Fritzkrieg's Gaming Checklist

Well, since Parappa did it, I'll follow suit (since I admire him so much)

To Do:

- unlock all the planes in Ace Combat 5, then lend it to Parappa
- finish Star Ocean: The Second Story, and eventually go through it again as the second character
- finish Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne
- play through Disgaea, Valkyrie Profile (for the second time), Final Fantasy VIII, and Vagrant Story
- finish Metroid Prime, and Zelda: The Windwaker
- get my arm tied behind my back so that Parappa will be a challenge at Burnout 3
- finish my playthroughs of favorite games I've already finished in the past: Xenogears (almost done), Suikoden II, Final Fantasy VI (recently started)
- get better at Ikaruga
- power up the Game Boy Advance and finish Final Fantasy: Dawn of Souls (FF1 & 2), and FF: Tactics

Antipreneur

Hmmm...

http://www.antipreneur.org/

An "anti-corporate" corporation? Can something like this actually succeed without going the way of Animal Farm?

It's important to realise that corporations are not truly "evil by definition," although they are pretty close. I saw the documentary "The Corporation" a while back, and if I recall correctly they mentioned something about corporations in the United States being bound by law to do what will make their shareholders the most money. I'm not sure if that is entirely true or not. I can imagine a situation, however, in which a corporate charter explicitly states that ethical conduct is of a priority and that investors buy into the company with the understanding that eithical conduct will come before profit margins and investment returns. I can also imagine where such a corporation flops, not only because "non-ethical" corporations out-perform it (which I don't believe is inevitable--there are certain forms of efficiency that come with ethical practices and are generally under-rated), but more-so because most investors (having little conscience) choose not to support such a corporation.

I am reminded of an incident at work, a couple of years ago now, where we had an investment advisor came in one afternoon to talk to the employees about setting up mutual funds. One guy asked if they had any "ethical" investment options, and the investment advisor not only told him "I can't recommend any," but even visably scoffed at the suggestion of such a thing. The attitude, clearly, was that only a fool would choose ethics over investment returns. The system in place is such that one simply forks their money over to big investment firms and doesn't question how they manage to grow that money.

As for Antiprenuer, well, I really like what they are trying to do. Hell, I will probably even support them by buying some of their products. But I don't expect them to become a force in the marketplace, and if by some chance they do manage that, they will almost certainly sell out and become what they were fighting against in the first place. It's so obvious that either of those things will happen that it makes me wonder if they are really even serious to begin with.

My Gamer Checklist

To Do:

- finish Half-Life 2, again
- play against the new Counter-Strike: Source bot
- play Half-Life: Source
- get World of WarCraft and play for 100,000 hours
- finish Resident Evil 4, multiple times
- finish Metal Gear Solid 3 for the second, third, and possibly fourth times, also play more Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes
- finish Disgaea: Hour of Darkness
- start on Phantom Brave
- master Gradius V, find a copy of Gradius III and IV for PS2
- finish Growlanser II and Growlanser III
- play through Xenogears, Xenosaga: Part I, and Xenosaga: Part II
- play Highway to the Reich
- play Korsun Pocket, get Battles in Normandy
- play Shogun: Total War, Medievel: Total War, and Rome: Total War
- play Final Fantasy XII (it'll be out long before I get this far)
- play Gran Turismo 4 for hours and hours (also will be out)
- kick Fritzkrieg's ass at Street Fighter III, Guilty Gear X2, and Burnout 3
- replay Zelda: The Wind Waker, 'cause I burnt-out before finishing it the first time, possibly get Zelda: Minish Cap
- play through Suikoden II, Breath of Fire III, Dragon Warrior VII, Chrono Cross, and Star Ocean: The Second Story
- get 4-player action goin' on in Zelda: Four Swords Adventures, Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles, and Pac-Man Vs.
- play through Neverwinter Nights and Dragon Age (should be out by this time)
- borrow Ace Combat 5 from Fritzkrieg and finish that

Hmmmm... I'm sure I'm forgetting something vitally important here...

Loyalty

I've already practically talked Fritzkrieg's ear off about this in person (and in a rather rambing and incoherent fashion, I might add), but I'm going to mention it here in a relatively terse manner: lately I've been preoccupied with the simple, common-sense notion that loyalty is a two-way street. More specifically, I've been thinking about how many leaders, organizations, and causes fail to maintain interest or support because although they demand the loyalty of their followers, they don't recognize that they must be at least as loyal to their subordinates, members, or fans.

For instance, you have George Lucas and the whole Star Wars phenominon. Unquestionably, there have been and are fans that are loyal to Star Wars. There have also been fans who have withdrawn their support for Star Wars--in whole or in part--because they felt betrayed by George Lucas's latest additions to the Star Wars saga (eps 1, 2, and soon 3.) In other words, Lucas failed to be loyal to some Star Wars fans.

Or consider some of the character interactions that occur in The Lord of the Rings, what with Denethor and such. He is quick to demand loyalty and even to invoke the word "loyalty," but he himself feels no obligation to demonstrate loyalty to those under his control. This is certainly one of his many failings.

The main point I am driving at here is that a lot of people seem to think that given power over others, they are entitled to loyalty from those others but are not required to demonstrate any loyalty towards them. People with a lot of power can often get away with this attitude and the mistakes that it breeds for a long time, but they will never be as successful as they could have been otherwise. What's more, it's not uncommon for someone who overestimated the loyalty they are afforded by others to lose power because of it--Lucas must have lost some influential fans, for instance, whereas his fan base could potentially have grown all the more strong if he had demonstrated loyalty. I have seen in my own workplace where those in leadership roles who choose to bully their subordinates eventually lose control of those subordinates, whereas others who are more respectful in their management style are much better able to keep their subordinates focused and motivated.

...every time a bell rings...

Season's Greetings/Happy New Year/Whathefuckever

from Ninjayo

(better late than never)

Corporate Management

A couple of weeks ago, I was browsing a translation of Sun Tzu's "The Art of War" over at The Gutenberg Project (free books online!)--you know, just for fun. I guess I'm that kind of pretentious bastard. Anyway, the point at the time was to amuse myself with all of the subtle truths contained therein that management at my job was clearly not following, and I had a good little chuckle about that. But it got me to thinking.

Over the course of a few weeks, I began to realise something that I hadn't considered at first. When I was thinking about how the "command structure" here at work fails to follow Sun Tzu's advice, I was thinking in terms of the employees being troops and their managers being commanders. What I came to realise is that this paradigm is not the best fit--rather, the managers are an army, and the employees are an enemy army. Re-reading the relevant bits from the version of "The Art of War" that I have makes it painfully clear that management is, in fact, more aware of such basic truths than I had first thought.

My New Computer, Finally

Well, I have a new computer--sorta. Faced with the reality of not being able to responsibly afford a new $1500 computer for many months yet, I converted what I was using as a Unix box (a bare-bones Athlon 2500 XP in a Soltek mobo--overkill for what I was using it for) into a Windows XP box using some mid-range gaming hardware (a Radeon 9600 and 512 MB of extra ram) that I had been using to play games during my lunch break at work. I also invested in a new 200 gig HD for the occasion. The result is that I have a zippy, quiet PC that doesn't run games ideally, but is good enough to play Half-Life 2 with reasonable settings.

Old Comp:
- Athlon 650 MHz Slot A CPU
- ASUS K7V mobo
- GeForce 2 Pro, 32 MB cache video
- 256 + 128 MB RAM
- 120 gig HD w 2 MB cache
- does well with Quake 3, Max Payne
- KOTOR chugs, but runs

New Comp:
- Athlon 2500+ XP (1.35 Ghz) Socket A CPU
- Soltek NForce2 series mobo
- Radeon 9600 Pro, 256 MB cache video
- 512 + 256 MB RAM
- 200 gig HD w 8 MB cache
- does well with Unreal Tournament 2004
- Half-Life 2 definitely playable

Shhh!

Here's something amusing: a series of courtesy cards that can be handed out to people who have loud conversations on their cell phones.

http://www.coudal.com/Shhh.pdf

There are a couple of other neat things on the site as well:
http://www.coudal.com