Reviews

Spore: DRM Backlash

Wayne Hartman — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 17:34:56 GMT

C|Net News has an interesting blog post highlighting Spore from EA Games. This game has been in the works for a couple of years now and its unique gameplay and concept have stoked the fires of anticipation for some time. However, one of the biggest things to come out with its release has not been its intriguing gameplay, but the strategies used to curb piracy. Spore uses a anti-copy protection scheme called SecuROM, which is considered by some to be much more than just an anti-copy protection scheme, but system subversive malware.

The controversy seems to seems to revolve around EA's activation scheme that only let's you install the game a total of three times. If your computer hard drive crashes, you reinstall Windows, you remove the game because you don't want to play it anymore--all legitimate activities on your computer-- don't matter because EA doesn't want people to pirate it. If you take a gander to the Pirate Bay, you can see that the numbers are quite substantive and send a very clear message: Consumers don't like DRM. At the time of this publication there were over 6000 seeders and nearly 20,000 leechers actively downloading a torrent of the cracked version of the full game. C|Net points at estimates that the game has been illegally downloaded nearly half a million times!

It seems that backlash seems to be making a very pointed comment on the state of DRM and anti-piracy efforts: the more you push honest people with malware-like software to keep them in check, the more you are going to drive them to do dishonest things. DRM only hurts, or is an inconvenience, to those who want to pay for creative works. The pirates will always find a way to do defeat and circumvent control mechanisms. But, as Princess Leia succinctly put: "The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers."

Cuil, The New Kid On The Search Block

Wayne Hartman — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 14:06:39 GMT

It seems that the arena of search has been relatively quiet since the search wares of the late 90s, so it has been a welcome surprise to see someone else rise up to challenge the search status quo since Google rose to the top. What's interesting is that Cuil, the new 'contextual' search engine, hails from Stanford lineage, like its Google predecessor. Even still, it's gray and blue on black color motif tries to distance itself both as much as possible from the giant. This only serves as a distraction, since it displays results in 2 or 3 columns, making it difficult to scan for results.

One of the issues that I've had with it are its inconsistencies. Last night I search for 'Wayne Hartman' and was greeted with a page that told me that it didn't have any results out of all the 120 billion pages it has indexed. When you compare that with all the leading search engines, something like that seems disappointing.

Another issue that I had was broken links--especially for their 'About Cuil' page. You'd think that if you wanted to be a serious player in the search business, you wouldn't have broken links--especially on your home page.

So will I use it? No. Half the time it isn't able to return search results, reading it takes more effort that its worth, and I really question the relevancy of results. Meh, I'll just stick with the king of the hill for now.

Another Apple Product Added To The Ranks

Wayne Hartman — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 19:20:05 GMT

Today I added another Apple product to the ranks of computer junk I have. After adding upgrading my wireless access point to WPA, I found it to be sluggish, and at times, outright unresponsive. Sometimes it would take up to two minutes for my iPod to connect! I attributed this to the access point itself. The previous firmware revision for it didn't support WPA, and the latest (and likely last) firmware update for it didn't seem very stable. It all came to a head yesterday when I accidentally got locked out of my house and I couldn't join my access point outside my home because it decided to go on the fritz again.

So last night, I hatched a plan to get a new access point. The problem was that I didn't feel like going to my wife to ask for some money because I had to burn a bitter amount on calling the locksmith out, so I couldn't just go buy one outright. Then, I remembered that I still had a $300 gift card from Apple. At that moment I realized that I could get an Airport Extreme Base Station and wouldn't cost me a thing. The added bonus is that it supports printer sharing, too.

So I went out there today and bought one. Setup was a little tricky, but I was able to get it quickly up and running. Some of the features that I really liked is the ability to put in 'bridged' mode where it doesn't create a separate network, but wirelessly extends your existing one. That combined with WPA2 encryption with RADIUS support, just beefs up the security even more.

After plugging everything in and setting everything up, I found out that connecting to the AP was extremely quick! Problem solved! My iPod Touch instantly authenticated after supplying my credentials, and didn't have to wait at all for to surf or check email.

Connecting the printer, on the other hand, was a little more tricky. You can plug it in, and it instantly detects it, but getting clients connected can be a pain. I found that the Bonjour service was pretty much useless to connect because I would get an error message that said: "You do not have sufficient privileges to connect to this printer." Oh really? I was, however, able to resolve the issue by following the steps outlined in this article I found online: http://www.ifelix.co.uk/tech/1004.html It completely eliminates the use of the Bonjour utility to add the printer to your computer.

After setting that up my network is now completely up! I get great wireless range, but as mentioned, the fast connect times are what really makes me happy this product.

Review: Indiana Jones

Wayne Hartman — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 03:19:58 GMT

There are a few movie franchises that have certain nostalgic value to me over the years. Star Wars (the originals of course), to name one, the other being Indiana Jones.

I remember when I was young and Raiders of the Lost Ark came out on VHS. My parents rented it along with a VCR machine (yeah, can you imagine renting a DVD player?), and we watched it at home. It was a pretty cool movie for a young kid, until the very end. Watching the bad guys' faces melt, explode, and vaporize wasn't a delightful affair, but all in all it was a cool movie. Temple of Doom wasn't too bad in that regard, but The Last Crusade was definitely more tame.

This time around Indy has aged quite a bit, the Reds have taken the Nazi's place as the government of doom, but I have to admit that the WMD this go around was a bit campy. Aliens? C'mon! Indy isn't a SciFi any more than X-Files was about treasure hunting. And the hunt smelled too much of National Treasure (or is it the other way around?)

In the end, they could have made nearly the same movie, cut the alien crap, still criss-crossed the Amazon, gone to the same temple, and ended it quite differently with much more stunning results. But having some flying saucer unearth itself from the jungle and poof into another dimension was just a little too cheesy for me.

I loved the 1950's tie ins and the political turmoil from the Red Scare, but the bad guys never seemed too threatening. It seemed like Indy had too much upperhand time. I really liked RotLA because right when Indy got the upper hand, the Nazis got right back and vice versa. This time it seemed like he was in control the whole time.

But will I buy it on DVD? Well, I'm going to have to watch it one more time. I wasn't too impressed the first time around. This movie 'jumped the shark' in more than one place. The scene where Marion drives the boat off a cliff and safely into the water was just goofy.

Like my experience with the prequel Star Wars movies, maybe nostalgia played too much a part in my disappointment (I'm surprised that Jar-Jar didn't make cameo appearance, what with aliens and all), so maybe a second take would assuage my wounded fond memories of what was a great trilogy.

Windows Need To Be Cleaned

Wayne Hartman — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 23:38:15 GMT

It's been well over a month since my last post. I've been preparing a new home, moving in, getting situated, etc.

CNet News has a good article on how Microsoft Windows needs a new start. I've been saying this since Vista came out, so it's nice to see someone in the industry speaking out on it.

To put it succinctly, Microsoft needs to start over. Windows has so much feature bloat that it really detracts from the experience. Windows XP pretty much had everything anyone could want as far as features, and if MS had built a new presentation layer just for it, we would all be set. MS intends to build Windows 7, the next release of the OS, on the same core as Vista, which seems like a big mistake.

You see, Windows has had to carry a lot of baggage over the past two decades from all the different design decisions they've made. Starting over has been all but impossible because of the need to maintain compatibility for all the software that has been written, which puts a damper on being able to something new and fresh from a technology perspective.

But a lot has happened in the past few years. Great leaps in technology allow end users to run previous operating systems on the same hardware in the form of virtual machines, making it possible to maintain the compatibility the software needs, as well as make a leap to a new platform for the future.

But, as the article points out, there hasn't been any real incentive for MS to do that--until now. Vista sales are lackluster, enterprises are opting out of upgrading to Vista and are looking to Windows 7, and Apple has made great strides in gobbling up greater market share.

This isn't the end for MS, but one cannot argue that since its release of Vista, MS has been in a bit of a funk. We'll see what the future holds.

First Impressions: Firefox 3 RC1

Wayne Hartman — Tue, 20 May 2008 02:19:21 GMT

With the announcement that Firefox 3 had entered release candidate status, I finally decided to install it and check it all out.

Installation is pretty simple and for those who are already Firefox aficionados, there are only a few subtle, but powerful differences in this new edition of one of the best browsers out there.

One of the key differences in this latest release is FF's new look. Mozilla made a concerted effort to make the browser feel integrated with whichever OS it is installed. This means that FF on OS X *looks* like a native Carbon app. FF on XP looks just as integrated as Internet Explorer. FF on Ubuntu Linux feels like it was part of the overall desktop theme. This is cool *if* your OS has a good theme going on. I usually run the Windows Classic theme on Windows XP, and to be honest, FF looks like junk when compared to its FF 2 predecessor. It actually inspired me to change to one of the other XP themes, just so it'd look OK. Customization allows you to override that, of course, but at this point there aren't very many themes to download and install.

Another detail that they've enhanced from a functionality perspective has been the download manager. You can do real stop and resume downloading, as well as perform searches against downloads. Another cool feature is that the time remaining information has been integrated into the status bar of the main browser window so that you know the download progress without having to have the download window visible.

A more subtle improvement (that I particularly enjoy) is being able to resize the address and search bar. As a software engineer, I end up doing searches on error messages that can get lengthy, so being able to expand and contract the search box to fit my query is a nice touch.

One noticeable difference is what has been termed 'The Keyhole'. Most traditional navigation buttons like Back, Forward, navigation history, etc. share equal prominence on the toolbar. In FF3, however, greater prominence has been given to the Back button, while the other nav buttons take a more diminutive role in navigation. I don't know that I like/dislike the change, just that it's different. Whenever you change something that users expect, you cause quite a bit of psychological dissonance that UI designers should take great care to avoid. We'll see how this plays out.

So is it a keeper? YES! There will be some lag time between getting updated themes, extensions, et all, but that comes with the territory. I can't wait until the final release comes out!

After the Honeymoon: The iPod Touch

Wayne Hartman — Sun, 04 May 2008 05:39:22 GMT

I've had an iPod Touch for a little while now, and have found it to do pretty much everything that I had hoped for it. It didn't take me very long before I jailbroke it, and the fact of the matter is, you'll never maximize the potential of it until you do. Apple's core set of applications leave the device wanting, but jailbreaking it brings out all the things that peoplle want in a mobile device, especially one as innovative as this.

I bought the device primarily to surf the net. It does It fantastically with the caveats of a missing Flash plugin. That glaring mistake aside, the iPhone/iPod Touch brings new meaning to the pairing of mobile devices and the Internet. Surprisingly though, I find myself reading ebooks on this little thing. I first started out with 1984 and Brave New World, and quickly moved to more contemporary science fiction like Star Wars.

So, with the honeymoon over, what do I not like? Well, I don't care for the limited set of gestures that it supports. This hampers anything with dragable support on a web page, as well as limiting things like copy and paste. Of all the things to include in a device, you would think that's one of the basic to be included.

If I had had the opportunity to purchase it again, would I? Absolutely! The thing is such a joy to use, and I feel like I can multitask web, email, etc much better than before. Updates are coming in June, so I look forward to extending its functionality even further.

Post From My New iPod Touch

Wayne Hartman — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 03:39:13 GMT

Today I was able to sell my old 80GB iPod to subsidize the cost of buying a new 16GB iPod Touch. I'd been stewing ever since it came out last September, but really didn't get too excited until the SDK was announced earlier this year. The one thing I really wish this thing had is Flash player. Many of the sites I frequent have Flash videos, so it kinda defeats the purpose of surfing the Internet without. Oh well, this is a pretty sweet piece of hardware, and I look forward to cruising the 'nEt with it.

Getters/Setters For Visual Studio 2008

Wayne Hartman — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 00:33:34 GMT

I've been able to get my hands (through legitimate means) on a copy of Visual Studio 2008 Professional Edition. I installed it this evening and wanted to take it for a spin.

Initial reaction: just the same as VS2005. One of my biggest gripes about the VS environment is its complete, utter lack of getters/setters generation. Sure, you can right click on each of your private fields and generate them, but that takes a long time, not to mention that it places the property at the top of your code and clutters it up. This should have been fixed in Visual Studio 2005, but puh-lease what's the excuse for not putting it in 2008?

I had recently found a add-in to do this in Visual Studio 2005, called VsPropertyGenerator 2005, but it wasn't working in 2008. My blood was boiling with each link that I clicked to find a similar solution for VS2008, but I did find a work around. All you have to do is follow the installation instructions for it and edit some files. Now, open the VSPropertyGenerator2.AddIn file in a text editor and you'll see that you have a plain XML markup there. Find the <Version> tag, replace 8.0 with 9.0, and voilà it should now work.

Microsoft, I forgave you for not having this in VS2003. It was your first crack in the OO world. But we are on your third release of your .NET IDE, so please make this a default feature of your IDE.

Guitar Hero III Problems Magnify Wii Flaw

Wayne Hartman — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 23:41:51 GMT

Guitar Hero III has indisputably been a smash hit on all three of the major game consoles, but one glaring mistake has tainted the Wii release of the acclaimed music game.

Apparently, Activision decided to ship the game with mono sound, not the advertised Dolby Pro Logic. How could they not have known??? Not that the game is any less fun, it just doesn't sound as good. Activision had admitted to the problem, but it wasn't until last month that they announced that a replacement disc would be in the works sometime 'early 2008'. What? A replacement disc?

I guess one of the glaring shortfalls of the Wii Console is its updatability for 3rd parties. Sure you can grab firmware updates for the Wii itself, but for gaffes likes this, you think as a 3rd party developer you'd be able to push updates to your product. While details are scant on how the disc exchange program will work, they have set up a 'pre-registration' so you can get a replacement disc as soon as they are ready. I'm hoping with all hope that it doesn't end up being a 'send us your disc and 8-10 weeks later you'll get your replacement' deal. It'd be great (at least in this case) if they teamed up with local game retailers like Game Stop/EB Games, Game Crazy, etc, to do the exchange at our convenience.

On the other hand, I can also see why Nintendo would not want to open that up. It used to be back in the good ol' days, you got a game cartridge and that was it. If you were a game developer, you had to make sure that the game as flawless. There were no patches, no Internet, etc. You had to get it right the first time. The ability of consoles to self-update, though, made it so that companies could deliver a product sooner, albeit with a few bugs or missing features. To me it encourages a sloppiness which erases one of the benefits of playing games on a console versus a PC.

In the end, though, Activision needs to get its act together and bend over backwards, do flips cartwheels--whatever it takes--so that I can play GH3 uninterrupted in Stereo. No excuses.

UPDATE 20 JAN 2008 22:48

Well, my worst fears have been confirmed. It looks like I'm going to have to ship my game disc back and live without being able to play for a while. Here's an email I got from Activision support:

We wanted to provide you with an update regarding the status of the Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Wii replacement discs. The game has been approved by Nintendo and is currently in manufacturing. We expect to have the replacement discs available in February. Once we have the discs, we will contact you and then proactively send you a prepaid return envelop with a game exchange claim form. You should return the completed form with your current copy of the game. Once we receive a completed claim form and game, we will send you the replacement disc. We thank you for your patience and support.

Activision

Lame. 'Proactive' would be more along the lines of 'hey, we'll setup the exchange with major retailers because we dorked up hardcore and we should inconvenience ourselves because of it'.

Guitar Hero III has indisputably been a smash hit on all three of the major game consoles, but one glaring mistake has tainted the Wii release of the acclaimed music game.

In the end, though, Activision needs to get its act together and bend over backwards, do flips cartwheels--whatever it takes--so that I can play GH3 uninterrupted in Stereo. No excuses.

UPDATE 18 FEB 2008 19:35

Well, I got a SASE in the mail on Saturday and a form to get my replacement disc. Activision says that it will take 3-4 weeks for a replacement disc to arrive. Bummer.

UPDATE 07 MAR 2008 17:10

It has returned! I got a little hard envelope with my disc and note inside:

Dear Valued Activision/RedOctane Customer,

Enclosed is your Guitar Hero III:Legends of Rock Wii Replacement Disc. We sincerely thank you for your patience and understanding. Please be advised that this re-masted disc should correct the audio issues you may have experienced. If you have any questions, or need any additional support regarding the remastered disc, please don't hesitate to contact Activision Customer Support at www.activision.com/support. Once again, thank you for supporting Guitar Hero.
Sincerely,
Activision/RedOctane

Now this is the sound I was waiting for! The game sounds spectacular!