Category Archives: tech

Next Step for Guitar Hero and Generative Music

Leave a reply

BoingBoing had a really interesting two part conversation between Xeni Jardin and Peter Kirn of Create Digital Music and Matt Ganucheau of Expression College about generative music.

There was a question asked toward the end about the next direction for Guitar Hero.  I didn’t feel that they had a good response (off the top of their heads) to it, so here’s my (had some time to think about it) opinion.

There are two directions to go from the current state of Guitar Hero, and in opposite directions.  I expect to see offerings in both directions in the future.

With regards to generative and collaborative music, there is the more creative direction (which as mentioned is less emotionally safe) in which people are collaborating in new composition.  It would be interesting for the software/game to lay a background and others to layer on that.  Perhaps with the software reacting and changing depending on player input.  Think drum circle with more instruments.

The other direction is toward more realism in instrument play.  I can’t recount how many times I’ve heard musician friends say “why would I want to do that when I can play real music?”  I can imagine a future generation of this style of gameplay that takes input from “real” instruments.  Using a MIDI interface is the most obvious choice.

Whether either of those directions will ever be as popular as the current Guitar Hero and ilk is unlikely in my opinion.  The dumbed-down, lowest common denominator game play is what leads to this genre’s popularity.

Video embeds for the conversation that got my mind churning:

Continue reading →

NYT: Get Rich Quick, Go iPhone (Not)

Leave a reply

Media coverage of iPhone application development (what? why is media even covering this?!) goes in a stereo-typical cyclical pattern that is almost weekly in its oscillation.  This week chiming in is the New York Times: Hoping to Make iPhone Toys as a Full-Time Job.

The Lede on this story sells the Gold Rush, no doubt leading young men West to dig in the dirt.

This article does point out the other side of the story briefly:

But the chances of hitting the iPhone jackpot keep getting slimmer: the Apple store is already crowded with look-alike games and kitschy applications, and fresh inventory keeps arriving daily.

But they quickly return and glorify the Get Ri¢h Story.  They return to 6-figure pronouncements and phrases like “minimal skill” and “only 7 days”.  It sounds like late-night hucksterism.

There are currently about 2000 apps released in the store per month.  Less than 1 a month is a get-rich-quick winner.  And those are usually gimmicks and one-offs.

There is a middle ground.  A reasonable expectations and reasonable skills balance.  But you won’t likely hear that story in the press.

I also wouldn’t be surprised if there were some big boys that back out of the arena in a year or two because of the dilution of perceived value.  They spend big bucks on game development and need to reap it back.

Of course, evolution in the hardware available is going to continue to change the landscape.

AirPort Utility Bypass for Bit Torrent

1 Reply

I was recently reminded that because I was so busy this year and didn’t make it to SXSW, that I had forgotten about the SXSW Bit Torrent.  I went looking and it didn’t take long to find that some had indeed put one together for 2009.

I was quickly reminded that the AirPort Extreme Base Station by default protects me from the wilds of the Internet and to get the torrent running you have to bypass the ports and directly map them to your inside computer.

I found an old write-up to tell me how to do it, but it’s very out of date. I figured it out from there, but anyone who’s non-technical likely couldn’t.

I’m not going to take the time right now to explain the details again.  But you should be able to follow his text and my screen shots to get the gritty work done and allow you to bypass your default firewall with the current 5.4.1 Airport Utility.

A few days from now I’ll have more music than I need and it will likely take me months to sift through it all.  But I do have a new, big media drive just waiting.

So, here are the screen shots, if you have any questions, let me know! Continue reading →

Reclaiming Privacy with a Tether?

2 Replies

Random Opinion:

A friend of mine commented that her iPhone Internet is faster than her work computer’s Internet.

It’s bothered me for some time that the assumption is that companies can spy into your business as much as they want because “they provide” the equipment. Are you going to listen to my phone call to my doctor as well? Unfortunately, too often, the answer (given seriously) is “yes”.

“We have no respect for you. You are meat. Here’s your minimum + $x.” It seems odd on the surface, but obvious once introspected. The more people pay you, the more they don’t intrude on you. This has always been the case for me, and I’ve worked a wide variety of jobs.

Continue reading →

Strangers in a Crowd

Leave a reply

A random idea for an iPhone Application: Apple announced they would provide bonjour discovery of devices in the iPhone 3.0 software.  (They announced it to the world, so it’s not covered by the iPhone SDK NDA, you NDA nazis.)

My mind was w[oa]ndering and I thought of an interesting, odd, but compelling idea for an iPhone application.

Strangers.  You can discover devices in the area.  You invite them all to play Strangers.  The push notifications show a “badge icon” (that red number) showing you have been invited to play.  Any number of people join in.  It becomes a game of 20 questions to discover who each is.  That means YES or NO questions only.

Player A (Q3) to Player C (Q2): Are you wearing red?

Player A is asking his/her third question.  This question is of Player C and is the second question asked of C.

To put a little twist on it, we could of course have one Bot running on each device and have it asking and answering questions as well.  (It would not answer truthfully, it would answer randomly.)

It’s a little creepy of an idea, but i can imagine there being at least one “discover strangers” application.  In some places it would be fun – MacWorld convention.

Perhaps just the anonymous, concurrent 20 questions game that people could join into and leave at will would be more feasible.  You can’t ask another question if one is pending for you to answer.

Anyway, that’s a random app idea in my head.  FWIW.

Palm Pre(mature)

Leave a reply

Do you remember when Apple announced its iPhone?  It had to file with the FCC, so it was going to become public 6-months in advance.  They pre-announced to keep control of their message.  They held a lot of cards to their vest, and it wasn’t really clear what functionality was actually available until the summer release.

Do you remember when Palm announced their upcoming Pre?  It was like a hullaballooed product release at CES.  It was so patently obvious (to anyone familiar with the technologies) that their wasn’t a lot of there there.

There was so much overreaching of claims by one major investor (trying to stoke more investment?) that it required an official SEC filing of facts. (source: AppleInsider – in sore need of copy editing, but an excellent article).  They now even claim it won’t be a direct competitor to the iPhone.  So, not good for Internet or games?

Indeed, AppleInsider contends that Palm is precariously positioned, and I wholeheartedly agree.  I think they will need a drastic influx of capital to finish and maintain development of the vapor platform they presented the world.  And this isn’t the most ideal economic environment for that to happen.