Charles Gallant

If you haven’t heard about Will Wright, or his latest project, they’re worth checking out. Everyone can learn from the success of the “Sims” series (Sim City, The Sims, etc.), no matter what you’re into. Will Wright just understands people.

In a nutshell, SPORE is a game where you play God. You control a creature through all its stages of evolution, from petrie dish on up the ladder. By the end of the game you’re in a space ship, exploring other galaxies. On the way you can grow fins, struggle through the food chain, learn to use tools, build cities, and just about everything in-between. Everything. It’s a lot to explain, so watch the video.

SPORE takes a very small amount of user input, and generates a huge amount of output. Just nudge the game, and it’ll churn out a brilliant pixar-esque character — fully animated & with sound effects. If you want to put bigger legs on your character, the game will automatically re-balance him out, adjust his stride, and probably allow him to run faster.

We’ve got lots of data and “user generated content” out there already, and there are ways of letting the user create the experience for you. Google did it by analyzing everyone’s links when they made PageRank. Digg did it with their own content when they made Digg Swarm. Facebook did it by using everyone’s circle of friends when they made their Networks. Nike did it by collecting strides when they made Nike+. I’d argue that SPORE has the most interesting one yet…

Just came across an interview of Bill Clinton on Fox News.  I have no interest in asserting any political views, but I found this interesting.

How can anyone possibly have all the facts, unless they were witness to them?  We’ve seen both sides of every story on TV and in the papers, and we’ve seen each one in a cinematic & convincing package.  Each one completely opposes the other.

All that’s really in that video are talking heads.  They talk about the back-story, the accusations, the specifics, and the facts, but those don’t mean anything to me.  Research just gives you a better look at the packaging.  There will always be someone who can articulate the other perspective in a way that sounds valid.  Truth for one person is false for another.  I think that my generation is getting used to this back-and-forth.