I am sure that everyone has had one of those weeks where even though nearly everything has gone wonderfully, you still want the week to be over. This is one of these weeks.
Note: I will update this post later with relevant hyperlinks. (Update: Updated and typo fixed.)
I am currently sitting in the Addison Conference and Theater Center for Dallas TechFest 2008. I had to leave at 6:15am to get here, and since the only wireless available to me is unsecured pay service, I'm typing this on my BlackBerry for lack of anything better to do.
A week ago today, I was lucky enough to get to see a live riffing by the crew at Cinematic Titanic of their next movie riff, the Roger Corman "classic" known as "The Wasp Woman.". (You can see this over at archive.org...but do you really want to?)
I have spent the last week poring over nearly 100,000 data records to try to find an integrity issue with our numbers, putting out fires at work, and overall just working myself a lot harder than normal...and now I am here so I can learn more stuff so that I can do more work.
Let nobody tell you that coders make sense. At least I am investing some time in my future. I know many coders who don't...or even worse, won't.
Anyway, I'm going to be posting a bit over at some other blogs in the near future. Currently finishing up a post called "There are no theists in QA.". Guess what the topic is?
May 3, 2008
April 27, 2008
Ken Miller on Intelligent Design
This webcast starts with a prayer, but do not let that distract you. This nearly two hour webcast is Ken Miller speaking at Case Western University about Intelligent Design (ID).
Ken Miller was one of the plantiff's witnesses in Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District, the recent case where ID was essentially struck down.
His lecture is approximately 70 minutes with the rest dedicated to a Q&A session, but even if you are not scientifically minded, I highly encourage you to watch this webcast. He isn't negative against religion, he isn't needlessly pro-science, he doesn't talk down to people. What he does do is show what is at risk in very stark detail. Pay attention at approximately 1 hour, 7 minutes, 40 seconds.
April 26, 2008
"Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" Lacks Intelligence
Some of you may know about a new film recently released by Ben Stein called "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed." The basic premise of the movie is that if you believe in creation instead of evolution, your views are being suppressed in education and that the "controversy should be taught."
The Net is abuzz with controversy about this film. Everything from one of the people interviewed for the film being kicked out of a screening for no apparent reason to Yoko Ono actually doing something admirable and suing the film's creators to ask them to remove a clip from John Lennon's "Imagine" that was used without permission.
As an aside, I think it's funny that a film of creationist propaganda would use a song that espouses "Imagine there's no heaven...No hell below us...No religion," all of which in the first half of the song...but I digress.
Now, I'd try to tear down some of the arguments posed by the film, but fortunately, I don't have to. A YouTuber by the handle of "Thunderf00t" has been doing an amazing job of it already. He has an amazing video series called "Why do people laugh at creationists?" that takes arguments put forward by creationists and tears them apart.
Here is his edition specifically focused on the PR campaign for "Expelled."
Now, this isn't to say that there are not legitimate controversies within evolution, but the controversies are not about the accuracy of the theory. The debate within the scientific community is more about the specific mechanisms in force during natural selection. Is it group selection, Dawkin's "selfish gene" theory, or others? All of these have merit and the evidence to support all of them is currently building.
If you insist on teaching the controversies present in science, make sure that you are teaching the controversies that are actually there.
The Net is abuzz with controversy about this film. Everything from one of the people interviewed for the film being kicked out of a screening for no apparent reason to Yoko Ono actually doing something admirable and suing the film's creators to ask them to remove a clip from John Lennon's "Imagine" that was used without permission.
As an aside, I think it's funny that a film of creationist propaganda would use a song that espouses "Imagine there's no heaven...No hell below us...No religion," all of which in the first half of the song...but I digress.
Now, I'd try to tear down some of the arguments posed by the film, but fortunately, I don't have to. A YouTuber by the handle of "Thunderf00t" has been doing an amazing job of it already. He has an amazing video series called "Why do people laugh at creationists?" that takes arguments put forward by creationists and tears them apart.
Here is his edition specifically focused on the PR campaign for "Expelled."
Now, this isn't to say that there are not legitimate controversies within evolution, but the controversies are not about the accuracy of the theory. The debate within the scientific community is more about the specific mechanisms in force during natural selection. Is it group selection, Dawkin's "selfish gene" theory, or others? All of these have merit and the evidence to support all of them is currently building.
If you insist on teaching the controversies present in science, make sure that you are teaching the controversies that are actually there.
April 25, 2008
MSN Bringing You The Unthinkable
I've had to start using MSN Messenger again at work, and one disturbing feature of it is a small content rotator at the bottom of the contact list. It cycles through various stories and video clips that are highlighted on various Microsoft and sponsor properties.
There was one I wasn't expecting to see...
Yes, that's right...Harrison Ford waxing his chest. I don't want to know about that...do you?
April 24, 2008
The #1 Reason Not To Be In Games Test
You started as a tester and were making $8 an hour and were happy. You did a great job, so they offered you a test lead position for $36,000 a year. If you were working a flat 40 a week, this would work out to approximately $17.30 an hour or $692 a week, and would be good.
Most test leads don't work a flat 40. Most test leads end up working about 60 hours a week. Guess what? You just prorated yourself down to $8 an hour. I'll explain.
When you are working hourly, you get paid time and a half for every hour above 40. If you aren't getting overtime, check with your local labor board because there are severe problems.
At $8 an hour, you gross $320 a week.
If you work 1 hour of overtime, that goes to $332 a week. At 10 hours of overtime (not uncommon), that goes to $452 a week. At 20 hours of overtime, that goes to $692 a week...a tie with the salaried test lead position.
During crunch time, there are times when I've worked enough hours to prorate myself down to minimum wage.
Most companies say that because you are salaried, you are now part of the bonus program, etc., but given how rarely the bonus programs pay out anymore, you really have to stop and think for a bit. If hourly won't pay a living wage and salaried essentially requires you to devote your life to work, who is really benefiting?
As long as game testing is seen as glamorous and attracts the sheer number of applicants that it currently does, there is no systemic solution for this. If you are going to accept a salaried position, work with your manager to put hard caps on the number of hours that you will work each week. Failure to do so can only end in wishing that you stuck around flipping burgers.
Most test leads don't work a flat 40. Most test leads end up working about 60 hours a week. Guess what? You just prorated yourself down to $8 an hour. I'll explain.
When you are working hourly, you get paid time and a half for every hour above 40. If you aren't getting overtime, check with your local labor board because there are severe problems.
At $8 an hour, you gross $320 a week.
If you work 1 hour of overtime, that goes to $332 a week. At 10 hours of overtime (not uncommon), that goes to $452 a week. At 20 hours of overtime, that goes to $692 a week...a tie with the salaried test lead position.
During crunch time, there are times when I've worked enough hours to prorate myself down to minimum wage.
Most companies say that because you are salaried, you are now part of the bonus program, etc., but given how rarely the bonus programs pay out anymore, you really have to stop and think for a bit. If hourly won't pay a living wage and salaried essentially requires you to devote your life to work, who is really benefiting?
As long as game testing is seen as glamorous and attracts the sheer number of applicants that it currently does, there is no systemic solution for this. If you are going to accept a salaried position, work with your manager to put hard caps on the number of hours that you will work each week. Failure to do so can only end in wishing that you stuck around flipping burgers.
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