Very recently (as in within the past couple of hours), I joined this social network/game called Empire Avenue (EA). It stemmed from being invited to this Facebook app/website called Klout, which some of you may be aware of. Unfortunately, I found out it was in violation of the UK Data Protection Act (granted, the posts are from November 2011, but Wikipedia hasn’t been updated to change the fact), so after I googled this little tidbit of information, I found out there were alternatives, such as PeerIndex (PI) (which I’ve also signed up to) and the aforementioned Empire Avenue. PeerIndex is nothing hugely special, apart from the fact it doesn’t violate the DPA and it’d based in the UK. However, it will suit my needs… not being able to change my username is a bit of a pain, but I’ll live. Anyway, PI basically links to your Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn (as well as 2 others that I don’t have) profiles and analyses them to see what sort of influence, and the like you have. According to it (though it’s not finished analysing stuff), my Index is 43, which isn’t too far behind GOG at 50, which makes me wonder if I really have that much influence. Time will tell I guess.

Anyway, EA is very much the same sort of tool, but it offers more options to connect (such as Flickr, WordPress, YouTube, FourSquare, Google+ and the only one I don’t have, Instagram) as well as being able to link Facebook Pages, though it seems to be more FB Apps to be honest. Anyway, this brings me to the second part of the title, given PI and EA were both about getting social, and gauging my actual influence (as well as expanding my reach) within the networks I’m a part of, plus it is a great way of exposing yourself to new people, especially if you see yourself as a brand, which ties into the personal value mention above, but more on this later. Anyway, from what I gather, EA is a much expanded version of Klout and PI, and incorporates elements of Facebook in the sense you have what is a wall and status updates, plus you also have something that is a bit like Friends For Sale, which is what intrigues me the most about it, and reminds me about what Wilson Luna said about adding value, and also I believe he was saying you should set yourself up as a personal brand (he certainly suggested registering your name as a domain name!). Anyway, the way it works is that you invest shares in people, and from what I gather, like an actual share market, the shares appriciate and depreciate in value.

You increase your available Eaves (the site’s currency) through connecting your social network accounts to it, inviting friends and getting achievements. In addition to spending money on people shares, you can purchase perks and upgrades, which is where the game element comes in (though it comes in with the achievements too). From what I gather, in order to increase your share value, you must be active both on the site and also within your social networks (and thankfully too, blogs… but you need 5 “approvals” first). So essentially, I expect this post to increase the value of my shares once I’m done with it. I also expect my other activity to do the same, which is a rather interesting concept when you think about it; everything you do adds value and therefore, the more value you add, the more people invest in you, because as I was told, “people don’t invest in products or services, they invest in people” and in EA, this is taken very much literal. I do like the idea, because it rewards you for participation, and exposes your personal brand (i.e.: you) to a wider “market”, meaning more people get to see what you get up to and hopefully it’ll mean more footfall on your sites/spaces (be it follows, comments, fans and so on). One thing I noticed though is it really shows you how many places you are, which is a lot of food for thought.

I actually realised it from Klout (given it had more connection options), but it’s still pretty amazing how much of my life is online, though to be honest it seems to be like that for anyone who is a geek, relies on the internet for their business or anyone who makes extensive use of social networks (my top 3 are Facebook, Twitter and Flickr and even here is linked into Twitter which is linked into Facebook which means that I won’t have to push things everywhere, thus saving me time). Anyway, if this post seems to reek of attention whorishness, that’s because in a way that’s pretty much what the post is about; but before you dismiss me, it isn’t just about me (even though I’m talking about my social influence), it’s about how this can work for anyone wishing to get themselves out there more. If you have a blog or many, it’s certainly worth considering getting signed up and linking them to it, because it gives you a wider audience. In all honesty, I really only have the chance to hit about 422 people on Facebook, or however many follow me on Twitter and also cross-posting on friend’s blogs, we’ll say it amounts to 1000 altogether. Anyway, out of those 1000 people, I’ll be lucky to get 5 people even looking at this blog on average, which isn’t even a 1% showing. So, unless I say something really insightful or brilliant, I’m basically relegated to the depths of the interwebs through simple lack of wider promotion. Now admittedly, other sites of mine have had greater success, but ultimately, I have a miniscule audience.

In fact, I think it’s because of Twitter I even have a few more people than what would be coming from Facebook alone, or at least that’s what I’m hoping anyway. Now granted, I have had a mention on Wrong Planet (top post – which I admit is pretty cool, though it’s unfortunate I never actually joined at that time; I became aware of that purely by chance. Still cool though, as I’m at least getting some recognition, however small it is), though other places I’m on have had much better popularity, such as my Flickr, as evidenced by the inclusion of a photo I took years ago of Greenwich Park (which I’ve coincidentally went back to to take a new picture of, which failed a bit). Anyway, this is why I have everything interconnected as much as I can, in the hope that one day I’ll actually break through to the surface, though in order to do that, I think I may need to write a bit more quality content. With regards to that though, I think it may be time to consider launching my Politics & Current Affairs/Business/Amateur Economist blog to tackle all those topics.

I can also outsource my gaming talk elsewhere as well, as I think that there is plenty of remaining stuff to talk about with the technology and science fields, as well as personal opinions on stuff and anything else I can’t put on dedicated blogs. As to why those 4 topics are going together, well they have some relation to each other, when you think about it. Iwill be sub-dividing them of course, but I do need a more serious venue for certain stuff, as the tone of this is pretty informal to be honest; I think the other topics will need a place where they can have more focus. Anyway, with this in mind, I’m going to deploy my Politics, etc. blog (called A Right State! – if you’re Irish, you’ll get it more, but big hint… it’s wordplay) sometime between now and the end of June. Another reason why everything is going together is because I don’t think I’ll have enough of an opinion on one of those topics alone to regularly blog (even if it’s once a month), although I may actually have a small team of bloggers to help me in achieving the goal, though the blog will have a focus mostly on the UK and Ireland and also the EU, though anything that affects those areas will be covered too; there might be some US coverage as it seems to be getting everywhere at present.

Anyway, there was one more thing I actually noticed which was actually very interesting, and from a spammer no doubt.. I’m genuinely surprised!  anyway, the gem is right here. Yes it’s extracts from a WWII Aircraft Recognition Manual. Totally random I know (this blog is subtitled random randomness, what were you expecting?) but it’s always funny how you stumble upon things like that! Oh yes, I actually forgot… the DiggerFeast is actually starting to go on track now, though once again changes have happened! For starters, I’ll now be doing one every 2 weeks, and they’re going to be under an hour (typically 30-45 mins), unless we have reason to go on longer. New ep is here if you’re interested. I am hoping to get a proper DiggerCrew or Stormhaven Media YouTube account up soon. On that note though, I’ve decided it’s best to merge Stormhaven Media with Stormhaven Radio (1 less page and community each to watch) and make them more community oriented. Additionally, I’ve been looking at reducing costs too, so many of my domains have been becoming UK domains as they’re the same price for 2 years as they are for 1 .com address, which is madness! So as part of my strategy I’ve been toning down on domains where I can and getting cheaper options.

Anyway, that’s it for now, it’s really humid here and it’s becoming a bigger struggle to type now… I’ll post up more stuff on EA when I have gotten to grips with it better. I do need to do up some business plans too later as well, woo.

Edit: I forgot to mention as well that I won a holographic model of a car (the Ford B-Max) off of PI, which is pretty cool… I missed out on winning free UnlimitedStorage off via.me, though strangely it’s not telling me on the Perk page that the offer is closed, very odd. Still, that’s another thing to blog about, innit? Then there’s the fact there’s more goodies I can get down the line… I’ll take pictures and upload them to Flickr. Though you’ll see some new pics before then, or rather old pics I never got around to uploading, plus more recent ones. Keep an eye on my Flickr for more updates, or my Facebook if you’re on that.

What I will do instead now but will take me a bit is to have 2 30-40 min eps in a month as opposed to 1 60 min ep a month. This’ll mean I can split stuff up a bit, as an hour takes too long to show, although there will have to be editing in some cases so the shorter vid means less headaches. I plan to add closed captioning but I will likely need a while to implement it in an orderly fashion. Still, if I can get away with uploading vids without editing, I’ll be happy! Anyway, watch this space for updates as when I start fleshing my ideas more, they’ll start to appear with placeholders or have mentions on here. It’s gonna be pretty crazy now for the next while!

This may be one of my shortest posts, but by god it’ll be one of the more insightful ones I’ve written! I might actually revisit the rules down the line  with additional interpretations, because while I’m operating at a different level to most  people, I am but a Padawan right now (obligatry geeky reference … so without further ado, let’s start:

1. Only 1 CEO
Okay, what I learnt here is that I’m in charge of my own life (but not fully my own destiny – I’ll get to this later), so I should make my own decisions and decide the effect they have on me. No one else is fully responsible for the decisions I make and though they can give me advice/suggestions, it’s ultimately down to me what I do.

2. No baggage
This one basically means leaving my emotional state and preconceptions at the door, tho do things without bias, as bias will mean I make poor decisions, be it through positive or negative emotion, I will still make a bad decision, so it’s important to have emotional state that while positive, does not lean into the realm where it causes me to make a bad decision; this is mostly for business,  although the life lesson here is to go in with an open mind.

3. If you’re in, you’re in
This one is a fun one! It means when you’re committed to a decision and have made a path to your goal, you stick with it till the end. That said however, you can change your path along the way if circumstances dictate, for as a story character of mine once said, “without a plan of action there’s no way to account for any variables in battle”. Point being, nothing in life ever goes to plan, so even if you’re committed to a goal, you may be required to change your plans to ultimately see it through. If you’re really lucky, you may either find a better way to get there (due to circumstances coming into play), or you can come back and cover the ground you had to skip the first time around, provided it’s still feasible to do, so don’t worry about missing a few stops, there’s always time to make good on things later!

4. Participation = Value
This is an easy one and in some ways ties into the above. Once you participate, you get value out of it, regardless of the outcome. The reason you get value from it is because you learnt as you went along and experienced it; you do not get real experience through staying still and watching… you must do it yourself, for good or bad, as even if it does turn out badly, you have learnt something.

5. Action = Rewards
This too, extolls the virtues of actually doing something. By taking action, you are rewarded… be it through experience or the outcome you hope for. Ultimately, this lesson teaches you to occasionally take risks and/or go out of your comfort zone because ultimately it could pay off!

6. How you do one thing is how you do everything
This one is rather obvious, though it reflects upon you as a person; essentially, if you run away from one thing, you’ll be constantly be running from everything… so instead of running, stand your ground and/or get stuck in!

7. Focus on you
There’s nothing wrong with being selfish from time to time, as if you don’t focus on yourself, how can you focus on others? Additionally, focusing on yourself allows you to see your strengths (and weaknesses) and shows you how you can put them to use best, which ultimately will help people out in the long run.

8. Trust the process
This is one I’ve learnt today, and thus has become a favourite. I’ll go into this after I’m finished the list, but suffice it to say this means that you need to put more trust in the universe, in the sense that eventually you’ll get to where you need to go (provided you take action). Occasionally this might mean trusting someone to help you reach your goal, other times this might mean you just let things work themselves out and continue the course; things don’t happen right away, so even though it may not look like things are going your way right now, have a little more faith and let things happen as you go along your path… you’ll be pleased with the results if you stick to it!

9. G.O.I (Get Over It)
If’s and but’s, we all have them… they cause us to hesitate or stall and sometimes, they cause us to question people/things, even though they know what they’re doing. I’ve been guilty of this quite a few times (if you’re reading this, sorry JD) because I failed to trust the process, simply because of my uncertainty with things. It’s not important that I know if they work or not at the start; what’s important is you drop your preconceptions and go with it (rules 4 & 5) and note the results as you go along, as you’ll find things will work!

10. Just for fun!
This is an easy one… try not to take things too seriously, and if you have a failure, so what? Get Over It! Close the board and start a new game! You have plenty of chances to, plus you learn as much (if not more) from losing something as you do winning. Sometimes things don’t work out, and that’s cool… they’re not always supposed to work out, because you have lessons to learn and these lessons help you to win games in the future.

You might have noticed that my interpretations feed into each other… that’s understandable given that the rules themselves feed into each other, although everyone interprets them differently, and each rule is interpreted at a different level to another person, although there are only so many levels to get for each.

Anyway, regarding why Rule 8 is my favourite at present is that before I flew off to America last year, I had a package delivered. Unfortunately, at the time I was unable to get it so had to fly off to America without picking it up. Anyway, things in America never went to plan, as some of my readers/friends know so basically when it came to recovering it after I came home, it became ‘lost’. It was never returned to the seller, so I pretty much lost faith in ever seeing it again. Now yesterday I got a pickup note for my last 2 eBay orders to be picked up from the deliery office, and the postman mentioned that there were 3 packages waiting for me, which I did think was a little odd at the time, as I had only ordered two. Anyway, I had a random thought of my long-lost order reappearing again, and when I came to pick up my packages (walking through the rain to get there, which felt like it took ages!), I saw the 2 parcels on top of another one at the bottom. Naturally, I had no knowledge of this parcel as my orders were complete at this point; I opened up the package and saw what was in it… it was my missing order!

I then looked at the package more closely as I realised what it was, and at that point, my mood picked up immensely, so much so I just pulled down my hood and let the rain hit me as I felt great, and hell… the trip home felt a lot quicker than it was! I now have one more thread of last year resolved, so I just have one more thing I have to sort out and everything is finally sorted from last year, meaning everything will be back to how it was in terms of my disadvantage, though I’ve learnt a lot along the way.

Ultimately though, the experience taught me to have faith in things and trust the process!

Thanks for reading.

I have a successful Wii recording, so that means I’ll be able to play both GameCube and Wii games with ease and record if needed. I do need to give the other systems a test-through as well, through composite, though my PS3 will be though component, and even nicer is the fact that because I ordered a HDMI to component splitter to use with the PS3, I won’t need to fiddle about with the settings, although on the flip side, I do have a PS2/PS3/Wii/Xbox 360 component cable if I really need it, which is always handy to have, especially as it means I can record everything in higher definition if needs be, although PS1 games seem to refuse to run on my PS2 when it’s in composite mode, oh well…. there is always the PS3 for that.

Anyway, all things considered, when I’m done, I hope to be able to record PC (both native and emulated), PS1/2/3 (PS2 & PS3), Wii/GameCube /Game Boy Advance/GB Colour/GB Classic (Wii & GameCube w/ GB Player), SNES/GB Colour/Classic (SNES with Super Game Boy), C64 (Tape & Disk and Cart – if I can afford them!) and Dreamcast games for the purposes of review, and also demonstrations. I do also have access to a 360 via my friends if I really need to use that, meaning I can use Xbox 360 and also most classic Xbox games too. Either way, with things well under way, I hope to see some great progress made this year… although I do need to buy some extra cables too, I think… I’m not using my own personal cables on a ‘work’ game system as it means both more weight to carry, plus they’d be potentially be exposed to more damage. Anyway, I’ll try to update more over the coming weeks to show off more of my stuff.. and rest assured, the DiggerCast and DiggerFeast will be getting updates soon, along with other sites!

This crossover system will be in place elsewhere too, but this is the most obvious (and perhaps simplest) example of its use.  Additionally, in order to somplify things, Stormkeeper dot Net will be moving to a unified system within the Xeno Storm Blogsite.  Granted, I may have said this before, but it’s worth saying again, for various reasons.  First of all, the reason why I’m doing this is to save myself a bit of space, though less logins to remember is another factor as well.  The other thing about it is that I’ll be linking the blog (and a wiki) to the forums, which will mean a single sign on for everything, which makes things a lot easier in the long run.  Additionally, I’ll also be looking at putting an addon that ties in domains to a WordPress account, which means very little overall will change, though in the early days, I may use my other personal domain to test things out while maintaining this concurrently.

Eventually though, I’ll be moving the blo over, and pointing my other personal domain to Stormkeeper dot Net.  I will also be removing all the games related tags (that I haven’t used) and the projects tags, though the games-related posts will stay put.  The reason for this is that my games blog is now going to be elsewhere, albeit temporarily, but games related posts will mostly be there now, unless there’s crossover.  The projects will be moved to a dedicated projects blog, along with the majority of my portfolio as well, which will free up space on my personal blog to do more personal stuff.  But yeah, there shall be a lot of reshuffling.  Additionally, I will have my own travel blog, which will both detail my mini and personal trips, but also will deal with my side of a team trips.  My projects blog will deal only with my own personal projects and tutorials, with my “travel blog” (which will probably get renamed) also handling my part of team projects, so I need to give a rethink of the blogs being called travel blogs.  Additionally, I think my projects blog may be more of a portfolio than anything else, so I may just rename it to that instead.  Even if it is a single sign in system, I still don’t want blogs all over the place, so will have to give stuff serious thought!

As well as domains though, I hope to use subdomains, but more on that later, once I’ve gotten a handle on things.  The first thing I intend to put up for XS is the forums, just so I can start getting stuff ready to deploy.  The next things I’ll be putting up are the FSIRC forums and also the pilot episode of the DiggerFeast and while not strictly XS related, there is some connection.  Either way though, I have a lot of plans for XS and will hope to carry them out this month, thus makingmy life a bit simpler.  I do feel I should inform people that I need to deploy ads on my blogs now as well, to help pay for server costs.  They were planned for any forums I run, but the blogs until now had remained ad free.  This will change over the next couple of months, though I’ll assure my readers that the ads won’t be intrusive or be the least intrusive out there.  Either way, these ads will help keep my sites active, or at least allow me to expand my operations.  I do have other plans for revenue generation as well, but they might apply more to my other websites more than here, possibly.

I’ll leave it at that for now.  Watch this space for details as to updates with this site, and also when the XS forums will be relaunched!

However, given that I’m going forward with my Stormhaven Media idea, it is very likely you won’t see a DiggerFeast episode for a few weeks, at least till I get the blog setup there. As for the DiggerCast, expect a new episode in the middle of October. Why then, you say? Well, the idea is to release eps every first and third week(end) and I need to focus on getting the team back together, as well as a couple new additions, plus given I haven’t worked on it for a while, I need to update the site list and also setup a page template! Rest assured though, the final format is nailed, and thus is the most complete show. Coincidentally, the DiggerFeast will likely follow a similar skeleton framework, for the reasons of consistancy at least. I am wondering at present as well if it’s a good idea to put everything in a single blog, although that said, WordPress is powerful enough to be modded for multiple purposes, so I think it would be the best option, in all fairness, especially once I learnt how to sort the domain stuff out. I’ll think of something eventually.

The only disadvantages I could see is the fact it may get a tad crowded on the About pages, especially as I have the DiggerCast and DiggerFeast joining up with a possible DiggerAds show (where my friends and I will riff a short selection of ads; possibly the shortest show in the list) and also a show (or even a section on the DiggerFeast or DiggerAds shows at the end, depending on which fits) about strange purchases (“Feast your eyes on this oddity!”, etc.) from eBay, car boot sales, the Pound shops and other unusual places or auction sites, or even just stuff we found abroad. Admittedly, this one requires funding and perhaps a lot of crowd sourcing, given that many of the items may cost a pretty penny to get over here. Still, it might be worth a shot. Of course though, odd gaming stuff will be handled by my gaming site, Gamed Up.

Speaking of Gamed Up… it finally has a presence besides on here, though it’s only temporary (and also in a single place; also has only one entry at the time of writing, but that’ll change soon) as a more permenant solution is on its way soon! You can go to http://gamedup.wordpress.com/ if you want to see what is up there. Please also note that all my games-related articles made here will gradually be copied or moved over there, and in fact anything gaming at all from here on out will be sent over there. Additionally, when the site is up, it’s very likely they’ll again be moved to my personal ranting blog, or in the case of reviews of software or hardware, to the relevent section on the site. I also have plans for other Stormhaven Networks sites as well, such as the addition of a business which shall remain nameless for now, though the Developments branch is basically going internal for now while this new branch (and the Media branch minus the Radio) are worked on.

I have been to see a business analyst about all my websites, and he basically gravitated more towards Gamed Up, as well as my paranormal group (which again will have its own blogs system soon, albeit a shared resource), which will be a hybrid events company and public services org, but more on that later on. The Free Spirits Network (formerly Friendly Storm Network) is also due for a few structural changes too, with the long planned and awaited FSChat moving into the first phase of development! This first phase involves contacting interested parties and asking them to sign up to a feedback & consultation forum, so they can tell me what they want to see in a chat site… I’m sure that staff that listens (or at least tries to listen) and general stability will be pretty high on the list!

Anyway… that aside, it is also an excellent opportunity to get FSIRC, FSChat’s sister site some exposure too, especially for those who want to make their own chat rooms, as FSChat is designed to be simple and moderated/closed, in opposition to FSIRC’s slightly more complex and open system. I acknowledged long ago that not everyone will want to wrestle with the comparitively harder setup that is FSIRC (though for those who want to learn, it’ll work well for them), so I’m offering a simpler chat option. Other places that stand to benefit are Gamed Up (managing a gaming room on there) and also Storm Paranormal (which will maintain the paranormal room). And while there will be single forums that handle the topic in general detail, the linkup with the sites will mean that people will get to take their interests further if they so wish – with the benefit of already knowing the staff on the site. Although perhaps paradoxically, the FSChat gaming room will not be able to be accessed via the Gamed Up chat, but then it is a different system, so it’s understandable. The same goes for the paranormal room too. However, I may make provisions in to allow people to eventually connect to either room they want through the respective sites (though the FSChat rooms require an FSChat account), which in itself will be quite an undertaking!

As you can see, I do have a lot planned, though my first concern will be the FSChat feedback forum, and also the entire Xeno Storm Network, which is undergoing some massive changes.  First of all, I decided that I don’t need a separate site for my named domain… it just means more to keep track of, so I decided to merge it with Stormkeeper dot Net as it makes sense to just merge the two.  Also, as part of financial cutbacks, I also plan on dropping a few more domains to bring my costs down.  Another thing I plan on doing as well is implementing a global single sign on system throughout XSN.  This means that the wiki, blogs and forums will all be accessible through the one account.  The forums will be the centrepiece of the XSN, as they were before.

I was initially going to use the copy of XenForo I purchased (with the assistance of an anonymous benefactor) for another site, and move the vBulletin install back to XS, but honestly I’m fed up with vB now, so want to offload it ASAP, but equally I need to bring XS back into the fold, because I want to move this blog to the blogs system, so I can do single sign in.  Some additional changes I have in mind are the addition of a travel blog for myself (and a couple others for friends), and also a project blog (for my crazy experiments and other stuff), which will make things a lot easier for me.  I already am aware of things that will allow XF to link in with WordPress and also a wiki solution, meaning things will be a lot easier to manage when I lay down the foundations!  My only concern at present is linking the domain to the new blogs system, but I’ll have some practice runs with that and I’ll keep the SK.net domain here til I’m sure it all works fine.  Another consequence of the merger is that I no longer need to put the XS-related stuff on my blog, which frees up space that is able to be used for my named domain functions, such as a C.V., though I will have a sanitised version of my C.V. up as a PDF, which omits some more personal details, though there will be an email to ask for more details.

Admittedly though, the C.V. is more an illustration of my credentials as opposed to actually being used for looking for a job, though I imagine I’ll be open to any that may be offered to me, if any are.  Still though, I do hope with the redevelopment of the XS Network, and also the addition of the FSChat feedback forum, things can start to move on.  I am thinking as well that my projects blog may also be recipent of my Projects page, albeit in an expanded format, that being Current & Planned Projects and also Past projects (both of which will also include involvement) pages; in fact those changes will be made now in preparation for this.

I’m going to stop here now so I can make the necessary changes to my blog in order to make everything go smoothly with it over the next week or two.  Hopefully everything will be smooth, but I won’t know till I try…

What's the score?
Presentation
How the game itself is presented, i.e. the story, plot, design, and the ideas the developer was trying to convey. Also covers how well everything is implemented.
Audio
Covers sound and music.
Visuals
How everything in the game looks.
Gameplay
How the game is to play, such as the controls and how everything interacts together, as well as how fun it is to actually play.
Value
Is the game worth buying at its current price? Also, will you be able to play the game again or is it basically going to be thrown away after completion?
Overall
This is the overall score of the game, which is NOT calculated by average

Here is a list of the descriptions of each score as well, to quantify the numbers in words:

0 – Non-existant (Features*) / Don’t bother (Overall)
1 – Terrible
2 – Awful
3 – Bad
4 – Below Average
5 – Average
6 – Above Average
7 – Good
8 – Very Good
9 – Excellent
10 – Outstanding (Features*) / Must-Buy (Overall)

* Features is defined as Presentation, Gameplay, Audio, Visuals and Value.

This is just an short update while I work on my main post (which should be out over the next couple of days), but there’s an article over on ZDNet which  essentially states that the 3D TV “revolution” is a waste of time!  I could have said that ages ago, but yeah… 3D TV is totally pointless.  I’m actually even wondering if the 3DS might be a bit giimmicky, but I’m gonna let it slide for now.  3D TV itself is rather pointless as a technology, but then the companies seem to expect (or rather hope) that we’ll spend money on a technology that at present is nothing more than a gimmick, especially when we’re barely taking advantage of HD at present!  Yes, I’m all for innovation and all that, but honestly, 3D TV is pretty much just a fad at present and I don’t see it becoming any more than that considering we’re still trying to get used to HD, which as of yet still isn’t a standard technology.  The ZDNet article implied that instead of adding a new gimmick to TVs, they should focus on making HD TVs more affordable and available to the masses.  And given in the UK there’s a Digital Switchover planned over the next couple years, I do think this is more important.  Admittedly though, where I live has no digital coverage at all, and only poor analogue coverage… I wish that were sorted out.  So, instead of fixing present tech, people seem more focused on “The Next Big Thing”, even though in this case, what’s being touted as such is just a gimmick.

Okay, maybe I should go back to the 3DS; I had a chance to play one for a little while, both at the airport before flying to the States and also in a local Walmart, so I am at least reasonably well informed about the 3DS.  I have also glanced at the 3DS Wikipedia article, and while I’m intrigued by the majority of the 3DS’s specs, I’m still not 100% sure about the 3D aspect.  Even more amusing is the fact that the cameras haven’t even been upgraded from the 0.3MP!  It’s not like I’m expecting something like 16MP with the cameras, but the least they could do is increase the sensors to 1 or 2MP; those are cheap enough to at least provide decent resolution on a larger monitor; consider the fact that the SD Card can be used elsewhere, like for printing pictures to paper… also consider that a picture resolution that is over 3-6 times larger than the camera of the DSi, which means sharper pictures.  There has already been comments (based on what has been said in the article) that 3D versions of movies look worse than their 2D counterparts, but then again that is to be expected given the way the films were initially filmed.  I suppose though, to give Nintendo its due, it did at least stick 2 camera sensors on the front so the 3D effect would probably look better than what you see in the movies.  Ironically, I was actually thinking Anaglyph 3D was cool (and still do to an extent), but I really don’t know how 3D adds to movies… sure, it looks good with a still image, but when it’s done with an entire movie, it starts to lose its appeal.

The reason why a still image in 3D is more appealing is because it’s just a still image and you can view it at multiple angles and it still can impress you.  Okay, maybe I’m easily amused, but that’s what I think; you’re free to disagree.  Ironically, I haven’t actually seen any 3D movies, but from the way it sounds, it’s probably best that I haven’t.  I’m also not entirely sure if it’s the sort of pop-out 3D (which is the more impressive kind) or the hologram type 3D where the background appears to have depth, although my point still remains that the tech is presently gimmicky.  However, what Jonny Chung Lee has done with 3D on the Wii strikes me as one of the most impressive uses of 3D.  Granted, this is moving into the realms of games (like I haven’t already gone there talking about the 3DS), but using 3D in games seems just a little less gimmicky than using it in movies, which just seems like an excuse to push 3DTV (and movies) in a world that’s still not fully gotten the hang of  HD yet.  At least in the case of games, there’s a better case for using 3D, although at the present stage of things it’s still not much above 3DTV.  That said however, if a game were made to properly take advantage of the 3D tech, instead of just it being an optional thing, then it may start to become worth it… but honestly, we’re looking at a few years down the line before a proper company goes down that route; you’ll find that it’s the indie and homebrew developers that embrace it first; again, look at Johnny Chung Lee’s efforts with the Wii, a system not even designed for 3D, and not only that, it’s a pretty cheap form of immersive 3D!

All that said though, Nintendo do have a better grip on 3D compared to most companies, when you consider the existence of the Virtual Boy, which was their first foray into 3D gaming.  Granted, it didn’t sell well, but Nintendo certainly learnt from their mistakes in releasing the 3DS (except for maybe still having really low resolution cameras!).  The technology is still in its infancy though, but at least the 3Ds isn’t entirely reliant on its 3D capabilities; it does have the vast DSi and DS library, in addition to the Virtual Console and other downloadable stuff to keep it going, in addition to the gradually increasing library of 3DS games.  The lesson Nintendo clearly learnt here is don’t solely rely on a gimmick to shift consoles.  The enhanced 3DS specs also mean that the system has a fair bit of untapped potential as well, so even if we don’t have games that use the 3D mode, we should at least have games that make use of the enhanced hardware of the 3DS, which will be a great prospect in itself… maybe we might finally see Final Fantasy 7 on on the DS?  That said though, I don’t quite know if the game could be fit onto a single 3DS cart, although after stealing a quick glance at some of the search results in Google (this is going to do wonders for my search results!), the cartridges apparently can store up to 8GB of data, which is more than enough for FF7, hell FF7 could fit on a UMD… though I amn’t confident to fully assert this, given I don’t know how many CDs FF7 takes up off the top of my head, so if anyone happens to know, I would appreciate being told.  Still though, even if it may just barely fit on a UMD, it should be able to fit on a 3DS cart at the very least, and even then the full 8GB capacity won”t even be needed!

I just hope they don’t make it 3D as it really doesn’t need it; what it could probably do with though is a graphical overhaul, but I’d be happy with being able to play the game as it was back in the day, or even similar to what it is like in FF3 or FF4; the fact both those games (which are pretty large, though maybe not as large as FF7) could be done in a similar style to FF7 shows that it should be possible to put FF7 on the 3DS at the very least… I wouldn’t go so far as to say that it could work on the DS with one cartridge though, especially because the DS carts hold 1 Gigabit of data, which roughly equates to about 128MB; I’ve seen the size of DS ROMs, so I know by default that it wouldn’t even store a CD’s worth of data!  Still though, FF7 appearing on the 3DS, or indeed any console is just a fanboy dream; I’m not expecting it to appear to be honest, but it’s nice to dream… it would be nice to see a remade version on the PS3 though.

Speaking of the PS3 and potential, I bet people are surprised to hear me not comment on the recent PSN outage.  Truth be told, that given I’m not home at present, there’s been less of a push for me to comment on issues that would normally affect me.  However, given that the PS3 is also related to the 3DTV gimmick, both through BluRay and also through 3D gaming (indeed, there was a patch released to help with it), it seems appropriate to talk about the PS3, or rather PSN.  A friend of mine showed me this article on IGN the other day, and I was not impressed with it.  I’m aware that it’s a joke, but all it really does is piss off those who use PSN, while giving the PS Haters and 360 Fanboys more ammunition to say how “crap”the PS3 is; the article comes across to me as somewhat immature and a slap in the face to those who use the PSN service.  I’m totally aware that the same thing would have happened if XBL is down, but that sort of article in any case seems immature and/or a tad petty.  Like one of the commenters said, if you’re a gamer, it shouldn’t matter what console you own.  My reasons for not having a 360 aren’t really anything to do with hating Microsoft (though I amn’t exactly a fan of theirs either); my reason is that I cannot justify yet another MS system in my house, given I already have 2 Windows desktops, as well as this Windows laptop and a broken Windows laptop.  There’s also the fact that I have a rake of PS1 games which I wouldn’t want to give away and also I wanted a Bluray drive, so my reasons for buying a PS3 were purely based upon practicality rather out of dislike.  Admittedly, I’d have loved a 60GB PS3 (a US version), and the restored option to install Linux (hint hint Sony), but the system itself (and PSN too) is pretty solid.

I would also say the same about the XBL service too, given there’s never been any problems that I have been made aware of.  I do quite enjoy playing on the 360, even if it’s only Rock Band 3 mostly, although I’m not a big fan of the controller, but that said, it’s not mind-bogglingly difficult to use; my dislike of the controller stems more from the fact that I prefer how a PS controller feels.  Anyway, I digress… PSN outage opinion, yes?  My major concern would lie with my account details,which may or may not have been compromised; as a result, as soon as I’m able to I am totally going to have change my accounts system around for websites I access, just to prevent my details from being compromised elsewhere.  My payment details are thankfully safe, because I’ve had 2-3 new cards issued since then, but even so, others wouldn’t necessarily be so lucky (though perhaps the payment details are safe if they’re separate from account details).  Given PSN has 60 million users around the world, even some of those account details being compromised is still dangerous; we’re still looking at a figure in the millions at least, which makes me think if I ever want to buy something on PSN (or anywhere else like that in the future), I’m gonna stick to the pre-paid cards instead… it’s certainly safer!  That’s enough about me though… what about Sony’s way of handling things?

Well, from what I hear, Sony is handling things poorly, although given what they’ve done in the past, that’s kind of par for course with them anyway; that’s not a stab at all, just look at what they’ve done in the past and you’ll see what I mean.  I can’t help but wonder if this “attack” is related to what happened with the “GeoHot Incident”, as well as the removal of Linux, amongst other things it could be.  I know Sony isn’t exactly in people’s good books at the moment.  I know another company in the games industry who also isn’t in people’s good books either… you could say that some people are “barking mad” about one of their releases, but I won’t be discussing them here; this is merely a hint of what I’ll be tackling next.  In fact, I do actually have a lot of the post done, but it still needs working on.  Anyway, enough about that, let’s get back to Sony/PSN.  Sony being tight-lipped about the entire incident isn’t really going to do it any favours either… nor is the lack of compensation due to the outage.  The fact that MS actually gives every (Gold & Silver) XBL Member a free XBLA game for any outages is something that Sony should really take note of.

It’s ironic that a company like MS that is disliked by so many people actually knows how to properly treat its customers… then we have Sony, who caused a lot of controversey with their rootkit installer in 2005, and more recently removed the option to install Linux, after promising months before that it wasn’t going to be removed, and then subsequently locking people out of PSN if people refused to update.  When you consider the most recent incident, along with the Geohot thing that was recently settled, it’s no surprise Sony got attacked.  I’m not saying it’s right or anything (why would I, given my personal details are on there too?), but it’s easy to see why Sony were attacked, and the way they’re acting now just goes to show how much the consumer is getting screwed over by them.  On a random note, if this did happen to XBL, I realised I’d get a free game out of it, simply for being an XBL Member, which is nice, but yeah… that was just a random thought.  I understand that a company is out to make money, but at the same time, it’s not exactly morally right to essentially take a customer’s money, then screw them over by denying them advertised features… I don’t think even MS were that bad, and even if they were, they have at least learnt from their mistakes.

Someone I spoke to (though don’t like) on a chat room I frequent said that he hoped Apple would be next, although I’m not quite sure that Apple have generated quite the backlash against people that Sony have.  Granted, I’m not exactly happy with Apple, given how they have screwed developers over, the fact you need a Mac to develop for their systems, the fact they want to clamp down on open standards and that their iStore is subject to extremely draconian rules, but even then they haven’t quite generated the amount of shall we say “fury” that Sony has.  I certainly won’t be buying another iPod ever again in any case, and in fact, I’m quite happy with my Sansa Clip Plus, although I need to pick up a 32GB SDHC Card for it so it can store up to 40GB of songs; for what is roughly a matchbox-sized device, it is really impressive with what it can do… I certainly can’t wait to properly put it through its paces from next week.  I especially like that the playback time for MP3s is in the double digits… I think 16  hours was the advertised battery life, which will be great for when I fly home, although the plane I was on when flying between Canada and the UK did have a USB port, so I can recharge it, plus listen to their music and watch movies, so I won’t rely on it too much till after I touch down in Heathrow.

All that aside though, it’ll be interesting to see how long before PSN is back up, and what Sony will say happened, and also what the damage is.  I am expecting an email about that either by the end of this month or early into next.  Suffice it to say, I think I need to start beefing my security methods up a bit, especially where it comes to my money or access to it.  I’d be recommending that others do the same as well, in case an attack of this magnitude happens again… that first attack may have been just to prove a point as I’m not sure if anyone claimed responsibility for the attack yet.  What I do know is that the downtime has cost Sony allegedly between $20 Million to $24 Billion, although I think the latter figure’s a bit extreme.  And my bad, it appears (according to this article) that Sony may actually compensate users after all.  It’s kind of hard nailing details down when this post is being written on the fly, though I’m expecting more additions and edits to be made when the proper story comes forward, because there’s a lot of rumours flying around too about this story.  Rest assured that while I don’t know the full extent of the details now, I will eventually find out, between reading subsequent news articles and also reading the comments below.

I should end this post now as I’m nearly at 3000 words for this post, but suffice it to say, I will be watching the PSN outage with more interest and will be sure to update this post (and future related) with more factual details on this as and when I can.  I still think $24 Billion is a a it much though, but then I realise there are 60 million PSN users, so the maths do add up.  I really can’t wait to get the Gamed Up site up and running though, so I can finally do some proper reporting with stuff like this.  Anyway, that’s it for now… I’ll be back soon with another post.

Oh, actually… one last thing… I’ll end up doing less DiggerCast and DiggerFeast episodes than I originally planned, due to financial and hardware issues, but some will be done… also expect that the Stormhaven Media website will be up soon as well.  Also, Stormhaven Networks is essentially being downsized; it instead will merge everything (Stormhaven IT, Stormhaven IP, Storm Servers and Stormhaven Networks) into a single company called Stormhaven Developments, which will focus solely on software development, be it games, business software or web-based software.  I also have to develop a 5 year plan for the company soon as well.  Rest assured that nothing will really be hugely affected, though you may notice minor changes involved with Stormhaven Networks, and perhaps FSIRC, but that will be discussed at a later date.

Edit: It appears that customers’ credit card details are secure, according to an article here; it also links to the official Sony thread.  The payment data is encrypted, but that doesn’t mean it’s not 100% secure, so be warned.  It also appears the amount of PSN users is 77 million, which is a lot.  I read that the average cost of identity theft is about $319 which is where the 24 billion comes from. Admittedly, while it is nice to finally get some answers, they should have said something sooner, even if it was just to say that they are assessing the damage and to please bear with them, but I guess someone would complain about it.  There is a lot of stuff out there at the moment about this story, so I may need to revise a few things later…

Edit 2: Anonymous have stated that the PSN network outage has nothing to do with them, although they were responsible for a previous network outage at the start of the month.  Sony seems to be getting attacked a lot this month!  I did wonder if Anonymous had something to do with the attack, but given they had orchestrated an attack before, I don’t think they felt the need to proceed with another.  The hacking therefore is a concern, because as far as I’m aware, it’s not known who actually performed the attack, meaning there is an increased danger that the payment details could be compromised, even if it is encrypted.