Stung Eye

Link: Ribbon Hero

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 22:14:00 +0100

If an activity can be learned;

if the player’s performance can be measured;

if the player can be rewarded or punished in a timely fashion;

then that activity can be turned into a game.

via: Lost Garden ✈ Ribbon Hero turns learning Office into a game

Photo: splityarn

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 20:43:39 +0100

splityarn

Video: Pomplamoose VideoSongs have two rules: What you see is what you hear, and If you hear ...

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 18:51:00 +0100

Pomplamoose VideoSongs have two rules:

What you see is what you hear, and
If you hear it, at some point you see it (no hidden sounds).

Some nice songs:

[via]

Blog: Mobile Development

Sat, 06 Mar 2010 15:15:05 +0100

This weekend I’ll be exploring:

PhoneGap - Cross-platform mobile app-dev using html / css / javascript.
JQTouch - A mobile plugin for my fav Javascript framework, JQuery.
iProcessing - The API from processing.js extended for mobile use.
MobiOne - Windows mobile emulator for iPhone, Blackberry, Android and Pre.

Step one: Install Eclipse, PhoneGap and the Android SDK along with JQTouch, iProcessing and MobiOne.

Step two: Play around. Create a few sample apps.

Step Three: Tomorrow Andrew and I will deploy these apps to his Android phone.

Comment

Blog: You Know Who "Gets it"?

Thu, 04 Mar 2010 22:48:22 +0100

The Hypemachine, Groveshark and SoundCloud understand that the future will be streamed.

You can listen to (in their entirety) every album of the Hypem top 50 of 2009. The top 50 was crowd-sourced from the top 10 lists of over 500 bloggers. The albums are hosted by Groveshark.

Yes, the Hypem leaderboard gets gamed now and then, and it sometimes get clogged with meme-ooze, but the web’s messy like that.

SoundCloud is a mix-hunters paradise. I’m listening to Dj Czech’s “Bucket Of Grease” mix right now.

Comment

Link: Waterloo / Google AI-Tron Challenge Results

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 20:55:00 +0100

The goal of this challenge was to write a computer-program capable of playing the game Tron.

The rankings for my Ruby bot:

146 / 708 Total Entries
3 / 23 Ruby Entries
16 / 88 Canadian Entries

The rankings were determined using tournament play along with the Elo rating system.

Early non-minmax versions of my bots are available on github. The winning C++ bot source is also available; as is a brief explanation by the author.

I enjoyed this challenge immensely. My Ruby programming skills also benefited from this Code Kata.

Update: A detailed examination of the winning bot. And if you’re brave, a Haskell bot explained. ;)

Also: The tron battle continues on dhartmei’s server.

Video: The future of games, a talk by Jesse Schell. ...

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 10:49:00 +0100

The future of games, a talk by Jesse Schell. [28 minutes]

Even if you’re not a gamer this is a must-watch video, especially the second half on the implications of “games that break through the reality barrier” and the attention economy. I’m not sure I welcome the “gameification” of life, but it does feel like the inevitable progression of the capitalist spectacle. “A world where points are distributed for paying attention — to ads, activities, or other people.”

Adding to the conversation:

Awesome By Proxy: Addicted to Fake Achievement
Achievement Porn

Video: One human, three machines, rhythm. Also: How it works.

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 21:05:00 +0100

One human, three machines, rhythm. Also: How it works.

Link: Instructables Restaurant

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 20:59:26 +0100

Amsterdam is now home to the world’s first open source restaurant. Everything you see, use and eat is downloaded from Instructables.com.

It’s an experiment in combining free culture with food concepts.

Photo: From May 2010 DC Covers in Three Sentences or Less. Also: Batgirl

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 13:20:39 +0100

From May 2010 DC Covers in Three Sentences or Less.

Also: Batgirl

Photo: Forget crop circles, Sierpinski snow-triangles are the new hotness.

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 11:19:56 +0100

Forget crop circles, Sierpinski snow-triangles are the new hotness.

Photo: via

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 20:29:28 +0100

via

Video: iProcessing is an open programming framework for native iPhone applications using the ...

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 20:25:00 +0100

iProcessing is an open programming framework for native iPhone applications using the Processing language. It is an integration of the Processing.js library and a Javascript application framework for the iPhone.

Video: This video shows two AI players battling it out for Tron supremacy as part of the Google ...

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 13:45:00 +0100

This video shows two AI players battling it out for Tron supremacy as part of the Google AI Challenge.

If you’ve ever wanted to learn about game-AI programming you might want to look into this challenge. Bots can be written in C++, Java, Perl, Python, Ruby, Haskell, C#, Javascript, Go, Scheme, Lua and Clojure.

If you don’t know where to begin, you can try your hand at learning game-AI by playing Ruby Warrior, a roguelike that you play by implementing a Ruby class containing your player’s control logic.

Link: From Fish to Infinity

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 13:34:43 +0100

The first of a series of columns by Steven Strogatz on mathematics “from pre-school to grad school”.

“The goal is to give you a better feeling for what math is all about and why it’s so enthralling to those who get it.”

[via: dad]

Photo: Climb Aboard Media: Photoshop / Custom Processing sketch. ...

Sun, 07 Feb 2010 17:36:00 +0100

Climb Aboard

Media: Photoshop / Custom Processing sketch.

I cannot remember the source of the ladybug. It was part of a free sprite library created by an indie-game developer.

Video: The Evolution of Remix Culture - How Remix is becoming a platform for collective ...

Sun, 07 Feb 2010 13:57:00 +0100

The Evolution of Remix Culture - How Remix is becoming a platform for collective expression by, and conversations between, social groups.

Although I essentially agree with the ideas presented in this video, there is something about expressing ourselves in terms of pop culture that brings to mind Baudrillard’s Simulacrum. But really, I should learn to stop worrying and the love spectacle. :P

Oh, and bonus points for the Glass Bead Game analogy.

Video: Pete Drake - Forever Analogue AutoTune using a steel guitar.

Sat, 06 Feb 2010 14:08:37 +0100

Pete Drake - Forever

Analogue AutoTune using a steel guitar.

Photo: Quick! My first animated gif remix. ...

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 19:39:00 +0100

Quick! My first animated gif remix. :P

[Source image from Lauren Nassef’s A Drawing A Day : via]

Link: Introduction to Reverse Engineering Software

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 19:02:52 +0100

Learn to use the Scientific Method to deduce specific program behavior and to target, analyze, extract and modify specific operations of a program (mainly for purposes of interoperability).

File under: Information that could one day be illegal to posses (given the current direction of copyright reform).