January 2012
7 posts
2 tags
If Government Embraced Technology...
As an entrepreneurial software developer, I don’t usually look to the government to solve problems for me. Instead I usually try to think of ways to solve the problem (or start a business to solve the problem) myself. Sometimes, though, I stop to think about what it would be like if the government truly embraced and understood technology the way I do. Here are three big changes that might...
3 tags
Forward: Let's Start a Political Party
I’ve never really been very interested in politics. At least, I wasn’t until SOPA/PIPA came along. The issue demonstrated for me two very important facts:
Technologists are severely under-represented in our current political system.
Technologists are capable of causing political change.
The first I’d known for ages, the second came as a surprise. I honestly never expected...
2 tags
This is How I Want Social to Work
I think that solving the dual problems of privacy and noise in social networking applications are very difficult. Personally I don’t think any of the major players (Facebook, Twitter, Google+) have tackled these problems entirely successfully. I did a little thinking and if I built a social network today, here’s how I would tackle the graph.
Let’s say that I just signed up for...
5 tags
Free-to-Play Could Crash the Gaming Industry
This post is part of my Where Games Are Going series in which I talk about the future of one of my favorite industries: video gaming.
At the same time that digital distribution is poised to level the playing field more than ever before for independent developers, another trend has the potential to cause a crash the likes of which hasn’t been seen since 1983. And it’s all...
Calling Infringement Theft is Dangerous
Note: I actually submitted this as an op-ed piece to the New York Times which is why it’s far less technically voiced than my normal work. Unfortunately looks like I’m not getting picked up there, so I’ll just have to stand on my own soap box.
One day, Terry walked into a popular record store, slid a CD into his back pocket, and left the store without paying. The same day, Ian...
Should we eliminate gendered pronouns?
Today I was typing up another blog post and had to use him/her as a gender neutral pronoun reference. This is something that’s always bugged me as it’s awkward to write and awkward to read. “They” is not a suitable alternative because it’s plural and therefore grammatically incorrect in a singular context.
That got me thinking: why do we have gendered pronouns at...
4 tags
Where Games Are Going: Consoles as App Platforms
I’ve been an avid gamer since, well, ever. Like many developers, an interest in video games (and creating them) is what first lured me to the world of programming. While I’m not a part of the game industry I follow it closely and have greatly enjoyed discovering such online video series as All Your History Are Belong To Us and Extra Credits this year. “Where Games Are...
