A Coming Storm – Bandwidth Caps, Streaming Content and Cloud Computing.

Not so long ago, Cable and Broadband Internet provider Comcast was in the news over the disconnection of a customer for excessive broadband use. Now, It'd be easy for me to write a page and a half of Comcast hate on this topic, as many people who have had dealings with that company have been dissatisfied with their service. However, the issue is more complicated than "Comcast Sucks," there are readers out there who live in countries or areas of the US where Comcast isn't even an option, and what is going on affects anyone who uses the internet, or it soon will. This issue skirts perilously close to the politically-charged concept of Net Neutrality, so we may drift into that discussion as well.

Since the early days of the internet, the companies that provide access have sought a way to change fee structures to either a usage-based model (like mobile phones have) or content-priority model (like Cable TV.) It makes sense, on its surface. People are willing to pay a certain amount for internet access, but technology moves ever forward, and new infrastructure, better speeds and more bandwidth cost more for the provider, without providing significant additional revenue. The problem is, since the time of America On-Line as a dial-up service, customers have unilaterally rejected any attempts to carve up service or to charge on a per-hour basis. However, customer outrage only accomplishes so much, especially in regions where there is little or no competition. A customer can be as angry as they like, but if they cannot take their business elsewhere, they have little recourse.

The massive costs associated with establishing a network infrastructure capable of providing residential high-speed internet has created a unique situation. In order to entice companies to create and do at least minimal improvements and maintenance on those lines, governments offer a regulated monopoly in many cases to recoup those costs. Unfortunately, the legal definition of "competition" in networking doesn't keep pace with technological development, so even after exclusive contracts run out, virtual monopolies may remain in place because while there is technically competition, the service alternatives may not provide a reasonable level of service. This leaves large areas with two, or even just one legitimate options for internet service as the norm, rather than the exception, and all sorts of customer abuse and anti-competitive practice can take place outside the auspices of laws designed to protect consumers from monopolies.

Well, not that sort of Monopoly, but you get my point.

These companies provide access to their network, but would, of course, prefer that individual customers not use all of their capacity all the time. If a significant percentage of customers did this, the network couldn't handle it, meaning more expensive and difficult network upgrades for the same fees. Since the public won't stand for certain changes to fee structuring, and in some countries internet access has been classified as a basic human need along with other essential utilities, blunting the power of the monopoly, something has to give. The solution was intially to throttle certain types of traffic, slowing down the connection for users who are performing certain network operations. The legal and ethical concerns around snooping into data entering or leaving customer homes made this a poor solution, and the concept of a bandwidth cap was instituted.

Coming at the issue from another angle, normal and legal consumer uses for bandwidth-hevy operations seem to be increasing daily. Streaming video through YouTube and similar services, High-Definition TV and Film by way of Netflix, Hulu and HBOGo, Voice-over-IP telephone service like Skype scratch the surface of high-bandwidth use. Cloud computing shares hardware and network resources to use applications like Google Documents, run websites like Reddit and provide online virtual backup drives for long-term storage that is not at risk of a single power outage or natural disaster wiping out all copies of important files. As these services become more popular, a whole lot of data needs to be transferred around, and that means more bandwidth and strain on the networks.

It isn't just pirates using large amounts of bandwidth anymore.

It was easy at first for large companies to "sell" the concept of bandwidth caps by insinuating that unless someone was a filthy pirate illegally downloading and uploading "stolen" intellectual property, that the caps wouldn't affect anyone. These caps have been in place in many areas for three or more years, and the hard limits are not going up, despite the increasing demand for bandwidth in legitimate internet traffic. Average caps in the US are currently around 250GB/Mo for service providers who also provide cable TV, leading to accusations that these caps are in place partly to discourage use of streaming video services that compete with cable television services. In Canada, caps are frequently even lower, especially away from large metropolitan areas where caps are as low as 25-60GB per month. That is as low as 12 HD films streamed over a connection in a month before disconnection of service. In Europe, the figures vary wildly, as the geographic size of areas needing to be covered by lines for networking is comparatively smaller in many countries, which in some places allows for better networks and more healthy competition.

Land lines, laptops and desktops aren't the only devices running into monitored and limited internet usage. As the internet speeds on mobile devices has improved over the years, customers found ways to use Unlimited data plans to "tether" mobile devices to computers for a comparable high-speed internet connection to DSL or Cable. As a result, many mobile providers no longer offer such plans as a financial necessity. It isn't just the cable companies and DSL providers that would prefer a customer who only uses their connection to check e-mail and play Farmville. With more devices in production that are connecting to the internet this tug of war will only get worse. Tablet PCs, gaming devices, internet radio receivers, and e-book readers are in use now, and even curiosities like digital picture frames with their own e-mail address to be mailed photos for display are currently on the market, and all will use a bit of bandwidth.

Pressure on world goverments and dedicated public relations campaigns representing both consumers and the interest of Internet Service Providers are fighting this issue out as we speak. At stake is how much and based on what criteria people will pay for internet access, and the difficult balancing act of maintaining a reasonable profit for companies who pay to establish and upgrade critical data networks against the growing needs of consumers and their desire for fair pricing. These are already many essential services that rely at least partially on internet access, so the argument declaring it a luxury weakens every year. I will, at the very least, be keeping a close eye on the outcome of this battle in both laws passed around the globe, and the court of public opinion.

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Blog Gadgets

Revenge of the Son of the Sequel 2: Terrible Sequels to Geek Classics.

I've written at length about good movies, games and TV with bad endings, but that isn't the only way to ruin something good. Often, you can have a single film that is amazing, an instant classic and one met with nearly universal fan, if not critical acclaim. The box office and secondary numbers come in, and the studios immediately get to thinking... "How can we make more money off of this?" Now, they can't be blamed for that, on its own... making money from producing more movies is sort of the point of their business, it is what their jobs are about. I won't be so reluctant to withhold criticism on the specific films created in these cash-grabs, and how they tarnish the memory of their original source, however. This won't be an exhaustive list, as I'm as unprepared to write a ten page article as most people are to read one, and a full third of that could likely be devoted to superhero sequels.

The Matrix

We've established our lead character is in no real danger, so how do we make these fights
exciting and meaningful? Have him fight more CGI!

Oh, god. Though the original has not aged well in my memory, for the first half-dozen or so viewings, I was amazed by the effects and intrigued by the world created for the sci-fi action movie. This film was one of the first must-own DVDs, with very well thought-out bonus content, a genuinely interesting commentary and a solid premise. Now, we've seen similar stories done better, and a last minute change to the machines' motivations so as not to confuse the audience aside, this is still a classic. The sequels are a blight, from half-baked plots where the climax is actually handled in a separate video game, to loose ends that are never satisfactorily explained, I didn't bother seeing the third film for years after being let down by the second one. Inconsistent, incoherent and poorly planned out, it is best to just pretend these films never happened.

Pitch Black/The Chronicles of Riddick

This was, I think, a case of a cool little low-budget film being turned into a vehicle for its star once it was clear that he was the sort of actor that Hollwood blockbusters are built around. In Pitch Black, the key to the tension is that the Riddick character is, for most of the film, considered at least as dangerous as the creatures that the survivors of the crash are being wiped out by. He is menacing, cruel, and at best an antihero, the extreme nature of the situation pushing him barely out of the villain category. However, when a sequel was needed to be a Vin Diesel blockbuster, a handwave to the original characterization was made, and he became a sci-fi hero in a world crafted by someone with a vague recollection of having once read Dune and a streak of plagiarism. The tone, visual style and characterization were preserved, however... this time in the tie-in video game (Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay) that was superior to the film in every way.

Highlander

Hi, I'm Mario Van Peebles,  and I ruin things. Professionally.

Highlander is one of those movies that suggested a world that begged for a sequel, at least on paper. The core problem is, the first movie pretty much wraps the concept up. Immortals have been killing each other and taking the power of those they kill for hundreds of years, and in the end, there can be only one. By the end of the movie, there is only one. The rest are dead, the hero won, Queen plays in the background. Great movie, and a geek cult classic. Every subsequent film comes up with more and more ludicrous justifications for continuing to tell stories in a concept that has played out to its logical conclusion. After seeing Highlander 2, I'd thought, "Well, at least there's no way this could get any worse." Boy, was I wrong. Quick way to tell if a movie is going to expand your horizons on how bad a movie can be: if Mario Van Peebles is in it, strap in for a bumpy ride. At least the television series kept the flavor of the original film and handled the paradox in the best (and maybe only) possible way... they ignored it.

The Mummy

I really liked the original Mummy, as we dont' get nearly enough pulp action outside of Indiana Jones (and no, we're not gonna talk about Crystal Skull. Maybe someday, but I'm not ready yet.) As a straight pulp adventure movie with light horror, the Mummy hit all the required notes. We got a villain with a backstory, a properly grizzled hero, the by-the-numbers romance subplot and a supporting cast with a badass mysterious foreigner and comic relief that walked right down that line between funny and annoying. When I saw the second film, I was amazed by how much they got wrong... the action set-pieces were annoying and random, the plot and pacing were uneven, and we hear all the while about the Scorpion King, played by the Rock, and he ends up barely in the movie at all. What we do see is a vaguely Rock-shaped bit of terrible CGI that at the time had me giggling, calling it the "Rock Lobster." And somehow, the third was just as bad. Poor Jet Li. I've seen him in so many good films, but virtually none of those are in English.

Pirates of the Caribbean

Geoffrey Rush's expression here is about what mine was at the rapid and  silly twists to Elizabeth Swan's
character in the sequels. "Weren't you a kind of sheltered Governor's daughter like, a year ago?"

I didn't expect much out of this when I first heard about it. Yeah, they cast Johnny Depp, but this was a movie adapted from one of the rides at Disney theme parks. After some positive marks from friends and reviewers, I ran out to see a matinee and was blown away. Jack Sparrow would go on to feature in plenty of terrible Halloween costumes and mediocre video games, but when it came out, it was hard to not like him. Skeletal pirates, ship-to-ship combat and great sword duels, we even get to see a port attacked, sacked and pillaged by buccaneers. Predictably, the characters I loved in the first ones were dismantled in the sequels, the cliffhanger ending of Dead Man's Chest felt like a ripoff, and At World's End was, well... just kind of stupid. Too many half-cooked plots and characters went into the garbled mess of the second and third film, and characters changed not as a result of logical development, but to fit the nonsense that passed for a plot. Even cutting the dead weight of Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley's characters adrift couldn't save the fourth film from feeling dull and tired as compared to the original.

I've steered clear of bad spinoffs and sequels in two genres in particular, as horror is kind of characterized by the campy, gleefully terrible sequel, and I'm not sure where to start with comic book films (Superman IV, maybe?) Also, I've written quite enough recently about George Lucas, so the Star Wars prequels and my feelings on them is pretty much a given. That said, I'll likely revisit this topic at some point in the future, as there's a score of other films that fit the bill here, with these that are best left forgotten.

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Blog Gadgets

Video Games: Many Complain They Should Be “Better,” Few Agree On What That Means.

Anyone who is paying attention to the evening news, and most people who try not to can see that most of western society is becoming increasingly polarized. We don't seem to have a large, vocal population that exists somewhere in a reasonable middle trapped between extremes. I'm certain those folks exist, but they are quiet enough that it seems that the majority of people anywhere drift toward extreme positions that disagree with each other. As I've pointed out before, the geek world is no better, and in some cases worse than the average subset of society in this regard. I am beginning to feel like this isn't worst in comic fandom or fans of particular science fiction TV shows or movies, where geeks stereotypically yell at each other about minutiae that most folks wouldn't be aware of, let alone care about. No, in reality, it seems like the most pointlessly divided and nearly schizophrenic community is video gamers.

I know this is unlikely to ever happen, but let's discuss the current state of complaints a bit.

Any forum, website or opinion column about video games will tell you in a matter of moments that there are a lot of people who complain about the current state of video games. Long gone, they'll tell you, are the days when games were quality, when there were consequences for character death, storylines mattered and developers weren't trying to soak us for every last dime. Games used to be great, and the mighty have fallen from grace, etc... You'll see these sorts of complaints all over the place, but scratch the surface of the complaints, and you'll find that while a lot of gamers are cynical and jaded about the state of the industry, you can see why these complaints are hard to address. It isn't that game developers are ignorant of fan concerns, and it isn't as though they know people are upset and just ignore the complaints. The problem is, that when pressed on the specific point of “What would you do to solve what is wrong with gaming?” people not only disagree, but give answers directly opposed to one another.

Consider the problem of the sequel. In general, I've heard more complaining about video game sequels than about any other facet of the industry, with the possible exception of DLC (Downloadable Content.) Even professional reviewers fall into the trap that developers get caught in. If a sequel deviates in any way from the first game in a series, it is derided and mocked, the developers accused of not understanding what made the first game great, and tarnishing its image. On the other hand, if the game is, aside from graphical improvements, basically the same as its predecessor, the developers are mocked for a lack of creativity and innovation. There is literally no way to keep the majority of gamers happy on this point. When new features are introduced, a vocal minority defends and decrys specific features, often screaming “We want more of this” and “Inclusion of this feature ruined the game” about the same mechanic.

Yeah, that sums it up.

This is especially evident when looking at discussions about game length. Gamers regularly complain simultaneously that games are both too long AND too short. The days of the 100-plus hour epic has passed, and many people are not happy about it. When a game is released with under 30 hours of gameplay in the core play experience, developers are called out for trying to cash in without providing enough content. That said, when the rare game with a robust 60+ hour play experience does get released, the primary complaint in customer reviews is that the game is too long for the story to be experienced. This sort of gamer is not happy that their personal attention span and the slew of great-looking new releases mean that the majority of their games will be put away, unfinished. What is a development studio to do?

Yet another manifestation of the fractured opinions of many video gamers concerns difficulty in modern video games. In general, once death happens in a game, you revert back to a convenient autosave or other checkpoint, and try again. Long gone are they days of limited lives, long sections of gameplay without the ability to save or significant penalty for failure. When a game has these “retro” elements, when encounters, sections or even bosses prove difficult, then the forums are ablaze with accusations of poor game design. However, when the low tolerance for frustration is accommodated, the overwhelming public opinion chimes in “Too easy,” and the days of when games were actually challenging are wished for with wistful sighs. Honestly, game developers would be completely justified in ignoring all customer feedback at this point, because the only thing the community as a whole seems capable of agreeing on is that games suck now.

Anyone bitching about games being too hard now is formally
invited to give this a try. Despite being one of the toughest games of all time, it was fun.

I'll grant that in many cases it isn't the same individuals holding the “I love this” and “I hate this” positions simultaneously on these divisive issues. It is possible that the gaming community is suffering from a crisis of identity, and some of this is due to a difference of expectations between generations. The average age of a video gamer is trending upward, despite the popular media's assertion that games are pastimes for young children and teenagers. The Entertainment Software Association puts the average age of video gamers at 37, and there are many ways in which the play styles of younger gamers differ from older ones. Younger gamers, in general, have lower tolerance for frustration, skip cutscenes and do not read in-game text, and are more prone to skip a single-player experience entirely in favor of online multiplayer.

An industry cannot survive by exclusively catering to the tastes of older customers, as the comic book industry's mistakes should plainly illustrate. In addition, the definition of what a “gamer” is frequently changes with the advent of social gaming on Facebook, popular casual game apps on mobile devices and family gaming gaining ground on handheld devices and consoles like the Wii. Large portions of the population who had never tried a video game before have been exposed to games, and they want more. They don't have Nintendo-era nostalgia, they don't hold sacred the same elements “hardcore” gamers do, and there are a lot more of them with open wallets than the small, vocal niche of gaming geeks. Things are changing, and gamers may not like it, but in the long run it makes the industry that supports our hobby healthier, and that is a good thing. Besides, there's at least one thing most of us can agree on. It is hilarious that the jocks that made fun of geeky folks in high school are conned out of $60 annually on the new Madden, a game that is nearly identical from year-to-year aside from rosters and statistics.

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Blog Gadgets

Eureka – More Science Fiction TV Gone Too Soon.

The news in the last week that SyFy has reversed their earlier decision to order a shortened sixth season of Eureka has people up in arms. I want to talk a little about that decision, the controversy and the show itself. Normally, in this kind of article, I could predictably be expected to play Devil's Advocate, tell the nerds raging on the internet that there's another side to the story. I won't be doing that. It isn't that I don't understand the other side. I get it. A show like Eureka is expensive to produce at the standards of quality its audience expects, and business realities sometimes force decisions such as whether to do the show with a budget that means it can't be done right, or to not do it at all. We've been given this bill of goods before, and this time, I'm not buying it. While I appreciate that it is more complicated than “people like it, ratings are good, so keep it on,” the explanation we've been given does not satisfy me. More on that later.

Group shot of the first season cast of Eureka. (Did I mention the show is streaming on Netflix?)

Eureka is a quirky show about a town in the United States (Eureka, Oregon) where the greatest geniuses the government and corporate sector could find live, work and share ideas. The central character is Sheriff Jack Carter who is neither scientist nor genius, but who was recruited from his work as a U.S. Marshal because his common sense, ability to connect with people and dedication to his work allow him to find the simple solutions that great minds think right past, and the town is safe. Many of the episodes concern a device or other dangerous technology or discovery that threatens at least the town, if not the world, and the investigation and research required to stop it before it is too late. Subplots involving Global Dynamics, the corporation that employs most of the citizens, and threats internal and external tell a larger story arc across the seasons.

The cast has counted among its recurring actors many geek favorites, and the leads are sure to be much loved for years to come for their work on this show. The two principal characters, Sheriff Carter and Dr. Allison Blake, who is first introduced as a Department of Defense liason to the town, are played by Colin Ferguson and Salli Richardson-Whitfield. The supporting cast includes Joe Morton, playing Dr. Henry Deacon, Erica Cerra playing Deputy Jo Lupo, and Neil Grayston playing Dr. Douglas Fargo. Over the years, the show has employed the talents of Matt Frewer, James Callis (played Gaius Baltar in BSG,) Wil Wheaton and geek sweetheart Felicia Day. The cast is able to consistently strike an unusual balance, pivoting between light-hearted comedy and the menacing weirdness of horror-tinged science fiction.

Nothing against the leads (pictured again, below) but the supporting cast
really brings the spark of genius to a show like this.

The cancellation announcement was handled in a particularly cowardly and unprofessional manner, with much of the cast finding out about the decision from fans who had seen the press release. The series will be forced to tie up all loose ends after being assured of an abbreviated sixth season to do so in only a single episode. [UPDATE:  Moments after I hit "publish", I saw a tweet indicating that SyFy would be giving the show's creators one more episode to wrap things up. Not satisfied, but credit where it is due.] The actors and producers are attempting to put the best face possible on the whole situation, attempting to demonstrate that they are more professional than the people who just put them all out of work are. Often, some of the blame for sci-fi TV not making it lays with the fanbase, who stop watching, stop talking about it, the ratings just aren't there. This was not the case for Eureka, as it was consistently one of the highest-rated programs on the SyFy Network. In the end, it came down to price.

We've heard this excuse before, and here is why that explanation does not satisfy me. The valuation for how much a television series should cost has been skewed over the last 15 years by the rise of a TV phenomenon that was interesting at first, but has formed the core of the most vapid and pointless “entertainment” on television. I am, of course, talking about the reality show. Network Executives love "reality" TV, as the shows are cheap to make, requiring no scripts, sets or special effects, and on many of them compensation for the principal “actors” isn't anywhere near what actors in scripted TV make. Is this what we want? Losing original, clever programming for more Jersey Shore, Real Housewives and Ghost Hunters? (By the way, I was a ghost hunter, and those guys are full of shit.) Reality TV, supernatural soap opera clones and professional wrestling now dominate a network that was once a great center for geeky TV. Their "rebranding" shows the lack of respect for their traditional fans, decisions like this add insult to injury.

Our principal stars of the show, Sheriff Carter and Dr. Blake. 

There is an intellectual arrogance among many of us geeks. We consider ourselves better than the unwashed masses that don't know how to fine tune settings on their personal electronics or effectively use Google to answer basic questions. We scoff at American Idol and the Bachelorette, but increasingly, we find the things that we enjoy are in the past. Internet “Save the Show” campaigns haven't worked in years, and I find myself thinking, watching and writing about television that has been cancelled way more often than I write about current shows. The things that we, in our arrogance, consider to be worthy, are going away and being replaced by a douchebag who calls himself “The Situation” making millions for being a tool on national TV. Thing is, I'm mad and I don't have any better ideas than any of the rest of us. I'm here preaching to the choir, and complaining on the internet.

The only way out, as far as I can see, is to stop supporting FOX, SyFy and the major TV networks who pretend to offer what we want, and then take it away. Anyone who, like me, is out of work has heard about “tough decisions” and “fiscal realities” before and we aren't satisfied with that being sufficient reason to lose something valuable. It is short-sighted and destructive, both in the job market and in the entertainment industry. We need to support up and coming projects free of the network and studio systems. Stuff like Felicia Day's webseries The Guild and Joss Whedon's Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, and encourage other writers and performers to make more of that. We need to use our command of the internet and social media to make people aware of these projects, make them wildly successful, support advertisers and companies that get behind making something of quality, even if it costs a little more. That is, unless someone has a better idea. We could use the big brains of a town like Eureka right about now.

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Blog Gadgets

"New Media" and Scarcity: A Geek's Perspective

I've read hundreds of articles on how information technology and access to greater amounts of content with fewer barriers is changing all forms of media, and written a few myself. Recently, I've encountered concepts online that ring true with my experiences these last six months. The “old way” of making a profit for large media companies, from the record, game and film industries to those who report the news, is based on certain assumptions about scarcity. If there are a small amount of companies producing quality content, then those that have the capacity to do so may charge whatever they want. Even if there is a lot of content out there, most of it won't be very good, and access to the best content has traditionally been artificially limited by an army of corporate middlemen. In decades past, if you wanted to watch quality TV or movies, you had your choice of a few studios and networks. Want to read the news? Maybe you have a handful of newspapers to choose from, or you are back to the TV networks.

Things have changed, but a lot of big companies don't want to hear it.

What changed? The barriers to creating and distributing content of all types have come crashing down, and the sheer amount of music, news, movies and programs... even books is massive. Even filtering out all but the best 5 or 10 percent of content produced in each of these categories there is still a lot. Currently, there are so many sources of quality content that the capacity for people to absorb and enjoy it all (or even most of it) is completely overwhelmed. We can see what that did to scarcity, with regard to supply and demand. The demand for amazing content has remained a constant, but technology has increased the supply to a point where old models for business don't make sense anymore. News agencies attempt to set up paywalls in front of their content while competing with sites that offer the same information for free. The piracy issue gets out of hand when businesses clinging to a dead strategy insist on erecting “walls” around content to create artificial scarcity so they can maintain their profits. People see this, and they see an illegal but convenient way to get the same content for free.

Am I saying that there's no such thing as scarcity anymore? Far from it. Supply and demand functions as it always has. What's changed is that it isn't the content that is scarce anymore. The available attention span of the average consumer is what is scarce, and as technology improves, the supply of quality content competing for a little bit of that becomes effectively infinite. What would happen if every person had instant and free access to all the best games, movies, music, television and news programs? I can say from experience that the Paradox of Choice kicks in. When presented with too many options, people become paralyzed with indecision. With content, this works a little differently. When presented with too many “good” options for what to do or watch, I've found myself bored by all of them. The brain can't process which of the hundreds of choices is the most satisfying one psychologically, so the default answer that kicks out is: none of it.

Companies love "New Media" as a buzzword, but on how to actually make
money from it without falling back on dead strategies? That's a little fuzzier.

Does this mean that as the price of content trends lower and lower, that people will inevitably be bored with everything regardless of the quality? I don't think so. More is clearly not always better, but that doesn't mean that the optimal solution is to have less content created. What I personally like is different from what someone else does, and the trick is to provide “filters” for people to see only what matches their personal tastes best. Recommendations based on preferences isn't new on the internet. Reddit and StumbleUpon, two massive portals for content sharing have become incredibly popular doing just that. Recommendations and filters on their own are not, for now, something that people are willing to pay for. However, many people seem willing to endure advertisements on sites that help them “filter out” more choices, and donations to the communities created around these recommendations and filters keep quite a few people employed.

People are used to this. Offer content for free, or for such a low price that it psychologically isn't all that different from free, and offset costs (and turn a profit) with advertising. That's the model that first made television and radio successful. The companies that will be most successful in the coming decades won't be the dying dinosaurs that thrash about with litigation and political pressure to hang on to the way things used to be. The new success stories will be the companies that help people decide what kind of content they want to be exposed to, and build a community around that. Those communities are valuable to targeted advertising for physical goods, and loyalty to a community that someone is proud to be a part of can reap the benefits of paid sponsorship, donations and merchandise sales. The most successful webcomics know this already. How long will it be before other types of content follow suit?

Will how we choose what to watch, read or listen to be determined by companies
that show us how to filter out what we don't like?

I'd be interested to see what happens when books, movies, television and games come around to and fully embrace these ideas. The free-to-play movement in gaming is an example of these principles gaining ground, with online games being provided for free, with optional micropayments for additional content or “extras” financing the game in terms of profitability. News aggregators and portals have optional paid memberships or sponsorships, and most sites offset the costs of users that choose to pay nothing with advertisements. How long will it be before streaming audio and video fully embrace the inevitability of a changing marketplace, and how will it all work? We're seeing early experiments with sites like Pandora and Thesixtyone for music, and I'm certain that TV and movies will follow suit shortly. The voluntary reduction of choices based on reviews, recommendations and personalized content filters may soon be considered more valuable than the content itself.

I wonder if a world that has completely transitioned from an old business model to this newer one would look at our current debates on media piracy, paywalls and Digital Rights Management as comically quaint. Who will be the big companies to reap the profits from a changed market, and what new challenges will a business face if the market accepts the new way of doing things as the default, rather than desperately clinging to a sinking ship? Maybe this discussion is moot or already out-of-date, and I've overlooked sites and services that are new, or just new to me. If you have an opinion about all this, or more information, please... sound off in the comments.

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Blog Gadgets

Collection Agencies: Predatory, Unethical and Often Illegal Practices Pursuing Money We Don't Have.

This afternoon, I got a painful reminder of the lengths unscrupulous debt collectors will go to attempt to squeeze blood from a stone, whether or not debts are legitimate. With the global economy in trouble, collection agencies are doing a booming business, even if their specific practices frequently fall outside what is allowed by law. The blatant scam and con-artist tactics used to attempt to extort money from those ignorant of the laws protecting them are just one piece of the puzzle. As the collection industry becomes more powerful, they apply political pressure and sink a whole lot of money into getting the legal system to interfere on their behalf, and the burden of proof falls on the public, many of whom are down and out, desperately trying to hold on as it is. A word before I get further into this. I've had debts in the past both legitimate and not. I ask readers to not assume anything about my financial responsibility when I write about this, and the standard disclaimer that I am not a lawyer is appropriate at this time as well.

Even both Scrooges (Ebenezer and McDuck) never stooped to the level
of many of these companies.

Advice concerning what is legal and what is not, and what the recourse for someone targeted by this sort of activity is tricky at best. For one, the laws vary wildly from country to country, and even if you are in the United States, both the laws themselves and how the courts choose to interpret them is often different at the State level. It is also worth noting that unless someone is well-versed in Fair Debt Collection Law and willing to file court paperwork themselves, many of the fines are small enough that hiring an attorney to fight to assert your rights in a matter like this is more expensive and stressful than it is worth to the average person. Illegal or quasi-legal tactics used by debt collectors is part of a numbers game. They count on ignorance of what is legal and/or hassle of defending yourself to make it profitable enough to collect from those who cannot or will not fight that the few willing and able to defend themselves do not affect the bottom line.

In the United States, there is a law called the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. This law was put into place to protect the public from unscrupulous practices by collection agencies, and the specific restrictions of this law are frequently ignored. The law requires a collection agency to provide written proof that a debt is valid, they are not allowed to contact a person by phone at inconvenient times, and they cannot threaten violence or any legal action they do not intend to take. Further protections are in place to keep a collection agency from harassing an individual, including a prohibition on abusive or obscene language and restrictions on who may be contacted regarding the debt. Many of the tactics commonly used by collection agencies violate one or more provisions in this law, and the debt collection industry is keenly interested in weakening it as more people become aware of how to use it to protect themselves.

Important legislation, but not a "one size fits all" sword and shield against legal action.
Understand it and how it is used for you locally before assuming it can or will protect you.

Particularly angry or legally savvy individuals have taken advantage of the FDCPA to countersue collection agencies over violations of the act. Damages awarded typically include legal fees, money lost as a result of an illegal debt collection plus $1,000 per FDCPA violation. The time, expertise and expense in pursuing these cases as an individual makes it a difficult proposition for the average person. Also, in certain states, the courts are more friendly to debt collection companies than they are to the consumers, so proper research and documentation is a must when considering legal action. Cases like this are becoming more and more common, however, as the unemployment rate holds at a fairly high rate. People with a lot of time on their hands and not much money to “pay off” unscrupulous companies are more likely to file these sorts of lawsuits.

Another disturbing manipulation of the legal system by these sorts of companies has led to the modern day version of the Dickensian debtor's prison. A debtor's prison was the practice of incarcerating an individual who would not or could not settle a debt, typically indefinitely as it is difficult to raise funds to settle a debt from a cell. Officially, the practice was outlawed in the US in 1833 as a form of cruel and unusual punishment, but legal loopholes have brought the concept back. Since 2010, collection agencies have, even without proper documentation to prove validity of debts, won warrants to have debtors arrested and held until payment was either made in full or a payment plan could be arranged. Funds used toward bonds have, in many cases, been forfeited to collection agencies towards payment of debts without benefit of a process to dispute the validity of the debt itself. Public outcry over these practices has motivated states to look into the callous manipulation of the legal system, and at least one major company specializing in holding public debt has stopped the process of seeking arrest warrants. Still, thousands of these warrants have been issued under the justification of being “the only way to get some people in to settle their debts.”

Can't pay rent, don't get income, go to jail. Who knew Monopoly was training Life Skills?

Personally, I've never been subject to legal actions as a result of these sorts of practices, and have declined to file lawsuits in instances where I am certain collectors have committed FDCPA violations. Without a growing number of people willing and able to defend their rights, and others voicing their displeasure over uneven enforcement of these sorts of actions, it will continue to remain profitable to skirt the line of what is legal and what is not. I'm curious to hear the perspective of readers outside the US about whether these sorts of vultures exist in other places where people are struggling financially. What do debt collectors do in your country? Is it all legal, and if not, what can be done about it. Let me know in the comments.

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Jumping Through Hoops – Unemployment Benefits

Today before sitting down to write, I wanted to check on the status of my accounts. Before joining the ranks of the unemployed, I suppose my income put me solidly in the category of the “working poor”. We lived check to check, but I look around, see 2 computers, video games and an iPod for my wife and I, and don't feel too bad about where we were, from a wider perspective. That said, keeping an eye on remaining funds when you know you could run them out is an important maintenance task. Ironically, since I've been out of work, frugality and the lack of a commute (with these gas prices) has put my wife and I less on the edge, money wise.

I checked the status of the unemployment funds on the state website, and it looked like I had a deposit settled today. Great. I go to check the balance on the debit card issued me for these funds... no money. There was a brief moment of panic, not because I'd starve or have a utility turned off without that money RIGHT NOW, but when your financial future is in doubt, the small amount of funds you do have access to is vital, and potential interruptions of those is scary. So, I go to call the Illinois Department of Employment Security. Busy signal. More light panic, but I persist, get through, wait on hold for a seeming eternity and eventually determine that all is well. I just need to wait a few days for normal processing that I likely never noticed a delay in before.

All this got me thinking about the process of getting these few dollars. I've talked about what unemployment isn't, and who pays for it, but not really about what it means to go through being on it. Making a claim for unemployment benefits is, mercifully, easier than it once was, at least in the state of Illinois. Rather than having to wait in line in an office or even on hold on a call center's line, making a claim and certifying for individual weeks of benefits can be done online. There is an application and several questionnaires to fill out, best started right after a job is lost, and frequently benefits may be placed on hold if there are any eligibility questions that a phone interview or supplemental paperwork is required to resolve.

For all my complaining and ranting... this is what it used to be like to get a few bucks for groceries.

After a waiting period, either a direct deposit (which I should have done) is started, or they mail you a debit card and there is more waiting. Every two weeks, you load up the archaic, almost quaint website that refuses to work in browsers other than Internet Explorer (more on that in a moment) and answer a number of questions about your situation that mostly will not change unless you've come into some money or something unusual happens that could affect any payments. Name changes, deferred payments, change of address, payments from social security or other disability or any number of other uncommon events that I check “No” to weekly. Then, within a few days you will receive funds averaging about 30% of what you used to make, plus a small additional sum for dependents.

Any changes to this process are difficult, as the bureaucracy involved is typically sprawling and byzantine, they prefer to communicate through the mail, as I presume their carrier pigeon service has been discontinued, but they are working on mastering the telephone. But they have a website you can turn to for help! It is optimized for Internet Explorer 6. I didn't mistype that last number, or accidentally flip it upside-down somehow. I try not to ever use IE unless a website makes me, but I don't think I EVER had IE6 installed on this machine. I learned about the issues with the website the hard way when I tried to switch to direct deposit, I had to fill out a series of online forms, and at the end of the process, got an “oops, can't save your changes” error.

High Technology, from the crazy future world of 2001.

While you fight with a website that is barely a generation above a Geocities page from 1996, get archaic forms presumably penned with a quill from the local post and collect the few dollars they'll give you for the trouble, you have to do a few things. First, register on another website that asks you to input your skills, experience and desired work schedule, salary, etc... a process that takes a few hours. The skills match website takes all your hard won life experience, calculates it... and tells you there are no jobs because the economy sucks. I half expected a “Please Try Again”, like you find on a yogurt lid when you haven't won a contest. Also, you have a form to document your search for gainful employment with no instructions on the expectations for its completion and vague fields to fill out. I can only guess that no one ever looks at 99.999% of these, even though you are required to keep them around for a year after you're done claiming unemployment. Every once in a while, I'd guess they pick a name at random and ask for these forms for laughs, as the instructions are so vague that just getting picked to be checked up on, I'd guess, means you're screwed.

So, this is a part of my adventure that doesn't involve swords or lightsabers, but does sort of involve shadowy cabals, scrolls with arcane symbols and the fickle hand of fate. I'll jump through hoops while I keep at it, and admit to myself that a whole lot of people have it a whole lot worse. Anyone else on “the dole” from a different place with maybe very different hoops to jump through? Tell us about it.

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Can We Please Stop Confusing Unemployment With Welfare?

I'm not going to get political here. Believe what you want about welfare, its role in society, etc. That's not what I want to talk about. These pages have, lately, been all about geeky stuff, and not at all about being out of work. Honestly, that's because the unemployment posts I've put together seemed... well, boring. A lot of them fell into the “weepy LiveJournal” kind of stuff I don't want to write, and no one wants to read.

Talking about video games, comics and tabletop RPGs is way more fun than whining.

That said, a way to write about something and make it somewhat interesting is to get good and riled about it, and I am. I have, in the last few weeks, read far too much about “people collecting unemployment on my tax dollar.” I've read blogs, forum posts, and tweets/status updates about it, and it pisses me off. Ignorance is something I have a short fuse for anyway, but when it is used to paint a group I fall into with a wide brush as lazy thieves, I approach meltdown. I'm going to say this once, using the smallest words I know to express it. IN THE US, A PRIVATE CITIZEN'S TAXES DON'T FUND UNEMPLOYMENT.

For clarification, I'm not talking about the “extended unemployment” offered by the US Federal Government, I am talking about the checks I am currently receiving, issued through the state. The way it works is that employers pay into an insurance fund for every employee they have, and if one of them becomes unemployed and qualifies for benefits, those benefits are paid from that fund. The fund keeps a surplus because not everyone qualifies for benefits, and quite a few people have another job (or something else) lined up when they leave a position, and the funds paid in for them are never used. No tax dollars. Don't believe me? Here. Or... Here. (First source is an article/overview, second is from an employer advocacy group, two sources as different as I could find.)

When I see someone yelling about how they are paying for me to sit on my ass, this is what I see and hear. DEY TUK OUR JERBS!

I've read articles recently (and am now wishing I'd bookmarked them so I could link) blasting the people who have chosen to not spend 8 hours per weekday looking for jobs that aren't there or worse, taking a job that will have a negative impact on their work and salary history in the future. There are people openly debating whether it is right for the unemployed to be happy in their situation. Why is this even a question? It isn't wrong to be happy, period.

There aren't so many people writing articles that display this level of arrogance and ignorance, forgetting that they or someone they care about are one corporate decision away from the same fate, but there are a LOT of commenters who feel this way. It makes me mad and a little physically ill to know that the expectation of quite a few of my fellow citizens for the pittance I receive that they did NOT pay for is: to be miserable daily, trudging along and willing to take the first foodservice or call center job that will take me.

Fair warning, strawman ahead.

I know there are a few people desperate enough to hold to this arrogant line of thinking that respond to the facts about how unemployment compensation is paid for that can take it a step or two further. Forgive me if I straw man a little here. The continued argument against unemployment says that if employers didn't have to pay into unemployment insurance, the extra funds could be passed on to employees. I understand this line of thinking, but respectfully disagree. The amount of compensation to employees has historically been determined by two factors. A federally mandated minimum wage, and what percentage above that minimum is the least a qualified applicant with specialized skills or training will accept to do a job that they are needed to perform.

I'm not sure where such anger and venom comes from. I suspect that there is a perception that there are a large number of people gaming the system and living like kings while sitting around doing nothing. In an extended time of high unemployment and strained financial conditions worldwide, this perception becomes less and less accurate as the weeks and months roll on. That is, if the perception was ever accurate. They took our jerbs, indeed. My apologies to non-US readers, back to geekery tomorrow.

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Can't Stick the Landing – RPGs and poor endings.

 Not so long ago, I wrote about Dragon Age 2. I read a lot of reviews of the game, and ended up liking it in spite of some of the things others mentioned that bothered them. Yeah, the same few areas were re-used over and over again. Yep, game was too damned short. And it sure would have been nice to get out of Kirkwall just a little bit more.

What bugged me most, and almost enough to wreck the game for me, was the tepid final act. The ending was abrupt and seemed forced, with characters behaving in ways that were supposed to be designed to make final choices difficult. The problem is, a good ethical/moral conundrum should not rely on all sides being equally unpleasant. “You're all jerks, but I hate this guy a little less, so we go with him.” That's not a well-written morality tale, it feels more like the attitude of the average apathetic American voter.

Don't give me that look, You know what you did.

This isn't the first time that a game I've played has had an incredible buildup, only to let me down at the last moment. The most striking example I can think of is Fallout 3 (to be fair, I've played NONE of the expansions or DLC.) Throughout, Fallout 3 had an engaging experience, your choices seemed to matter and I was having a good time. Then, you get to the ending, and you are forced into a “this or that” choice, both of which aren't very good... and you can't even back out and decide later. I gritted my teeth, unhappy but resolved to see it through, and then got the ending. I'd beaten previous games in the Fallout series, and expected to see the consequences of my decisions and how they affected the world. Not so. The vast majority of the decisions I made turned out to be utterly meaningless as far as my ending.

This ruined the game for me, and is the reason I didn't continue on with any of the additional material.

War. War never changes. And neither does the ending, aside from 2-3 choices you made.

Thinking back on it, a lot of the Final Fantasy games were like this, too... the ending got so weird that I disconnected with what came before and stopped caring about the story. What is it about so many modern RPGs that have great beginnings, great mid-game, and then completely fall apart somewhere in the Third Act? There are a few things that will utterly ruin a game if included in the ending.

1. Radically changing your storytelling right at the end: This includes not only the “we're all in a dream/the afterlife/the matrix” or the sudden inclusion of aliens or magic “a wizard did it”, but establishing one kind of pace and one standard for player input for the game, and another for the ending. Talk about ruining suspension of disbelief.
2. Huge buildup to a climactic conclusion, and insufficient closure before providing a cliffhanger. Cliffhangers are annoying enough in games, but they really rob the player of the experience if after hours and hours of struggle, there's no moment of “victory.” If you take away the feeling that a hero's fight accomplished something, who cares what happens next?
3. Cardinal Sin: Do Not, I repeat, DO NOT let a character other than the one the player controls swoop in to be the deciding force in victory. If this ultra-badass is the real hero of the day, why did anyone else bother to show up? Thanks, I always wanted to play “unintentional sidekick.”

Almost everything listed above, in one game.  The ending is somehow less comprehensible  than being an underwater soccer star whose father becomes a Satan Whale.

What games really infuriated you with a letdown at the end? Was there one in particular that everyone else seems to hate but you actually kind of liked the ending for? Let me know.

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