I made spanakopita today. Unfortunately, I didn't take a picture, so you'll just have to believe my claim that it looked nice. It didn't really look like the photo on that Wikipedia entry; ours was a lighter gold color, and had a bit higher pastry-to-filling ratio. It tasted great; we splurged on some really nice quality feta cheese, and it was definitely worth it. I've had a roll of phyllo dough wasting space in the freezer for months, and this was both a great way to use it up and a fun experiment with a dish I've never made before.
I mentioned some ideas for games I'm working on in my last post. Brian offered to help out with a web game, but I'm not sure how to get hold of him anymore. So Brian, if you're still reading: Send me an email and I'll run my idea by you.
I tried out Minecraft today, although that poor guy probably doesn't need any more links. Penny Arcade did a couple of comics about what a great game it is, and since they're one of the most popular gaming comics on the web (they're #1 or #2), the Minecraft web-site immediately crashed under the load of interested gamers going to try it out. The basic idea seems to be that you wonder around, punching trees, which gives you wood, which you use to make tools, which you use to dig a hole, where you can find diamond and ore, which you use to build a castle and weapons to defend yourself from the zombies. Also: You can build roller coasters, just because. It is, in fact, fun.
Minecraft is also yet another example of publisher-less publishing, and the value of getting attention--the guy managed to get a few thousand registrations over the past 6 months, but in the past few weeks I believe he's made somewhat more than a million dollars. His Paypal account was frozen because they were worried something fishy was going on (600,000 euros in a week!), but as soon as he can get that taken care of, he'll be independently wealthy. Good luck to him.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Sunday, September 12, 2010
A New Post
At the encouragement of my wife, who is a good person, I'm posting another blog post. I don't know that I really have anything especially interesting to say. I suppose I will just sort of blather and hope that it works out.
I've been thinking quite a bit about hobbies lately. There's quite a lot of things I'm interested in doing. I enjoy writing music, writing video games, and writing stories. I suppose all of these things have "writing" in common. However, at the moment, I'm kind of between projects -- I have some old, half done things that I could pick up again, or I could try and start something new. I've though of trying to do some software work to help make next year's GEEX conference better, for example. I've also thought of trying to start my own online web game (a major obstacle there being that I would need to learn quite a lot, so it would have to be something really simple). I've also got a bunch of half-finished video games lying around, waiting for a little more attention to make them playable. The same goes for songs -- I've got a whole bunch of rhythm tracks, bass tracks, and interesting chord patterns sitting on my computer, waiting for a little more attention.
Arguably, the trick is to focus on just one thing, so that I can make a lot of satisfying progress with it. Right now, the most likely candidate for getting more attention is an old scripting language/game that I was working on a while back, and which has some really interesting stuff that I could expand on. I don't know. I guess I also feel like, even if I were to push this stuff through to completion, would anyone ever actually play with it, listen to it, or read it? Self-motivated projects are fragile things.
Anyway, that's what I was thinking about today.
I've been thinking quite a bit about hobbies lately. There's quite a lot of things I'm interested in doing. I enjoy writing music, writing video games, and writing stories. I suppose all of these things have "writing" in common. However, at the moment, I'm kind of between projects -- I have some old, half done things that I could pick up again, or I could try and start something new. I've though of trying to do some software work to help make next year's GEEX conference better, for example. I've also thought of trying to start my own online web game (a major obstacle there being that I would need to learn quite a lot, so it would have to be something really simple). I've also got a bunch of half-finished video games lying around, waiting for a little more attention to make them playable. The same goes for songs -- I've got a whole bunch of rhythm tracks, bass tracks, and interesting chord patterns sitting on my computer, waiting for a little more attention.
Arguably, the trick is to focus on just one thing, so that I can make a lot of satisfying progress with it. Right now, the most likely candidate for getting more attention is an old scripting language/game that I was working on a while back, and which has some really interesting stuff that I could expand on. I don't know. I guess I also feel like, even if I were to push this stuff through to completion, would anyone ever actually play with it, listen to it, or read it? Self-motivated projects are fragile things.
Anyway, that's what I was thinking about today.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
I'm Engaged!
I proposed today, so it's official -- I'm going to be married sometime this summer. Precisely when this summer, and precisely where the marriage will be taking place, and precisely what kind of reception there will be, etc. etc. is all undecided.
It's still a little over 3 months away, so it's not like there's a huge rush, but there certainly is a ton that needs doing.
For some reason, I'm very cheerful. This is probably related?
It's still a little over 3 months away, so it's not like there's a huge rush, but there certainly is a ton that needs doing.
For some reason, I'm very cheerful. This is probably related?
Tuesday, March 02, 2010
Almost Democracy: The Death of Hukou?
If you read the title, you may be wondering: "What is hukou?" In China, there is a system where everyone is classified according to where they are supposed to live: In the countryside, or in the city. It's a form of segregation, except that instead of being divided along any kind of racial lines, it's built around where you were born.
This system's been around for around sixty years, and it's heavily entrenched in China's socialist legal code. If you're from the countryside, your benefits, medical care, and welfare all assume that you work as a farmer or similar. People who live in the city get corresponding city benefits.
The problem is that most of China's progress has been in the cities. The cities are where the economy is growing, it's where the prosperity is improving, it's where you can get an education, and it's where you can get ahead in the world. The countryside, by comparison, has stagnated. In a mirror of the west's urbanization, rural Chinese have migrated en masse to the city to find work and a better life.
The problem? Their documents do not entitle them to government-provided services in the city, and under communism, that's pretty much everything. These "migrant workers" live anywhere they can, get medical care however they can, and get an education wherever they can, if at all. In short, they are the city's second-class citizens, and they have the second-class wages to prove it. The Chinese government didn't intend for them to be in the city--their destiny was to become farmers. It's a long-standing problem, and something really ought to be done. And that's where it gets interesting.
Just recently, several newspapers in China called for the abolition of hukou. There are a few notable points here: The editorial was printed by more than a dozen newspapers, which sends a message of solidarity; if it were just one paper, it could be classified as a dissident voice, but it isn't. So this is interesting on a lot of levels -- firstly, it's the press criticizing government policy in a communist country. Secondly, there is a reasonable expectation that the government will listen -- the editorial is hardly a call to arms, but rather an appeal to authority to act. Thirdly, it suggests that China may be evolving mechanisms of policy correction, even in its nigh-total absence of democratic institutions.
In our own political theory, the free press is considered a vital corrective force, a check against governmental abuse. It's interesting to see the press function that way even in a society where the press is not particularly free, and where the general population can't vote to throw out officials they don't like.
This system's been around for around sixty years, and it's heavily entrenched in China's socialist legal code. If you're from the countryside, your benefits, medical care, and welfare all assume that you work as a farmer or similar. People who live in the city get corresponding city benefits.
The problem is that most of China's progress has been in the cities. The cities are where the economy is growing, it's where the prosperity is improving, it's where you can get an education, and it's where you can get ahead in the world. The countryside, by comparison, has stagnated. In a mirror of the west's urbanization, rural Chinese have migrated en masse to the city to find work and a better life.
The problem? Their documents do not entitle them to government-provided services in the city, and under communism, that's pretty much everything. These "migrant workers" live anywhere they can, get medical care however they can, and get an education wherever they can, if at all. In short, they are the city's second-class citizens, and they have the second-class wages to prove it. The Chinese government didn't intend for them to be in the city--their destiny was to become farmers. It's a long-standing problem, and something really ought to be done. And that's where it gets interesting.
Just recently, several newspapers in China called for the abolition of hukou. There are a few notable points here: The editorial was printed by more than a dozen newspapers, which sends a message of solidarity; if it were just one paper, it could be classified as a dissident voice, but it isn't. So this is interesting on a lot of levels -- firstly, it's the press criticizing government policy in a communist country. Secondly, there is a reasonable expectation that the government will listen -- the editorial is hardly a call to arms, but rather an appeal to authority to act. Thirdly, it suggests that China may be evolving mechanisms of policy correction, even in its nigh-total absence of democratic institutions.
In our own political theory, the free press is considered a vital corrective force, a check against governmental abuse. It's interesting to see the press function that way even in a society where the press is not particularly free, and where the general population can't vote to throw out officials they don't like.
Saturday, February 06, 2010
I have no idea for a post
This post is largely free of any intellectual content whatsoever. I just dropped by and noticed "wow, it's sure been a long time since I last posted!" So I figured I'd just type something out, stream of consciousness style, edit lightly, and hit the orange button.
It has long been an observation of mine that when my friends acquire girlfriends, the vast majority of their free time disappears. "Fascinating," I thought, "girlfriends appear to eat nearly all of one's free time." Then, somewhat to my surprise, I found myself girlfriended, and surely enough, the vast majority of my free time immediately evaporated. "Where did it go?" I wonder to myself, sometimes. I'll have to ask her if she knows.
I'm going to go and help a coworker move tomorrow. If anyone would like to come along and help, I could use the help. Since he's moving within the Salt Lake valley, I plan to also spend some time in Salt Lake, possibly acquiring chocolate and/or Ikea furniture. These are both things which are more interestingly obtained in Salt Lake.
Badly spoken English is something of a pet peeve of mine. For some reason, this seems to hold true even when the English is, strictly speaking, French. I present this specimen: voila. This French word means something like "look there!" It is often accompanied by pointing. The problem is that, in the hands of non-French speakers, this word is frequently mutated into "viola," a pleasant but totally unrelated musical instrument. Today, I actually heard someone SAY viola when they MEANT voila. I winced.
Thus, I invent this rhyme:
I before O is played with a bow,
but swap them around to show what you've found.
Perhaps you can think of a better one. My brother once told me about an online text-adventure game he played, in which one could find a character called "the ghost of the English language." The ghost could confer upon you the power to use the public chat channels, but before it did so would give you a quiz about proper English usage. Players were not allowed to speak on the chat channels until they had achieved a full 100% score on the quiz, which they could take as many times as they liked. When one succeeded at the quiz, the ghost would say "now go forth, and avenge my death!"
That is all.
It has long been an observation of mine that when my friends acquire girlfriends, the vast majority of their free time disappears. "Fascinating," I thought, "girlfriends appear to eat nearly all of one's free time." Then, somewhat to my surprise, I found myself girlfriended, and surely enough, the vast majority of my free time immediately evaporated. "Where did it go?" I wonder to myself, sometimes. I'll have to ask her if she knows.
I'm going to go and help a coworker move tomorrow. If anyone would like to come along and help, I could use the help. Since he's moving within the Salt Lake valley, I plan to also spend some time in Salt Lake, possibly acquiring chocolate and/or Ikea furniture. These are both things which are more interestingly obtained in Salt Lake.
Badly spoken English is something of a pet peeve of mine. For some reason, this seems to hold true even when the English is, strictly speaking, French. I present this specimen: voila. This French word means something like "look there!" It is often accompanied by pointing. The problem is that, in the hands of non-French speakers, this word is frequently mutated into "viola," a pleasant but totally unrelated musical instrument. Today, I actually heard someone SAY viola when they MEANT voila. I winced.
Thus, I invent this rhyme:
I before O is played with a bow,
but swap them around to show what you've found.
Perhaps you can think of a better one. My brother once told me about an online text-adventure game he played, in which one could find a character called "the ghost of the English language." The ghost could confer upon you the power to use the public chat channels, but before it did so would give you a quiz about proper English usage. Players were not allowed to speak on the chat channels until they had achieved a full 100% score on the quiz, which they could take as many times as they liked. When one succeeded at the quiz, the ghost would say "now go forth, and avenge my death!"
That is all.
Wednesday, January 06, 2010
Greetings, oh vast public.Ever had one of those nights where you don't sleep much so you end up falling asleep really early the next day and then you wake up around 10 PM and you can't sleep at all the following night? Yeah, me too. And since I've completely run out of RSS feeds to read, web-sites to visit, e-mails to respond to, missionaries to write to, and web games to update, I have resorted to the bottom of the barrel, and you are getting a blog update.
The photo-shopped church sign, by the way, is mine. I don't know if I've posted it before, but I liked the result so I've had it sitting on my desktop for ages. If it made you smile in vague amusement then it has done its job.
Speaking of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, I'm a regular Kiva user. I have a hundred or so dollars which I regularly flip through their loaning machine, and which is used to provide small loans to entrepreneurs who are trying to create a livelihood (usually in other countries, but sometimes in poorer parts of the U.S.). Kiva allows users to count their loans toward teams, and maintains a ranking of which teams are providing the most loans. "Kiva Mormons," the team which I usually count toward, is just a handful of loans behind the "Flying Spaghetti Monster" team, and there's some competition to try and recruit more people so that we can pull ahead.
There have been some people in the team that worry that competitiveness is not a good motivation for charitable work. This got me thinking, especially since I heard of this verse in the Koran:
For every one of you [Jews, Christians, Muslims], We have appointed a path and a way. If God had willed, He would have made you but one community; but that [He has not done in order that] He may try you in what has come to you. So compete with one another in good works.
I think "compete with one another in good works" is a great way for religions to relate to one another. If you believe you are God's true church, make an argument with deeds rather than words. I can also think of a nod to this in Christianity:
Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.
This is more advice for those who are trying to discern true religion from false, but it's also a reminder to those of us who call ourselves the true religion -- we ought to be producing good fruit. So yes, I think that competing in good works has a sound basis. And with that, just 93 more loans to pass the spaghetti people!
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