I cancelled my account today, barely escaping another month charged for not playing. Tron 2.0 might have cost me $50, but at least when I wasn’t playing it it didn’t charge me $14/month.

WoW’s a great game. It’s well-balanced, it’s fun to play (mostly), and I totally loved riding around on my kodo all over the place. For my first online RPG, I couldn’t imagine a better way to get into it.

Here’s the problem, though:
I don’t have time.

Oh, sure, WoW’s designed for the person without a lot of time. And it is, in a way: the rest meter does a lot to help keep things even. But at higher levels, all of the quests you can go on are elite or instances. When I quit, I had 18/20 elite/instance quests and the other two were actually elite/instance and not properly classified (go kill this one elite guy who spawns 90,000 normal guys of your level, should be a piece of cake).

This requires you to either be in a good guild, which I was before it merged, or find pickup groups, and pickup groups… hooooooooly mackeral, it really only takes one moron to make your life difficult, and then you’ve wasted a night.

But moreover, having friends/a good social network requires you to play a lot. I’m trying to finish a book project, I’ve got a challenging day job that requires me to work at work and then sometimes afterwards, and a wife I like spending time with.

One of the great things WoW does, though, and I talk about this every time I write about video games, is it gives a great sense of rising power as you go. At level 50, when I have to cross back through areas I remember were way hard before, they’re a cakewalk now. The instances are more interesting and challenging, and your tactics have to get way better (which, again, goes back to the grouping thing).

The other thing is that I’m really moving away from PC gaming. Despite having to buy a second X-Box recently (thank you, Microsoft), I’m at the point where my not-that-old computer can’t really handle what I want it to do for game performance (run 1600×1200 for my LCD and do it fast) without having me spend a huge chunk of money on it, and

• I’m cheap in my old age and
• As long as I’m spending money on random consumer items, I’d rather buy a nice TV or something

I suspect, of course, that when the next Call of Duty comes out, that’ll be it for my new-found resolve. Man, I liked that game.

Technology is useless without proper implementation. Pick long passwords. If you want to choose something that’s spelled phoenetically, that’s better than being complicated but short. One of the things that’s wrong with choosing “password” is not that it’s easy to guess, but that it’s only eight characters.

If a black hat is faced with trying to guess n passwords of length 5-10 digits, they can reasonably assume almost all of them are five. Unless the systems they’re attacking requires special characters, that’s 26 lowercase + 26 uppercars + 10 numbers = 62 possible characters/digit.

So let’s take a standard one-way hash algorithm (call it FOO-1). FOO turns any string into a 20-character hash, which is used to sign it, whatever.

To build a database of all possible values of FOO for five character passwords is not hard:

52^5 * 20 = under a gig of data, and a six-character store becomes almost as easy and a seven-character attack well within affordable storage solutions.

Piece of cake. Now a data attack that exposes the hashes becomes quite lucrative: given the hashed values, an attacker then has a good chance of finding the five/six/seven character string that produces that hashed value.

But if you’re a smart user, even weak hash algorithms like FOO protect you with sufficently long passwords. Say you decide to pick “password” for your password and then pad it out with zeros to the maximum allowed by any site (in this case, ten). At ten characters, there’s no way a black hat gets it:

52^10 * 20 = 2.89E + 18.

It’s untenable to store that much data (and okay, so at this point, you’re probably going to argue that FOO, with a 20-byte output, isn’t all that fun, but you get my point). The black hat’s going to pick off the many easy targets and leave the long-passworded guy alone.

Which, of course, raises another intersting dilemma: should ecommerce sites be required to get user passwords of at least n-length and meeting certain standards, in addition to using industry-standard algorithms? Or do users have the right to expose themselves to harm?

The Tulalip Casino’s running ads that claim that they’re the casino for smart people. I understand people make their living at poker, or even in handicapping horse races. But the games offered at your local casino — blackjack and a hundred variants, roulette — they’re particularly costly entertainment. Play long enough, and you will be left with nothing. Las Vegas wasn’t built on buffets. Smart people can gamble knowing the deal and yet still enjoy themselves. They may choose their casino based on which ones offer the best odds to minimize their losses, but if they’re doing it for entertainment, that’s only part of the trade-off.

The casino for smart people is like “the cigar of healthy chain smokers” or “the nine pound hamburger for your active lifestyle”. It almost immediately sets the audience up to say “What? No it isn’t.”

I don’t understand how these things get out in the world and in front of people. Did they really test well before survey groups or something? And if so, can I get the names of whoever was on that panel?

I finally got around to watching Appleseed (the 2004 movie). It was a really strange experience.

I watch a ton of movies, and I watch a lot of animated movies. I’m particularly fascinated by movies that do crazy things, that show the viewer a new world. While I understand that Howard’s End may be a quality movie, it’s unlikely I’m going to flip over it.

But back to my point — I love seeing something entirely new in a movie. So I loved the Matrix, and (like many) was disappointed by the sequels. I didn’t like Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, but I was smiling while watching it, enjoying the sheer head-first energy that showed in its creation.

Appleseed was both good and terrible.

The graphics are beautiful, as great as any I’ve ever seen in an animated movie. There’s a great sense of style: the landscapes are beautiful, if sometimes too shiny (which along with “weight” is a endemic problem to animated films). But the characters are flatter, looking more like traditional cell-shaded animation. And some of the scenes are just amazing, I was floored at how good they looked, they were almost electric to watch. I don’t get that back-of-the-head tingle very often, so it’s notable for that if nothing else.

The downside was that it’s based on an animated series (or possible a comic book?) so there’s a long plot that possibly makes sense in context, but here’s my plot summary, with spoilers:

Deunan’s a soldier, fighting these evil armored dudes (robots? cyborgs?) in a destroyed metropolis. During a reaaaally cool fight scene, she’s trapped but rescued by armored dudes in white suits. They take her to this utopia city.

One of the people who rescued her was a former fellow soldier who got blown up and is now mostly dorky-looking robot parts. In this utopia city, there are two races: humans and genetically engineered clones called “bioriods” who are tweaked. In the utopia, the humans control the army (these humans are anti-bioroid), and there’s this council that works with the supercomputer that controls everything.

New story begins: someone tries to kill Deunan. Her comrade aids and then betrays a regular army/terrorist coup. That coup turns out to have been engineered by the council, who is trying to destroy all humans for some reason. Their scheme is stymied by Deunan, and the utopia city is saved.

There were times during the movie that I was swept up in a scene or even just looking at the city and didn’t care, but particularly during exposition scenes I kept thinking “that doesn’t make sense, how would they have known that at the time? Why would that character do that then, if they knew… whaaaaat?”

By comparison, take “Kung Fu Hustle”. Not as deep — you’re not intended to watch KFH and contemplate the essential horror of man’s inhumanity to man, or whether humanity’s warlike nature dooms us. But it’s a much more fun movie, with the same kind of nutty sense of the world it lives in, and after I’d seen it I felt a lot more happier and satisfied.

So Appleseed: wacky.

Expanding on the bike route thing, here’s the first version of the loop page I’ve been working on. If I’m only duplicating someone else’s work, let me know — I haven’t been able to find any good complilation pages that aren’t 50% dead links.

I know web polls are garbage. And yet on the History Channel’s web page today, I came across this whopper:

Should female troops be barred from engaging in ground combat in all branches of the military?

Wow. That’s a terrible question. The results?

Yes
46%		5810 votes
No
54%		6823 votes

	Total Votes: 12,633

I have two things to say here.

First, women are already in combat. The only issue is whether we acknowledge this or not. They may not serve in infantry platoons, but they’re the gunners in HUMVEE convoys, they’re being ambushed, shelled, bombed, and they’re shooting back. Pretending that this isn’t the case only denies them recognition for what they endure.

Second, barring women from combat means nothing. Do people think that the people ambushing, shelling, and bombing American troops would respect a declaration that female soldiers aren’t supposed to be in combat? Should those women stand around and do their nails until someone comes by and puts the bullet into the forehead up close and personal?

As a country, we need to acknowledge what’s going on — women are already in combat. Combat doesn’t respect artificial distinctions between combat and non-combat designations, and it wouldn’t respect a rule barring them from combat. If you allow women into the military at all, you’ve allowed them into combat. We should give them their due respect.

I’ll update this with miles, etc.

1. Lake Washington. From my house: down to Marymoor (early, before people get up — even then, you’ll be dodging walking clubs/jogging threesomes), N on Burke-Gilman around the top of the lake*, then follow the UW-Seward instructions to get to Lake Washington Blvd, take that to Seward, Seward to Jean Coulon, then take the trail up along the W side of Lake Washington that kicks you out at the I-90 Coal Creek underpass. Added bonus: throw in some Mercer Island loops for extended hill work to hit your distance/hill goals.

* I love the stretch through Woodinville/Bothell early in the morning, when no one’s there and it’s still a little bit cold as you whip through the turns. The poor trail condition (roots! roots! roots!) down to and through the UW is hard. Burke Gilman through Redmond becomes more and more dangerous as morons fill it, to the point where you may as well sit up and soft-pedal it through.

2. Duvall-Snohomish-Monroe-Duvall. I used to ride this all the time when I lived out there. Head out from Duvall and follow the Flying Wheels route. Pretty easy on the hills. Lots of easy rural roads. Only problem is you’re exposed with short shoulders on some curves, which would be scary if there was more traffic. For added fun, you can throw in the loop down to Carnation.

3. Not-so-Chilly Hilly. 33m, ~2600 feet of climbing. Take the ferry out to Bainbridge, do the Chilly Hilly route. Repeat as required to reach your distance goal, or until you die. Beautiful. Also painful as all hell, especially if your friend is (say) 25% lighter than you are and likes to kick your ass up long gradual climbs. Seems like it’s hard to get food/water during the ride.

My experience playing Psychonauts:
Love, love, love (repeat)
Last level: haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaate, boiling frustration, near-controller-tossing rage, giving finger to monitor, swearing loudly
Then looooooooove.

The game goes from being fun and challenging to frustrating and nearly impossible in the last level. Disappointing and also baffling — how can someone make a great game and then right at the end take a turn to “awful”? Didn’t someone test it?

One of the best games I’ve played in years. The story is great, the dialogue is outstanding, it’s got a genuinely funny sense of humor, it’s clever, and there’s only one stretch that made me think about quitting… and then the ending’s worth it. Loved, loved, loved Psychonauts, and I wish it all the success and sales in the world.

The state’s ruled that having a license plate with a bible reference on it (JOHN316) is cool. Someone complained and they said “pishaw, that’s dumb, there’s no problem here”. Which, sure, GODSGUD and stuff is all over the place.

So here’s my question — can I get a ruling on whether I can have PAGAN1 or GOSATAN or NOGOD or GODZDEAD or whatever? If it’s cool to proselytize on vanity license plates, then it should be open to everyone, no matter who’s offended by it, right? If the state’s really willing to tolerate controversial vanity plates because they’re in favor of the country’s majority religion, then shouldn’t it be open season for this kind of thing?

And if not, why not?

I saw a bald eagle in my backyard this morning. I was working on my bike, and heard this weird sound — more like a scream than anything. I looked up into the trees to see an enormous white headed bird, and I felt a shock spread from the back of my head as I recognized it from hanging around in Juneau, where bald eagles are much more common.

Then came the crows, yelling after the eagle, trying to take a beak at it. The eagle moved, the crows pursued, a noisy angry mob. The eagle took off, soaring in long, lazy circles way above while the crows gathered in the tops of the trees, calling to each other and complaining.

I stood in the grass, my bike on the stand with pedals off, 15mm wrench in hand, and laughed.

Hamfisted metaphor time: I’ve been having problems putting up with the overhead at USSM, specifically the amount of crap heaped on us as authors. In particular, I’ve lately been told that I “need to take my meds” before writing about baseball, I’m a vile person, blah blah blah, and then today I got a snitty letter from a dude who pointed out a grammar error. His email started off “how about paying a little attention to grammar?”

I have, within arms reach as I type this, a good dictionary, thesaurus, Strunk and White, a set of style guides, a slang dictionary, and a book on modern American usage. I sometimes read them for fun. Saying I don’t pay attention to this stuff because I made one stupid error is exactly the kind of constant sniping that makes me want to stop doing things in front of an audience.

I went out for a ride, and burned around Lake Sammamish. On the east side — saw the eagle again (I assume it was the same one — having seen one so rarely here and knowning it took off in that direction from my house). This time it was chilling in a tree, all by itself, and there were no crows anywhere near it.