game itself is interesting. The game is in the vein of an door RPG with images, but not anything spectacular... The kicker is that the art is stick figure drawings! Most people would probably think that a low graphics, tons of text, and poor art style would be completely stupid for a game. The charm is that there is lots of internet and gamer satire and humor. Things from the whole "leet' (or spelled 1337) computer culture to internet humor make their rounds, even things such as an item called 31337 7r0wZ0RZ. The story is pretty well crafted to boot. It's more turn based laughs, but with enemies like the Zmobie or the Baseball Bat, it just keeps you going! It's quite a fun game and well worth the time.
If you're into a game with a fun story, goofy art, and great tongue-in-cheek humor, Kingdom of Loathing will not dissapoint! It definitely has an appeal to the older gamer who respects the days when games needed a good story to be profitable. The author does offer nice gifts to players who donate for the server costs of the game... Veteran players say that the new "nerfs" to the errata have made the game harder, but it also presents a fun challenge too.
I am curious to see how some of the other people's speeds compare to mine...
Go to SpeedTest.net and try it out! Reply with a comment or link me to your post!
