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Boynton Beach Art Walk Is Back On
By Alex Rendon
Photos: RedEYE Reboot at ArtServe
By Monica McGivern
Photos: Caturday Masquerade Ball at Stache
By Michele Eve Sandberg
Boynton Beach Shuts Down Art Walk
By Alex Rendon
By Monica McGivern
The People of Florida Supercon 2014
By Ian Witlen
JAPAN: Kingdom of Characters at Young At Art Museum
By Christina Mendenhall
Thought Coalition at TATE'S Comics
By Michele Eve Sandberg
Who's afraid of putting on Edward Albee? Not GableStage. And this production of the playwright's mind-bending verbal labyrinth was a dizzying, enigmatic tour de force. Strong all around, from Joseph Adler's crisp staging through the tight and engrossing performances (including some nifty work from John Felix and Cynthia Caquelin). Add to the mix the excellent work of Jeff Quinn, Daniela Schwimmer, and Nate Rauch -- for sets/lighting, costumes, and sound, respectively -- and what you get is hard to beat, even if it were competing in a theatrical capital.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
It's the Weekly's weekly round-up of local police calls--small fry edition . . . MONDAY, JULY 20Artist's rendering of Bank of America robber. He may belong to that notorious street gang, the Lollipop Kids.Watch Those Kids at the Playground A 3-year-old boy was at the playground in Ponderosa Park ... More >>
Hey, juvies, it's our weekly Weekly round-up of Orange County police calls . . .MONDAY, JUNE 29 The pre-vandalized Scott BorasAnyone Fitting the Description of a Major League Baseball Team Owner Spotted Outside Before the Crime? The windows of super-agent Scott Boras' Land Rover were vandalized whil ... More >>


text:
Facebook triple stuffs Swedish data center
In concert with the launch of the Open Compute Foundation on Thursday in New York, social media giant Facebook announced it is building a data center in Sweden close to the Arctic Circle, its first outside of the United States. The massive data center, which will be three times the size of the 300,000 square footer that Facebook …
Make data centers, not railways...
One of the local Green Party leaders, Gustav Fridolin, has said that the 100 million Swedish crowns the project has received from the EU should have been spent on infrastructure - railways, housing etc - instead of the data center.
Can't say I particularly like Facebook - but iron and concrete instead of silicon? Is '19th century industrialist' the new green chic?
From the life of the marionettes
So. I wonder how long it is going to take for them to realize that here in Euroland we have data protection laws and privacy laws and things.
Unless, of course, as an American Corporation, they want to claim some sort of extraterritoriality.
Icon, because brrrrrr!
errrm....how are they going to get the electronical databits in and out of this remote, chilly facebox? Do they have decent broadband in the Swedish forests? Or will it be dialup?
Two words
Fiber optic
Sweden has a very very very good fibre infrastructure. We should not be mocking it.
Lots of homes have 100mbit to the property and there are decent rates of connectivity in the wilds as well.
Nothing like our 1mbit ADSL crap.
I am pretty sure that whoever put the data centre there knows how to connect to the outside world with it.
Running fibre cables to a datacentre is cheap and mostly a relatively small / short term cost compared with the long term cost for the electricity to power and cool the facility. This facility is going to be cheap to keep cool (less electricity) and the the power it does use is also cheap.
Which surprised me why so many people cram data centres into the docklands near London where electricity and cooling are much greater.
Heat going to waste?
As far as my research tells me, they are letting the waste megawatts of heat dissipate into the environment instead of using it as heating for local housing, for example.
Does anyone know if there is a technical and/or economic reason for this?
Seems to me that 120 meagwatts could heat quite a few flats.
Cost - pure and simple - also I don't imagine that there are many residences within easy hot water pumping distance.
It's all about the wiretaps, bitch
Now, not only Zuck will know everything about you, but the Swedish "Stasi" will too...
State wiretaps
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Sweden introduce some extreme warrentless wiretap laws a few years ago, meaning all internet traffic passing through the country can be scrutinized at the drop of a hat?
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text:
|To use Sonar in Eclipse on a project, it is required that the project has been first analyzed in a standard way by Sonar.
Setting Sonar Servers
To take full advantage of SonarQube in Eclipse, it is recommended that your project be analyzed on a regular basis by SonarQube. Regular analysis allows the Eclipse plugin to distinguish between existing issues and any new ones you introduced.
If your project is not already under analysis, you'll need to declare it through the SonarQube web interface.
Once your project exists in SonarQube, you're ready to get started with SonarQube in Eclipse.
Setting SonarQube Servers
Go to Window > Preferences > SonarQube > Servers.
SonarQube in Eclipse is pre-configured to access a local Sonar SonarQube server listening on http://localhost:9000/. To use another address, you first need to define this server by using the Eclipse global Preferences window:
Image Removed
Linking Projects to Sonar Servers
Once the Sonar server(s) is(are) You can edit this server, delete it or add new ones.
The user you set to access the server has to be granted the Execute Preview Analysis permission.
Image Added
Linking a Project to One Analyzed on a SonarQube Server
Linking for the first time
Once the SonarQube server is defined, the next step is to link your Eclipse projects project with projects a project defined and analyzed on Sonar server(s). This linkage operation can be done by right-clicking on the the project in the "Package explorer", and then by choosing "Configure -> Associate with Sonar...":
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In some cases the Eclipse project may not be automatically associated to a Sonar project. If that happens, you need to manually enter the groupId and the artifactId of the Sonar project.
Unlinking a Project from Sonar Server
This operation can be done by right-clicking on the the project in the "Package explorer", and then by choosing "Configure -> Remove Sonar Nature":
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Configuring Mylin to deal with Reviews
A Sonar Mylyn connector allows to track reviews.
Creating a Sonar Task Repository
To start using this feature, a new Sonar task repository has to be created (see the Mylyn documentation page for more information):
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Validate Settings returns Authentication credentials are valid even if you have not entered correct credentials (Username/Password).
So, make sure to correctly deal with your credentials otherwise you will not be able to retrieve any review.
You new repository should now appear in the Task Repositories view:
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Creating a Query
To browse the reviews, you can create as many queries as you wish:
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Here's an example of a query that retrieves all the reviews assigned to you on every project:
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The reviews should now appear in the Task List view:
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on this SonarQube server.
To do so, right-click on the project in the Project Explorer, and then Configure > Associate with SonarQube...:
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In the SonarQube project text field, start typing the name of the project and select it in the list box:
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Click on Finish. Your project is now associated to one analyzed on your SonarQube server.
|Note that for Maven projects, the association is performed automatically.
Changing linkage
At any time, it is possible to change the project association.
To do so, right-click on the project in the Project Explorer, and then SonarQube > Change Project Association...:
Image Added
Unlinking a Project
To do so, right-click on the project in the Project Explorer, and then SonarQube > Remove SonarQube Nature:
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Advanced Configuration
Additional settings (such as markers for new issues) are available through Window > Preferences > SonarQube:
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You are now all set with configuration and you can start using Sonar SonarQube in Eclipse.


text:
Amnesty backs Google shareholders
A Google shareholder has called for the search giant to clean up its act, a move that's been welcomed by Amnesty International. An advisor to five public pension funds in New York has filed a shareholder proposal calling on Google to adopt a stronger anti-censorship stance. Google has been widely criticised for bowing to …
About time
Google has a corporate responsibility here, purely due to its demi-god status as a near monopoly. It's about time someone important raised it. I hope the motion gets passed - why can't Google's directors have moral fibre in their body as well?
Do corps. need a mandatory ethical code to follow
It looks like corporations have to be forced into adopting an ethical code.
Remember your slogan "Do no evil", its an ethical code to follow every where & every time.
After watch the documentary "The Corporation" you get a better understanding of the creation of this virtual entity that people use to shield themselves from repercussions.
Google - Censorship? Us...?
This is, of course, the same Google that delisted Inquisition 21 http://www.inquisition21.com/ after it pointed out that large numbers of credit cards from the "Landslide" database in Operation Ore were being used fraudulently:
Curiously enough they never seemed to have explained *why* a site, disseminating information which appears to be clearly in the public interest, doesn't get indexed by them...
Law is Law
The law is the law in which ever country you operate. I hear so many arguments about how businesses should not be above the law and should face punishment for breaking it. Whether we like it or not, China is its own country with its own ruling party and its own laws. Google cannot, just because the free world wills it, break Chinese laws and expect to either continue operating in China or not at the very least face criminal prosecution. Just because it's legal to sell pot in Amsterdam doesn't mean a legitimate Amsterdam company can come over to the states and sell pot and not have to follow our laws against it.
I say if you believe so full-heartedly that Google and Yahoo! should not have to censor content in China hop a plane, gather supporters, and start a revolution so that a ruling body can repeal the censorship laws. Barring all you self-righteous hypocrits actually going out of your way to help end the censorship stop expecting businesses to break laws because you think its wrong.
Google Artist
Google create nothing, no web sites , no email systems, adwords was their only creation.
It's not a matter of obeying local laws
It's having the integrity not to operate purely for profit in countries that have such laws.
Google and Yahoo can't break Chinese law, and you're quite right in saying they shouldn't be expected to face jail time in a Chinese prison for doing so.
But neither should they support the governments behind such laws by expanding their economies and offering their services.
Google and Yahoo can't survive without operating in China? I don't think so, I maybe wrong but I have feeling Google and Yahoo shareholders might just be able to survive financially without the profits from operating there.
The good they do for their employees while operating in China? If their culpability in assisting the capture and imprisonment of even a single Chinese citizen doesn't counter this I don't know what would.
Google are far less culpable of course, because all they do is limit what their search engine can look up - not really that big a deal in the scheme of things. Yahoo's owners on the other hand should be ashamed of themselves. I'm sorry, but balancing the lifestyles of the exceedingly rich versus helping to imprison a free speech advocate is hardly a difficult decision. Their choice is simple, which should be to leave the country they're not helping to make any better.
Some argue that the mere presence of western corporations in China helps to soften the stance of a totalitarian regime. I haven't seen any evidence of this - but I'll acknowledge the possibility does exist. I'd just like someone to prove it in some way, because it would make me feel a bit better about using Google. I no longer use Yahoo - not because they gave up a name when they had no choice but to do so, but because they continue to operate for profit in the country that made them do it.
At the moment I'm not convinced earning huge profits in countries run by governments such as the Chinese is anything but exploitation and greed.
Do I benefit from these companies being there? Quite possibly, but I do try my best to avoid Chinese goods manufactured in sweat shops run by Japanese and Western corporations. It is actually impossible to do completely if you want to own a computer, a DVD player and a TV - but you can at least try. It just costs a bit more - and yes I'd rather pay a lot more for a computer, and have a clean conscience.
Its funny how
Capitalism bridges a gap between us and China, yet completely ignores humanitarian crisis.
Oh well, just Capitalism being capitalism. Keep the market free! Keep the people under control!
Do Google Shareholders Actually Have Voting Rights?
IIRC, the shares sold by Google in their IPO were not standard shares - the voting powers had either been stripped or seriously limited.
Andy, I'm not sure you can avoid sweat shop created goods nowadays, even if you pay a premium. Most premiums derive from branding expenses and higher quality components/materials. The same factories put the pieces together.
A lot of companies nowadays claim that their workers are "paid above the market-rate". Very reassuring that is - same conditions with an extra $1 per month. Coolio. Or is that coolie-oh?
On the bright side, Chinese generations to come can look forward to their very own Monty Python Yorkshiremen. "When I were a lad, I used to go t' dye factory..."
worth having a go
>> Andy, I'm not sure you can avoid sweat shop created goods nowadays, even if you pay a premium. <<
Probably right, but does that mean trying to source things in a more ethical manner is pointless? The sudden uptake of fairtrade goods by all the major supermarkets (even Lidl now have a fairtrade brand!) proves there's a market for ethical products. Ethical consumerism is probably the only mechanism that ordinairy people can use that actually effects the behaviour of large, capitalist organisations....
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The students, staff, and community surrounding Frank W. Cox High School Orchestras are dedicated, passionate, committed, and are known for providing a reputation of excellence as one of the top high school orchestras in the Hampton Roads area.
upcoming events
September 20
7th Annual Orchestra Cookout!
Food & Fun! Shelter 5, Great Neck Park, 2-6 PM
September 27
Senior Regional Auditions
Good luck to those auditioning! Kellam HS
October 8
Mandatory Meeting
Mandatory Meeting for ALL students & parents. 6:30 PM - Chorus Room
- Activities planned for the year - Paintball, Bonfire, Gingerbread Competition, Laser Quest, Kickball Tourney, Ice Cream and more...,
- The orchestra leadership team has met and the annual orchestra activities are now on the calendar! Check them out...,
- Symphony concert tonight - such an awesome collaboration between the band and orchestra students!,


text:
Ready, get set, vote!
Summary: Here's a collection of Web sites that might be useful as you get ready to vote today.
TOPICS: Browser
In honor of election day, here's a list of Web sites that might find useful:
- Your county clerk's Web site. In most states, this is the place to start to find out who's on the ballot, where your polling place is, and how you'll be voting.
- The League of Women Voters has non-partisan information on races and issues. Since most of the races will be local, be sure to check your local LWV site.
- Another site with extensive, non-partisan coverage of candidates, visit Project Vote Smart. Enter your zip code and you'll get data about the races that affect you.
- Go to Opensecrets.org to get information on who's giving money to your candidate.
Of course, most of these sites will be experiencing heavy loads today, so you may have to try a few times to get the data you want. Most polling places across the nation are expected to be crowded, especially those where new voting machines are being used and voters are taking extra time to figure them out. Get there early.
If you have a favorite site with campaign information, leave it in a comment.
Kick off your day with ZDNet's daily email newsletter. It's the freshest tech news and opinion, served hot. Get it.


text:
To play for state basketball championships, McCallie and GPS must overcome opponents led by Mr. and Miss Basketball finalists.
The Division II-AA state semifinals today at Lipscomb University in Nashville have top-ranked GPS (21-1) playing eighth-ranked St. Benedict (23-6) at 3 p.m. EST and No. 7 McCallie (18-7) facing fourth-ranked Briarcrest Christian (19-9) at 4:30.
St. Benedict is led by Symone Daniels, a 5-foot-11 post who has signed with Drake University and is versatile enough to play on the wing. But GPS, which is in the state tournament for the first time since 2003, has a Miss Basketball finalist of its own, junior point guard Chadarryl Clay.
Clay is ranked the nation's ninth-best point guard by ESPN, averages 15.6 points and six assists per game and scored 17 of her game-high 28 points in the final quarter of the Bruisers' quarterfinal win.
"We know that Daniels is a very good player obviously, but I feel like Chadarryl is the best player in the state," said GPS coach Susan Crownover, whose Bruisers' only loss was to Orlando's Dr. Phillips School in a holiday tournament. "We're really clicking when she gets everybody involved and we're not just standing around watching her."
The Bruisers have won 12 straight games since their loss, including eight by double figures.
"What makes me feel good is how excited we are to still be playing," Crownover said. "It would be easy to be worn down by this time of the season, but our girls are so ready and hungry to show what they can do. Our effort has just been super here lately, but it will boil down to the same thing it always does this time of year — rebounding and playing defense."
The GPS/St. Benedict winner will play the winner between fifth-ranked Briracrest (23-5) and defending champion Ensworth (20-8) for the girls' championship Saturday at 4 EST.
In the boys' bracket, McCallie returns five of its top seven players from a heartbreaking loss in last year's semifinals. Christian Brothers won that game on a 70-foot heave at the buzzer.
McCallie's top priority is to slow Austin Nichols, Briarcrest's 6-foot-7 sophomore Mr. Basketball finalist who has made 70.8 percent of his shots from the field this season and averages 15.3 points, 6.1 rebounds and 3.4 blocks per game.
"Obviously he's a very good player and will give us a good challenge," Blue Tornado coach Dan Wadley said. "Overall they're similar to us in a lot of ways, so it will be a very evenly matched game.
"I think the biggest difference for us this year is experience. Our guys went up there last year and were kind of star-struck. We led most of the game and lost because we didn't close out and take care of business. This year we know what's at stake. We've earned the right to be here, and our guys seem more businesslike. We all want to make Chattanooga proud."
The winner of McCallie's semifinal will face the winner between top-ranked Ensworth (25-3), which has yet to lose to an in-state team, and 10th-ranked Montgomery Bell Academy (19-8). The boys' title game is set for Saturday at 6.
Stephen has covered local sports in the tri-state area for more than 24 years, having been with the Times Free Press since its inception, and has been an assistant sports editor since 2005. Stephen is among the most decorated writers in the TFP's newsroom, winning numerous state, regional and national writing awards, including seven in 2013 and a combined 12 in the last two years. He was named one of the top 10 sports writers ...


text:
Tomorrows the big day, botteling my first batch of cider.
any last minute advice for a newbie?
Clean wash rinse everything
It is pretty much impossible to get residual sweetness in a sparkling cider without force carbonation. Will this be a still cider in wine bottles?
I made 2 gallons of cider and wanted it to be sparkling so I placed a plastic water bottle with the same cider that I bottled into glass bottles, and used the plastic water bottle as a gauge for the pressure build up. When the plastic bottle was rock hard I placed the glass bottles in the fridge. This took a couple of weeks at a temperature of 72-74* and no bottle bombs.
This will likely be a very dry cider. I have found that some residual sweetness balances out the tartness of the acids. I've used both White Labs English Cider and Sweet Mead yeasts, and have not been able to get the fermentation to stop before complete dryness. I guess you could try adding extra sugar and pasteurizing the bottles after about a week but that is an iffy experiment I'd hesitate to try. I've also tried using wine yeast and bottling in swing top prosecco bottles after about a week of fermentation, then into the fridge, but again, fermented to dryness and the bottles gushed big time when opened. Another option is to pour a small amount of sugar syrup into the glasses before adding the sparkling dry cider, and stirring gently before serving. Good luck!


text:
No matter how many Sweet and Tender Hooligans shows we've been to, the thrill of spying on the slack-jawed, unsuspecting, first-timers in the crowd never fades away. There's that moment where all of the evidence that tells them that they're actually watching a Morrissey/Smiths tribute band just nonc ... More >>
Sweethead perform at Alex's Bar on FridayDon't know where to go this weekend? Heard Mentality makes it easy--here's the rundown of great music coming to town.
House of Blues
If you were stuck at home with pink eye or the gout this weekend, well, you've got some problems that we can't help you with. But what we can help you with is these wonderful slideshows from some 'certs this past weekend, like Chad Sengstock taking pics of Long Beach-by-way-of-Fullerton indie rock f ... More >>
Sweet and Tender Hooligans
Mimicking Moz with the Sweet and Tender Hooligans
Dispatches from the Latino Morrissey love-in


text:
tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32878593351749018212014-11-18T11:06:50.077-05:00Parallel ContextA Pair of Views on GamingDeftighttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-3149810501755345182014-11-18T11:06:00.001-05:002014-11-18T11:06:50.096-05:00Let's Pretend Nobody Else Exists...There are a lot of things Blizzard does right with WoW. Even the most ardent WoW hater has to concede that in general Blizzard doesn't release a buggy product when a WoW patch/expac comes through.* WoW also gives enough people what they want that they still dominate the MMO market, and they shamelessly steal ideas from other games and give it their own unique twist.

But there is one aspect to WoW that Blizzard has done poorly in, and it concerns how the US and European servers are configured. Namely, that you'd never guess that the other one exists.

All of the other MMOs I've played in have at least given you the ability to create a toon on every server the game has, but WoW for some reason won't allow you to do that on European and U.S. servers. You get one or the other, and that's it. A long long time ago, I saw the announcement of cross-server grouping as a way to finally get a chance to play with some of my blogger friends over in Europe, but I was quickly disillusioned when I realized that the US and European servers still don't seem to know the other exists.

This kind of turns the wonderful love fest of the Looking for Group documentary on its head, since I can see that Europeans play WoW via the blogs, Tumblrs, podcasts, and fan made art/videos, but I can't play with them without purchasing the game again for the EU region.

I bring this up because other games, such as LOTRO and SWTOR will let you play on European servers. Age of Conan consolidated all of their servers this past year as well. GW2 is a bit closer to the WoW model in that you're locked into the server you start with --and creating a toon on a European server means your license gets transferred to the EU region-- but it still lets you select a European server from the start.

My kids have LOTRO toons across several servers, and they've often commented to me on people occasionally speaking in French on Gen Chat.** I recently rolled up a new Smugger on a European server in SWTOR, and I can attest how connected you feel seeing guild recruiting ads saying "we are an all Polish guild" or "we're an all Russian guild". Or that you'll see someone let loose some British slang in Gen Chat. You get that sense of togetherness, the feeling that people all over the world are hanging out in Coruscant with you right now, without having to leave the game at all.

And really, the lag for the European SWTOR servers is only slightly worse than the lag for the West Coast US server that I typically play on.

I understand that there are license issues at play here, but it still seems odd that this restriction is still in place a decade later, particularly when the world has shrunk with the advent of new social media and the explosion of smart phones and tablets. It just seems a relic of the past, when the most exotic location a fellow player might be from is Buffalo.

*Design flaws, yes, but bugs are minor compared to most other AAA software releases. Having spent time in software QA back in the 90s, I've occasionally wondered just how much pull the software QA team at Blizzard has. Typically software QA is a small speed bump to the rest of the release train, and even if the QA people are screaming that something isn't ready for release the software will ship regardless.

**Which they find incredibly cool that they're playing a game at the same time someone in France is.

Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-17034122055743764762014-11-14T14:20:00.001-05:002014-11-14T14:20:24.212-05:00The More Things Change....I'd been watching the news about the release of Warlords*, and it seems to be a bit more difficult than the usual launch troubles. There's the initial chokepoint of having everyone click on a single NPC to access the Warlords content, but between that and the rush of people to get in there was nothing unusual. But then you throw in a strong DDoS attack, and you've got a real mess.

I saw some of the net traffic charts and it seems they're originating from China, which kind of puts the kibosh on any conspiracy theories concerning GamerGate, but that also makes me wonder whether the DDoS attacks that happened shortly before I unsubbed were actually a test run before the main event.

Personally, I don't think much of a Chinese hacker DDoS attempt against a game launch, because there's nothing critical there to be concerned about. It's akin to a bunch of pigeons crapping on chess tables out in the park: you shoo them away, you clean up the mess, and you can go play. There's no real reason for it other than to simply be an asshat, in spite of what Lizard Squad says about "improving server farms" in their DDoS attack on Sony's Playstation Network and phoning in bomb threats on a Sony exec's plane.

The servers will go back up and people will start playing again, so unless we see a repeat in the next week or so, the DDoS didn't really have any lasting damage.

Go play, people.

*I still think of the old Atari game Warlords when I type that, and WoD means "World of Darkness" from White Wolf Publishing for me.Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-69802767031704995612014-11-11T13:40:00.000-05:002014-11-11T13:40:38.890-05:00Hanging out With The Beautiful People, Part 2In my neverending quest to be 1-2 years away from being trendy, I finally broke down and bought Guild Wars 2.

(What, you thought I was going to talk about Dragon Age: Origins? Okay, I could, since I'm finally playing a Bioware Fantasy RPG for the first time since Baldur's Gate II, but that's beside the point.)

It had been over a year since I last played around with the game on a free weekend, but I'd been thinking pretty hard about what should replace WoW* as my main fantasy MMO. Age of Conan is too grindy for me to use it as my main (although it is great in spurts of a week or two at a time), and while I like what Neverwinter is doing I'm constantly screwing up with my keyboard commands when I play the game.**

I can't justify another subscription for the time being, so that eliminates The Elder Scrolls Online. I've already outlined my opinions of Aion in two previous posts, and I've pretty much left LOTRO to the kids***, so what remained was ArenaNet's pride and joy.

Shouldn't he be in a Dr. Pepper Ten commercial?

I still have issues with all of the beautiful people around, but I've come around to liking the quest system there. While the "heart" system for quests is a bit head scratching at times, particularly when you're not expecting to read about "hearts" in an MMO (other than stabbing an enemy in the heart), but it does do a good job of moving you throughout a region without tying you down to a specific story.

The story questlines are reminiscent of Age of Conan, where they're triggered once you get to a certain level. The difference is that Age of Conan's entire starting zone (Tortage) is filled with both regular quests and your personal storyline's quests, whereas GW2 has you wait until the correct level (L10, I believe) until you can start up that storyline.

Also, much like Age of Conan, GW2 is very unforgiving when you attack an enemy a couple of levels higher than you. If you get three regular enemy on you and they're about 1-2 levels higher, you'd better hope that there's another player nearby to assist.

And that's the thing that surprises me the most about GW2, even this long after it dropped: people still come out of the woodwork for the (plentiful) group events. There's no need to call out for LFG; people magically appear and assist.

If this sort of behavior had been around in Wrath, Blizzard probably wouldn't have done away with almost all group quests in Cataclysm.

***

SWTOR has spoiled me on questline interaction and cutscenes. GW2 (and Neverwinter) don't have the lip movements in alignment with the spoken words, and that is more annoying than I expected. But one thing that GW2 is ahead of the curve on is "scout" method of pushing a player deeper into a zone. It's very clever, and while I expected it to be very "gamey", it turns out that I really do like the methodology.

"So you've been out here for days, and you still look immaculate?"
"Well, you're not exactly caked in mud either."
"Good point. Must be my magnetic personality."

It may be a simple conceit, but I do like the Renaissance/Age of Reason look to the gear. So many RPGs and MMOs are firmly based in the Dark Ages or High Middle Ages, and when something comes along that bucks the trend, it feels like a breath of fresh air.

***

Am I going to keep playing GW2?

Yes. I've already played GW2 more than I have Skyrim, so I don't see why not. While it might not completely take the place of WoW in my current game listings, it more than stands on its own.

*I keep getting bombarded with e-mails from Blizzard to Azshandra, saying she has a free week in Azeroth and that she should come and check out the game again. The similarities to a timeshare sales pitch aside, It's starting to make me wonder if my Rogue has indeed gone Rogue on me. I might want to scan my bank statements a bit more carefully in case she's been partying with my gold or something.

**I feel like a stereotypical keyboard turner when I play Neverwinter, and I hate that. In spite of those limitations, I do have a Cleric up to L22 or so, and I intend to keep playing it on a low key basis until I get at least one toon to max level. Since I tend to play MMOs solo, however, I don't know how much group content I'll be doing on Neverwinter, as I dislike not being able to pull my weight. And with a Cleric, you can bet that any drop off in healing would be noticed by everyone.

***That's not to say that LOTRO is for kids, but more that my kids play LOTRO enough that I've taken to thinking it as "their game". Plus, the color scheme for the UI still drives me nuts; I must be borderline colorblind or something.

Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-23791561098572637952014-10-31T15:57:00.003-04:002014-10-31T15:57:25.769-04:00Short Post for a FridayWhile I've got several posts in various states of completion, I really didn't have anything ready to go by today.

Therefore, I'll give you this link to Dorkly's 6 Types of Gamer Couples. For the record, my wife and I are The Cutthroat Couple.

Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-84673694526737872432014-10-25T01:14:00.000-04:002014-10-25T01:15:11.223-04:00You just knew it was coming...I love Buzzfeed.

They did the Fake Geek Guys video, and now this:

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I found this on Dorkly first, which I also love.

Oh, and never forget College Humor's classic Female Armor Sucks.Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-27681141887687717372014-10-19T00:57:00.001-04:002014-10-19T12:28:10.539-04:00It's Just PixelsAs more crap seems to be flung over the Zoe Quinn Incident, it's easy to look at all this and think that the entire gaming hobby has turned into this putrid ooze of hatred and filth.

At times like this, I think of my kids and am thankful that I banned them from social media. I did it ostensibly because I wanted them to be mature enough to navigate the social morass of Facebook and Twitter, but I've since realized that it's social media that needs to grow up instead.

I suppose it's not a big surprise that I have found myself wondering what on earth the Internet is good for if it is filled with bile.

Do you really have to ask what movie this is from?

It's not an idle speculation, either. I've been on the internet in some form or another since the 80's, and I remember the heyday of Usenet. I remember the free flow of ideas, the fights and holy wars, and I remember the signal to noise ratio slowly degrading over time until people decided enough was enough and abandoned Usenet in favor of "walled garden" forums.

I wonder if we reached a similar breaking point in gaming.

The forces at work in Gamergate have been lurking below the surface, but Gamergate has exposed the slimy underbelly of the gaming world for everyone to see. When Gamergate makes the front page of the New York Times, you can no longer say that the harassment inflicted on Anita, Zoe, and others is not a big deal. The harsh light of national media exposure is now on the controversy.

And the Gamergaters are about to find they are not seen in a flattering light.

As I've said time and again, perception is everything. You can have the best argument in the world and have truth and justice on your side, but if you act like an ass nobody will believe you. Gamergaters don't exactly have truth and justice on their side, just coordination and creative editing tools*. In fact, a very very good case could be made that if it weren't for all of the bile directed their way, Anita Sarkeesian and her fellow critics would never have gotten the exposure they have.

I doubt that Anita is going to grace them with a thank you, however.

What will happen now?

Well, the dynamics that led to Gamergate --the increased participation of women in gaming and the increasing dissatisfaction on how women are portrayed in games-- aren't going to change. If anything, women will continue to participate in gaming in ever growing numbers. They're going to see the advertising, the YouTube videos, and the store displays and want to try things out too. They're going to grow up in families playing games, and they're not just going to stop because they hit adulthood.

And they're going to want games with protagonists they can identify with.

This is not a hard thing to understand.

Hell, this is not that hard a thing to program, either.

Bioware has made a living creating both male and female toons for its games. You don't see the female Trooper in SWTOR running around with a bare midriff because that'd be instant death in a firefight. Perfect World has created armor for female toons in Neverwinter that is far more realistic than what I've seen for the average WoW toon.

Wizards of the Coast, in the release of D&D Fifth Edition Player's Handbook, explicitly states that a player can play any type of character they want to.** Paizo has a long reputation for presenting women and minorities in its Pathfinder gaming materials, such as the number of women and minorities among their iconic representations of their classes.

But why don't we see more examples like this? Are we, as gamers, too focused on the next shiny to demand more? Are we going to be focused on raiding and getting to max level and all of the background art to notice that something is missing?

Or are we just content to for things to be as they are, saying that they're no longer quite as bad as Leisure Suit Larry and Spellcasting 101:

One of the less risque pics from Spellcasting 101,
which came out when I was in college.
(Yes, I'm that old.) From abandonia.

Well, um...

From WoWWiki.

*That creative editing, ironically enough, is what some of them complain about Anita Sarkeesian doing with her series.

**"You can play a male or female character without gaining any special benefits or hindrances. Think about how your character does or does not conform to the broader culture's expectations of sex, gender, and sexual behavior. For example, a male drow cleric defies the traditional gender divisions of drow society, which could be a reason for your character to leave that society and come to the surface.

You don't need to be confined to binary notions of sex and gender. The elf god Corellon Larethian is often seen as androgynous or hermaphroditic, for example, and some elves in the multiverse are made in Corellon's image. You could also play a female character who presents herself as a man, a man who feels trapped in a female body, or a bearded female dwarf who hates being mistaken for a male. Likewise, your character's sexual orientation is for you to decide." --From D&D 5e Player's Handbook, Page 121.

EtA: added italics to the PH quote.Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-57854676838094201032014-10-08T13:50:00.001-04:002014-10-08T13:50:44.594-04:00News: Dragon Age: Origins is free from OriginNo, you read that right.

In advance of Dragon Age: Inquisition being released shortly, Origin is releasing DA:O free for the taking until October 14th.

Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-17092879947943854972014-10-06T19:51:00.002-04:002014-10-06T20:03:15.847-04:00Before anyone accuses me of spoilers.......there's a new expac announced for SWTOR: Shadow of Revan.

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Yeah, that kind of gives away certain elements of the mid level flashpoints, but I'm not concerned. Looks interesting indeed, that the Revanites will have a part to play.

EtA: Removed the "the" from the title.Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-32612239809385332192014-10-03T17:32:00.001-04:002014-10-03T17:33:01.075-04:00Oh hai, Friday. Where'd you come from?It's been a busy week at work, and I've not had much time for writing. Therefore, check out this female Draenei cosplay instead:

From fashionablygeek.com.

Yes, there's several more pics at the site; go see it. I'm seriously impressed by the amount of work that went into it.Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-65092469500157742642014-09-26T12:05:00.001-04:002014-09-26T16:58:40.818-04:00We Got it All Wrong After AllWorld of Starcraft?

WoW 2?

A more robust Diablo MMO?

Well, Titan was none of the above. According to an article on Kotaku, Titan was supposed to be a hybrid Sci-Fi shooter with a heavy dose of MMO elements. More than anything else, it was supposed to be similar to the recently released game Destiny*, but with much heavier MMO interplay.

Given that this would have been a completely new property for Blizz, it would have been that fourth leg to their table that currently has Diablo, Starcraft, and Warcraft holding the company together. It does sound very interesting in concept --particularly the ambitious nature of the economic game-- but I know I could never play Titan since it's a shooter.**

In the end, I suppose that Destiny was the final nail in Titan's coffin, since you're getting about 75% of Titan in Destiny's released form, and why would you want to compete with a game you're releasing?

One aspect to Titan that might have been interesting would be how it would have translated into PvP. With MOBAs all the rage these days, could Blizz have turned a portion of Titan's development into a PvP game that would compete with already released MOBAs? I suspect PvP wasn't a focus of Titan's development process, and that might have hampered Titan on release as well.

Regardless, Titan is now dead, deader than Jacob Marley, but you never know when elements of it will appear in other, already released games.

*By Bungie, which is released through Activision/Blizzard.

**Shooters give me headaches. Seriously. I have to take dramamine before I can even attempt to play a shooter.

EtA: Cleared up a grammar error in the first paragraph.Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-63811350099885301522014-09-25T06:36:00.003-04:002014-09-25T06:36:59.507-04:00Thursday FunnyThere are days when Dorkly really hits home....Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-40278074376205910932014-09-23T16:23:00.003-04:002014-09-23T16:23:34.721-04:00Fall of (the) TitanFor those wondering what's next for Blizzard, it's not Titan.

Titan, the often rumored MMO successor to WoW, has been officially canned by Blizz.

What I got from the Polygon article (go, read the link, I'll wait) was that Blizz couldn't recapture that elusive "it" that they had with WoW, and decided to kill off Titan before it became an albatross and dragged down their reputation. Does that mean that even Blizzard can't put out a new MMO in this climate that will potentially topple WoW? Probably, but that's not their stated goal. Does it mean that it can't put out a new MMO that will at least be successful and not hemorrhage subscribers after a few months? I think that more likely.

If that doesn't give the MMO market pause, then I don't know what will. Even Blizzard is admitting defeat before Titan was even released.

The article also tells me that WoW is going to be the last word in the MMO genre from Blizzard. No Starcraft MMO, no WoW 2, nothing. What you see in WoW is what you'll get; some incremental updates, some new expacs, some other stuff from other MMOs (housing) added on, but at its heart WoW is going to be the MMO you see today.

I also suspect that the rise of League of Legends and other MOBA games has had an impact here as well. Video game professional leagues have suddenly become big business, and money is flowing in that direction. Releasing an MMO when the money is going elsewhere isn't smart business. Of course, you can lose your way merely chasing the money; a AAA video game is often years in development, and where the money is at when you start development is not where it's at when you're finished.*

Finally, expect more small tie-in titles in the future, such as Hearthstone, but leveraging their existing Blizzard properties. It is entirely possible that Blizz isn't going to create anything new, such as completely original games with new worlds and/or properties, for a long time to come. Creating a new, original property takes some risk, and Blizzard seems to be electing to go the safe route and reuse the properties instead.

To be honest, Blizzard has been living on its existing properties (Warcraft/Diablo/Starcraft) for a while now, and Titan was going to be a fourth leg of a table. I guess that table will have to get by with three legs now.

*See: novels and movies. The time it takes for a novel to be written and then published is a couple of years --and movies even longer-- and tastes can change at the drop of a hat.

Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-16315859468204491662014-09-22T00:02:00.001-04:002014-09-22T00:02:22.442-04:00One More Post on Gaming and MisbehaviorI wanted to point out a couple of new articles on internet shaming and worse:

By Karen "Shayalyn" Hertzberg From Ten Ton Hammer: Shaming and Gaming - This is Not Okay

By Spinks (Woo hoo, Spinks is back!) From Welcome to Spinksville: Guild culture, game culture, gamer culture (with notes on GamerGate)

"Enjoyed" isn't the right word for this, but they were very thoughtful posts and I am very glad they were written.

Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-48654442479042871122014-09-18T14:15:00.001-04:002014-09-18T14:15:33.340-04:00Facepalm CityAs you may have heard, Microsoft is buying the developer house Mojang, which owns Minecraft. Unless you're more plugged into gaming circles, you'd also know that the creator of Minecraft, Markus "Notch" Persson, left Mojang the same day, citing how he'd like his life back.

Between this and other recent gaming related items, the term "we eat our own" comes to mind.

But this article by the Washington Post's Andrea Peterson, How the Gaming Community Destroys its Heroes, really hits home.Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-70344006953826810332014-09-11T10:47:00.001-04:002014-09-11T11:50:09.733-04:00Arguing With MyselfSir Lancelot: [Sir Galahad the Chaste is being seduced by an entire castle full of young women] We were in the nick of time. You were in great peril.
Sir Galahad: I don't think I was.
Sir Lancelot: Yes, you were. You were in terrible peril.
Sir Galahad: Look, let me go back in there and face the peril.
Sir Lancelot: No, it's too perilous.
Sir Galahad: Look, it's my duty as a knight to sample as much peril as I can.
Sir Lancelot: No, we've got to find the Holy Grail. Come on.
Sir Galahad: Oh, let me have just a little bit of peril?
Sir Lancelot: No. It's unhealthy.
Sir Galahad: I bet you're gay.
Sir Lancelot: Am not.
--From Monty Python and the Holy Grail*

I don't smoke.

I used to occasionally light up a cigar (on the average of once or twice a year), but I gave that up years ago.

The tipping point for me was noticing a change in how I really REALLY wanted to smoke another one within a day of the last one. If you ever smoked a cigar, that last half of the cigar has that harsh blech taste that typically acts as a damper on lighting up another one, and when I caught myself holding a pen like it was a stogie, puffing away, I realized I was very close to a tipping point.

It's been over a decade since I experienced that sort of craving. Sure, there's that feeling of euphoria when you walk into the dealer hall at GenCon and see all of the game vendors waiting to take your money, but that wears off fairly quickly when you immerse yourself in the crowd.**

This past month, however, I've been dealing with WoW withdrawal, which until I actually unsubbed I would have laughed off.

I've been at work, sitting through meetings, when I've had the urge to go run Alterac Valley. And when I mean urge, it's not a "oh yeah, it'd be cool to do XXX," but more like "I NEED TO DO THIS NAOW!!!!"

I've been cooking and cleaning around the house when I really really wanted to stop and go sneak into Eversong Forest on my NE Rogue and watch the new toons out and about.

I've been tired and ready for bed and I've thought "Hey, what about changing my rotation a bit," and gone halfway down the stairs before I realized what I was thinking.

I've found my fingers twitching, mimicking my rotation, at odd moments of the day.

I've had a conversation with myself, eerily mimicking the Monty Python moment above:

"You know, it's not a big deal. You can resub."
"No, I've got good reasons for not doing it. I like having less drama in my life."
"Yeah, but I do miss playing Alterac Valley."
"There are other MMOs that have PvP, so cut it out."
"But it took you how long to get good at WoW's BGs? You'd have to start over with more drama. Why not stick with what you know?"
"Did you not get the 'less drama' part? I was sniping at the kids that past few months before I quit."
"That's on you, not the game. Come on, man up and resub."
"No, and that's final."

***

If you'd have told me that I'd have experienced this when I unsubbed, I'd have thought you were crazy. I take WoW breaks of a week or three all the time, so I figured this would be easy once I actually pulled the trigger. But the thing is, that's a false analogy; even if I took a break from the game, the game was still there, ready for me to play. Now, having actually cut the cord, I don't have that security blanket.

I'm hopeful that this, like the cigar thing, will fade with time. There's plenty of other games out there, and I'm sure that I'll find them interesting once I, you know, actually start playing them.

*Courtesy of IMDB.com. I have it in a book somewhere in the basement, but I didn't want to spend over 1/2 hour looking for it.

**And you also look at the prices and realize there's no way you can afford to buy ALL THE GAMES.

EtA: Added reference to IMDB.com.Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-53139740787287793432014-09-03T21:02:00.001-04:002014-09-03T21:02:19.542-04:00Toon Naming Rule #1......DON'T name your toon right before dinner.

In the span of 15 minutes this evening, I saw toons named "chuckroast" and "marsh'mallow" on Tython.

So, if you're wondering what to name that new Jedi Knight or Bounty Hunter, don't take a whiff of the smell from the kitchen and decide that the name "beef'stew" is appropriate.

Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-53973251654357996142014-09-02T16:23:00.001-04:002014-09-02T16:23:08.542-04:00Game Developers Strike BackJust in case you missed the latest brouhaha in the gaming world, Anita Sarkeesian released a new entry in her Tropes v Women series, which was accompanied by what is becoming the all too familiar scene of bile thrown in her direction. Including the rape and death threats that some trolls seem to think are warranted.

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This was the video that was the straw

that broke the camel's back.

Well, between that and the Zoe Quinn incident, some game developers have had enough of this behavior.

Independent game developer Andreas Zecher has posted an open letter calling for this sort of disgusting behavior to stop, and quite a few development houses --including Bioware, Ubisoft, and XBox-- have signed on.

You can find the open letter here.Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-2831244056029738652014-08-28T09:40:00.001-04:002014-08-28T11:48:48.192-04:00A Thursday Quick Hit: Girls on GamesDeftig's wife passed this Kickstarter along to me, and I figured I'd share it. I recognized quite a few of the games that were shown in the Kickstarter, and I'd be interested in hearing their stories.

EtA: Changed the title to make it actually reference the Kickstarter, like I'd originally intended, before I pressed the Publish button by mistake.

Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-27426924284645793082014-08-20T12:01:00.000-04:002014-08-20T23:23:03.962-04:00Gen Con 2014: And Lo, there were Gamers as far as the eye could see...On a day with leaden skies and the omnipresent threat of rain, we piled into the van* and drove up to Indianapolis for Gen Con 2014.

Having made the trek for several years now, I made sure we were prepped the night before. Yeah, even though it was a day trip, I know the routine fairly well: someone will want a certain shirt to wear, and someone else will be trying to find their misplaced list of vendor spaces to check out.

And I will want a good night's sleep, so that I don't konk out on the way back home. Which isn't a good thing if you're the driver.

We met up with my brother-in-law**, got our badges, and headed inside to the big hall.

***

Unlike prior years, there wasn't anything in particular that I wanted to see. Unfortunately, I didn't take very many pics either, although there were a lot of cosplayers in attendance. Among the better cosplay outfits were a couple in Black Cat and Spider-man outfits, a woman dressed up as the Ranger on the front of last year's program book, a pack of Timelords (primarily Tom Baker and Matt Smith), and a family dressed as (Adam West era) Batman, Supergirl, and a little Supergirl. Sure, there were the pro cosplayers, such as the Rebels and Imperials near the Fantasy Flight Games booth, the Gandalf roaming around in the outer hallways, and the Wolverine cosplayer who picked a fight with Darth Vader***, but for every Soda Pop Minis woman who did an exacting job on her outfit there were about a dozen or so kids dressed up as superheroes and Star Wars characters.

The biggest cosplay laugh I had went to the guy who ran around in a scruffy t-shirt and jeans, holding out a cardboard sign "Will GM for Beer". My wife and I applauded that one, and he took a bow.

The Mayfair Games' sponsored Training Grounds, where kids could play board games and put crafts together, was absolutely packed. Yes, this was Family Fun Day, but seeing a couple of hundred families happily playing whatever game was available was an awesome sight.

I tried to not take any pics of the kids, but instead
I focused on the sign itself. However, imagine about
200 kids and parents between me and that sign...

As is traditional, in the exhibit hall there were a lot of demo areas for you to try a game out for a few rounds to see if it was something you liked. I really really wanted to check out some of the new offerings from Fantasy Flight Games, such as Star Wars Armada and Star Wars Imperial Assault, but those tables were almost impossible to get to. My wife and I checked out a lot of the family oriented booths for deceptively simple games that play quick, and we found a few at the Maranda Games booth. One of the games I particularly liked was called Eternas, which is a twist on the old Connect Four game.

Eternas, from marandaenterprises.com.

Instead of a grid to work with, you're presented with pegs in a circle, and each player has a limited number of wooden beads to use. The pegs only allow up to four beads at a time, and there are no edges, but for the most part it plays like Connect Four. However, you can't play to a tie: once you run out of beads, on your next turn you must select a bead of your color from the top of a row and move it to another location. It's a subtle change, and one that makes the game a lot more cutthroat.

There were other games that I found interesting, such as Freedom, which is a cooperative game depicting the Underground Railroad. It had won numerous awards this year from The Dice Tower, yet I somehow missed any discussion of it. And if you thought that the Freedom is some sort of lighthearted board game, the cards and events will disabuse you of that notion.

Freedom: The Underground Railroad, by Academy Games.

***

Geek Chic always manages to make me cry a little whenever I stop by their booth.

This is from 2012's Gen Con, but it's still accurate.

That... is what they call The Sultan. Do you see those wooden edges? They fold down. Like this:

From geekchichq.com

The Sultan starts at $12,950 (US), and can go up to $16k (US).

This is one of those "If I win the lottery" items.

***

The main exhibit hall added an extra section this year, which allowed the overall exhibit space to grow by about 20-25%. And it was still packed.

That back section near the addition, which was filled with Kickstarter backed demos and products, was extremely hard to get through. However, whomever decided that the main card vendors should be there, next to the card playing area, should get a raise. I saw people go into the playing area, come out a while later, and go straight to the card vendors.

There are some very interesting games in the Kickstarter area that made it worthwhile to peruse, such as Clever.

***

Among the more traditional gaming companies, Paizo (the makers of Pathfinder) and Fantasy Flight (the makers of a ton of different board/card/RPGs) were running out of stock. Fantasy Flight had a sign at the entrance to their area so you could find out what was already sold out before you went in their space. Both of these companies as well as Mayfair (the creators of Settlers of Catan, among other games) had lines so long they snaked around their entire areas.

A small portion of the Paizo booth. And my finger.

Another view of the Paizo booth. Five minutes after taking
this picture, the line for checkout (on the right) snaked
around the poster of Seoni and doubled back toward me.

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Fantasy Flight Games' Report from Day 1 of Gen Con 2014

There were plenty of demo tables available for gaming companies such as Days of Wonder (makers of the Ticket to Ride family of games), Z-man (makers of Pandemic), and Queen games (which tend to be more hard core Eurogames, such as Alhambra and Aqua Romana).

RPG companies not named Paizo were well represented too.

While Fantasy Flight is more well known for their boardgames, they were well represented in the RPG area with the release of the beta of the third volume of their Star Wars RPG, Force and Destiny.**** This third volume covers the Jedi and the Sith in an environment around the events of the Original Trilogy, so any force users out there will be (for the most part) on the run from the Empire. This beta release was so popular that FFG sold out of it by Sunday, and players were queueing up to try out the game at their demo tables.

Pinnacle Entertainment had their Savage Worlds products out in abundance, as did Catalyst with their Shadowrun RPG, and the Shadows of Esteren team with their RPG. There were even some really old time RPGs, such as Flying Buffalo's Tunnels and Trolls and The Design Mechanism's version of Runequest.

But what about Wizards of the Coast and the 5th Edition of D&D?

"Gonna need a bigger boat," my ass.
From dnd.wizards.com

WotC had an entirely separate hall to themselves this year, and it was packed with gamers trying out the new 5e. You could purchase the game there as well, but given the discounts via Amazon, there weren't as many people queueing up to purchase the new Player's Handbook right then and there. However, there was a huge release party on Friday night outside of the convention center.

***

There seemed to be an increase in the LARP vendors this year, as opposed to other years. I'm sure someone probably got all huffy about the corsets for sale being too stereotypically feminine, but given the amount of steampunk cosplayers wearing them, the vendors were just giving the people what they wanted.

***

According to the press release after the con finished, there were 56k+ attendees this year, and Gen Con has doubled in size since 2009. Things seem to be building up toward the 50th Anniversary in 2017, but now the question becomes whether Gen Con can maintain its momentum while remaining a fun con to attend. I think they can, and seeing the crowds of families and kids enjoying themselves on Sunday gives me hope for the future.

If you're looking for more coverage of Gen Con, you can find plenty of pics at Zachary Houghton's RPG blog:

Gen Con Blog: Gen Con Eve
Zack's Gen Con Blog: Day 1
Zack's Gen Con Blog: Day 2
Zack's Gen Con Blog: Day 3
The Best of Gen Con 2014

The Roo Sack Gamers have a podcast of interviews of some of the vendors at Gen Con this year:

Side Hop 8: Gen Con 2014 Interviews*****

In addition to the first YouTube video listed above, Fantasy Flight Games have a production of each day at Gen Con. No, you won't find us in the video this year (unlike in some prior years), but they still capture a bit of the zaniness at Gen Con:

FFG at Gen Con - Day 01
FFG at Gen Con - Day 02
FFG at Gen Con - Day 03
FFG at Gen Con - Day 04

And finally Drive Thru Review has a playlist of various games that they'd demoed during Gen Con.

Gen Con 2014

*Without air conditioning, as it is on the fritz.

**Who also runs the actual play podcast Roo Sack Gamers (look to the right for the link). What is an actual play podcast? It's a podcast where a gaming group records their gaming sessions for post later. The Roo Sack Gamers --so named after the roo sack dice bag (don't ask)-- run RPGs that are on the more narrative end of the RPG spectrum, such as Burning Wheel, Dungeon World, etc, that could use a little attention. Why listen to an actual play podcast? Well, if you want to run or participate in an RPG but you're not quite sure how the game will play out, you can listen to an actual play podcast and get a feel for things.

***All in jest, and it would have made for an excellent pic but I came out of the exhibit hall just in time to see them leaving.

****From what I've been told off the record, there's a LucasFilm requirement for any release --beta or not-- to be done via print. I'm not entirely confident about whether this is truly the case, as I'd prefer more evidence, but the reality is that FFG had come out with a print version only for every beta release.

*****And yes, before you ask, the kids that were interviewed at the end of the podcast are the mini-Reds.

EtA: Forgot the Paizo pics.
EtA: The Roo Sack Gamers had to re-upload the podcast, so I had to fix my link.

Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-1909590434476848362014-08-14T16:31:00.000-04:002014-08-14T16:31:05.762-04:00Mark Your CalendarsWarlords of Draenor will drop on November 13th, 2014.

Here's the trailer:

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All done? Good.

Given the focus of the cinematic, I think it's pretty plain we're back to a Horde-centric story. It also feels like, well, a bit like this:

<object class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/luuUE0x7-TY/0.jpg" height="266" width="320"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/luuUE0x7-TY&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/luuUE0x7-TY&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>

That doesn't mean that all that's old is new again and we're back to the original Warcraft stuff, but it is definitely a throwback in design.

But I just can't get excited for it.

No demons here, move along. Nothing that says "the Alliance will play an integral part of this expac," either.

Welcome to Draenor 2.

Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-43486009675356469582014-08-12T20:59:00.001-04:002014-08-13T10:07:49.238-04:00Play it again, Sam...There's a Change.org petition for Blizzard to immortalize Robin Williams in WoW.

I would like that, but within the past hour it was announced that Lauren Bacall has passed away today as well. If Blizzard does immortalize Robin Williams at the World's End Tavern, I would also like them to have Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart at a table nearby, watching the show.

EtA: Yes, I know that my title is a) a misattributed quote, and b) from Ilsa Lund in Casblanca, played by Ingrid Bergman. However, it didn't feel right referencing a bar such as World's End Tavern without using that quote. I suppose I could have used "You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve?", but that scene isn't from a bar.

Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-65813497353521835232014-08-11T23:37:00.000-04:002014-08-11T23:37:01.407-04:00RIP, Robin Williams

Robin passed away today, the victim of an apparent suicide. While he was most well known for his comedy and acting, he was also an avid gamer. He played Warcraft 3, D&D, sand table tin soldiers, and a variety of video games.

He battled his demons, depression and drug addiction, until the very end.

Robin, you will be missed.

<object width="320" height="266" class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/t_lp6pKODD4/0.jpg"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/t_lp6pKODD4&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/t_lp6pKODD4&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>

Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-86468067815821355072014-08-09T13:16:00.002-04:002014-08-09T13:16:26.740-04:00"I attack the darkness!!"In honor of the release of the fifth edition of Dungeons and Dragons, I figured I'd post an oldie but goodie from the Dead Alewives, their classic Dungeons and Dragons sketch.*

<object width="320" height="266" class="BLOGGER-youtube-video" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0" data-thumbnail-src="https://ytimg.googleusercontent.com/vi/9Kgx2b1sIRs/0.jpg"><param name="movie" value="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/9Kgx2b1sIRs&source=uds" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><embed width="320" height="266" src="https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/9Kgx2b1sIRs&source=uds" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>

And, well, whaddya know. Gen Con is next week. I'm looking forward to checking out the games, watching the crowd, and seeing the previews with the family. Among what I'm hoping to see are a preview of Fantasy Flight Games' new Star Wars miniatures game, Armada. I've always wanted to yell "IT'S A TRAP!" during a game, and now it looks like I'll get the chance.

THIS. This looks cool. From fantasyflightgames.com.

*I have to confess when I first heard it, I cringed because I lived through the Satanic Panic back in the 80s, but then the transition to the gaming happened, and I lost it. If you replace Mountain Dew with Milwaukee's Best Light, then you have my gaming group from back in college...

Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-44655008352328994712014-08-08T22:02:00.002-04:002014-08-08T22:02:44.139-04:00Video Game Armor Logic

From cheezburger.com

Um.... Yep.Redbeardhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-3287859335174901821.post-87048751644594822642014-08-07T16:37:00.003-04:002014-08-08T06:27:14.512-04:00Overheard on a ThursdayIn The Foundry flashpoint (SWTOR):

DPS: Holy Shit! We just killed Revan!!
Tank: Yep. Pretty cool, ain't it?
DPS: Well, I guess I can stop playing now, because I've done everything I've ever wanted to do in KOTOR.
DPS: [starts dancing] Weeee just killed REVAN!!!!!!

EtA: After sleeping on it, Shin has the right of it. Done.Redbeardhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com


text:
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I started lifting and doing the major lifts including deadlifts back in the start of summer, so my grip strength definitely increased, but I dont think my hands got much bigger.
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- 24/7 Customer Service 1-877-991-3411
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Find A Grave BULLYS Maliciously Attack baby's Memorial
Today in a Find A Grave face Book Group I learned that minimum of 2 women who have been viciously stalking and bullying a woman; by attacking the name of her deceased four year old son.
They have created a memorial for their victims deceased four year old son. Then made upsetting comments in the baby's memorial to emotionally torment the mother.
Jackie Wilson Goddard / AKA Diehard AKA READ THE FAQS has been stalking her victim since July of 2012. Jackie created a fake account and the creator Sylvia transferred the baby's memorial to Jacky Wilson Goddard's fake account. Both parents and a sister have asked the creator to remove the babys memorial because they found the idea of the woman using the death of their loved one as a number in a competition for a game of who can collect the most dead peoples names contest, demeaning to the child's life. SG 's drive to get a top stop is a higher priority than giving a family peace. The woman lives in Texas and achieves her numbers by copying and pasting the names from a Minnesota Database as her own work in to findagrave. This is how she found the name of the four year old who's parents she is Harassing by demeaning the life of their child.
The woman in Texas also stole a photo from the mothers memorial for the child on another website. Billion graves locked down the childs record at request of the mother. The sad part is this woman takes thousands of photos for other people out of the kindness of her heart and the Volunteers from Findagrave putting the baby's name under constant attack makes it impossible for the mother to honor the memory of her child.
JIM TIPTON HAS DELETED UPON REQUEST OTHER MEMORIALS FROM PARENTS WHO WERE UPSET BY STRANGER MADE MEMORIAOLS' FOR THEIR CHILDREN. YET DESPITE A REQUEST MADE BY THE BABYS SISTER TO DELETE THE MEMORIAL HE HAS YET TO REMOVE THIS CHILD'S MEMORIAL ITS POSSIBLE THAT JIM TIPTON IS USING THE CHILD TO EMOTIONALLY ABUSE THE MOTHER BASED ON THE FACT THE OTHER MEMORIALS BY PARENTS WERE DELETED WITH IN 2 DAYSc1f45cc
Laughing at all of you. Jun 20, 2013
F.a.g. has every right to abuse and profit from the deaths of children see how they couldn't wait to steal pics of the victims of sandy hook. F.A.G. members love to help jimmy tipton make millions of dollars from their time gas batteries internet service camera etc...they are all a bunch of ignorant f.a.g. s' and the parents that have lost a child and f.a.g. is making money from the child's death should be glad that is they didnt' lose more children for f.a.g. to exploit.0 1 Reply
Anonymous › Laughing at all of you. May 29
Aside from the numerous bullying attacks from the bullies, which is plenty of things findagrave is doing wrong considering the admins support these bullies, allowing a parent to grieve without having the site ignore her requests. Not only did they bully her, they stole her photo and used it on findagrave without permission. It took another website hitting them with a takedown notice to get it removed.1 0 Reply
Jim Tipton Jun 11, 2013 Moab, Utah
I am Jim Tipton the owner and millionaire owner of F.A.G.0 0 Reply
Jim Tipton May 07, 2013 Moab, Utah
Yes, I'm a thief and there is nothing you can do about it. I will continue to profit from the deaths of your loved ones I will continue to violate copyrights. How else can I get a picture of your loved ones unless I have my members steal them from the obituaries you paid to have printed in your local newspaper. So what if you paid for the burial plot and the gravestone my website is going to profit from pictures of that gravestone. Deal with it I'm rich and greedy and nobody is going to stop me!0 0 Reply
Toots › Jim Tipton Aug 25, 2013 Chesterfield, Missouri
God will.0 0 Reply
PhuckTipton Mar 06, 2013 Fayetteville, North Carolina
Tipton is a THEIF and a ***. The SOB needs to be locked up. And all those *** hoarders/collectors are nothing but pitiful, miserable little self-loathing maggots with no life of their own.0 0 Reply
loren Jan 23, 2013 Beech Grove, Indiana
how anyone can justify using an baby's death to attack others is simply yet another example of findagrave's total disregard for the living and the dead! there is a special place in *** for tipton & all those other pyschos!0 0 Reply
Anonymous Jan 21, 2013 Spanish Fork, Utah
I believe this person is telling the truth. Stalking seems to be a pastime for some members, and many of them are from Utah, and having ignorant silly wars over who's plural wife is the lesser or the better wife. How about the first wife being top dog, after all the first wife had to put up with the lesser wives and their BSing. Enough said.0 0 Reply
Bad Karma › Anonymous Jan 22, 2013
I had a first wife to my polygamist ancestor who was listed on this site, with a comment next to her name calling her a "HO". I suppose because she was the wife of a Mormon polygamist and someone felt the need to slander my ancestor. I know without a doubt that this woman was a loyal and good wife to my male ancestor. I Cannot say the same for the male ancestor involved as he had other women he called wives. This kind of behavior is quite bad for a company to allow their staff, or whoever they are to write such a filth next to someones comment. I deleted the comment for my ancestors sake. I agree that polygamy is adultery, but no one deserves this kind of slander next to their name. Especially when she was the first wife and legal spouse. Geeeze!!!
wow! › Bad Karma Jan 23, 2013
It had nothing to do with being a HO! Most Mormons believed that the Lord chose to institute plural marriage for a brief period in the nineteenth century as the Church was becoming established. The nineteenth century Latter-day Saints felt that they were practicing plural marriage in strict obedience to God's will and that the practice was divinely inspired. In fact, Mormonism still acknowledges polygamy as a divine principle that may apply in heaven, though it's no longer in practice on the earth. I agree with you no website should allow that. People can be so ignorant if they think todays standards ideal and values are the same as those that came before them. UGH IDIOTS!0 0 Reply
Anonymous › Bad Karma Jan 23, 2013 South Beach, Florida
A bunch of control freaks who once had the nerve to say it came from GOD.....HA HA HA!!!!! Like anyone with a real brain would ever believe in that silly nonsense, accept for a few brainwashed whacka-doodles. It is called big time deception.
LOL Jan 18, 2013 Green Cove Springs, Florida
to: cyber stalking?? commenter that was sooo funny! Thanx for the laff! Glad you are getting psychiatric help...not sure it wil do any good.0 1 Reply
Cyber stalking?? Jan 17, 2013 Charlotte, North Carolina
So sorry... I am an ***!, it is true findagrave is full of cyber stalking bullies. PLEASE get help with your State's Attorney General.
How silly of me I have some really serious problems.... I will be getting professional psychiatric help
Cyber stalking?? Jan 16, 2013 Charlotte, North Carolina
How silly, sounds like some of you have some really serious problems...PLEASE get help0 0 Reply
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He's gay, he's Republican, he's one of Denver's greatest standup comedians. Talk to anyone who's been in the scene for more than a few years, and they'll tell you: Chuck Roy has been instrumental in creating what is now known as Denver comedy. After years spent warming up crowds for Craig Kilborn in ... More >>
Now that we've finally eked our way into the warmer weeks of spring (fingers crossed), it's time to get off the couch and head out into the fresh air to get to May's ten best comedy events. We've got albums being recorded, albums being released, two Latino-themed shows, nerd heroes Aziz Ansari and C ... More >>
If you know Denver comedy, you surely know Chuck Roy. The former anchor of the satirical newscast The Crop Report -- an Onion News Network-style series of short sketches on marijuana, Roy is one of the most established names in Denver comedy, hosting an endless rotation of events at Comedy Works (af ... More >>
While the Afghan Whigs are probably not the first band people think of when they think of the '90s, album for album, the band consistently put out quality material. The outfit's soul-inflected rock, which could just as easily be called power pop even though it packed a lot more punch than some of th ... More >>
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The Benchwarmers put a zero on the board.
Josh Blue takes center stage.
Ideas that were forgotten but not gone in 2003
Mr. Ferrell comes into his glory in Old School.
Jack and Meg White resist the spoils of success.
Ohmigod! Five seasons in, South Park's the funniest show on TV.


text:
Follow Us on Twitter
Laurence Verriest, Community Affairs Lead, Microsoft Belgium.
Child Focus is a Belgian NGO that has been working tirelessly to protect children online for many years. Microsoft has collaborated with Child Focus for the last four years and has been training children and teachers in schools around Belgium on internet safety. As one of the volunteers at Microsoft I am particularly proud that this long term partnership and the valuable work of Child Focus undertakes.
Microsoft has a long standing commitment to keeping the internet safe for children. In Belgium, as part of this commitment, we decided to devote our Employee Volunteering Program, which offers three volunteering days per year to employees, to child online safety. We noticed, during discussions with our NGO partner, Child Focus, and other stakeholders (NGO's, FCCU, government agencies and universities), that teachers still don't feel confident bringing the subject of Internet Safety in class. So in 2009, we decided to provide Microsoft employees with the opportunity to volunteer to provide Safer Internet Training in primary and secondary schools for children between the ages of 8-13. Microsoft worked with Child Focus to develop a specific training pack explaining why the Internet is fun and useful, but also covering the potential dangers such as privacy, spam, cyber bullying etc.
Microsoft trains employee volunteers and matches them with schools where they give e-safety lesson in class. The program has proved incredibly popular, and we have seen a strong growth in demand from schools. To meet this demand we've extended the program to include our partner, Getronics, in the initiative, which is helping us to reach an even greater number of children.
In our last fiscal year - July 2009 to June 2010 65 Getronics employees and 101 Microsoft employees – a full third of our employees - trained over 10,000 children in schools all over the country.
But more important than the numbers, the training has been very effective, in the words of a teacher from Cardinal Mercier in Braine L'alleud: "We would like to thank Microsoft Belux and everyone concerned in this project, for the training you provided to our pupils on the dangers of the Internet. We would like to thank Mister Van Mollekot and Cremers who brought 7 sessions with professionalism and passion for 12 classes. The pupils and the teachers learned a lot! Could you come back in June to train the other classes?"
In the words of one colleague "I was delighted to have participated in the volunteering day. It was enriching from both a human and professional point of view. It was a real moment of realization in understanding the daily challenges for our users! It was surprising, uplifting and what a pleasure to hear their perspective"
In December 2010 Microsoft Belux was honored to have the incredible work of Child Focus and the Internet Safety program recognized with the "European Union Employee Volunteering Award for Belgium". This competition recognizes companies for their employee engagement initiatives and is organized by the European Commission and coordinated by Business & Society for Belgium. Microsoft was selected by an independent jury that included representatives from the University of Antwerp, the Flemish employment agency, Network for Training and Entrepreneurship and HR Tribune magazine. The award ceremony was attended by 100 people from both public and private sector, NGOs and academia. John Macdonald, head of task force for the European Year at the European Commission delivered the opening address while a panel discussion on the role of employee volunteering included the CEO of Deloitte Belgium, ING Belgium, PWC and Freshfields, and Xavier Lamote from Microsoft.
Pictured at the presentation of the European Union Employee Volunteering Award for Belgium are Ellen Stassart, Child Focus; Mieke Kennof, Business Manager Microsoft Belux; Laurence Verriest, Community Affairs Manager Microsoft Belux; Xavier Lamote, BMO Director Microsoft Belux and Rudi Thomas, Chief Executive Officer of VBO/FEB the federation of business in Belgium
Microsoft will now participate in the European finalist contest in March 2011.
The Employee Volunteering Program is an excellent opportunity for our employees to develop their personal skills and be ambassadors of our Citizenship programs. As one of the volunteers at Microsoft I am particularly proud that this long term partnership and the valuable work of Child Focus has been recognized in this way.
Laurence Verriest manages Microsoft's community affairs programs in Belgium.
online safety programs
Wish to have this kind of online programs all over the world!
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Jeff Branscome writes about Spotsylvania County schools. You can email him at email@example.com.
Rapid-paced board meeting
The Spotsylvania County School Board met last night, but barely. The meeting lasted about 15 minutes.
Nothing had changed on projected revenues from the state and county so there was nothing to update for the fiscal 2012 budget.
No one came to speak about the budget during the public hearing.
The board officially accepted the retirement of Courtland Principal Steve Fitch who leaves at the end of this school year to become principal of a South Carolina high school for 2011-12.
The board also named Janet Hodges principal for the Rappahannock Juvenile Detention Center for 2011-12.
Permalink: http://news.fredericksburg.com/gettingschooled/2011/04/29/rapid-paced-board-meeting/


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November 26, 2014
Posted Monday, March 10, 2014 --- 10:58 a.m.
ROSEMONT, Ill. (AP) -- In a room on the ground floor of the conference's sparkling new headquarters, the Big Ten is putting the final touches on its version of Cooperstown or Canton.
Fans will be able to relive some of their favorite moments through a series of interactive exhibits at the Big Ten Experience touting the conference's successes on the field and away from it. The museum opens in the spring or summer, and Commissioner Jim Delany says it will allow "us to create a zone for capturing the past and telling our story."
It's a story that dates to January 11, 1895, when leaders from Purdue, the University of Chicago, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Northwestern and Wisconsin gathered at the Palmer House Hotel in Chicago to outline a blueprint for administering athletics.
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Photos: BT Tower at 40
Summary: London's landmark through the years - in pictures
TOPICS: Networking
3 of 5Image
Originally known as the Post Office Tower, it was the UK's highest building at the time, standing 189 metres tall including a 12 metre London Weather Centre radar mast.
The tower was designed to meet the increased demands of broadcasting by allowing the use of microwaves instead of landlines for transmitting television signals.
Today the tower handles around 3,000 switched calls per day, 99 per cent of all live football and terrestrial television passes through it and it is a Grade II listed building.
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Welcome me to your digital world
The "Welcome Me to Your Digital World" portal was launched in İstanbul with the participation of over 100 people including Chairman of Intel Craig Barrett, UN Resident Coordinator in Turkey Mahmood Ayub and Salih Çelik from the Ministry of Education.
New Horizons - "Welcome Me to Your Digital World" is a digital inclusion program to reach rural and low income boys and girls and local youth councils through Social Media. The aim of this Project is to bridge the divide between young people who lack and cannot afford home access to computers in rural Turkey. It is aimed at including digitally excluded 1,600 poor school-age boys and girls in digital life by equipping them with computers, and enabling them to access and contribute to online knowledge creation.
The "Welcome Me to Your Digital World" portal is in partnership with Intel, UNDP, Youth for Habitat and The Turkish Informatics Foundation. The strategy involves the distribution of new and used computers to poor boys and girls by building a bridge between the donors and beneficiaries through the social media portal. The portal is rich in educational content and also fun to access. Coached by their teachers, students can place essays, artwork, photos or similar content to express themselves.
The portal will operate initially as a pilot project in 11 schools at the primary, secondary and high school levels. It is currently running at four primary schools, with seven to 10 teachers and 60 to100 students actively participating at each school.
The end result of this new portal will be the creation of an infrastructure and a management model for the expansion to all digitally excluded communities in Turkey.


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We have stayed at other resorts in the area (Rio Grande) but this is our winner, so far. The villa was very clean and nicely decorated not to mention with all the amenities found at a hotel, except for a safe. Our teenagers had a great time paddle boarding, biking, kayaking (all included) at the Boathouse. The only complain was that it seems that the villa right above ours, was being remodeled and on the Monday morning we woke up by the sound of their tools. If at least they could delay to begin making noises later in the AM, instead.
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Exceptional resort living when you want to get away from it all. This is a first class unit located within an exceptional resort. Marta the property manager was a joy to work with and was always there to answer questions and returned emails quickly. I enjoy vacations that pull me away from the hustle and bustle and allow me to unwind. Bahia Beach is one of the best places I have found to do just that. The resort was so peaceful and beautiful that we always looked forward to returning "home" after enjoying other activities on the island. You will definately need a car to get around outside of the resort but there is also a chance you might not ever want to leave! My only disappointment was the lack of a golf cart to get around the resort in, but for $60/day they will rent you one at the pro shop.


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