Y'know what? Adobe really ought to sell the ITC Benguiat typefaces to Microsoft. I'm getting tired of using Verdana and Trebuchet MS all the time. But, that's not why you're here...

I've made quite a few updates to the website recently... The Sims page, which is entirely new; a few small rewrites to the Inspector Gadget  and Mario pages; and an overhaul of the Luigi page. All of these occurred within a few short weeks of each other.

Also, I've decided not to release The Mind's Rubbish Bin on a single page or series of pages, but rather to integrate them into new pages regarding the same subject (Star Trek TMRB would go on a Star Trek page).
In fact, that's pretty much what I'm doing already. I talked a few months (maybe nearer to a year) ago about giving the website a singular focus. I realised yesterday, as I was scouring the Internet for Luigi trivia, that it already has one.
The purpose of the rather long-winded articles that I have on the site isn't to be a second Wikipedia. Rather, each page has a set of otherwise worthless trivia on it (the "Trivial Information" sections). In fact, there's a lot of trivia to be had in the articles, themselves.
The site's focus is trivial, inconsequential information. In effect, a giant TMRB.
For that reason, I think that Spiny McSpleen's Nifty Website v.3.0 will be called The Mind's Rubbish Bin. Nothing will really change but the name.

"Select a chapter": Mario, Luigi, Charles Martinet, Star Trek, GoldenEye 007, Weird Phobia Names, Haiku Error Messages, pick one and knock yourself out... with knowledge!

Posted by theniftyperson at 3:16 AM CDT

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As you may recall, back in June was this year's Electronic Entertainment Expo (also, more commonly known as "E3"). A number of forthcoming games for Wii and Nintendo DS were announced, as well as the unveiling of the first Eighth Generation console, the Nintendo 3DS.

Some people might argue, "No, it's not the Eighth Generation -- it looks practically the same as the Nintendo DS Lite, but with a wider upper screen and a thumbstick, it's backwards compatible with DS games and with the DSi Shop, and it has 'DS' in the name."
All of these statements are true (except, perhaps, the DSi Shop one... no one really knows at this stage). However, all who saw the 3DS testimonials and the interview with Miyamoto-san from E3 will know that the 3DS has an enormous number of technological advancements, relative to its predecessor, the Nintendo DSi.
Apart from having a new menu screen and a pair of cameras, DSi was identical in technology to the DS Lite, which was a condensed version of the Nintendo DS. Still very much a Seventh-Generation device.
However, the 3DS will have a thumbstick (akin to the "controller nub" on Sony's PSP), video-recording capabilities, new games which will not be compatible with previous DS models, and (the star of our show) the 3D display. All the glitz of 3D films, but without the glasses. Definitely an Eighth-Generation device. But, I digress.

Somewhere on the order of thirty-five new games were unveilled at E3 as well, intended for the aging Seventh Generation consoles. In particular, Donkey Kong Country Returns, Kirby's Epic Yarn, GoldenEye 007, The Sims 3, Epic Mickey, Metroid: Other M, and The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword for Wii.
Well, a fair amount of time has passed since E3. Enough time, some would speculate, for the design and programming crews to finish their work on these games. This has proven to be the case on many of the E3 games.  Metroid and Kirby have been released now. Toys R' Us claims an in-store stocking date of November the 2nd and 9th for GoldenEye and The Sims 3, respectively. Nintendo's website returns a release date of November 21st and 30th for Donkey Kong and Mickey, respectively.
Fortunately, no further information on the subject of Zelda: Skyward Sword has been provided. "Fortunately?" Yes, for those who don't think Wii has overstayed its welcome just yet.  As I mentioned on that entry of mine back in July, the trend over the past two generations has been to release two Zelda games per console. DS has had its games: Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks. Wii has had only one thus far: Twilight Princess. When Skyward Sword is released, Wii will be living on borrowed time.

Of course, there is no cardinal set of rules governing when gaming consoles will be obsolete. That's entirely up to the crew who work on the new consoles. Wii could have ten more Zeldas released for it before the "Nintendo 512" comes out. If the crew needs more time to shoehorn all that technology into less real-estate, Wii could last until 2020 (an unprecedented lifespan for a gaming console, of course -- 14 years).  Then again, Nintendo could announce Wii's successor at E3 2011 and release it a month later.
The point is, Nintendo is highly unpredictable in this field. Looking at "typical" stuff, ever since Super Mario World, there has been only one Mario platformer per console. Wii has had two: Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 (an exception, I guess, would be Super Mario Land and Six Golden Coins on the original Game Boy -- both are platformers).  Nintendo could surprise everyone yet again with a third Zelda. We just really don't know.

All we do know is that the Nintendo 3DS inches ever closer to completion.  Anticipated games are being released like bullets from a Gatling gun. The Eighth Generation is upon us!

Posted by theniftyperson at 1:23 AM CDT

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Descartes, Bastonia... The sun rose in the east and the clock tower in the square chimed 8:00. Spiny McSpleen woke up with the idea that today would be just like any other day...
...but, what he didn't plan for was... that... er... he was right.
Not a very exciting plot for a novel, eh?

Anyway, linking mentally to 10/10/10's post, I forgot to mention something of monumental importance. Whilst there are only twelve triple numbers every 100 years, one of those happens to be a sextuple number.  Now, those who are familiar with certain "reality shows" where women have "sextuplets" (very real, that) will know that the prefix sex- means "Six" (as opposed to the homonym, which means something completely different). Next year, on November the 11th, will be this century's only sextuple number -- 11/11/11.  And, of course, all of those other obscure mathematical days afterwards.

Next, did you know that Toys R' Us runs the most thorough background check on potential employees than any other firm or government entity? This is, most likely, because registered paedophiles ought not to work in toy stores. On the application, it even says that people's attempts to hide their past from Toys R' Us Corporate will fail.

I think that's all...

Posted by theniftyperson at 7:37 PM CDT

Updated: Thursday, 21 October 2010 6:06 PM CDT

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It's not really a proper blog, this, is it? Most people use their blogs for stuff like game reviews or news articles. The crap on this blog is what Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter are for. Mind you, none of those websites even existed when Of Carbon and Silicon went live for the first time back in 2005!

Anyway, onwards to lesser and greater things. Wait... never mind.

So, it's a jolly good thing that I've finally chosen which new mobile phone to get... because my current mobile phone died today. Not like "dead battery", like "time for a hardware upgrade". Like "no longer capable of functioning within established parameters". Cue the Marche Funebre by Frederic Chopin.
Well, between the time when I actually get my new mobile and now, I had to have a stopgap. An emergency mobile. A Tracfone from Walgreens fits the bill. I had to initialise it today in order for it to work... which meant forty-five minutes on the line (the land line) with a series of computer prompts and access codes.
That's really why I bring this up. I mean, you don't care about my mobile phone -- you come here to read about my own experiences with and opinions of life in general.

I'm quite used to dealing with computerised answering services, through experience with my college loan debts. Banks and lending firms seem to enjoy having their customers pressing buttons and saying "Yes", "No", and "English" in response to prompts. That way, they get more money at the end of the pay-period not having to pay actual people to do that kind of tedious work.
So, I ring up the number with which I was provided on the little leaflet thing with the initialisation code on. At first, it sounds like just another run-of-the-mill pre-recorded set of computer prompts. But, as I listen to the announcer, I start getting more and more creeped out by the minute. At the end of the deal, that announcer's voice is now firmly entrenched in the uncanny valley.
"Why?" you might ask...
I thought I noticed an odd thing about the way the announcer would say words. I finally figured out, he was saying the word "Tracfone" exactly the same way each time. Whilst pitch would fluctuate depending on the usage, inflections would not.
It finally hit me when I was receiving my activation code. The announcer was providing the code in nonsegmented strings of numbers. "Nonsegmented", in this case, meaning that it sounded as though the announcer was reading it from a leaf of paper. Pre-recorded prompts use short voice clips -- announcers for these will be asked to recite numbers as though they are all in the middle or end of a sentence. In effect, when you get on the line to a recording and it lists numbers, it will be segmented, as though each number is its own sentence. The Tracfone announcer was not doing this. I was provided with strings of three numbers at a time, read as though the entire string was a sentence. I came to one inescapable conclusion...
The Tracfone answering system announcer is a speech synthesiser.
The only other alternative was that the numbers in all Tracfone activation codes come in the same strings of three numbers, only arranged differently. In this way, a human announcer would be given a list of each 3-digit number and asked to read them all like a list. That seems rather unlikely. If that were the case, then Tracfone activation codes would be supremely easy to crack (provided one had the right equipment).

I remember from research I did into robotics for a high-school project that AT&T have been working on a natural-sounding speech synthesis programme. The most readily-accessible one to the public is on NOAA weather radios -- most markets use a voice called "Craig". This particular synth has been undergoing constant debugging, using the weather band as a testing platform (the public don't care about vocal inflections or whether this phoneme or that phoneme is processed correctly -- they just want to know if they're going to be struck by lightning). To that end, "Craig" is now able to change the pitch and tone of voice depending on the urgency of the situation (it might say, "Severe thunderstorm warning until 3:47 AM," as though it were reading a passage from an instruction booklet, whilst it might say "Tornado Emergency for the Omaha/Council Bluffs area!", as though it had just witnessed the Second Coming). Also, there is currently an endeavour to have it simulate breaths between sentences -- a feature currently available on the latest version of MacInTalk.
So, I guess AT&T have made more progress than I thought in the relatively short stretch of time since my sophomore year of high school. Whatever this voice was that I heard on the line with Tracfone certainly had me fooled. And I like to think that I'm quite good at distinguishing acoustic and artificial sounds (I work with sound, after all).

As I mentioned before, it's really sort of creepy when you think about it. Not creepy like "cemetery at midnight" or "cold, dark room"... it's more like "nightmare that you remember the next day" creepy.
Now that Man has succeeded in creating an indiscernable artificial voice using phoneme sampling from acoustic speech, the next step is what we in the music trade call "acoustic modelling". In this case, creating an artificial vocal tract in a computer, using no speech samples at all.  This is what I find totally disturbing -- up to this point, computers have always been reliant on humans for everything. Taking the human element out of speech synthesis is just one of many stops on the road to total computer supremacy.
In fact, with this (so far, theoretical) acoustic model, Man can begin taking liberties with the voice. At this stage of evolution, Man is the only species capable of vocal speech. A simple CT scan of any vertebrate's airway will provide the synth's programmers with enough information to begin adding human vocal parameters, thus providing voices to any non-human (and, verily, non-primate) animal.

Here's a bit of trivia from The Mind's Rubbish Bin that I find to be apropos...
From the middle-ages all the way through to the 1700s, creating an apparatus capable of speech was considered witchcraft.  Of course, most fields of modern scientific endeavour were considered witchcraft... however, I'm inclined to agree with them on this.
Soon after vocal modelling is perfected (perhaps even before), conversation simulators will be all the rage. I first became aware of these during downtimes in the 2003 school play. There was (and maybe still is) a programme on the internet called, I think, "Oliver". It was a text field that one could type a statement or question into and the programme would return an appropriate response. Of course, its "attention span" was not all that great -- it didn't carry on with a single subject at length, frequently asking random questions of its own ("What's your favourite colour?", "Where are you right now?", "Do you play an instrument?" -- conversations could easily turn into interviews with "Oliver").
Of course... puh-shaw, man: 2003! A lot can happen in seven short years when it comes to technology.  After the conversation simulator is perfected, used in tandem with vocal modelling synthesis and artificial intelligence, the computer becomes its own life-form. Depending on how it is programmed, it can become either Data or Lore. Interacting with humans to try and become human, itself... or become bent on universal conquest.

At this point, I would like to remind our eminent computer scientists of Asimov's First Law: a robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to be harmed.
"Wait, robots? I thought we were talking about speech synthesisers!"
We were. However, all of these technological advancements will all eventually culminate in the creation of a highly intelligent independent electromechanical agent. Robots. Androids. Consider, for a moment, the following: the Star Trek: The Next Generation character of Data is not, in fact, a human actor, but a fully-functional android. This is, of course, incorrect, but just think about it for a couple of ticks. Consider that without vocal tract modelling in computer software that Data would be incapable of speech... and, if you don't have a robot that can speak, why should you have a robot at all?

Hm. I guess I go off on tangents enough to justify calling Of Carbon and Silicon a "blog" after all.

Posted by theniftyperson at 2:08 AM CDT

Updated: Thursday, 21 October 2010 7:53 PM CDT

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I would have written more last time, but I had been awake for 20 hours at that point. To think, there are some people who can stay awake for days at a time! The longest time I've managed at one stretch was 40 hours, give or take.  Irrelevant to the matter at hand, however.

First, I've managed to decide on a new mobile phone. At one point, I'd had it down to three candidates: a Droid, a BlackBerry, or an iPhone. After due consideration, iPhone was removed from the list. Next to go was the Droid line, mostly because of price. BlackBerry is the winner -- specifically the model known as "Curve". The newest model, Torch, is much too expensive for the starving artist... I don't want to be one of those lower middle-class blokes who chooses the newest piece of technology over eating for a month (though I might make an exception when the Nintendo 3DS is released).
Anyway, I figure I'll need its myriad features eventually. Especially as I've sent away two more voice-acting and composing demos for professional consideration -- the Z-list celebrity needs a way of communicating his whereabouts to his fanatic stalkers, after all.

Next, I've managed to secure a booking for the role of piano-player at the College of St. Mary in Lincoln's second annual children's Halloween costume party... mostly because my mother happens to be the school's admissions counsellor. As with last year, I will be dressed as Luigi. It's a closed event, however -- there's a bouncer and everything. However, if you should happen to be driving northbound on Cotner Avenue between Vine and Holdrege streets, look into the window of the strip-mall on the left side of the road and you'll see a man dressed as Luigi, sitting at a desk with a synthesiser on it.

Finally, I dislike it when food companies mislabel their products. This pint of Ben & Jerry's Coffee Heath Bar Crunch that's sitting opposite me right now clearly contains Half Baked.

Posted by theniftyperson at 5:16 PM CDT

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I wish I had known of this quotation in 2008...

"A delayed game is eventually good. A bad game is bad forever."
--Shigeru Miyamoto

That is all.

Posted by theniftyperson at 4:23 AM CDT

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Flashback: January 2000. It's the turn of the century, the beginning of the new millennium, and TheSims.com goes live. The Sims, itself, is still a month away from release, however.

Flashforward: June 2009. The Sims has become a gaming legend and some now refer to it as The Sims Classic, The Sims 1, or The Sims Original to distinguish it from its sequels. Its second sequel, The Sims 3 is released this month also. Some months ago, the original URL, TheSims.com, redirects the user to a directory of Sim games -- The Sims Original and 2; SimCity 3000, 4, Societies, DS, and Creator; SimAnimals; and MySims.

Unflash to the present day. The ten-year-old Sims Original website has now been deactivated. Entering and searching for the URL ("thesims.ea.com/us") redirects the user to The Sims 3's website. Attempting a workaround, I went to Google and searched generically for "the sims", which returned several hits for the original website. Clicking on one of them, I was directed to a "404'd" type page on TheSims3.com.

On a related note, I went to Walmart the other day and perused the PC software section, as I generally do. Walmart is good about keeping old electronics hardware and software in stock for a long while (for example, Microsoft Office 2007... I think. Or '06... whichever one exists).  I got my copy of The Sims Complete Collection from them in 2007 (it was released in 2005). I've seen it for sale on every subsequent visit... until last month. The Sims Complete Collection was nowhere to be found. There was The Sims 2 Deluxe Edition, The Sims 2 combination Open for Business-H&M Stuff-Ikea Stuff, The Sims 3 World Adventures, The SimCity Box, but The Sims Classic was glaringly absent. On every visit since, I have not seen The Sims Complete Collection for sale at Walmart. GameStop doesn't have it, either. Target, Best Buy, Shopko, even Office Depot -- places where I'd seen it for sale in the past -- were sold out.
At Best Buy, I even asked a clerk about it: checking his computer terminal, he said, "Well, it doesn't look like we have it in stock. But, The Sims 3 is the newest version."
Having played The Sims 3 and finding it inadequate in comparison to The Sims Original, I replied, "The Sims 3? Have you no respect for the dead?"
That's 633k5p33k that you use when you talk about outmoded electronics. Clearly, this man was not a 7rü3 633k, 'cos he totally missed the joke.

Of course, what I said in jest turns out to be the case. As far as EA is concerned, The Sims Classic may as well be dead. I don't believe they even offer technical support for it anymore. I should test this theory by coming up with a fictional problem with my copy of Livin' it Up (which I haven't owned since 2004) and send it off to EA tech support.
I guess I should have noticed the downward trend that Sims Classic was taking when it showed up in a SimMania pack a few years ago. This pack had The Sims, SimCity 4, and SimGolf in it.

Of course, in tech terms, a decade is a long time. After all, 2000-2010 represents the end of the Nintendo 64, all of the GameCube, and the first four years of Wii, to put it into perspective. Really, anywhere, ten years is a long time. Someone who was born in 2000 would now be in the fourth or fifth grade. An automobile of typical workmanship would now have accumulated so many trips to the mechanic's shop that it would be more economical to buy a new car. Windows ME was the newest operating system in 2000. Now, it's gone through XP and Vista, with the newest being Windows 7.
But, for some reason, The Sims Classic seems newer to me than, say, Windows XP, or a 2000 Pontiac Grand Am, or a copy of Luigi's Mansion. To borrow a cliché, it seems like just yesterday that The Sims: Makin' Magic was released... okay, maybe more like a couple of months. In any case, it doesn't seem as antiquated as EA's recent actions would have me believe.

I suppose, if I were still into conspiracies, EA could see The Sims Classic as a threat. Players who traded in their old Sims expansions and bases for the new ones may have been rediscovering just how much better it was back in the day, making blog entries on much more popular sites than this about how Sims division will never measure up to Will Wright's original vision, shown in Sims Classic. So, EA could have severed all ties to the original Sims -- stopping production of The Sims Complete Collection, shutting down the original Maxis website for the game, redirecting people who want to go to the old site just over a few servers to The Sims 3 website ("Don't look back at old crap like that! Look forward to new crap like this!").

But, I don't get into that anymore. Conspiracies are based on conjecture, wild assumptions, and outright paranoia. The simple truth of the matter is that The Sims Classic has had its day, lasting six years beyond its original date of obsolescence by The Sims 2. The servers couldn't stand the strain of supporting three independent Sims exchanges, forums, and downloads pages any longer.

It really is the end of an era. The end of, if one may be so bold, the niftiest era in recent history. One that I won't soon forget. Hopefully you shall remember The Sims Classic as well.

R. I. P.
THE SIMS
"The People Simulator From The Creator Of SimCity"
February 2000 - October 2010

Posted by theniftyperson at 11:59 PM CDT

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I nearly let today slip past without recognising it as October the 10th, 2010 -- 10/10/10. I've always been interested in co-incidences like that, ever since I could read a calendar. Sequential numbers, triple numbers, numbers that spell stuff in 13375P33K, that kind of thing.

In fact, today is the tenth of only twelve triple-numbers in the 21st century! Since there are only twelve months in a Gregorian year, only the first twelve years of any particular century apply to the triple-numbers. The first was January the 1st, 2001 -- 1/1/01. The last will be December the 12th, 2012 -- 12/12/12.
I remember 6/6/06 because my quasi-goth mate, Jonas, from high school identified it as the Devil's Day (666 being the mark of the beast). There won't be another such day for 94 years! Hopefully by Devil's Day 2106, Zephram Cochrane or someone of his ilk will have successfully tested the first faster-than-light propulsion system.

Also going out the door for 100 years are the sequentially-numbered dates. Days like 01/02/03 or 08/09/10. December the 11th, 2013 -- 11/12/13 -- will be the final number sequence for 88 years (the next being February 1, 2103).  Of course, if you use the American dating sequence, the final day for you will be December the 13th, 2014 ('cos Yankees put the date down month/day/year, whilst everyone else puts it down day/month/year).

Also, talking of random calendar stuff, I totally missed this century's Mario Month!  In the dating sequence used everywhere but the US, March 2010 appeared as MAR/10! I was consciously aware of Mario Day, but Mario Month slipped my notice... I still had a radio programme at that time, too! Talk about one's excuse for having an all-Nintendo OST programme!

Anyway, if you're feeling depressed at the prospect of losing your sequentially-numbered dates and triple-numbers, consider the following. There are numerous other obscure mathematics to look forward to.
Take, for example, a Fibonacci sequence: 0,1,1,2,3,5 (the sequence is done by adding the next number to the previous one -- 0+1=1, 1+1=2, 2+1=3, 3+2=5, et cetera). Fibonacci Day will be on 01/12/35 (either December 1st or January 12th, 2035).
Next, prime numbers: in the non-American dating sequence, May 23rd, 2071 (23/5/71) will be Prime Day. In the American sequence, though, Prime Day will fall upon February 3rd, 2057 (2/3/57).
We can't forget the highly cototient numbers, either! In the non-American sequence, August 24th, 2023 (24/8/23) is Cototient Day. However, the US will have to wait 59 more years for Cototient Day, as the American sequence puts it on February 4th, 2082 (2/4/82)... at that rate, one may as well wait until January 1st, 2101.
If one happens to use the American sequence exclusively, though, Pi Day will be quite a grand day in 2015 -- March 14th, 2015 (3/14/15) expresses more digits of the Pi decimal than any other such day since 1592 (in which the year could be displayed in full and still be valid: 3/14/1592).

If you still need reassurance, though, look up integer sequences on Wikipedia. There are loads more that you can use to make yourself look either really smart or really lonely.

Posted by theniftyperson at 9:56 PM CDT

Updated: Friday, 15 October 2010 6:45 PM CDT

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It's been a while since I wrote anything here.  Not like other times, when I went for months without making new entries, but still... what is the purpose in having a blog without writing in it, eh?

So, as I have nothing better to do, I'll just start typing and see how far I can get.

Right. So, last time, I addressed The Sims 3 being a capitalist monolith. Well, you know how Google will search an HTML document for a word or phrase, then display an advert or three in the margins that have to do with the word or phrase it chose? In an interesting bit of irony, Google found that post and is displaying links to the EA Sims 3 for consoles site. Funny how that worked out, i'n'it? A corporate disestablishmentarian ranting post attracting official links to the very game I ranted about!

Next, I've become rather good at drawing Okudagrams. LCARS displays. Star Trek: The Next Generation? Still no idea? Here's an example, then...

That is an okudagram I made for an SKP (Google SketchUp document) of a TNG PADD. Now, I'm sure that some Trek anorak is going to find fault with something in that display, but, I don't really care. If the only thing you have to do all day is troll obscure blogs looking for problems in fan-created Star Trek material, you probably don't have a job or a girlfriend and you live in your parents' basement.
Yes, well, anyway... that took a nasty turn, didn't it. The point is, that I've gotten rather good at drawing those, both in CGI and on paper. It's even better in CGI, really, 'cos I recently managed to track down the LCARS font. Amazing thing, the search engine. Typing "star trek font" into Google can send one to the most interesting places.

Next: there are finally clouds in the sky! For nearly two weeks, here in Lancaster County, we've had naught but cloudless blue skies for as far as sincerity goes in a pumpkin patch: as far as the eye can see.  I'm probably a freak of nature in this manner, but I find clear skies with lots of sunshine to be terribly uninspiring. To me, sunshine means sunburn, heat, UV rays, summer-time, spiders, big bugs, sweating, and wasting money on air-conditioning.  When the clouds come in, though -- particularly cirrostratus and cumulonimbus -- there's no better source of inspiration. Autumn and winter are my two favourite seasons... cor, I've even done piano improvs with "autumn" and "winter" in the title ("An Autumn State of Mind" from the self-titled album and "Early Winter" from Utopia). I'm something of a cloud enthusiast -- not only as their being a harbinger of cooler temperatures, but also just as things to look at. I have a rather extensive collection of cloud photographs on my mobile phone and my DSi, ranging from whispy cirrus to tornadic cumulonimbus.

Finally, today's nifty word is, "basalt".
Look it up, why don't you?

Posted by theniftyperson at 10:55 AM CDT

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Many's the time when I used to come here and post some thousand-word complaint about Electronic Arts' The Sims division... it became commonplace, in fact.
For a while, I thought I'd covered all the main points about The Sims 3 -- uncustomisable community lots, substandardly-textured objects, insufficient quantity of hairstyles, no piano, blah-blah-blah. But, it seems as though a new issue has arisen since my last "Sims 3 is worthless" post. In fact, it's an issue which I never thought in my ten years as a Sim geek would ever become a problem...

Corporate takeover.

It would appear to me that Electronic Arts has totally taken over The Sims franchise, transforming it from Will Wright's long-time project for a people simulator into a corporate monolith. A monument, if you will, to high profits by selling a fundamentally substandard product to unsuspecting consumers, who are lured in by shiny new graphics and the names of iconic bands.

That's really what I wanted to address here: the music issue.
Back in the early days of The Sims Classic, no one at EA was particularly certain that this new game, which primarily was about house-building, was going to be any good. So, Jerry Martin, Robi Kauker, Kent Jolly, and Michael Cormier were the game's entire music team. In-game songs were written entirely by them and performed at one of EA's studios. The singers who performed the stereo songs were not well-known -- downright obscure, in fact. Just people who were looking for work in California.
So, a few months later, the game is released and, hey presto, it's a million-seller!

The Sims 2 -- it started out innocuously enough. Just a ragtag group of TV and cinema composers, headed by the Mothersbaugh brothers, late of Devo. Then, about halfway through the series, good old Rod Humble comes onboard and insists they start using local bands. Y'know, people who were not yet household names whose posters could be found on bulletin boards and lampposts all over L.A.  So, The Sims 2 turns out to be a great success, too!

The Sims 3 -- in this case, we start out with the original score taking a backseat to the bands who make the "music" (feh -- anti-music is more like it) for the stereo. Let me repeat that...

The stereo! A single object in the Electronics sort of the Buy Mode catalogue. One which most people aren't going to get for their Sims.
This single object has works from the likes of Nelly Furtado, Leanne Rimes, and Lady Antebellum. Now, as I don't typically listen to anything composed after 1899, unless it was written by Jerry Goldsmith, John Williams, Koji Kondo, or Jerry Martin, I don't claim to have a great deal of knowledge on this point... but, you've got to figure that, if even I've heard of them, they must be famous enough to demand a six-figure paycheque.
If the price of the stereo object in The Sims 3 accurately reflected the amount of money spent to have the music made for it, Malcolm Landgraab, himself, wouldn't be able to afford it! A cheater would have to type "motherlode + Enter" so much, the keys involved would stop working! An honest player would have to play the game nonstop for 700 years to have their Sims earn enough!

Of course, one cannot forget Steve Jablonsky's contribution to The Sims 3... or can one? Let's face it -- he'll never be Jerry Martin. His original score for this game seems to have been engineered for total ignorance. It's just a cacophony you have to get through in order to hear the stereo stuff.
Speaking strictly as a composer, Jablonsky's Sims 3 BGM is half-remixes of Mutato Muzika's Sims 2 score, half-Desperate Housewives. It's easily the weakest OST in franchise history.

An extrapolation. Assuming Sims division remain on their present course, the fourth Sims installment will have no original score at all, relying completely on jam-bands and pop groups for the background noise.
And, you know what? That's fine with me. The Sims 3 isn't nifty. I'd go so far as to say that it's right on the borderline between "not nifty" and "complete rubbish".  I used to fantasise about what kind of OST I'd write for The Sims series. Hell, I've got an entire flashdrive full of Sims-inspired piano improvs!
Now, though... I wouldn't compose for The Sims if a hot girl with a suitcase full of money begged me to.

The Sims is a corporate sell-out. One wonders how Will Wright feels about it. I mean, it must be gratifying to see one's own idea become a multi-million-dollar franchise... but, at the same time, to see the company responsible for it taking the shortest path to money, even if it means squashing game quality like an insect in the process.

Posted by theniftyperson at 1:31 AM CDT

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You remember TMRB, right? Once a candidate for the website's title, The Mind's Rubbish Bin has been condensed into a single page on Spiny McSpleen's Nifty Website...

...at least, until now!

TMRB has spent the last several months (nigh on a year, actually) being expanded to include many different fields of study. Thus far, I've found trivial stuff regarding Star Trek, Super Mario, and of course, general miscellanea. It's not ready for publishing just yet, but here's an idea of what will be found therein...

Miscellaneous
Every possible move in the game of Chess has a name.

A traditional doorbell sound is comprised of the first two notes of the Westminster Quarters (in music theory, a major third).

The Chinese translation of the former KFC slogan, "Finger-Lickin' Good" approximates to "eat your fingers off".

Snow has been falling on planet Earth for millions of years. During that time, no two snowflakes have ever been identical to one another.

Super Mario
The arcade version of Mario Bros. is the only build in which Koopas leave their shells. In all other versions, they simply wobble on their backs for a bit before repositioning and becoming hazardous again. In the Game Boy Advance version (built into the Super Mario Advance series), Koopas were replaced with Spinies.

Luigi did not appear in any games during the year 1994. He also did not appear in any original platformers for the Game Boy (his only side-scroller appearance being Super Mario Bros. Deluxe for Game Boy Colour). Mario, on the other hand has appeared in no fewer than two games per year since his introduction in 1981.

The 1993 Japan-only release, Mario & Wario, contains no Japanese text. All game text is in English.

Luigi did not appear in any original first-party platformers during the fifth generation. (Nintendo 64, Game Boy Colour).

There have been more Mario games released with Charles Martinet as the voice of Mario than there have been without.

Star Trek
The USS Enterprise-D has made more onscreen appearances than any other Starfleet ship. It appears in every episode of The Next Generation, one episode of Deep Space Nine, one episode of Enterprise, and the film Star Trek: Generations: 181 appearances in total.

The franchise's tag-line, "...To boldly go where no one has gone before," contains a split-infinitive. The proper way to phrase it would be, "...To go boldly where no one has gone before".

Two characters from as many Trek programmes have been named after Gene Roddenberry in some way. In The Next Generation, Wesley Crusher derives his first name from Roddenberry's middle name. In Voyager, Thomas Eugene Paris derives his middle name from Roddenberry's first name.

Vasquez Rocks, a park near Agua Dulce, California, has been used to portray alien planets on every Trek series but Deep Space Nine. Its first appearance was in the original Star Trek's episode, "Arena", where it served as the stage for Kirk's fight with the Gorn. It most recently appeared in Star Trek 2009 to portray Vulcan (creating continuity with Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, where it was used for the same purpose).

The End... for now.

I was quite surprised to find just how much minutiae exists in the Star Trek franchise. I suppose with all those Trek anoraks out there, who could argue the meaning of "petaQ" with Gowron, himself, it's to be expected. Of course, TMRB isn't a dumping-ground for uninteresting bits of OCD crap -- anachronisms, continuity and character errors, inconsistencies. Y'know, stuff that only an ub3r633k who shows up to film premiers in costume could find redeeming.

There's quite a lot of Mario trivia as well. Needless to say, what's listed up there isn't even the half of what I've found on any of those subjects. It's more like half of a fraction of a decimal. Invalid! Does not compute! Boom! There goes R2D2.
Oh yes, almost forgot -- I'm currently working on the Star Wars TMRB and Zelda TMRB, also.

Give it, perhaps, five more months -- then, I'll be finished. Or not. Who knows, really?

Posted by theniftyperson at 9:16 AM CDT

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You know Those, right? Your mama said there'd be days like This. Everyone has had one of Those days -- the day where, for all your charm, wit, and hand-eye co-ordination, everything seems to go wrong. You spill your coffee, you put two different shoes on, you knock your head on the car-door, you burn your lunch, your reformat your flashdrive and discover that you accidentally deleted the 3rd-quarter analysis spreadsheets with it. You know, Those days.
Well, I'm having one of Those weeks.

Though not strictly this week, Friday last, I encountered the largest spider on the face of the planet, which set me up for several days'-worth of arachnophobia. Every night since, I've had nightmares involving unnaturally-gigantic spiders. Just last night, I dreamt I found a particularly dense spiderweb, similar to what a funnel-web spider would make, only it was inhabited by a wolf-spider the approximate size of both my hands.

Then, on Sunday (the official start of the week in the SMTWTFS format), I go to a coffee-shop and encounter a ghost from my past. I shan't discuss it in great detail, but, suffice it to say, I would have preferred arachnophobia at that very moment.

However, I can safely say that today, Wednesday, the 22nd of September, has been the worst day of the week thus far. First, after I woke up this morning, I was only half-conscious when I went to make a pot of coffee. I ended up dumping a quarter of a cup of coffee-grounds into the reservoir instead of the basket. The reservoir, still being wet from the cup of tea I made at midnight, was frightfully difficult to clean.
An hour ago, or thereabouts, I went to the petrol station, as my car was dangerously low on the explosive propulsion liquid. I put my credit card into the thing there and it didn't take. I tried it again, no luck. I went into the convenience store to see if they could programme in 20 quid of petrol onto the card. They said it was being declined in every case.  Turns out I was sent a bill through the ever-so-reliable United States Postal Service by the credit card firm, which, of course, I never received. At any rate, I dusted off my backup card and used it to buy petrol. An activity that should have taken four to seven minutes to complete took twenty-eight minutes.
I was actually on my way to Thé Cup (a bistro with a piano in it, about which I have written in a past entry, like July-ish). I had intended to do a modicum of composing there whilst partaking in Earl Grey tea and a scone. Quite an inspiring place, really, Thé Cup -- their piano leaves a bit to be desired, but its post-industrial, hole-in-the-wall type environment is a jolly good place for new age composers to ply our trade...
...assuming one can get there...
I drive away from the petrol station and proceed to 48th Street, thence to Randolph. I turn north on 27th to approach the place at the only angle for parking. When I endeavour to shift lanes, I discover that a sodding great red pick-up truck, emblazoned with Nebraska Cornhusker football decals, has materialised out of thin air -- as though the Starship Enterprise, itself, has beamed this vehicle onto the road. I manage to avert certain disaster by speeding up enough to overtake (something which a nearby policeman looked twice at). Eventually, I find the second-to-last road to take me to Thé Cup -- I'm still trying to convince myself that I'll probably never encounter that same truck again (people who drive such large vehicles around here tend to have inferiority complexes and memberships in the National Rifle Association), I manage to miss the last road. I end up in the turning lane of a one-way street, with no hope of being able to double back on the route for several miles.
When I finally get back home (a task of great difficulty for all the road work going on around here), one of my crackhead neighbours attempts to run me down (either accidentally or intentionally) as I exit my car.

But, fear not, as This week is still young yet. I'm sure that something will happen between tomorrow and 2359 CST Saturday that will make today look an absolute picnic. A picnic in tall grass full of huge spiders, but a picnic nonetheless.

Posted by theniftyperson at 4:23 PM CDT

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Since I don't have a Facebook account anymore, I have to go back to posting my random crap here on Of Carbon and Silicon, like the old days.

First, I was out for a stroll in the park this morning and I came across what could be described as the largest spider on the face of the planet. Now, for those who don't know, I have a just a touch of arachnophobia... all right, make that major arachnophobia. There are places I won't go if I think there are spiders there. If I were being chased by an EF5 tornado and the only place to hide from it was an abandoned, spider-infested underground storm cellar, I would probably take my chances with the tornado. There are worse things than death, after all. Encountering spiders is certainly one of those things.
In any case, I wouldn't have seen it if I hadn't been watching an earthworm squirming about on the pavement. Anyway, I took one look at it (the spider, not the worm) and immediately reversed course at a moderately-paced run. I saw a bloke jogging who was going in the direction of the spider, to whom I thought for a split-second I would shout, "Go back! Don't go that way!", but I considered that, with his dark sunglasses, he wouldn't even see the thing. He probably trod on it, but I didn't think to turn around and have another look.  The unfortunate part of the story was, I had been walking for about twenty-five minutes at that point and I had very nearly gone full-circle -- I could see my car at the top of the hill. My impulsive desire to run away caused me to completely retrace my steps, going another quarter-mile in the opposite direction. Fortunately, the nearest thing I found to another huge spider on the way back to my car was a Daddy Long-Legs (which are but mites, not arachnids). So, I got quite a bit of exercise this morning.

Let's see, what else...?
Ah, yes. I finally finished a decent (though a bit lengthy) voice-acting demo CD. It contains 22 tracks, which are all fairly short. The longest is, maybe, a minute and 15 seconds. Most of them are around five to seven seconds. Anyway, I sent one to two of our local TV stations -- hopefully, one of them will prove to be profitable.
Just in case you should wonder what I can do with this unusual voice of mine, here's a small sample of the 22-track demo...
Jasper
The Boss
German Accent
I consider the former two character voices to be the easiest ones with which to improvise. They're also the most difficult to maintain over long periods of time, mostly because they both require a sort of gruff vocal effect. To achieve this, one must project one's voice without being loud. Sort of like the way computer sound cards will only allow waveforms to peak so high before they distort.
The German accent turned out to be one of the longer tracks on the disc, mostly because my standard test phrase for all of my other accents didn't fit it ("A properly laid-out kitchen should permit a Sim to go from refrigerator to stove to dining room in a relatively straight line"). I found the German test phrase in the front of the Sims 2: Apartment Life instructional literature.
I guess my test phrases demonstrate just exactly how lazy I am. I had The Sims 2 player's guide and the Apartment Life instructions just lying about near or on my desk. Didn't have to go far to find them.

So, that's basically it for now. Come back tomorrow. I might have decided to write something else.

Posted by theniftyperson at 11:18 AM CDT

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Weird. I don't know what it is about the iPhone versus other mobile devices, but something certainly causes it to receive a great deal of press, scrutiny, and criticism.  A fabled 300-page uber-bureaucratic phone bill... a thousand-quid application that serves only to show others how wealthy one is... censorship issues with certain publications... micromanagerial bureaucracy every which way... it certainly gives just cause to make one stop and think. I certainly have and it made me think twice about the iPhone as something I would buy.

As I said in a previous entry, I'm in the market for a new mobile phone. I had it down to three candidates: a Droid, a BlackBerry, or an iPhone. Make that two candidates -- strike one iPhone.
Now, of course, only the bad, controversial stuff ever makes it into the national press, but the iPhone seems, to me, as though it does not quite measure up to my standards for a mobile device.
First, I'm very much against micromanagement and sustained control over a product by the company that made it. Once an item makes it into the hands of the consumer, it becomes the responsibility of the end-user, not the company. From what I understand, whenever someone criticises the iPhone for not working the way the person thinks it should, Apple issues an apology and a software update. I don't know about the iPhone 4, but previous models had no choice but to accept Apple's updates. It was either update or brick -- no middle ground.

Plus, AT&T have been known to engage in bureaucracy for bureaucracy's sake to protect their own interests. Draconian restrictions written into the fine print on all of their contracts may trick one into signing away one's liver, which their task-force come to extract if you can't make payments on time. The alleged 300-page iPhone usage bill suggests that AT&T haven't changed their ways. Evidently, someone who chooses the default billing options will receive a detailed manifest outlining every billable action performed on the iPhone during the month. If one talks, texts, surfs the web, and does whatever the hell else one can do with the thing a lot, one may end up with a bill the approximate length of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.

Then, there's the functionality issue. The iPhone 4 is notorious amongst cable TV news anchors and late-night comedians alike for its inability to make calls if you hold it a certain way. Also, unlike most mobile devices, including but not limited to the Microsoft Zune, Nintendo DSi, and BlackBerry Bold, the iPhone has moisture sensors on the unit's exterior. This configuration makes the unit more susceptible to bricking from exposure to any level of aerial water vapour. On most devices, you'll find similar sensors concealed under the battery, protected from all kinds of moisture short of total submersion in water. With the iPhone, one is encouraged to use it only in a dry environment, such as a room with a dehumidifier or the Mojave Desert at high sun, otherwise, the unit will take in any humidity it finds and lock up from unacceptable moisture levels, which, of course, voids the warranty.

Then, there's some question about the App Store, vis-a-vis censorship of content. Apple is like Nintendo, as it was in the pre-ESRB era -- censoring content which they find to be offensive in some way. With Nintendo, at least, there was a predictable hierarchy of reasons why something was censored. In the case of games with blood, gore, sexuality, or references to alcohol, tobacco, or drugs, Nintendo would request the developer to remove the content and replace it with something else. Basically, as long as gameplay was not heavily reliant on blood, gore, sex, or drugs, the developer could remove the content and Nintendo would release it as an "acceptable" game (e.g. a street-racing game where the cars would pass by a pub called "BEER" -- the developer could change it to "SHOP" or something for the NES release).  Apple's censorship of content is not as predictable. Whilst they claim only to censor material containing pornography, drugs, extreme violence, et cetera, their track record has not proven this to be true. For example: a while back, there was an App in the store having to do with the band, Nine Inch Nails. Version 1.0 was released, uncensored in any way. However, version 1.2, containing naught but a software patch to prevent crashing on overseas iPhones, was delayed by Apple, then rejected outright. Eventually, enough people made a scene, which caused Apple to cave, releasing v.1.2 to the App Store.

That's another reason why I'm scratching iPhone off the list. Verily, it's why I prefer alternatives to Apple products (this Gateway laptop I'm using to compose this entry, for example). Apple tend not to stand up and defend their decisions, being easily defeated by a relative few people. If they were a kid in school, the school counsellor would say that they cave to peer-pressure.
Sort of the antithesis of Electronic Arts (about whom I've complained many times on Of Carbon and Silicon), who are so steadfastly devoted to making money that they don't tend to waste precious man-hours on development of software patches, deciding to patch out the bugs in the next release.
I don't get the same greedy-capitalist vibe from Apple. They're keen on keeping their customers happy. A bit too keen, I'm afraid. They released the iPhone 4 too soon, not giving the units enough time in the manufacturing stage. "Get it made and sold quickly," was the mantra. This led to several units being sold with jaundiced screens, as the laminating glue used to hold the aluminosilicate cover onto the chassis hadn't had a chance to completely dry before assembly was completed.
At this point, I often bring Nintendo into the discussion. Nintendo know what they're doing and they know how they're going to do it. If they estimate monthly sales of a new console to be a half-million, then they'll only make a half-million consoles in the first month. If it turns out that there's an actual demand for 3/4 of a million consoles and the original 500 thousand sell out in a matter of weeks, too bad! Patience.
I suppose, not being based in Japan, Apple doesn't quite grasp the virtues of Zen-like patience. Make it now and make it quickly.

So, one phone down. Two more left.

Posted by theniftyperson at 12:46 PM CDT

Updated: Monday, 13 September 2010 4:30 PM CDT

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First, "Terra-Metrics" is changing. Not structurally or stylistically, but nominally. "Terra-Metrics" will, henceforth, be known as Cirrostratus.
To be quite honest, I was never incredibly pleased with the old title... it was meant to create a parallel between the song and the SimCity series. I was trying too hard to imitate Jerry Martin when I gave it that title. So, anyway, I'm listening to the song for the first time since November '09 (not just having it in the background, but actually listening to it). I decided that "Terra-Metrics" didn't fit the song. So, I opened a new text document and just started typing stuff that would make a better title. After the fifteenth, or so, alternate title (most of which had to do with mountains or water), I hit upon the idea that the song sounds like rain. Weather. Clouds. Cirrostratus.
Meteorologically speaking, cirrostratus is a type of high, dense clouds. Whilst not usually indicative of any significant precipitation event, they're my favourite kind of cloud form (next to Cumulonimbus, the harbingers of tornadoes) -- they block out the sun and seem to cool everything down by seven degrees. Just yesterday, I saw some interesting cirrostratus that looked like snowdrifts. But, I digress.

Next, I have completely finished a new song. Its title: The Paved Frontier. Basically, this is the tale of a composer who goes for a stroll down an unfamiliar forest path. The composer has never been on this path before, making every twist, turn, and fork in the road a new adventure. However, whilst it may seem new and unexplored to him, someone has obviously been here before, as the path is one of pavement.
It was derived from an untitled piano solo I wrote back in, maybe February or March '10. Last month, I decided to try out a variable-dynamic violin part on it just for summat to do. I decided I liked it, so I developed it some more. The violin became a violin section, I put some contrabasses in, and I almost changed the piano to a vibraphone... but, who wants to hear a vibraphone solo for four minutes?  Besides, when I get an orchestra to play it, the song would ultimately require three vibraphones to play a part written for a single piano.

C'est tout pour maintenant. Retournez-vous demain, s'il-vous plait.

Posted by theniftyperson at 3:03 AM CDT

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A number of weeks ago I chanced to enter a Culver's restaurant, whereupon, after I received my chicken tenders and plate of chips, I discovered there to be free Wi-Fi (information dispensed by a sign on the nearby wall, which I had not seen until that moment). Having my trusty, somewhat dusty Metallic Blue Nintendo DSi with me, I connected to the internet and, thus, to the DSi Shop.
I had read things on Nintendo's website about so-called, "DSiWare"... verily, the console itself came with six such applications installed already (Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Minis March Again, Mario Clock, Mario Calculator, FlipNote Studio, and two that I've never actually used). In any event, so intrigued was I at the prospect of having instant access to new programmes that I spent 20 quid on 2000 Nintendo Points. From Culver's free Wi-Fi, I downloaded three DSiWare applications: Rhythm Core Alpha, MusicON: Retro Keyboard, and Scrabble Classic. That left me with 500 Points which were burning the proverbial hole in my pocket until today. At a local grocery store, I discovered there to be free Wi-Fi again. I connected my DSi to it and downloaded one final programme: myNotebook: Carbon ("Carbon" referring to the colour, not the footprint).

Now, on an unrelated note, I also recently found myself in the local shopping-centre's Verizon Wireless store. I had been studying a Droid X, I think it was -- comparing it to a BlackBerry: functionality versus overhead costs and subscription fees.  I need a new mobile phone and I've narrowed it down to three candidates: a Droid, a BlackBerry, or an iPhone. Controversy and hidden charges surround all three, but that's how stuff works in a capitalist society: who can swindle their subscribers out of as much money as possible.  I figure five million owners of these devices across the country can't be all wrong -- they must see something in them, otherwise they wouldn't be selling as well as they are.

And now, the link between the two topics.
It seems to me as though all of the applications... er, "apps" for Android, BlackBerry, and iPhone are all intended to perform the same general function as DSiWare -- to be downloaded from a remote location onto the user's mobile device for use at any time of the day or night, anywhere on the face of the planet (sort of).  I already have a Nintendo DSi... DSi Shop is my App Store. Someone needs to discover that Nintendo are making a gigantic error in judgement by not using DSiWare to compete with other mobile devices. DSiWare developers seem to be focussing mainly on games ("It's for Nintendo -- the Mario people!"), whilst they could be doing a great deal more. Post-It Notes that one can write on and "stick" to their DSi's main menu! Graphing calculators! Address books! Tax software! Tip calculators! Graph paper! Day-planners! Dictionaries! Thesauri! Translators! Why, Nintendo could corner the market on paper and calculator apps alone! Never mind what could be done outside DSiWare... entire suites of office stuff (stickynotes, calendars, address books, day-planners, and notepaper all in one DS card)! Architectural design suites! Then, someone like SanDisk could come along and make a sleek, compact, yet durable DS card holder that could fit in one's pocket.

Don't get me wrong -- Flips: The Bubonic Builders is fine in its own right, but Nintendo are stunting their own growth by not seeing the DSi's full potential as a mobile device. Specialising in games is no longer an option. In this era of the iPhone, people want to be able to do stuff with their devices. Maybe assign one team to work on games and another to work exclusively on mobile apps?

It'll work, mates!

Posted by theniftyperson at 1:18 AM CDT

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Ever since the turn of the century, I have been continuously perplexed at my generation's insistence on being "unique".  However, everything that we consider to be "unique" has been played out and standardised for decades.

Take gangsta-rap as an example.  Actually, no... take it to be an icon, a monolith, a veritable monument to standardism. The formula for a hip-hop, R&B, or gangsta-rap piece hasn't changed since the genres' introduction in the '80s: a simplistic acoustic or synthesised melodic loop consisting of one measure in 4/4 time, non-musical verse loosely superimposed over it, and a bass/drum line designed to destroy your lower-end car-stereo speakers.
Now, in the case of R&B, a variable-note improvised vocal part, typically a female voice, is added to the list as well. In the case of gangsta-rap, the verse tends to speed up, perhaps in an effort to sneak profanity and graphical descriptions of violence past the label's censors.

Now, for some reason, much of my generation have taken hip-hop to be the manifestation of rebellion.  Somehow, this standardised formula which has been copied by hundreds of so-called "rappers" since the '80s has become the thing people think of when they rail against "The Man".  A number of R&B songs have been written with current events in the subject matter. Anti-Bush, pro-choice versus pro-life, the election of President Obama, anti-war sentiment, Christianity versus Islam, that sort of thing. I even heard a gangsta-rap thing the other day about breaking into jail and decapitating Bernard Madoff, among other things (mostly about freeing fellow gang-bangers from prison).

Anyway, hip-hop et. al. has become something of a dumping ground for disestablishmentarian sentiment. Not only that, but it has regularly been mistaken for "music".  The Webster's New World Dictionary, Second Collegiate Edition defines music as:

The art or science of combining vocal or instrumental sounds or tones in varying melody, harmony, rhythm, and timbre so as to form structurally complete and emotionally expressive compositions.

That's the crux of the whole matter right there -- varying melody and harmony. Neither hip-hop, nor R&B, nor gangsta-rap have any of the above. There may be a simple melody, but nothing that varies. Compare Hans Zimmer to Eminem... it's like comparing a violin to an elastic band. Both will create constant harmonic tones if plucked with the finger, but only the violin has the staying-power to create a vast sequence of musical notes, where the elastic will eventually break.

Unfortunately, standards have fallen since Webster's Second Collegiate dictionary was published back in 1970. Internet Explorer's built-in Encarta Dictionary: English (North America) defines music so:

Sounds, usually produced by instruments or voices, that are arranged or played in order to create an effect

...Essentially, something you knock up in a few minutes that you can get gunned down in the street for releasing.

I have no qualms about saying this: hip-hop, R&B, and gangsta-rap were all responsible for the downfall of And Now for Something Completely Different. Adopting the felonious attitude and pigheadedness of millionaire rappers, the hosts of the hip-hop "music" programme on KZUM managed to slide around professionalism and co-opt the programming director into participating in their scheme. I am convinced that the rapper credo of "why ask for something when you can steal it?" was the inspiration behind the conspiracy which eventually ended my radio programme.

But, enough personal inferences. The point of this rambling, apart from "to waste space on the Tripod servers", is this.
Rebellion is only rebellious so long as it remains unique. If enough people begin rebelling in the same way, then the rebellion, itself, sets the new standard of normalcy. Even the anarchy so desperately fought for by the subjects of the rap will still retain a measure of order if achieved. ("What?") Consider, if you please, the ancient Greek and Roman eras. No real centralised government existed until Rome's downfall was near. In effect, anarchy. The "Empire" was, in fact, comprised of hundreds of individual city-states with their own laws and societal mores. What was legal in Town A may have been a capital offence in Town B.
The point: rebellion doesn't get you anywhere. Basically, instead of creating chaos from order, you create a new kind of order which future generations may seek to overthrow with their own "rebellion".

Posted by theniftyperson at 9:11 PM CDT

Updated: Tuesday, 7 September 2010 10:29 PM CDT

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After many long months of development, I finally have enough music written and improvised for a third album! Unless I can come up with a better title, it will be called "Dai Sakusen", after the title track.

I'm rather proud of myself, if one may be so bold -- on the last two albums, there were a lot of short songs and one really long song. In both cases, "Terra-Metrics". If it hadn't been for that song, Utopia wouldn't have happened -- at the time, "Terra" was just over nine minutes in length, bringing the total album duration to just over 20 minutes. In Autumn State, I re-recorded "Terra", which shortened it to about 8:45. Still rather long.  But, "Terra" can't get any better than it was in Autumn State, so I'm not including it in Dai Sakusen.  I decided that at a fairly early stage... meaning I couldn't use its sheer length as a crutch (as portion-control, if you like) to write less music.
Here's the track list as it stands now...

1. Dai Sakusen! (The Grand Adventure)
2. The Paved Frontier
3. SIMesthesia
4. If the Walls Could Talk
5. Night Drive
6. Rain on the Road
7. City Sunset
8. An Autumn State of Mind (Spiny McSpleen's Theme)
9. Freshmen 4 Ever

To offset the lack of "Terra" in this album, I decided to compose longer songs. The shortest one is the improvised, "If the Walls Could Talk", lasting only 1:53. The longest is "City Sunset" at 5:48. The average song time on the whole album is about 2:55. The total duration is 28:23.

Of course, there is a slight problem in the distribution process. All right, two problems. Problem one: I don't have a radio programme anymore. Even if the host of the programme before mine was an arrogant bastard, at least I had a means by which I could debut my own music. Problem two: I don't have a Facebook account anymore. I maintained a "J Sebastian Perry" fan page there where I would update my fans (all six of them) about new compositions and albums.

So, essentially, I have the finished product, but no way of making people aware of it.

Never mind.

Posted by theniftyperson at 9:00 PM CDT

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It's not a good habit to be in -- updating one's blog only every so often. There was a time when I was writing at least something in it every single day.  So, I thought I should clear away the cobwebs and write something for a change.

Right... where to begin?

Last month sometime, I came up with an idea for a children's chapter book series -- not for kindergarteners who only know a few words, but for the older kids who are more perceptive to so-called "vocabulary words". Quite honestly, I don't think I could manage to write a Dick, Jane & Spot-type book... I'd spend months just dumbing down my vocabulary. But, I digress...
The series is that of mystery, akin to The Boxcar Children or Encyclopedia Brown or something. The protagonist's name is "Eric Porter" (an Anglicised version of "Hercule Poirot"). He is in the fourth grade of an American elementary school (where he shall remain, in perpetuity -- too many perfectly good kids' book characters have been ruined because their respective authors decided to age them like real people), he has a sister in second grade, named "Leah" and he enjoys playing "Holmes & Watson" on the playground, where he is Holmes and his friend, Jason, is Watson.
Thus far, I have fourteen potential plot ideas, but only ten of them will be written into actual volumes. I've written two books already (they're not very long -- the longest is 18 pages in Microsoft Works) and the third one is forthcoming. Once I've finished it, I know a publishing firm here in town where I can have it distributed. That's likely to happen by Q1 2011, so look for the first three books in the Eric Porter: Private Detective series to show up in a bookshop near you.

Next, I've managed to find that Enterprise episode I was talking about in the previous entry. It was a series two episode called "Carbon Creek". That information turned out to be irrelevant, however, as I couldn't recall what I needed it for. Pathetic, really.

Proceeding, now. On Thursday last, I attended a broadcasters' job fair to see what kind of opportunities exist for a free-agent manly announcing voice. Two television stations, two radio co-operatives, and our local PBS/NPR affiliate were represented. One of the TV stations' representatives right put me off ("We're not a radio station," he said, "We don't need announcers." Well, my good sir, I imagine your advertising division would argue against that statement!), but the other told me just to send along a demo CD of all of my voices and accents and they'd listen to it (I know: "Kiss of death. You'll never hear from them again." It's something, anyway). The PBS/NPR affiliate told me the same thing, whilst adding that they will have need for a fill-in announcer at some point in the near future. So, tomorrow or the day after, I'll be recording a new demo.
An aside -- I know that people want to appear as professional as possible when looking for a job in such a fiercely competitive market as mass media. However, this job fair took place on the hottest day of a 1.5 week heat-wave. Air temperature of 100 Fahrenheit, dewpoints in the 70s, heat index of 110. I was hot enough in my simple (though tasteful) polo shirt and trousers -- there were two blokes and a (really cute) girl in attendance who wore suits! In retrospect, I probably should have contrived to get that girl's mobile number... oh well.

And finally, I seem to have become something of a celebrity amongst the staff of a small coffee-shop and bakery known as Thé Cup ("thé" being French for "tea"). See, there's a piano at this shop. If you were to know me, you'd know that my motto is "Give me a piano and I'll play it." Also, this Thé Cup has proximity to a local high school, meaning they're likely to attract my kind of audience. The highlight of my piano repertoire is a medley of ten or eleven songs from Mario and Zelda (plus, my inability to play the proper harmonies in the Super Mario Brothers theme has led me to create a distinctively New Age chord progression to play instead of Kondo-san's time-tested chords).
Anyway, I went there today... well, yesterday, I guess (I haven't slept yet)... and ordered my usual: Earl Grey tea and a scone. After I'd been sitting at the table with my order for, perhaps, three minutes, a girl from the staff approached. She introduced herself as "Dani" and said that she, personally, "loves [my] piano-playing".  Now, I've gotten myself into more trouble than I care to recall, speculating about relationships on this blog. But, suffice it to say, I believe I will contrive to return to Thé Cup tomorrow.

Posted by theniftyperson at 1:27 AM CDT

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Dash it all! I was going along, working on the Star Trek portion of The Mind's Rubbish Bin and, suddenly, I fall into a hole.

It seems that an episode of Enterprise that I thought I saw in the original run doesn't actually exist. Perchance you had the same illusion as I?
Archer, Tucker, and T'Pol are discussing stuff and T'Pol mentions that one of her ancestors was part of a group of Vulcans who crashed their ship on Earth in the 1950s. In the penultimate scene, T'Pol's ancestor is seen giving to someone at a desk a bit of Velcro.
Also, I seem to have mislaid an episode of Voyager... I think. It may also be from Enterprise.  Someone, who I have satisfied myself to be Tom Paris (though it may be Trip Tucker) had a run-in with a cloaking device and had their entire arm (or torso) disappear on them.

As Hercule Poirot would say, the little grey cells are not functioning properly. Rather than click and scroll forever on Memory Alpha, I could leave it to the mind as I sleep, then have fish for breakfast. Cough.
Or, perhaps you might be able to solve the problem.
If you know which episodes I'm talking about, reply to this post and tell me as much as you can about the title and the series (or, "season") in which it was seen.

In any case, I have managed to assemble a great deal of trivial crap about Star Trek, both the programme by that name and the franchise. The Mind's Rubbish Bin is being slowly emptied so it can be filled again.

Posted by theniftyperson at 11:43 PM CDT

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