Well this is interesting. Via Blue’s News: Slashdot has a post titled, “AI Researchers Produce New Kind of PC Game“. From the post (exerpted from a “Bandwidth Exceeded” reference site):
Unlike most games today that use scripting for the AI, non-player-characters in NERO learn new tactics in real-time using advanced machine learning techniques.
Design News has posted an article discussing the future of simulation systems as integrated product design and test tools (among other things); a subject that’s near and dear to me. It’s a nice article and well worth the read. From the entry:
Bevilaqua gained insight into some of Lockheed’s stickiest design issues. He learned about the advantages of shortening the turn radius of the F-35 and found ways to use software to cut the qualification times for air-to-air refueling of the F-18. He also applied his game expertise to the study of so-called “viffing” (vectoring in forward flight) on the AV-8B Harrier, thus improving the aircraft’s maneuverability.
“Sometimes, you can know the equations, but not really know the physics,” Bevilaqua notes. “That’s what the games did for us: They taught us the real physics behind the equations.”
All that from playing videogames. That’s a pretty powerful statement.
You’ll also see three letters pop-up in the article: PLM. They’ve been getting some play here over the past month or so, but I now consider “product lifecycle management” a limited way of defining the potential for this kind of software integration (I’ve already written a first draft for an entry to be posted on the SLSalon blog that deals with this – should be up within the week). I suspect a new definition for what this stuff is morphing into will eventually emerge – I don’t think of people as products.
I’ve been toying with Chris Anderson’s Long Tail ideas for a few months now; turning them over in my head and trying to resolve some perceived discontinuities: “cult” items, functions of Time, aso. All this in order to arrive at a more complete unified theory, I guess. I’ve even used Second Life as a way to help visualize and discuss these ideas (see above image). Last night I finally grabbed some time to model and render my latest 3D models which I collectively call the “ecoToroid” (I went 3D after seeing those “signal to noise” graphs; and especially that “Sales vs Stuff” image).
As I commented on The Long Tail blog, I’m guilty of not giving this the attention it probably deserves; especially in trying to figure out what this thing looks like in a historical context – I’ve already modified my 3D models once and I could see where they could use more thought and further modification (maybe even reverting back to something more like what I had originally). Perhaps later when I have more time. Anyway, instead of trying to explain what I’m thinking, I’m just going to post a couple of images and see what happens. Maybe these will spark ideas in someone else’s mind. Maybe not. But I figure it’s better than letting these things sit on my hard drive.
I also thought I would open up the comments on this entry. Typically I don’t allow for comments simply because the spam I get is too much bother to deal with on a blog as obscure as this one. There’s also the fact that I need to mod the code so the comment block width works on all browsers; right now you can type well outside the boundary in IE I think – sorry about that. If you want to leave a comment, I’d suggest typing it in a text editor and doing a cut ‘n paste. Hopefully in the near future I’ll fix this page so it’s a little nicer. Til then….
(edit: O-kay. Seems as if opening up one post to comments opens up the others, even though their commenting has been closed. Must be in the WordPress code but I just don’t have time to find out. Having just mass deleted about 500 spam comments, looks like it’s time to close the door for a bit. Oh well.)
(images Copyright © C. Sven Johnson)
Interesting entry over on O’Reilly Radar concerning the Supernova 2005 presentation given by Linda Stone. If you’re in the Industrial Design field or familiar with Ms Stone’s background at Microsoft’s Virtual Worlds/Social Computing Group, this may be of interest to you.
The only thing I wonder is if the cycle she describes moves like a wave – with “early adopters” at the leading edge, aso. This might explain what I perceived as a subtle but significant ripple in the social fabric caused by the cinematic release of “Fight Club” in 1999. Seems to me that the movie – and the book on which it was based – might have qualified as early indicators. Guess I have some reading and research to do especially since I see a potential tie-in to some thoughts I’ve had in another area.
BBC News online has an informative article on the amazing growth of online gaming in China. Interesting to note the government’s involvement: three separate ministries oversee the videogame industry. Of course there was no mention of virtual worlds. So maybe they could see fit to add another “ministry” – if just to help this poor virtual world resident posting on one official forum:
I Always Play Slingo, I Seen 10k Pot In Xxlodge Club, And Last Night Always From 3k-10k Changing The Pot, I Think The Players Are Mad, But To A Pity , I Was So Bad Luck Played All Night Didn’t Win Any , When I Near Ly Win I Met Devils,
So I Think, We Need Make A Script To Keep Us From Devils
I’ll update this when a “Soul-Saving Script” turns up in the virtual marketplace. Any day now…
