On the subject of computing as utility.

This weekend I purchased Valve Software's latest masterpiece, the long-ago released Half Life 2. I've since been obscenely pleased with how good the game is, but that's actually another topic entirely. This little entry is about Valve's design and distribution methods, and what I believe they signify.
( Utility computing, Valve, and other old news. )

( ATI gets a tip of the hat )

I'm pretty sure my brain started wandering off somewhere on that first one, and I lost some of the points I was going to make. I am, however, not going to fix my short-attention-span damaged writing tonight. I needs me the sleep.

Oh. Pherapods. Second coolest FPS game mechanic evar. It's like 'Follow me', but evil.

First coolest is still the gravity gun. The gameflow in HL2 is just a little more intelligent than average - and so many little puzzles involving moving things around involve the gravy gun... it's just very slick. The whole game design has me in serious awe. Leaves the frogs standing and all that.

Sleep.

So many online comics. Some geek needs to make a portal.

Grah. My old comics page, which has been flighty and crashy for a while, and I've not bothered to fix it, finally keeled over a couple days ago. That suggests to me that I should make a new one... but that'd require... effort. So for now, I've got a dump of the original database.

( comics database in csv... )

The Us list is full of crazy.

Someone on the Us list started a flamewar conversation about religion a couple days ago. It's been full of shit like any conversation about religion is, but I choked on this little gem:

Fundamentalist Christianity is inherently peaceful because they practice the example of Christ.

Apparently we all see the wrong fundies, cuz when I think fundamentalist, I think about the people who're condemning everyone but them to hell because their lifestyle is wrong, and in those areas where they're in power, making sure everyone either conforms or breaks. Either public perception is wrong as to who the fundamentalists are, or this guy's cracked.

Of course, the followup line to the above described fundamentalist Islam as inherently violent...