#graphics r all public domain (I HOPE)

[misterradio]

[architectnews]

The Design Village spotlights 11 student architecture and design projects

In our latest school show, undergraduate and postgraduate students at The Design Village in India present architecture and design projects ranging from a shelter for cats to an algorithmic learning aid for people with dyslexia.

Other projects include a music festival that aims to bring the sighted and visually impaired people together, and an analysis of the impact of menstrual euphemisms in India.  The projects aim to explore how informed processes are vital to developing solutions to solve today's problems.

The Design Village

School: The Design Village Courses: Fashion and Textile Design, Product Design, Graphics and Communication Design, Space and Interior Design, Transportation and Mobility Design, Interaction and UX Design, International Practice in Habitat Design, Practice of Design 

School statement:

"The Design Village is a multidisciplinary design institute based in National Capital Territory, India. The institute believes in impact through design as a medium that can solve the problems of today and propose solutions for the future.

"Much like an actual village, The Design Village is an organic whole where culture is rediscovered and values of empathy are nurtured by supporting fellow villagers and The Design Village itself. It aspires to be an energetic and thoughtful place where designers want to be and teachers want to teach.

"The Design Village’s 2nd graduate show unveils projects that tinker with the ideology of design as a verb. They earmark concurrent contexts and envision solutions for a better future through rigorous, informed and mindful processes."

People for Animals (group project)

"In collaboration with Studio Archohm, a student group designed an environment for neglected cats that rejuvenates them through space and design. The concept is for The People for Animal Shelter – an animal welfare centre in the National Capital Region of India.

"Keeping the behaviours of cats as a foundation and eliminating any possible stressors, the students created an oasis to address their various needs and create a micro-climate. Apart from being both a home and playpen for cats, the design allows birds to rest and drink water on the roof."

Students: Shireen Saxena, Tarushee Sachdeva and Syed Javeed Badri Professors: Sourabh Gupta, Rishabh Soni and Mohan Kumar Verma Email: shireen_pg20@thedesignvillage.org, tarushee.sachdeva_pg20@thedesignvillage.org, syed.badri_pg20@thedesignvillage.org

Lost in substitutes by Namoshree Jain

"Lost in substitutes asks: are we really experiencing the world in this era of digital compression? As we meander in a world of e-books, digital games and video, Namoshree has created an experience providing sensory inputs in varying intensities from minimum to excess.

"In a post-pandemic world, we have all arrived at the painful realization that we miss sensory inputs such as touch. As we hope to increase interactions with people, Namoshree has designed a safe experience that caters to our physical and mental well-being."

Student: Namoshree Jain Professor: Tuttu M. Thomas Email: namoshree.j@thedesignvillage.org

Baraabari – Bringing the blind and sighted together by Vidita Maheshka

"Baraabari roughly translates to 'parity' in English.

"Through her project, Vidita Mahesheka has created a shared platform for the sighted and individuals with vision impairments. Working with the National Association for the Blind and Music Basti, a music school, she proposed a music festival as a site for inclusivity.

"Aiming to address social exclusion and awkwardness (often experienced by the people with low or no vision) Vidita emphasizes auditory input rather than visual, creating a site for parity and increasing social interaction between the sighted and people with vision impairments."

Student: Vidita Mahesheka. Professor: Pritesh Maru Email: vidita.m@thedesignvillage.org

I am dyslexia – Words no longer the limitation by Kiran H. Nath

"Growing up neuroatypical, Kiran H. Nath struggled with the education system. Kiran believes that it designs people like him out of the learning paradigm, forcing students to conform to distinct ways of learning. As a result, children and young adults often lose confidence.

"Kiran's project addresses this issue. He has designed an algorithmic application that responds to its users' learning abilities. Mapping the prowess of a dyslexic mind, Kiran worked with the Madras Dyslexia Association and designed a product to enhance and celebrate abilities rather than focusing on perceived disabilities."

Student: Kiran H. Nath Professor: Mudita Pasari Email: kiran@thedesignvillage.org

India Pavilion – A symbol of cultural exchange (group project)

"Over a series of workshops from across the globe, the India Pavilion was built at Domaine de Boisbuchet, Lessac, France, in 2019. It celebrates the union of space, material and light to create architectural experiences representing Indian civilization.

"The pavilion attempts to create a collective public space, allowing visitors to interpret the building as an 'agora' in dialogue with nature. It testifies to the importance of cultural exchange and symbolizes the necessity of views from the outside to readjust and revitalize Indian values."

Students: Zoya Gupta, Anoop Kumar Vinod Kumar, Arjun Gupta, Arshad Bajil Kuttasseri, Mukul Kapoor, Akarsh Goyal, Albert Shawn Figaredo, Ikshita Sharma, Sachin Choyal, Namoshree Jain, Souvik Mukherjee, Dharini Singh, Rishabh Soni, Anjana Sravya Yalamanchili, Abhirami Ravi, Vidita Maheshka, Yash Mishra, Saiyam Arora, Ushmita Aggarwal, Arushi Khatri, Vanshika Mehta, Sarthak Tayla, Khadija Rajgarhwala, Purva, Abad Ali, Harsh Chauhan, Akanksha A. Thapa, Sanjana Suri, Ankita Kochhar, Pranav Shyam Kalambi, Vineet Rao, Mayank Gupta, Maulik Yagnik, Snighdha Gupta and Tanvi Aggarwal Professors: Sourabh Gupta, Mridu Sahai, Lena R. Gupta, Carlos Guisasola, Pablo Sevilla Alonso, Gopendra Pratap Singh, Vidur Madhav, Vatsal Agrawal and Mohan Kumar Verma Email: taskbox@thedesignvillage.org

Displaced Masculinities – The men in contemporary Punjab by Archit Dhiman

"Archit Dhiman, a non-Sikh Punjabi male, examines the underlying themes and patterns that impact the notions of 'masculinity' within contemporary Punjab in India.

"Applying a framework using an intersection of various fields, Archit has developed a multi-dimensional analysis from analysing  Punjabi regional cinema. Archit has also referenced scholarly work from global ethnographers and anthropologists.

"The paper aimed to render a collage of imagery that impacts the notions of masculinity in Punjab. Moving away from stereotypical definitions, the paper superimposes the images of masculinity and femininity on societal, national and global premises."

Student: Archit Dhiman Professor: Vatsal Agrawal Email: archit@thedesignvillage.org

Analysing the impact of menstrual euphemisms with visual language in urban adults by Unnati Sharma

"Through her master's dissertation, Unnati Sharma tackles euphemisms used for menstruation in urban India. Despite claims of modernity, most of India still refrains from having this conversation, resulting in countrywide problems of menstrual hygiene and an apparent lag in SDG indicators for health and well-being.

"Unnati argues that there is an urgent need to normalize and address the many associations people have with menstruation. This need to understand menstruation (beyond its scientific meaning) could be addressed by using visual euphemisms as a tool – allowing more open conversations between the menstruating and non-menstruating populations."

Student: Unnati Sharma Professor: Prachi Joshi, Sneha Ravishankar and Lena R. Gupta Email: tdvunnati@thedesignvillage.org

Craft sustainability with special reference to chindi rope in villages of Haryana by Sachin Choyal

"Sachin Choyal’s master’s dissertation explored sustainable mapping practices using pre and post-consumer textile waste within rural communities of Haryana, India, which has developed into a study of sustainability itself.

"Examining creating rope from waste fabric, Sachin mapped the processes and cost structures, helping create a sustainable business model for local communities (who usually create products for local consumption). Since the project's completion, Sachin has developed an unusual weaving technique to produce fabric for rugs, throws and jackets."

Student: Sachin Choyal Professor: Mudita Pasari and Lena R. Gupta Email: tdvsachin@thedesignvillage.org

!ook  a wordless visual storybook by Ananya Joshi

"In collaboration with non-profit education organisation Khel Planet, Ananya Joshi has designed a book emphasising the art of looking. The project asks us to shine a light on objects and beings we overlook – to see, acknowledge and engage with them.

"Ananya’s wordless book is designed for 6-10-year-olds and their caregivers. It aims to encourage readers to build positive relationships, improve language expression, exercise vocabulary and explore plot lines. Not having a singular storyline allows the readers to direct the story while creating a space to question and ponder upon illustrated cues."

Student: Ananya Joshi Professor: Sneha Ravishankar Email: tdvananya@thedesignvillage.org

The possibility of an objective ethical framework in Persuasive design: A theoretical reflection by Karan Pal Singh Virdi

"Persuasive technologies aim at changing the behaviour and attitude of users. Karan Pal Singh Virdi addresses the ethical concerns with such technological interventions by designers, as it is suggested that many academic ethical frameworks lack a designer’s perspective.

"This study contributes to this missing link by investigating a possibility of an objective ethical framework— guiding unbiased decisions and adapting to dynamic factors that contribute to ethical dilemmas.

"The suggested methodology is two-phased, inspired by a five-stage design process. First phase involving scrutiny of existing frameworks and the second phase involving practical applications of the same."

Student: Karan Pal Singh Virdi Professors: Mudita Pasari, Lena R. Gupta, Shemal Pandya Email: tdvkaranpal@thedesignvillage.org

Meghalayan tales – stories from the magical land of Meghalaya (group project)

"A group of students working with the Meghalaya Infrastructure Development and Finance Corporation propose ideas of enhancing sustainable tourism in the northeastern state of Meghalaya, India.

"The students observed a stark disconnect between the tourists and the aboriginal tribal population. To bridge this gap, they suggested carrying local myths, stories and legends to the tourists before, during and after their visit to Meghalaya.

"Their proposal included visual aids, graphic books, theatrical and immersive displays, which allowed for the tourist to be immersed in and interact with local cultural aspects of Meghalaya."

Students: Muskaan Mahendru, Sunidhi Chaudhary, Hitesh Chikarsal and Vanshika Mehta Professor: Anusha Dhawan Emails: sunidhi@thedesignvillage.org, muskaan@thedesignvillage.org, vanshika@thedesignvillage.org, hitesh@thedesignvillage.org

Partnership content

This school show is a partnership between Dezeen and The Design Village. Find out more about Dezeen partnership content here.

The post The Design Village spotlights 11 student architecture and design projects appeared first on Dezeen.

[kdeven57-blog]

This Python tutorial will help you learn Python and build a career in this top programming language. Through this tutorial, you will learn Python basics, its salient features, basic syntax, variable types, operators, functions, modules, and more. You will also understand what exception handling is, how to access database, Python classes and loops, and ultimately how to write Python codes. Learn Python from Intellipaat Python Certification course and excel in your career!

Introduction to Python Programming

What is Python used for? Let’s begin with this Python tutorial in order to make you understand what Python programming is. We will start from Python basics.

As per Stack Overflow, Python language is one among the fastest growing programming languages in the world. Forbes says that Python language has seen the 7th largest increase in demand in the past few years. Due to this, there is an acute shortage of skilled and certified Python professionals. Hence, job opportunities for Python programming have increased, tremendously. According to Indeed, the average annual salary of a Python Developer in the US is $123,000.

Interested in learning Python? Enroll in our Python Course in London now!

Watch this Python Tutorial Video for Beginners for more insight.

Python language is one of the most popular programming languages of the 21st century. It is a general-purpose language and has been here around for over 20 years. Python Syntax is also extremely simple and elegant.  With its gentle and gradual learning curve, Python is considered as the best introductory programming language. I hope the introduction to python is clear to you by now.

Kick-start your career in Python with the perfect Python Course in New York now!

So, let’s jump onto the other topics in this python tutorial and learn python for beginners.

Here is the list of topics covered in this Python Tutorial, just in case you want to jump right into a specific one:

Why Python?

What Can Python Do?

Python 2 Vs. Python 3

Beginners’ Tips for Learning Python Programming Online

Why Python?

When it comes to automating the predictive model, Python language is the first choice for Data Scientists

Python language provides some of the awesome and robust libraries for Big Data, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and Deep Learning.

For deploying Machine Learning models in production, Data Scientist prefers Python programming over R.

It is easy to integrate Python with Big Data frameworks such as Spark and Hadoop.

Python language has huge online community support.

What Can Python Do?

Python is a general-purpose language, which means that it can be used to write software applications in a variety of domains without being restricted to a particular domain. This feature sets Python apart from the domain-specific languages. Being a general-purpose language, Python can do a number of interesting things. Some of them are listed here in this python tutorial below:

Python programming can be used to write an application using Tkinterwhich use graphics rather than text to interact with the users.

Python language can be used to create games, using its modules such as Pygameor Kivy.

Python can also automate boring stuff such as sending emails, uploading status on a Facebook account, and more

Python can also be used to experiment with computer vision using its openCV library. It is particularly used in robotics to enable the robots to see and avoid obstacles while moving.

Drawing complex graphs and visualizing the data can be by Python, using its matplotliband similar libraries.

Being one of the top choices for data analysis, Python can also mine Twitter Data. How convenient is that! Especially, if you consider the fact that in today’s world there are literally hordes of data created every second.

We have the perfect professional Python Course in Bangalore for you!

Watch this Python for Data Science Video.

Difference Between Python 2 and Python 3

Since the release of the new version of Python, i.e., Python 3, which is explained the most in this Python tutorial, there has been a bit of debate in the coding community over deciding which Python version is better. Whether Python 3 is better than Python 2 is a rather subjective question, and the selection between the two eventually comes down to personal preference. But, one must know how Python 2 and Python 3 are different. Python 3 is a fundamentally different version from Python 2.

Check out all the key differences between Python 2 and 3:

Basis of the Difference

Beginners’ Tips for Learning Python Programming Online

While learning as a beginner through this Python tutorial, you should follow these tips which will help you deal with some new concepts:

Tip #1: Practice Python every day

It is important to have consistency while learning any new programming language. It is important that you should make a commitment to write code every day, as it will play with your muscle memory which is a very important part in programming. Increase your level of coding gradually but never stop playing around with the Python basics coding part. You may end up learning something new every time you practice Python coding even about the python basics.

This python tutorial will also help you keep a good grasp of Python basics. Here are some examples for you to exercise:

Print the type of an element:

>> a = “this is a string”

>>> type(a)

>>> <class ‘str’> #output

Use docstring to add multi-line descriptive descriptions in your code:

>>def printOutput(str):

>>>“’This function will print the passed string’”

>>>print (str)

>>>return;

Watch this Python Tutorial Video for Beginners.

Import libraries:

>>> import sklearn

>>> import pandas as pd

>>> import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

Perform operations and play around with them:

>> a = ‘Intellipaat’

>>> a.upper()

>>> ‘INTELLIPAAT’

The list does not end here, there are plenty other basic things that you can practice.

Tip #2: Use Interactive Python shell

Whether you are new to Python data structures (dictionaries, lists, strings, etc.) or you are debugging an application, the best learning tool is the Interactive Python Shell.

To use the Interactive Python Shell, first, you should install Python on your computer. This Python tutorial on the step-by-step Installation procedure of Python will help you learn how to install Python in your system. To activate and use the Interactive Python Shell, simply open the terminal on your system and run Python 2 or Python 3 depending on your version of installation. Once the shell is open, you can start writing the code.

Tip #3: Debug your code

Hitting a bug is normal when you start writing a complex program. Don’t get frustrated here; it happens with everyone! Instead, take these moments as pride and think of yourself as a bug bounty hunter. Debugging your own code will help you learn even more.

It is important to have a methodological approach while debugging the code, which will help you find where your code has broken down. Going through your code step by step in its executable order and making sure that each part of your code works fine is the way you should go about it.

Watch this Python Interview Questions video.

Tip #4: Try to build some small projects

Always try to make up a small project for each concept. This python tutorial will help you build confidence for writing Python programs, as well as this will help you develop the muscle memory. Once you have a solid foundation on the basic data structures (Python Dictionaries, Python Strings, Python sets, Python Lists, etc.), object-oriented programming, and writing classes, you will be ready to deploy these programming concepts in real life. Keep writing small codes to keep your concepts clear while learning through this Python Tutorial.

Tip #5: Contribute to open source

Python is an open-source language which means that its source code is available for the public to download, use, and modify. Anyone can collaborate and be an active member of Python community. You have access to the code written and produced by big companies. Working with these codes will be a very valuable learning experience. You can even reach out for other community members whenever you hit a bug in your coding.

For the best of career growth, check out Intellipaat’s Python Course in Sydney and get certified!

Intellipaat is providing free Python Interview Questions and Answers, which will help you excel in your career!

Originally published at www.intellipaat.com on August 24, 2019

[topicprinter]

I started as a freelancer but now running a successful writing company for the past few years. For instance, one of my recent projects was writing and leading a team of writers to produce all the content for a tech startup, at $20k/month.As a result, I have been at both ends of the spectrum: writer and well as employer of writers, and qualified to offer some advice which I feel can really help you. As you know, there are hundreds of places to find and hire content writers:Freelance marketplaces (Fiverr, Upwork etc.)Remote job sites (Flexjobs, Virtual Vocations etc.)Social Media (Facebook groups, LinkedIn search etc.)Google (Search freelance finance writer, for example)Writing job boards (Problogger, Freelance Writing Gigs etc.)But your chances of finding a writer who can actually write the kind of content required for successful content marketing/blogging are next to nil.Here’s why:No matter where you post your requirements, you will get hundreds of applications, 99% of which are mediocre writers. It’s going to take forever.Your budget is peanuts. You’re looking for a good and affordable and fast content writer, but at less than 5-6 cents/word.Your idea of good content is just that it should have the correct English language, and pass the Copyscape test.You don’t have the time or expertise to check whether the writer is actually delivering content better than what’s already available on other sites.You think publishing average quality content is still better than publishing no content.In fact, let me tell you what’s actually happening in the industry. 99% of writers don’t know jack about writing good content, even the ones who charge high rates.Don’t believe me? Let me tell you about my little experiment to see if there is a difference in quality of work of cheap and expensive content writers.My Hiring ExperimentSince I am in the writing business, I am always looking for talented writers. So a few weeks back I hired 3 content writers with different rates. I found them mostly through freelance marketplaces and Google search.All of them were experienced and had been writing for clients for 3+ years. I gave each of them a topic to write on. When they finally delivered their drafts, I was surprised to see there wasn’t much difference in the quality of work they submitted.One of the drafts was downright poor, the other two were decent, but none of the drafts could be called even good, forget about great.And I am sure this is the case with most content writers. But it doesn’t impact them because 99% clients don’t know jack about what they need to check in their work.So they approve it based on their own preferences/tastes regarding what they want. Clients think they are getting good content, and writers think they are writing good content.In both of their delusions, what gets published is poor content, and what gets hurt is business return on content spend. Why else do you think there is so much poor content being published in most business blogs?Since it’s just a rehash of dozens of articles already available on the same topics, it fails to rank and get any traffic. As a result, clients get frustrated and quit, thinking that this whole content marketing/blogging thing doesn’t work.So does that mean you’re doomed and there’s no hope? Nope! There is a way.Before you start looking for a content writer, take the time to learn about content marketing and writing on your own.This will not only help you to be able to assess someone’s work, but also to develop an appreciation for the craft and know what it’s worth. So you will not be looking for the cheapest writers.Get serious about content marketing. Have a strategy. Do it right, or don’t do it at all. Otherwise, you’re just wasting your time and money.Look at other articles in your niche/industry which are ranking high in Google search results. Analyze how they are written, how long they are and what makes them great - graphics, examples, use of research data etc?Now that you are ready to hire a content writer, I am going to tell you the best and fastest method of finding one that no has mentioned in any other answers.Read Similar/Competitor BlogsAre there any blogs which cover the same type of topics as you want to get content for? Any favorite business magazines or trade journals related to your business? Blogs of your competitors?I am sure some names will pop up in your mind. If not, you can do a quick Google search for “top [niche] blogs.” If you are into a fitness business for example, search for top fitness blogs or best health blogs.Now look at which of the articles written on these blogs are guest posts or contributions. These are articles not written by the blog’s staff, but by an external contributor.And many of these contributors are freelance writers. You can tell by looking at their bio below the article. In most cases, the bio also has a link to their website or social media profile, which you can use to contact them.For example, here is one of the articles I wrote for OceanWP on how to start a blog, which shows a short bio of me at the bottom.Why is this the best way to find a content writer?Since they managed to get published on reputed publications in your niche, you can trust that these are professional and credible writers who can write high quality content.Plus, from their content, you can tell they are already knowledgeable in your domain. Two birds from one stone. How about that!Finally, I hope this was useful and you’re more knowledgeable and realistic about hiring a content writer than you were before. If you have any other questions I can help with, or just want to chat, feel free to reach out.

[mathematicianadda]

IntMath Newsletter: Eigenvectors, 3D solar system, graphics

30 Jul 2019

In this Newsletter:

1. New on IntMath: Eigenvalues and eigenvectors 2. Resources: Desmos and 3D simulator 3. Math in the news: News and science 4. Math movies: Graphics and addresses 5. Math puzzle: Tangent circles 6. Final thought: Culture

1. New on IntMath: Eigenvalues and eigenvectors

Eigenvectors are very important in many science and engineering fields, including compuer science. (Google's search algorithm is based on eigenvectors.) It was one of the many topics I learned about as a math student where I could find the answers, but I really had no idea what I'd found, what the concept really meant, or what they were good for.

I wrote some new pages incorporating interactive applets which I hope gives the reader a better idea of what this interesting topic is all about. (It's usually taught at university level, but the mathematics involved is not that challenging - mostly multiplying and adding.)

On this page we see how multiplying by a matrix can achieve the kind of transformations graphics artists and robot designers use a lot, including reflection, rotation, skew (shear), scaling and displacement.

See: Matrices and linear transformations

The applet on this next page allows you to explore the physical meaning and geometric interpretation of eigenvalues and eigenvectors.

I've used stretching of a map of my home country to show how transformations achieved by matrix multiplication can be replaced with much simpler scalar multiplication (which is a key idea of this topic).

See: Visual explanation of eigenvalues and eigenvectors

Like most matrix operations, it's very easy to make simple mistakes when calculating eigenvalues and eigenvectors.

This calculator allows you to check your work, and/or to explore what happens with eigenvectors for everything from 2x2 and 3x3 up to 9x9-size matrices.

See: Eigenvalues and eigenvectors calculator

You may also be interested in:

How to find eigenvalues and eigenvectors? (outlining the algebraic steps for finding them - this was the only part I learned at university).

Applications of eigenvalues and eigenvectors (which includes a highly simplified description of how Google search works).

2. Resources

(a) Using Desmos to create learning resources

Here's a recent tweet by teacher Liz Caffrey:

Check out how one of my students uses the graphing calculator to take notes! She sets up and saves a new graph each day. Here are her notes from our notice/wonder on standard form of quadratics! I never would have thought of doing this.

Math Classwork 4/23/19 - Trinomial Explorations

I know from my own experience how much richer my understanding of topics is after I've created similar interactive explorations. Doing it with Desmos is really quite easy, and I encourage you (whether student or teacher) to give it a go. You don't need a lot in the way of programming skills.

(b) Harmony of the spheres

This is a 3D simulation of the solar system, built on an "open source gravity simulator".

Earth and Moon system

It also has some "What-if" scenarios. This example shows what would happen if Earth actually orbitted Saturn:

You can drag left-righ, up-down to explore and use the mouse wheel to zoom. Press the "Play" button at the top to animate the scene.

Earth VS the Rings of Saturn

You can also change the physics parameters, and add masses. It's very nicely done. (Probably best on a laptop.)

3. Math in the news: News and science

Last week marked the 50th anniversary of the moon landings. This was an extraordinary human achievement, but the misguided belief that it was all a hoax continues to grow, fuelled by ignorant people (and bots) through social media. Where and how we find our news, and how we critically examine the sources and conclusions, becomes increasingly important as the growth of fake news has the potential to rip apart our societies.

(a) How do we find out what's happening?

In the US, more people get their news from social media than traditional news sources, while in other countries it's the reverse. See a short summary: Where do people find news on their smartphones?

From the original Digital News Report, by Reuters and University of Oxford: Executive Summary and Key Findings of the 2019 Report

(b) What do we know about science?

Those of us involved in science education would like to think most students graduate with a reasonable general knowledge of the various branches of science, and will have a good grounding in how science actually works. But it appears that is not always the case.

The (US) National Science Board's Science and Engineering Indicators 2018 makes for some sobering reading.

Science and Technology: Public Attitudes and Understanding

Here's a sample of the misunderstandings gleaned from the results of various quizzes.

Antibiotics kill viruses (which is false): 50% or more got it wrong in most countries

Human beings developed from earlier species of animals (true): 30 to 50% got it wrong

Astrology is scientific (false): around 40% (US) thought it was true

Understanding experimental design: over 50% got it wrong in most countries

No wonder we have the growth of drug-resistant superbugs, rampant species destruction, and climate change deniers.

4. Math Movies

(a) The simple genius of a good graphic

Data visualization is an increasingly important item in everyone's skill set these days. Information designer Tommy McCall outlines the evolution of charts and diagrams with plenty of interesting examples.

See: The simple genius of a good graphic

(b) A precise, three-word address for every place on Earth

When I first arrived in Japan where I lived for 4 years, I was amazed at how different their address system was compared to what Iwas used to. Rather than sequential numbers (usually odd on one side and even on the other) along roads, the Japanese system is built around regions and sub-regions of a suburb.

So I found the pretext of this next talk quite interesting.

Many houses do not have any kind of address system, and to find anyone, you need to rely on local knowledge. Chris Sheldrick has an interesting solution - use three-word addresses!

See: A precise, three word address for every place on Earth

I like the basic concept, but surely numbers are more universal? Wouldn't addresses based on latitude and longitude make more sense, especially as that's how our phones know where we are already?

5. Math puzzles

The puzzle in the last IntMath Newsletter asked about the possible dimensions of 2 pencils.

A correct answer with sufficient reasons was submitted by Georgios. Special mention to Nicola who worked on a generalized solution involving circles and ellipses, which she explored using Desmos.

New math puzzle: Tangent circles

Circles that are "mutually tangent" touch at one point only. We have 3 such circles, with centers P, Q, R and radii p, q, r respectively. We are given the lengths PQ = 15, QR = 21 and PQ = 14. Find p, q and r.

You can leave your response here.

6. Final thought - culture

Pangolin (image credit)

Living in different countries gives you fresh insights about culture. A lot of the cultural practices that seemed vital to our existence have faded as time goes on, and others we question due to their environmental impacts. While they may not have had much effect hundreds of years ago when there were less people in the world, perhaps some aspects of the following don't make a lot of sense any more?

Buying SUVs for suburban runabouts

Living in large houses a long way from work

Eating whale meat

Burning paper in the Hungry Ghost Festival

Consuming rhino horn, pangolin scales and shark fin

Buying ivory carvings

Wearing baby seal furs

Maintaining the traditions while minimizing their impacts is surely the best way to move forward.

Until next time, enjoy whatever you learn.

Related posts:

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IntMath Newsletter: Solar vision, GeoGebraTube In this Newsletter: 1. Math teacher's solar vision 2. GeoGebraTube...

IntMath Newsletter: Conic sections, resources, Ramanujan In this Newsletter: 1. Conic sections interactive applet 2. Resources...

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[thenew8bitheroes]

NESmaker Publishing

In this post, I want to discuss all of the ins and outs and considerations in publishing games created using NESmaker.  This includes making physical copies to sell, crowdfunding, and general distribution.  Let’s break it down into legal concerns, ethical concerns, and best practices.

LEGAL: Let’s start with the legal ramifications, as that is the first question many people ask.     1) By purchasing a license for NESmaker, you are granted permission to use and edit the code base to create your own NES games for both personal and commercial projects.  You have the license to use the code base provided by us, as well as the code provided by other contributors that is packaged with the download.  2) You may not re-sell raw code or assets that are packaged with NESmaker, or edits of that code or those assets.

3) You may not use graphic or sound assets that are packaged with NESmaker tutorial assets for commercial purposes.  They are for learning and personal use only.  Unless otherwise explicitly specified, make sure that you are creating your own creative property with your own graphics and sound assets. 4) You may not use NESmaker to create games for IPs that you do not explicitly own the legal rights to, in writing.  That includes fan games for personal or educational use.  The simple rule of thumb - did you create it?  No?  Do you have in writing the permissions to use it?  No?  Is it public domain?  No?  Then please find a different idea.

ETHICAL CONCERNS: This is a much bigger gray area, and truly what I think most people are asking about.  For instance... 1) you are under no legal obligation to announce that your product was created with NESmaker, however we hope you are proud of that fact, and it would be unethical to explicitly claim otherwise.  By crediting NESmaker, you are implicitly crediting the programmers and developers that worked on the product as having helped with programming for your game, and by proxy, those who have licensed the NESmaker team and all users moving forward to utilize their hard work in the underlying engine.  We never require a watermark or any branding on any work or promotional material you create using NESmaker.  However, we do appreciate credit being given where applicable.

2) You are under no legal obligation to share your code updates, bug fixes, alterations, methods, modules, cores, or scripts with the community, however we hope you realize that by sharing these you help the community grow and drive the capability of what can be done with NESmaker.  In the end, helping others create better games just yields better games, it doesn’t detract from your own.  And, for what it’s worth, much of the foundation you’re likely using was created by us and shared with you, preventing you from having to do years of R&D.  We hope you pay it forward, and do the same for the community when you figure out how to do something cool. 3) You are under no legal obligation to pay any royalties to the NESmaker team for projects you create with NESmaker if you are acting as your own distributor (if we have not been involved in any way with your method of distribution).  At this point, that is everyone, because we are not distributing or publishing games.  However, I selfishly feel it would be ethical for you to buy me a frosty libation with the spoils of your victory if we’re ever in the same town!  In all seriousness, you are under no legal obligation, but we hope that with the money you save by not having to pay us royalties of this kind, you support other developers, and that you support future components of this project.  If the point is more awesome NES games, your help as part of this community is invaluable in this way.  

BEST PRACTICES: Here is where some of you are now, in terms of your interest in making commercial products or monetizing your NESmaker projects.  I’m humbled that we are there already - your collective effort, quality of work, and amazing evolution of what this software can do is inspiring!  So lets talk for a moment about this part of things, and I’m sorry if some of this is vague.

1) Lets first talk about crowdfunding.  We are advocates of crowdfunding.  It is a great way to raise awareness about a creative project and help projects that would never get off the ground find financial footing.  We also know the depths of complications that arise from doing crowdfunding campaigns of this type, and we also are very well versed in project failure rate and audience fatigue.  This is a niche interest, and while there is strong support for it, burdening the retro game lovers in the crowdfunding universe with too many projects of this type will result in everyone losing and no projects being green lit, leading to waning interest or less confidence in the amazing work that you’re all doing.  So for those with commercial ambitions for their projects, this requires a much longer conversation.

Now, you can listen to me on this, or choose to ignore me.  You have no legal obligation to adhere to this.  Your games are your intellectual property, to do with as you see fit.  You neither need our consent nor our enthusiasm to do a crowdfunding campaign.  However, if you interest is aligned with ours, to build a stronger community where everyone benefits and new NES games thrive, here is my proposal on general guidelines for how we as a company will give our blessing and throw support behind crowdfunding campaigns moving forward.

Inform us of your intention to do a crowdfunding campaign prior to launching and even prior to making a firm timetable.  We’d like to help if it makes sense.  And we also want to try make sure NES projects are strategically spaced out...and that’s not only for NESmaker games, but any new NES homebrews that might be in development.

Demonstrate that you can complete a game.  Before we advocate for or support your project, we need to have confidence that you can create something of scope and quality.  If you can not demonstrate that you can fully complete a NES project, you’re not yet ready to try to Kickstart a NES project.

Have a proof of concept of the current game that you plan to Kickstart.  On top of a completed project, have a working demo of the game you ultimately want to create.  Not only will it give us as a community confidence in what you’re creating, but it will give your backers confidence as well.

Demonstrate that you have completed a successful crowdfunding campaign in the past.  Whether it was for a game or something completely different, show that you understand the ins and outs of crowdfunding by having done it before.  Now, maybe you haven’t, and that’s ok.  Work with someone who has to help you get yours off the ground.  Make them part of your team and release your project through their account which has a proven track record.  Or alternatively, try a small project related to your game first to help raise excitement and learn the ropes.  Crowdfunding is a full time obligation, and often requires months, if not years, of prep work to be successful.  There are many pitfalls you won’t know until you’re in those trenches.  Having been in those trenches before will go a long way towards our confidence to officially support a project.

Demonstrate your support for other NES homebrews, whether they’re NESmaker games or otherwise.  Demonstrating you’re not a lone wolf trying to cash in on nostalgia, but rather someone who is interested in fostering this community, will go a long way towards us supporting your ambition in crowdfunding your project.

Know that there are a lot of moving parts to all of this.  Understand that the timetable that may be convenient for you may not align with what may be best for the community or our efforts with NESmaker, which may result in us being unable to participate or support as much as we’d like.  For instance, with the contest currently running, we obviously can’t actively support any particular project over the others.  At the time of launch for a major NESmaker update, our efforts may be spent on that.  Etc.  Just because we’re not in a position to actively support your project doesn’t mean you can’t do it or that it’s not worthwhile.  But chances are the more you work with us, the more we’ll be able to help.

Keep it classy.  While we 100% advocate for people to use NESmaker to create any type of game experience they are compelled and able to create, and we’re generally big kids and personally enjoy plenty of content that may be deemed ‘inappropriate’, if you’re hoping for any official support from us as a company in a crowdfunding campaign, remember that we have 6 year old kids using the software.  Use your head on this.

If you think the above bullet points are too much expectation, trust us...you’re not ready for a crowdfunding campaign yet.

2) Lets talk about other distribution methods besides crowdfunding.  We are currently very hard at work on other potential publishing and distribution avenues for qualified, finished games.  Unfortunately, there is nothing concrete that we’re comfortable talking about yet, but some of the things are pretty cool.  One of the problems of being in a rush to get your game out now is that you might miss out on some really cool supports from these things.  Please keep that in mind!

3) Quality control.  This is a big issue on a conceptual level.  For front-facing games, there obviously needs to be a metric for evaluating quality of content.  However, we don’t ever want to discourage beginners or hobbyist whose passion may dramatically overshadow their skill level.  We don’t want to act as quality control...we would much prefer the opposite.  We want to be the bridge that get complete newcomers involved.  However, lack of quality control will leave new players disenchanted with games created with NESmaker, which is a circumstance in which everyone loses.  A bigger problem is we simply don’t have the infrastructure to act as quality control.  Our team is incredibly small, and that would take up far too much of our time and resources to manage.  Just like with publishing and distribution, we do have some concepts in mind for that, but we’re not quite there yet. 

I hope this answers a lot of questions that you may have about all of this.  Our community is awesome, and we are extremely happy that you’re a part of it.  The more we rally behind each other and move this thing forward as a cohesive passion, the more exciting things seem to get!  So let’s keep pushing it together!

[hermanwatts]

Sensor Sweep: Bruce Pennington, Science Wonder Stories, H. Bedford Jones, Post Oaks and Sand Roughs

Reading (Rawle Nyanzi): By now it is well-known that reading in the US has declined across all demographic indicators. Whether it’s caused by television, the internet, video games, or boring literature classes, the drop-off in reading time is plain and obvious to see. Some even claim that we are entering a��“post-literate” period where the written word is actively rejected in favor of images and sounds conveyed by electronic media.

  Art (DMR Books): In the process of finding art for my new Gene Wolfe post, I noticed that the artist, Bruce Pennington, turns seventy-five years young today. Bruce has been a fixture on the UK fantasy/scifi scene since the late ‘60s. Check the link here to see what Bruce has been up to for the last five decades.

  Science Fiction Pulp (Pulpfest): The first issue of SCIENCE WONDER STORIES hit the newsstands ninety years ago, on May 3, 1929. Behind the dramatic Frank R. Paul cover were included five short stories, the beginning of a serialized novel — “The Reign of the Ray” by Fletcher Pratt and Irvin Lester — a science quiz (with the answers in the issue’s stories), an essay contest, and “Science News of the Month.” SCIENCE WONDER STORIES ran for twelve issues dated June 1929 through May 1930. David Lasser was managing editor and Hugo Gernsback was publisher and editor-in-chief.  Each issue had a fantastic Frank R. Paul cover.

  History (Running Iron Report): On July 28, 2014, an American expat living in Sweden named Indiana Neidell (for real) launched a Youtube project titled The Great War. Its premise was to cover the events of the First World War, matching up the centennial of that seminal conflict week by week through November 11, 2018. Other segments included technology developed during the war, concurrent events like the Mexican Revolution and vignettes on remarkable personalities.

  Pulp (DMR Books): The King of the Pulps died on this date seventy years ago today. Henry James O’Brien Bedford-Jones, better-known to his millions of fans during the pulp era as “H. Bedford-Jones,” passed away in his comfortable Beverly Hills home after forty years of living well off his pulp fiction.

Bedford-Jones was born in 1887 in Canada, though he spent most of his life in the U.S. Before his twenty-second birthday, he had sold his first story to one of the greatest pulps ever, Argosy. He went on to write over a million words of pulp adventure per year for decades.

  Radio (Tangent Online): The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939-47) aired “The Adventure of the Dying Schoolboys” on November 9, 1946. During this incarnation of Sherlock Holmes on radio (the first coming in the early 1930s and the last running to 1959), Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce reprised their Universal studio film roles of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson for close to 220 episodes. Afraid of being typecast–and following the cancellation of further Holmes films–Rathbone wanted out of his radio role. Though the show’s sponsor at the time, Petri Wines, offered him a generous bump in compensation if he would continue, Rathbone declined.

  Robert E. Howard (REH Foundation): The REH Foundation Press is proud to present Post Oaks and Sand Roughs & Other Autobiographical Writings. Outside of the boxing stories, whenever Robert E. Howard used the name “Costigan” the autobiographical implications weren’t far behind. This volume collects those “other” Costigan tales, including the title novel as well as the previously unpublished early draft. It also contains other items that reveal details about the people and places in Howard’s life, including the “Lost Plains” stories, items from The Junto, personal essays, and more, all restored to the original text, where available.

  Popular Culture (Rawle Nyanzi): I believe that all professionally produced franchises are either SJW -converged or soon will be, given enough time.

Let’s run down some prominent examples:

– Star Wars, the biggest name in sci-fi, attacked its own legacy and its most loyal fans to the point where its most recent movie flopped — the first flop in the franchise’s history.

  Fiction (John C. Wright): From Book 1: My name is Officer Thomas Nolan, and I am a saint.Tommy Nolan lives a quiet life. He walks his beat – showing mercy to the desperate. Locking away the dangerous. Going to church, sharing dinner with his wife and son. Everyone likes Tommy, even the men he puts behind bars.

Then one day a demon shows up and he can smell it. Tommy can smell evil –real evil. Now he’s New York City’s only hope against a horrifying serial killer that preys on the young and defenseless.

  Fiction (Elgin Bleeker): John Buchan’s 1915 novel, The Thirty-Nine Steps, is one of the grand old spy adventures of yesteryear and is still a pretty great read.

Most people will know the plot thanks to Alfred Hitchcock’s 1935 movie version, “The 39 Steps.”

A spy with information vital to the British government is killed in Richard Hannay’s apartment. The police think Hannay did it and hunt him down. The real culprits – enemy spies – think Hannay knows their secret plans, and set out to kill him.

  Cartoons (Broadswords and Blasters): As a kid growing up in the 1980s I was naturally attached to cartoons. That’s one of the defining characteristics of late Gen-Xers/early millenials (I’ve seen us referred to as a crossover generation, but isn’t everyone really?). For me, those cartoons were GI Joe, He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, and Voltron.

  Pulp Awards (Pulpfest): The PulpFest Organizing Committee is pleased to announce that fifteen individuals have been nominated by their peers for the 2019 Munsey Award. The honor is named after Frank A. Munsey — the man who published the first pulp magazine. This annual award recognizes an individual or institution that has bettered the pulp community, be it through disseminating knowledge about the pulps or through publishing or other efforts to preserve and foster interest in the pulp magazines we all love and enjoy. Congratulations to all of the nominees for this prestigious award, presented annually at PulpFest.

  Comic Books (Rough Edges): Several years ago, I read the graphic novel GRAVEDIGGER: HOT WOMEN, COLD CASH, written by Christopher Mills, and enjoyed it a lot. These days, Mills is putting together an entire line of comics called Atomic Action, which takes public domain superheroes and puts them in new stories written and drawn in the classic style of the Sixties and Seventies (which means they’re right in my wheelhouse). The first issue of these new comics, SPACE CRUSADERS #1, came out recently, and it’s great fun.

  Paperback Horror (Kirkus Reviews): If you’ve spent any amount of time in a used bookstore, you’ve undoubtedly seen the horror paperbacks section. Adorned with decades-old book spines that are predominantly black, they boast covers that are simultaneously creepy, kitschy and remarkably appealing. Those books never fail to evoke a sense of nostalgia and—I’ll admit it—appreciation.

Grady Hendrix shared that same appreciation with readers in 2017 with the publication of the Bram Stoker Award-winning love-letter to 70s and 80s horror fiction, Paperbacks From Hell.

Anime (Karavansara): I have often written in the past about the impact that the first series of Mobile Suit Gundam had on my generation and on me in particular. I think the best evidence of how much it impacted me is the fact that I am still watching the cartoons – no longer as a start-struck teenager, not as an otaku (I never was that), but with an eye to narrative structure, themes, character arcs, patterns.

  Gaming (Niche Gamer): One of the hardest aspects of game development is standing out from other games of the same genre. This is further compounded when you are heavily inspired by a particular style of game. Enter Hellmut: The Badass from Hell. A twin-stick shooter like Enter the Gungeon with a style roughly based on a more light-hearted classic Doom. Comparisons to both those games quickly end once you start to play. Does Hellmut evolve from other games in the genre, or is it a mutation better off being sterile?

    Sensor Sweep: Bruce Pennington, Science Wonder Stories, H. Bedford Jones, Post Oaks and Sand Roughs published first on https://sixchexus.weebly.com/

[thesinglesjukebox]

ARIANA GRANDE - 7 RINGS [4.28] For the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone...

Iris Xie: Ariana, NO. Riding on the rhythms of Black artists like Princess Nokia and 2 Chainz and mixing it with "My Favorite Things": I am astounded at her dismissive fluidity between the verse and the chorus, and her blatant entitlement in the hook, "I want it, I got it." This is not the same way that Beyoncé and other artists have used it; when they say "I want it, I got it," it's not just for the singer, it's representation for all who need to seek power and strength in that message. This is a declaration of privileged entitlement and is only sympathetic to those who need to seek power in not being held accountable, in feigning innocence, in hiding behind privilege to do whatever they want without consequences. Ari's built her empire, and the discarded cores of the songs wrung dry for "7 Rings" is part of the plan for her expansion. The disrespect of Black artists has always been part of the story in popular music (and the world) and is threaded into the very framework and sound of popular music, but it's honestly breathtaking how obvious and easy Ariana is about it. It's brutal, it's self-indulgent, it's disrespectful as fuck, and if she decides to cast herself as Alexander the Great for the "7 Rings" music video, that would just be perfect for this song. [0]

Vikram Joseph: I really thought Ariana might be self-aware enough to understand how downright obnoxious she might come across in releasing a glorified flex about her gigantic wealth, but apparently not. It's brazenly over-the-top ("my receipts be looking like phone numbers") and I hoped, vainly, that it might be satirical -- her own explanation of the backstory behind the song makes it plain that it's not. No right-minded person resents her success, but in this socioeconomic climate -- oh, fuck it, in any socioeconomic climate -- a line like "I see it/I like it/I want it/I got it" is craven and crass. Musically, it's a bland, passable slow-jam, apart from the parts which exhume the decaying corpse of "My Favorite Things," which nobody wanted to see. Ariana Grande has called this a "friendship anthem" (because she bought rings for 6 of her friends), which reveals more about her concept of friendship than she perhaps would have liked. [2]

Alex Clifton: I know Ariana's described "7 Rings" as a friendship anthem, which on the surface is true; it's inspired by a shopping trip where she bought her girls friendship rings. But for a song about friendship, it feels awfully distant. The lovely thing about "Thank U, Next" was that it was personal and empathetic, exes named and thanked with grace in a way we rarely ever see in pop music. Here, friendship seems to be replaced with luxury; her posse feels anonymous, like they could be any girls in the club. The song's an absolute bop, making "My Favourite Things" into something sexier than it should be while also giving Ariana the chance to rap impressively. [7]

Danilo Bortoli: It was not impossible to see this coming. After the song that pretty much defined the social media zeitgeist in all of its lack of glory, comes the contractually-obliged, self-congratulatory victory lap which anticipates an also mandatory album rollout ritual. Meaning: "7 Rings" should be a mere filler. Not only because it sounds like Princess Nokia with less wit and bravado and more privilege, and not only because it evokes mindless "Pretty Boy Swag" comparisons (suggesting Soulja Boy's flow is not in public domain by now). No, "7 Rings" is bad because it strips away Ariana's empathy and replaces it with a bunch of meme-worthy signifiers: Breakfast at Tiifany's, ATM machines, retail therapy, all wrapped under a cold, soulless beat. Yet, given how calculated that beat is, you can tell cold was what she aimed. Sadly. Here, "I want it, I got it" is her mere wish, lacking the wit to make it happen. [3]

Thomas Inskeep: "I see it, I like it, I want it, I got it," Grande sings on this ode to conspicuous consumption, and while I'm happy she's doing well, it's hard to relate when I've been unemployed for almost five months. And the track, based around a chunk of the melody of "My Favorite Things," is nothing special. She's raised expectations for her music, after the quality of last year's Sweetener, so this doesn't cut it on multiple levels. [3]

Julian Axelrod: I hoped "Thank U, Next" would be the Lemonade to Sweetener's Beyonce. Now I'm worried it's Ariana's Reputation. [6]

Katherine St Asaph: Viktor & Rolf just released a set of comically expensive reaction GIFs, also known as their Spring/Summer '19 collection. You probably shouldn't continue reading this blurb until you've seen every single one. The dresses themselves are either nightgowns with epaulets or hyper-femme tulle ziggurats, like Mount Everests constructed entirely from bubblegum and Marie Antoinettes. The main details -- if you can really call something a "detail" if it's in huge meme font -- are emblazoned snot-slogans like "I Am My Own Muse" or "No Photos Please" or just "NO." So swamped in fabric, all the models look even more like children than usual, making the collection resemble Abercrombie tees or Nickelodeon tween shows, in all their oversassed questionability. But there's craftiness to the brattiness. Said the Vogue writer, perhaps with a slight whiff of "oh god, I really have to, don't I": "All the assorted typography and graphic design -- the text as well as the eagle head, the skull, the candy hearts, and so forth -- resulted from layers of additional tulle. Trite sentiments backed up by technical prowess." This also describes Ariana Grande's music: tart but frilly, meme-ready but warmly produced. Or rather, it's a description of her music since Sweetener and before this. For all the suffocating memesphere around it, "Thank U, Next" is a fine standalone Mariah Carey pastiche. "7 Rings" is a Gwen Stefani pastiche, primarily of "Wind It Up": garish showtune interpolation, slapdash arrangement, half-assed lyrics (being tied up with cuffs? Weird sex, but OK), and borrowed hip-hop posturing, as if her main takeaway from "Formation" was it being about buying shit. Can you even imagine how bad a fast-fashion version of those gowns would be? You can certainly hear it. [3]

Will Adams: Ariana Grande's post-Sweetener rebranding as an Extremely Online #queen is an instructive, if tiresome, example of how social media has blurred the lines between genuine authenticity and personality as imagined by PR suits. "7 Rings" does the same trick of "Thank U, Next" in that it attempts to reverse engineer memes as desperately as Katy Perry. But while "Next" was at least tuneful, this is a joyless cover of OMG Girlz's "Pretty Girl Bag," no more effective at fostering goodwill than a deluge of tweets that only serve to remind you that you'll never be her. [3]

Maxwell Cavaseno: There was once a time where Ariana singles needn't be based around their ability to serve as content and memes. That time may feel like years behind us but it was quite literally three months ago and yet is titanically irreversible. Now Grande's songs feel less like any real ability to showcase the talents of her singing, just more like suitable IG Story content based on an effervescent bitchiness demonstrated as "#confidence" and beholden to boringly cynical rap cadences. "Spend It" sucked years and years ago as a dead-eyed anthem by a 40-year-old pro making songs for 30-year-olds trying to hang with the 20-year-olds in the club. Distressingly, its progeny in "7 Rings" doesn't sound any less cynical. People can say all the critiques about the Sweetener run they could, but nevertheless that was a period in which you could honestly indicate that Ariana Grande was enjoying herself and doing her best. I'd be hard pressed to find such from material like this. [3]

Nicholas Donohoue: I get in fights over Ariana's message discipline. It is now settled law that "Thank U, Next" is the high point of Ari's career in terms of self-mythologizing, but I couldn't help feeling stung by: i) her releasing the song right before the peak of "Breathin'" (her actual high point of artistic expression), capping herself at the knees by cutting off one great point of personal vulnerability in lieu of addressing her less interesting public persona and, ii) by attaching "Thank U, Next," her tight construction of showcraft and narrative shifting, to a music video Frankenstein-ing four early 2000's movies with distinct tonal and subject conceits together. For as much love as I have for a titan of courage and rolling-with-the-punches like Ariana, I feel she might be careless as to what she transfers into her own sound and image. I don't know what "7 Rings" is suppose to mean. I have confidence this style of more showtune trap is an element of Ariana, but I don't know if it's a wise progression from the tuneful, honest, and numbly reminiscent take in "Thank U, Next". The money and excess politics over a spare beat are confounding mostly due to people loving it because they seem destined to never have it. This isn't even touching the racial critiques that Ariana is strolling where pop-based Black women have had to stomp (re: Rihanna and the word "savage"). Undeniably there is power here for Ariana, but who is meant to benefit from this, including Ariana? [4]

Jonathan Bradley: From the R&B undertones of debut album Yours Truly on, Ariana Grande has been a white pop artist who has attempted to situate her work in a racially liminal space: not black, and not even a pantomimed blackness in the mode of Miley Cyrus's less estimable moments or Iggy Azalea, but one nevertheless imbued with performative and stylistic cues borrowed from that cultural context. It's a position that is complicated by the proficiency of her baby-Mariah vocal, by -- perhaps unconsciously on her part -- the historically contested whiteness of Italian-Americans, by a debut hit that interpolated the Latino rapper Big Pun and featured a guest verse from white rapper Mac Miller, by pop's history of making African American ideas into mass culture, and by Grande's own political advocacy for civil rights causes. And alongside this has been her claim on a decidedly non-liminal gendered space: from pastels and ponytails to short skirts and rom-coms, Grande's image is underlined by stylized femininity. In her post Sweetener singles -- and even on "God is a Woman" -- she has used this to stake out a claim of maturity and independence, and, by extension, a distinctly feminine authority: "Thank U, Next," for instance, was a sugary distancing from the men with whom she'd been associated that asserted self-reliance ("her name is Ari") and professional success ("this song is a smash"). "7 Rings" continues blending girlishness with power, and like Taylor Swift on Reputation, Grande is making herself more untouchable by making her music chillier. She nods at Julie Andrews and Audrey Hepburn from the opening line on, and posits feminine solidarity and capitalist consumption as the enabling force of her dominance. Her flow here has been sourced to everyone from Princess Nokia to 2 Chainz to Soulja Boi, but considering the lyric, the likely inspiration seems to be Beyoncé on "Formation." And that rapping, the trap beat, and the nods to luxury goods combine to form Grande's most overt and most questionable tracing of blackness in her career. Conspicuous consumption in black music is an implicit challenge to systems of wealth that have excluded its makers; in a white context, it's just shopping. Grande's ability to sustain public goodwill in maintaining the tenability of these contradictions seems dependent as much on the sensitivity of her approach as it does on the context of the music. "7 Rings" makes more explicit some of the uncertain contours of Grande's music, but it does not fail: it is delicious in its fluffy imperiousness. [8]

Stephen Eisermann: I said this last year about Drake, but it rings true now about Ariana: it was only a matter of time before things got too problematic to ignore. Someone, somewhere will surely write about the musical blackface (as well as excessive use of bronzer), but focusing on the song alone -- yeah, this is hot. Ariana's coos play well with the trap arrangement and although she may have stolen someone's flow, she sure wears it well. It's a fun song to bop to, and I'm all for a good friendship banger, but ignoring all other circumstances for a banger is just irresponsible at this point. [6]

Crystal Leww: Ariana Grande's always made some incredible music, but the art direction and conversation around her has been subpar, at best, and oftentimes kind of icky! That first album Yours Truly was so beyond in how well it paid homage and tribute to the feeling of the late-'90s/early-'00s R&B pop. But there were accusations of playing into the idea of the Sexy Baby to sell records. A lot of this was super unfair -- Grande was so young at the time and most of this was projection by gross, older men who should have known better -- but this weird dichotomy between Grande as a really excellent musician and Grande as a frustrating image, brand, pop star, object of obsession from stans has persisted. "7 Rings" kind of rules as an actual track; Grande's created a super polished, slick product that pays homage to Soulja Boy flow while borrowing the melody and concept from The Sound of Music. But everything around this track sucks from the continued "borrowing" of Black culture (e.g., 2 Chainz's pink trap house) to use of "Asian" characters and urban culture to the insane defensiveness from Grande stans around all of this. I can't believe that Ariana Grande is going through her Katy Perry phase. [7]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: God, this was a bad idea. Everything here shouldn't work -- the metronomic synths, the unholy fusion of Rodgers & Hammerstein to Soulja Boy, the diving head-on into the murky cultural appropriation accusations that have dogged Ariana for a minute now. And yet despite all of these (entirely self inflicted) problems, Ariana manages to pull together the best possible song given the circumstances. It's still not good, but her sheer force of personality makes "7 Rings" into an object of fascination. [5]

Alfred Soto: It's not any more mediocre than her other mediocre singles, but despite the famous sample and rap cadences she sounds like a person visiting a childhood home she happily left. The home is deluxe but sparely decorated, and the wine good. Guests are welcome, especially Mariah Carey. [5]

Edward Okulicz: I've seen The Sound of Music a number of times that is more than I wish to admit here. Rephrasing the song so it's not about things that are believably in the life of an Austrian nun and instead are about things you'd go buy or consume conspicuously isn't original, though. Big Brovaz did more with this chorus and I think poor-shaming is a PR mistake. [3]

Tobi Tella: Sampling The Sound of Music is an inspired choice, and one that will always get the inner theatre kid on me on a song's side. But the chorus mostly leaves me cold -- it's a fun boast, but there's not much too it and I don't think hip-hop is a particularly good genre for her. When she starts spitting bars during the bridge and saying things like "gimme the loot!" I just get secondhand embarrassment. [6]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: The inversion of "My Favorite Things" is sly: there's no admittance of sadness, the things in question aren't quotidian, and Ariana's able to attain everything at a moment's notice. The lay person can't just fly somewhere to witness "raindrops on roses" or "silver-white winters," but everything that Ariana lists is a consumable product that's readily purchasable. Since she was never sad in the first place, there's no actual need for "simply remember[ing]" anything -- she's creating her list of favorites as she has them rung up. As such, "7 Rings" isn't a song about surviving the present, but it does implicitly acknowledge its potential for being unsatisfactory. The cryptic synths and sparse arrangement hint at this sad undertone, but it never quite gets there. And therein lies the song's biggest flaw: the lack of melancholic (sub)text makes this less interesting, and the display of opulence is frequently offset by Ariana's fumbled rapping. There's little resembling actual human emotion or personality here, but given her success with "Thank U, Next" and now this, Ariana is maybe more interested in being a meme. [3]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox ]

[ketoprakjakartablog]

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Ten Great Adventure-Game Puzzles

This blog has become, among other things, an examination of good and bad game-design practices down through the years, particularly within the genre of adventure games. I’ve always tried to take the subject seriously, and have even dared to hope that some of these writings might be of practical use to someone — might help designers of the present or future make better games. But, for reasons that I hope everyone can understand, I’ve spent much more time illuminating negative than positive examples of puzzle design. The fact is, I don’t feel much compunction about spoiling bad puzzles. Spoiling the great puzzles, however, is something I’m always loath to do. I want my readers to have the thrill of tackling those for themselves.

Unfortunately, this leaves the situation rather unbalanced. If you’re a designer looking for tips from the games of the past, it certainly helps to have some positive as well as negative examples to look at. And even if you just read this blog to experience (or re-experience) these old games through the sensibility of your humble author here, you’re missing out if all you ever hear about are the puzzles that don’t work. So, when my reader and supporter Casey Muratori wrote to me to suggest an article that singles out some great puzzles for detailed explication and analysis, it sounded like a fine idea to me.

It’s not overly difficult to generalize what makes for fair or merely “good” puzzles. They should be reasonably soluble by any reasonably intelligent, careful player, without having to fall back on the tedium of brute-forcing them or the pointlessness of playing from a walkthrough. As such, the craft of making merely good or fair puzzles is largely subsumed in lists of what not to do — yes, yet more negative reinforcements! — such as Graham Nelson’s “Bill of Player’s Rights” or Ron Gilbert’s “Why Adventure Games Suck and What We Can Do About It.” It’s much more difficult, however, to explain what makes a brilliant, magical puzzle. In any creative discipline, rules will only get you so far; at some point, codification must make way for the ineffable. Still, we’ll do the best we can today, and see if we can’t tease some design lessons out of ten corking puzzles from adventure games of yore.

Needless to say, there will be spoilers galore in what follows, so if you haven’t played these games, and you think you might ever want to, you should absolutely do so before reading about them here. All ten games are found in my personal Hall of Fame and come with my highest recommendation. As that statement would indicate, I’ve restricted this list to games I’ve already written about, meaning that none of those found here were published after 1992. I’ve split the field evenly between parser-driven text adventures and point-and-click graphic adventures. If you readers enjoy and/or find this article useful, then perhaps it can become a semi-regular series going forward.

And now, with all that said, let’s accentuate the positive for once and relive some classic puzzles that have been delighting their players for decades.

1. Getting past the dragon in Adventure

By Will Crowther and Don Woods, public domain, 1977.

How it works: Deep within the bowels of Colossal Cave, “a huge green dragon bars the way!” Your objective, naturally, is to get past him to explore the area beyond. But how to get him out of the way? If you throw your axe at him, it “bounces harmlessly off the dragon’s thick scales.” If you unleash your fierce bird friend on him, who earlier cleared a similarly troublesome snake out of your way, “the little bird attacks the green dragon, and in an astounding flurry gets burnt to a cinder.” If you simply try to “attack dragon,” the game mocks you: “With what? Your bare hands?” You continue on in this way until, frustrated and thoroughly pissed off, you type, “Yes,” in response to that last rhetorical question. And guess what? It wasn’t a rhetorical question: “Congratulations! You have just vanquished a dragon with your bare hands! (Unbelievable, isn’t it?)”

Why it works: In many ways, this is the most dubious puzzle in this article. (I do know how to make an entrance, don’t I?) It seems safe to say that the vast majority of people who have “solved” it have done so by accident, which is not normally a sign of good puzzle design. Yet classic text adventures especially were largely about exploring the possibility space, seeing what responses you could elicit. The game asks you a question; why not answer it, just to see what it does?

This is an early example of a puzzle that could never have worked absent the parser — absent its approach to interactivity as a conversation between game and player. How could you possibly implement something like this using point and click? I’m afraid a dialog box with a “YES” and “NO” just wouldn’t work. In text, though, the puzzle rewards the player’s sense of whimsy — rewards the player, one might even say, for playing in the right spirit. Interactions like these are the reason some of us continue to love text adventures even in our modern era of photo-realistic graphics and surround sound.

Our puzzling design lesson: A puzzle need not be complicated to delight — need barely be a puzzle at all! — if it’s executed with wit and a certain joie de vivre.

2. Exploring the translucent maze in Enchanter

By Marc Blank and David Lebling, Infocom, 1983

How it works: As you’re exploring the castle of the mad wizard Krill, you come upon a maze of eight identical rooms in the basement. Each location is “a peculiar room, whose cream-colored walls are thin and translucent.” All of the rooms are empty, the whole area seemingly superfluous. How strange.

Elsewhere in the castle, you’ve discovered (or will discover) a few other interesting items. One is an old book containing “The Legend of the Unseen Terror”:

This legend, written in an ancient tongue, goes something like this: At one time a shapeless and formless manifestation of evil was disturbed from millennia of sleep. It was so powerful that it required the combined wisdom of the leading enchanters of that age to conquer it. The legend tells how the enchanters lured the Terror "to a recess deep within the earth" by placing there a powerful spell scroll. When it had reached the scroll, the enchanters trapped it there with a spell that encased it in the living rock. The Terror was so horrible that none would dare speak of it. A comment at the end of the narration indicates that the story is considered to be quite fanciful; no other chronicles of the age mention the Terror in any form.

And you’ve found a map, drawn in pencil. With a start, you realize that it corresponds exactly to the map you’ve drawn of the translucent maze, albeit with an additional, apparently inaccessible room located at point P:

B J ! / ! / ! / ! K V ! / ! / ! / R-------M F / / / H P

Finally, you’ve found a badly worn pencil, with a point and an eraser good for just two uses each.

And so you put the pieces together. The Terror and the “powerful spell scroll” mentioned in the book are encased in the “living rock” of the maze in room P. The pencil creates and removes interconnections between the rooms. You need to get to room P to recover the scroll, which you’ll need to defeat Krill. But you can’t allow the Terror to escape and join forces with Krill. A little experimentation — which also causes you to doom the world to endless darkness a few times, but there’s always the restore command, right? — reveals that the Terror moves one room per turn, just as you do. So, your objective must be to let him out of room P, but trap him in another part of the maze before he can get to room B and freedom. You need to give him a path to freedom to get him moving out of room P, then cut it off.

There are many possible solutions. One is to go to room H, then draw a line connecting P and F. Sensing a path to freedom, the Terror will move to room F, whereupon you erase the connection you just drew. As you do that, the Terror moves to room V, but you erase the line between V and M before he can go further, trapping him once again. Now, you have just enough pencil lead left to draw a line between H and P and recover the scroll.

Why it works: Solving this puzzle comes down to working out how a system functions, then exploiting it to do your bidding. (Small wonder so many hackers have found text adventures so appealing over the years!) First comes the great mental leap of connecting these four disparate elements which you’ve found scattered about: an empty maze, a book of legends, a map, and a pencil. Then, after that great “a-ha!” moment, you get the pleasure of working out the mechanics of the Terror’s movements and finally of putting together your plan and carrying it out. Once you understand how everything works, this final exercise is hardly a brain burner, but it’s nevertheless made much more enjoyable by the environment’s dynamism. You feel encouraged to sit down with your map and work out your unique approach, and the game responds as you expect it to.  This simulational aspect, if you will, stands in marked contrast to so many static adventure-game puzzles of the “use X on Y because the designer wants you to” variety.

It’s worth taking note as well of the technology required to implement something like this. It demands a parser capable of understanding a construction as complicated as “draw line from H to P,” a game engine capable of re-jiggering map connections and rewriting room descriptions on the fly, and even a measure of artificial intelligence, including a path-finding algorithm, for the Terror. Nobody other than Infocom could have implemented a puzzle of this dynamic complexity in 1983. I’ve often noted that the keystone of Infocom’s design genius was their subtly advanced technology in comparison to anyone else working in their field; this puzzle provides fine proof of what I mean by that.

Our puzzling design lesson: Technology isn’t everything in game design, but it isn’t nothing either; the tools you choose to work with have a direct impact on the types of puzzles you can attempt. A corollary to this statement is that the technology which goes into design affordances is often far more subtle than that which allows whiz-bang graphics and sound.

3. Getting the babel fish in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

By Douglas Adams and Steve Meretzky, Infocom, 1984

How it works: You’ve escaped planet Earth just seconds before its destruction at the hands of a Vogon Constructor Fleet. You’re now in the hold of one of the Vogon ships: Vogon Hold This is a squalid room filled with grubby mattresses, unwashed cups, and unidentifiable bits of smelly alien underwear. A door lies to port, and an airlock lies to starboard.

There is a satchel here.

In the corner is a glass case with a switch and a keyboard. It looks like the glass case contains: an atomic vector plotter

Along one wall is a tall dispensing machine.

That dispensing machine contains babel fish, which, when inserted into your ear, will allow you to understand the many strange alien languages you’ll soon be encountering. Rather than belabor this famously extended puzzle point by point, I’ll just provide you with a transcript of the steps you need to go through to solve it. In real life, of course, you would spend much more time bumbling and fumbling than does our ideal player here.

>examine machine The dispenser is tall, has a button at around eye-level, and says "Babel Fish" in large letters. Anything dispensed would probably come out the slot at around knee-level. It bears a small label which reads "Another fine product of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation."

>i You have: no tea a thing your aunt gave you which you don't know what it is a towel It looks like your gown contains: pocket fluff The Hitchhiker's Guide an electronic Sub-Etha signaling device a loose pile of junk mail a toothbrush a flathead screwdriver

>push button A single babel fish shoots out of the slot. It sails across the room and through a small hole in the wall, just under a metal hook.

>remove gown Okay, you're no longer wearing your gown.

>hang gown on hook The gown is now hanging from the hook, covering a tiny hole.

>push button A single babel fish shoots out of the slot. It sails across the room and hits the dressing gown. The fish slides down the sleeve of the gown and falls to the floor, vanishing through the grating of a hitherto unnoticed drain.

>put towel on drain The towel completely covers the drain.

>push button A single babel fish shoots out of the slot. It sails across the room and hits the dressing gown. The fish slides down the sleeve of the gown and falls to the floor, landing on the towel. A split-second later, a tiny cleaning robot whizzes across the floor, grabs the fish, and continues its breakneck pace toward a tiny robot panel at the base of the wall. The robot zips through the panel, and is gone.

>cover panel with satchel Okay, the satchel is lying on its side in front of the tiny robot panel.

>push button A single babel fish shoots out of the slot. It sails across the room and hits the dressing gown. The fish slides down the sleeve of the gown and falls to the floor, landing on the towel. A split-second later, a tiny cleaning robot whizzes across the floor, grabs the fish, and continues its breakneck pace toward a tiny robot panel at the base of the wall. The robot plows into the satchel, sending the babel fish flying through the air in a graceful arc. A small upper-half-of-the-room cleaning robot flies into the room, catches the babel fish (which is all the flying junk it can find), and exits.

>put mail on satchel Okay, the loose pile of junk mail is now sitting on the satchel.

>push button A single babel fish shoots out of the slot. It sails across the room and hits the dressing gown. The fish slides down the sleeve of the gown and falls to the floor, landing on the towel. A split-second later, a tiny cleaning robot whizzes across the floor, grabs the fish, and continues its breakneck pace toward a tiny robot panel at the base of the wall. The robot plows into the satchel, sending the babel fish flying through the air in a graceful arc surrounded by a cloud of junk mail. Another robot flies in and begins madly collecting the cluttered plume of mail. The babel fish continues its flight, landing with a loud "squish" in your ear.

Why it works: This is easily the most famous text-adventure puzzle of all time, one whose reputation for difficulty was so extreme in the 1980s that Infocom took to selling tee-shirts emblazoned with “I got the babel fish!” In truth, though, its reputation is rather exaggerated. There are other puzzles in Hitchhiker’s which rely heavily — perhaps a little too heavily — on the ability to think with the skewed logic of Douglas Adams. This puzzle, however, really isn’t one of them. It’s certainly convoluted and time-consuming, but it’s also both logical in a non-skewed sense and thoroughly satisfying to work out step by step. From the standpoint of the modern player, it’s only really objectionable aspects are the facts that you can easily arrive at it without having everything you need to solve it, and that you have a limited amount of tries — i.e., a limited number of spare babel fish — at your disposal. But if have made sure to pick up everything that isn’t nailed down in the early part of the game, and if you use the save system wisely, there’s no reason you can’t solve this on your own and have immense fun doing so. It’s simply a matter of saving at each stage and experimenting to find out how to progress further. The fact that it can be comfortably solved in stages makes it far less infuriating than it might otherwise be. You always feel like you’re making progress — coming closer, step by step, to the ultimate solution. There’s something of a life lesson here: most big problems can be solved by first breaking them down into smaller problems and solving those one at a time.

Importantly, this puzzle is also funny, fitting in perfectly with Douglas Adams’s comedic conception of a universe not out so much to swat you dead all at once as to slowly annoy you to death with a thousand little passive-aggressive cuts.

Our puzzling design lesson: Too many adventure-game designers think that making a comedy gives them a blank check to indulge in moon logic when it comes to their puzzles. The babel fish illustrates that a puzzle can be both funny and fair.

4. Using the T-removing machine in Leather Goddesses of Phobos

By Steve Meretzky, Infocom, 1986

How it works: While exploring this ribald science-fiction comedy, Infocom’s last big hit, you come upon a salesman who wants to trade you something for the “odd machine” he carries. When you finally find the item he’s looking for and take possession of the machine, he gives you only the most cryptic description of its function: “‘It’s a TEE remover,’ he explains. You ponder what it removes — tea stains, hall T-intersections — even TV star Mr. T crosses your mind, until you recall that it’s only 1936.”

Experimentation will eventually reveal that this “tee-remover” is actually a T-remover. If you put something inside it and turn it on, said something becomes itself minus all of the letter Ts in its name. You need to use the machine to solve one clever and rather hilarious puzzle, turning a jar of untangling cream — whatever that is — into unangling cream, thereby to save poor King Mitre’s daughter from a tragic fate:

In the diseased version of the legend commonly transmitted on Earth, Mitre is called Midas. The King was granted his wish that everything he touched would turn to gold. His greed caught up with him when he transformed even his own daughter into gold.

King Mitre's wish was, in fact, that everything he touched would turn to forty-five degree angles. No one has ever explained this strange wish; the most likely hypothesis is a sexual fetish. In any case, the tale has a similar climax, with Mitre turning his own daughter into a forty-five degree angle.

This is pretty funny in itself, but the greatest fun offered by the T-remover is in all the other places you can use it: on a tray (“It looks a little like Ray whatsisname from second grade.”); on a rabbit (“A bearded rabbi wearing a prayer shawl leaps out of the machine, recites a Torah blessing, and dashes off in search of a minyan.”); a raft (“It sinks like a stone. I guess a raf doesn’t float nearly as well as a raft.”); a pair of cotton balls (“Let’s just say that some poor male raccoon is speaking in a particularly high-pitched voice.”).

Why it works: The T-removing machine is sometimes held up as another puzzle concept that couldn’t possibly work in any other medium than text. I’m not sure if that’s literally true — later in this very list we’ll see another funny wordplay-based puzzle that does work inside a graphic adventure — but it certainly is true that no responsible producer would agree to pay for all the work required to implement all those one-off, just-for-fun responses in graphics. In text, though, they’re just a matter of an additional sentence or two.

Adventure designer Bob Bates likes to point out that the vast majority of what the player attempts to do will always be wrong; that’s just the nature of the endeavor. When she does one of these wrong things, the designer needs to do as much as possible to entertain her. A later generation would dub this the “juicy” approach to game design: rewarding curiosity and creativity, even if none of it contributes directly to the prosaic task of finishing the game. Steve Meretzky had a great puzzle already with the T-remover, King Mitre, and the untangling/unangling cream. He could have left it at that by coming up with excuses for why you couldn’t put other things in the T-remover. Instead he stayed faithful to his invention and implemented many alternatives alongside the “correct” use of the machine.

Our puzzling design lesson: Don’t ignore the “else” in the “if, then, else” of an adventure game. It makes your game feel like a living world rather than an arbitrary collection of logic gates to be navigated, and shows that you respect your player’s creativity.

5. Escaping the pirate Lafond in Plundered Hearts

By Amy Briggs, Infocom, 1987

How it works: Would I be engaging in too much gender stereotyping if I noted that the puzzles in the only Infocom game to be written by a woman often deal in social intelligence rather than abstract logic? This is another fairly lengthy sequence, so it’s best if I once again just show you what happens if you do everything correctly. "Welcome, ma petite." Lafond bows you in.

Lafond's Bedroom Lafond's bedroom shows all the outpourings of his megalomania. Royal hues of purple and gold weigh down the hangings on the bed and the eastward window, as if trying to smother the moonbeam shining in.

Lafond is leering, lip curled.

A lace-covered table crouches beside a wing-backed chair in one corner. Sitting on the table is a green goblet, a blue goblet and a flagon.

"Have some wine." Lafond pours wine into two glasses, giving a blue one to you. "Drink this down. We have a long night ahead of us." He drains his own.

>drink wine You empty the blue goblet of wine.

"Good girl," he says, "Let's see more cooperation of this sort."

Suddenly, the door slams open. It is Jamison, coatless, sword bared, his shirt ripped. "Thank God I am not too late. Leave, darling, before I skewer this dog to his bedposts," he cries. The scar on his cheek gleams coldly.

With a yell, Crulley and the butler jump out of the darkness behind him. Nicholas struggles, but soon lies unconscious on the floor.

"Take him to the dungeon," Lafond says, setting down his glass. "You, butler, stay nearby. I do not wish to be disturbed again.

"Now that we are rid of that intrusion, cherie, I will change into something more comfortable. Pour me more wine." He crosses to the wardrobe removing his coat and vest, turned slightly away from you.

>pour wine into green goblet You fill the green goblet with wine.

"In private, call me Jean, or whatever endearment you choose, once I have approved it." Lafond is looking into the wardrobe.

>squeeze bottle into green goblet You squeeze three colorless drops into the green goblet. You sense Lafond hesitate, then continue primping.

The butler enters, laying a silver tray of cold chicken on the table. "The kitchen wench has gone, your grace. I took the liberty of fetching these myself." He bows and leaves the room.

"Sprinkle some spices on the fowl, ma petite," Lafond says, donning a long brocade robe, his back to you. "They are hot, but delicious."

>get spices You take a pinch of spices between your thumb and forefinger.

"Tsk. The cook has gone too far. She shall be 'leaving us' tomorrow." Lafond adjusts the lace at his neck. >put spices on chicken You sprinkle some spices on a wing and nibble it. The peppery heat hits you like a wave, leaving you gasping, eyes watering.

Lafond strolls to the table smiling slyly. "But you haven't finished pouring the wine." He tops off both glasses. "Which glass was mine? I seem to have forgotten." He points at the green goblet and smiles in a way that does not grant you confidence. "Is this it?"

>no You shake your head, teeth clenched.

"Ah yes, of course." Lafond obligingly takes the blue goblet.

He inhales deeply of the bouquet of his wine, then turns to you. "You must think me very naive to fall for such a trick. I saw you pour something into one of these glasses -- although I cannot smell it." He switches goblets, setting the blue goblet into your nerveless grasp and taking up the other, smiling evilly. "Now you will drink from the cup intended for me."

>drink from blue goblet You empty the blue goblet of wine.

"Good girl," he says. Lafond takes the leather bottle and drops it out the window. "You shall not need this. You may suffer no headaches in my employ."

He lifts his glass to drink, but stops. "Your father, for all his idiotic meddling in other people's business, is not a fool. I doubt you are, either." He calls in the butler, ordering him to empty the green goblet. The man reports no odd taste and returns to his post.

>get spices You take a pinch of spices between your thumb and forefinger.

Lafond draws near, whispering indecencies. He caresses your lily white neck, his fingers ice-cold despite the tropic heat.

>throw spices at lafond You blow the spices off your fingertips, directly into Lafond's face. He sneezes, his eyes watering from the heat of the peppers. Reaching blindly for some wine, he instead upsets the table, shattering a glass. Lafond stumbles cursing out of the room, in search of relief.

>s You run out -- into the butler's barrel chest and leering grin. You return to the bedroom, the butler following. "The governor said you were not to leave this room."

>z Time passes...

The butler seems to be having some problems stifling a yawn.

>z Time passes... The butler's eyes are getting heavier.

>z Time passes...

With a grunt of anger, the butler realizes he has been drugged. He grabs the leather bottle and throws it out the shutters.

The butler collapses, head back, snoring loudly.

>s You creep over the prostrate butler.

Why it works: Plundered Hearts is an unusually driven text adventure, in which the plucky heroine you play is constantly forced to improvise her way around the dangers that come at her from every direction. In that spirit, one can almost imagine a player bluffing her way through this puzzle on the first try by thinking on her feet and using her social intuition. Most probably won’t, mark you, but it’s conceivable, and that’s what makes it such a good fit with the game that hosts it. This death-defying tale doesn’t have time to slow down for complicated mechanical puzzles. This puzzle, on the other hand, fits perfectly with the kind of high-wire adventure story — adventure story in the classic sense — which this game wants to be.

Our puzzling design lesson: Do-or-die choke point should be used sparingly, but can serve a plot-heavy game well as occasional, exciting punctuations. Just make sure that they feel inseparable from the narrative unfolding around the player — not, as is the case with so many adventure-game puzzles, like the arbitrary thing the player has to do so that the game will feed her the next bit of story.

6. Getting into Weird Ed’s room in Maniac Mansion

By Ron Gilbert, Lucasfilm Games, 1987

How it works: In Ron Gilbert’s first adventure game, you control not one but three characters, a trio of teenage stereotypes who enter the creepy mansion of Dr. Fred one hot summer night. Each has a unique skill set, and each can move about the grounds independently. Far from being just a gimmick, this has a huge effect on the nature of the game’s puzzles. Instead of confining yourself to one room at a time, as in most adventure games, your thinking has to span the environment; you must coordinate the actions of characters located far apart. Couple this with real-time gameplay and an unusually responsive and dynamic environment, and the whole game starts to feel wonderfully amenable to player creativity, full of emergent possibilities.

In this example of a Maniac Mansion puzzle, you need to search the bedroom of Weird Ed, the son of the mad scientist Fred and his bonkers wife Edna. If you enter while he’s in there, he’ll march you off to the house’s dungeon. Thus you have to find a way to get rid of him. In the sequence below, we’ve placed the kid named Dave in the room adjacent to Ed’s. Meanwhile Bernard is on the house’s front porch. (This being a comedy game, we won’t question how these two are actually communicating with each other.)

Dave is poised to spring into action in the room next to Weird Ed’s.

Bernard rings the doorbell.

Ed heads off to answer the door.

Dave makes his move as soon as Ed clears the area.

Dave searches Ed’s room.

But he has to hurry because Ed, after telling off Bernard, will return to his room.

Why it works: As graphics fidelity increases in an adventure game, the possibility space tends to decrease. Graphics are, after all, expensive to create, and beautiful high-resolution graphics all the more expensive. By the late 1990s, the twilight of the traditional adventure game as more than a niche interest among gamers, the graphics would be very beautiful indeed, but the interactivity would often be distressingly arbitrary, with little to no implementation of anything beyond the One True Path through the game.

Maniac Mansion, by contrast, makes a strong argument for the value of primitive graphics. This game that was originally designed for the 8-bit Commodore 64 uses its crude bobble-headed imagery in the service of the most flexible and player-responsive adventure design Lucasfilm Games would ever publish over a long and storied history in graphic adventures. Situations like the one shown above feel like just that — situations with flexible solutions — rather than set-piece puzzles. You might never have to do any of the above if you take a different approach. (You could, for instance, find a way to befriend Weird Ed instead of tricking him…) The whole environmental simulation — and a simulation really is what it feels like — is of remarkable complexity, especially considering the primitive hardware on which it was implemented.

Our puzzling design lesson: Try thinking holistically instead of in terms of set-piece roadblocks, and try thinking of your game world as a responsive simulated environment for the player to wander in instead of as a mere container for your puzzles and story. You might be surprised at what’s possible, and your players might even discover emergent solutions to their problems which you never thought of.

7. Getting the healer’s ring back in Hero’s Quest (later known as Quest for Glory I)

By Lori Ann and Corey Cole, Sierra, 1989

How it works: Hero’s Quest is another game which strains against the constrained norms in adventure-game design. Here you create and develop a character over the course of the game, CRPG-style. His statistics largely define what he can do, but your own choices define how those statistics develop. This symbiosis results in an experience which is truly yours. Virtually every puzzle in the game admits of multiple approaches, only some (or none) of which may be made possible by your character’s current abilities. The healer’s lost ring is a fine example of how this works in practice.

The bulletin board at the Guild of Adventurers tells you about the missing ring.

You go to inquire with the healer. Outside her hut is a tree, and on the tree is the nest of a sort of flying lizard.

Hmm, there’s another of these flying lizards inside.

I’ll reveal now that the ring is in the nest. But how to get at it? The answer will depend on the kind of character you’ve built up. If your “throwing” skill is sufficient, you can throw rocks at the nest to drive off the lizard and knock it off the tree. If your “magic” skill is sufficient and you’ve bought the “fetch” spell, you can cast it to bring the nest to you. Or, if your “climb” skill is sufficient, you can climb the tree. If you can’t yet manage any of this, you can continue to develop your character and come back later. Or not: the puzzle is completely optional. The healer rewards you only with six extra gold pieces and two healing potions, both of which you can earn through other means if necessary.

Why it works: This puzzle would be somewhat problematic if solving it was required to finish the game. Although several lateral nudges are provided that the ring is in the nest, it strikes me as dubious to absolutely demand that the player put all the pieces together — or, for that matter, to even demand that the player notice the nest, which is sitting there rather inconspicuously in the tree branch. Because solving the puzzle isn’t an absolute requirement, however, it becomes just another fun little thing to discover in a game that’s full of such generosity. Some players will notice the nest and become suspicious, and some won’t. Some players will find a way to see what’s in it, and some won’t. And those that do find a way will do so using disparate methods at different points in the game. Even more so than Maniac Mansion, Hero’s Quest gives you the flexibility to make your own story out of its raw materials. No two players will come away with quite the same memories.

This melding of CRPG mechanics with adventure-game elements is still an underexplored area in a genre which has tended to become less rather than more formally ambitious as it’s aged. (See also Origin’s brief-lived Worlds of Ultima series for an example of games which approach the question from the other direction — adding adventure-game elements to the CRPG rather than the other way around — with equally worthy results.) Anything adventures can do to break out of the static state-machine paradigm in favor of flexibility and dynamism is generally worth doing. It can be the difference between a dead museum exhibition and a living world.

Our puzzling design lesson: You can get away with pushing the boundaries of fairness in optional puzzles, which you can use to reward the hardcore without alienating your more casual players. (Also, go read Maniac Mansion‘s design lesson one more time.)

8. Blunting the smith’s sword in Loom

By Brian Moriarty, Lucasfilm Games, 1990

How it works: Games like Hero’s Quest succeed by being generously expansive, while others, like Loom, succeed by boiling themselves down to a bare essence. To accompany its simple storyline, which has the rarefied sparseness of allegory, Loom eliminates most of what we expect out of an adventure game. Bobbin Threadbare, the hero of the piece, can carry exactly one object with him: a “distaff,” which he can use to “weave” a variety of magical “patterns” out of notes by tapping them out on an onscreen musical staff. Gameplay revolves almost entirely around discovering new patterns and using them to solve puzzles.

The ancestor of Loom‘s patterns is the spell book the player added to in Infocom’s Enchanter series. There as well you cast spells to solve puzzles — and, in keeping with the “juicy” approach, also got to enjoy many amusing effects when you cast them in the wrong places. But, as we saw in our earlier explication of one of Enchanter‘s puzzles, you can’t always rely on your spell book in that game. In Loom, on the other hand, your distaff and your book of patterns is all you have. And yet there’s a lot you can do with them, as the following will illustrate.

Bobbin eavesdrops from the gallery as Bishop Mandible discusses his plan for world domination with one of his lackeys. His chief smith is just sharpening the last of the swords that will be required. Bobbin has a pattern for “sharpen.” That’s obviously not what we want to do here, but maybe he could cast it in reverse…

Unfortunately, he can’t spin drafts as long as the smith is beating away at the sword.

Luckily, the smith pauses from time to time to show off his handwork.

Why it works: Loom‘s minimalist mechanics might seem to allow little scope for clever puzzle design. Yet, as this puzzle indicates, such isn’t the case at all. Indeed, there’s a certain interactive magic, found by no means only in adventures games, to the re-purposing of simple mechanics in clever new ways. Loom isn’t a difficult game, but it isn’t entirely trivial either. When the flash of inspiration comes that a pattern might be cast backward, it’s as thrilling as the thrills that accompany any other puzzle on this list.

It’s also important to note the spirit of this puzzle, the way it’s of a piece with the mythic dignity of the game as a whole. One can’t help but be reminded of that famous passage from the Book of Isaiah: “And they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”

Our puzzling design lesson: Wonderful games can be and have been built around a single mechanic. If you’ve got a great one, don’t hesitate to milk it for all it’s worth. Also: puzzles can illuminate — or undermine — a game’s theme as well as any other of its aspects can.

9. Teaching the cannibals how to get a head in The Secret of Monkey Island

By Ron Gilbert, Lucasfilm Games, 1990

How it works: For many of us, the first Monkey Island game is the Platonic ideal of a comedic graphic adventure: consistently inventive, painstakingly fair, endlessly good-natured, and really, truly funny. Given this, I could have chosen to feature any of a dozen or more of its puzzles here. But what I’ve chosen — yes, even over the beloved insult sword-fighting — is something that still makes me smile every time I think about it today, a quarter-century after I first played this game. Just how does a young and ambitious, up-and-coming sort of cannibal get a head?

Hapless hero Guybrush Threepwood needs the human head that the friendly local cannibals are carrying around with them.

Wait! He’s been carrying a certain leaflet around for quite some time now.

What’s the saying? “If you teach a man to fish…”

Why it works: One might call this the graphic-adventure equivalent of the text-adventure puzzle that opened this list. More than that, though, this puzzle is pure Ron Gilbert at his best: dumb but smart, unpretentious and unaffected, effortlessly likable. When you look through your inventory, trying to figure out where you’re going to find a head on this accursed island, and come upon that useless old leaflet you’ve been toting around all this time, you can’t help but laugh out loud.

Our puzzling design lesson: A comedic adventure game should be, to state the obvious, funny. And the comedy should live as much in the puzzles as anywhere else.

10. Tracking down the pendant in The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes

By Eric Lindstrom and R.J. Berg, Electronic Arts, 1992

How it works: This interactive mystery, one of if not the finest game ever to feature Arthur Conan Doyle’s legendary detective, is notable for its relative disinterest in the physical puzzles that are the typical adventure game’s stock in trade. Instead it has you collecting more abstract clues about means, motive, and opportunity, and piecing them together to reveal the complicated murder plot at the heart of the story.

It all begins when Holmes and Watson get called to the scene of the murder of an actress named Sarah Carroway: a dark alley just outside the Regency Theatre, where she was a star performer. Was it a mugging gone bad? Was it the work of Jack the Ripper? Or was it something else? A mysterious pendant becomes one of the keys to the case…

We first learn about Sarah Carroway’s odd pendent when we interview her understudy at the theater. It was a recent gift from Sarah’s sister, and she had always worn it since receiving it. Yet it’s missing from her body.

We find the workplace of Sarah’s sister Anna. She’s also in show biz, a singer at the Chancery Opera House. The woman who shared a box with Sarah during Anna’s performances confirms the understudy’s story about the pendant. More ominously, we learn that Anna too has disappeared.

We track down Anna’s solicitor and surrogate father-figure, a kindly old chap named Jacob Farthington. He tells us that Anna bore a child to one Lord Bromwell some years ago, but was forced to give him up to Brumwell without revealing his parentage. Now, she’s been trying to assert her rights as the boy’s mother.

More sleuthing and a little bit of sneaking leads us at last to Anna’s bedroom. There we find her diary. It states that she’s hired a detective following Sarah’s murder — not, regrettably, Sherlock Holmes — to find out what became of the pendant. It seems that it contained something unbelievably important. “A humble sheet of foolscap, depending on what’s written upon it, can be more precious than diamonds,” muses Holmes.

Yet more detecting on our part reveals that a rather dense blackguard named Blackwood pawned the pendant. Soon he confesses to Sarah’s murder: “I got overexcited. I sliced her to make her stop screaming.” He admits that he was hired to recover a letter by any means necessary by “an old gent, very high tone,” but he doesn’t know his name. (Lord Brumwell, perhaps?) It seems he killed the wrong Carroway — Anna rather than Sarah should have been his target — but blundered onto just the thing he was sent to recover anyway. But then, having no idea what the pendant contained, he pawned it to make a little extra dough out of the affair. Stupid is as stupid does…

So where is the pendant — and the proof of parentage it must have contained — now? We visit the pawn shop where Blackwood unloaded it. The owner tells us that it was bought by an “inquiry agent” named Moorehead. Wait… there’s a Moorehead & Gardner Detective Agency listed in the directory. This must be the detective Anna hired! Unfortunately, we are the second to ask about the purchaser of the pendant. The first was a bit of “rough trade” named Robert Hunt.

We’re too late. Hunt has already killed Gardner, and we find him just as he’s pushing Moorehead in front of a train. We manage to nick Hunt after the deed is done, but he refuses to say who hired him or why — not that we don’t have a pretty strong suspicion by this point.

Luckily for our case, neither Gardner nor Moorehead had the pendant on him at the time of his death. We find it at last in their safe. Inside the pendant, as we suspected, is definitive proof of the boy’s parentage. Now we must pay an urgent visit to Lord Brumwell. Is Anna still alive, or has she already met the same fate as her sister? Will Brumwell go peacefully? We’ll have to play further to find out…

Why it works: Even most allegedly “serious” interactive mysteries are weirdly bifurcated affairs. The game pretty much solves the mystery for you as you jump through a bunch of unrelated hoops in the form of arbitrary object-oriented puzzles that often aren’t all that far removed from the comedic likes of Monkey Island. Even some pretty good Sherlock Holmes games, like Infocom’s Sherlock: The Riddle of the Crown Jewels, wind up falling into this trap partially or entirely. Yet The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes stands out for the way it really does ask you to think like a detective, making connections across its considerable length and breadth. While you could, I suppose, brute-force your way through even the multifaceted puzzle above by visiting all of the locations and showing everything to every suspect, it’s so much more satisfying to go back through Watson’s journal, to muse over what you’ve discovered so far, and to make these connections yourself. Lost Files refuses to take the easy way out, choosing instead to take your role as the great detective seriously. For that, it can only be applauded.

Our puzzling design lesson: Graham Nelson once indelibly described an adventure game as “a narrative at war with a crossword.” I would say in response that it really need not be that way. A game need not be a story with puzzles grafted on; the two can harmonize. If you’re making an interactive mystery, in other words, don’t force your player to fiddle with sliding blocks while the plot rolls along without any other sort of input from her; let your player actually, you know, solve a mystery.

(Once again, my thanks to Casey Muratori for suggesting this article. And thank you to Mike Taylor and Alex Freeman for suggesting some of the featured puzzles.)

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/ten-great-adventure-game-puzzles/

[karingottschalk]

Warrewyk Williams of Fujifilm Australia presented the Fujifilm GFX 50R Touch and Try event at Ted’s World of Imaging in Sydney. Photograph copyright Karin Gottschalk 2018, all rights reserved.

Fujifilm Australia’s Warrewyk Williams arrived at the Touch and Try event at Ted’s World of Imaging in Sydney last night with one of the few, if not the only, Fujifilm GFX 50R medium format rangefinder-style digital cameras along with a selection of G Mount lenses, Fujifilm GFX 50S DSLR-style medium format camera, Fujifilm X-H1, Instax printers and more. 

The event provided an opportunity for a brief but informative hands-on with the GFX 50R with the proviso that the camera is a pre-production model with pre-release firmware and therefore possible quirks and operating speed reductions compared to the firmware version 1.0 that will be available for production versions at release time. 

This event was particularly welcome as I have not had the opportunity to touch or try the X-H1, GFX 50S or any of Fujifilm’s Instax products, given the closure of our local top-end camera stores, and I have long been hoping and waiting for a digital version of Fujifilm’s justly loved and celebrated “Texas Leica” 120 roll film analog cameras of the past. 

Fujifilm GFX 50R with Fujinon GF 45mm f/2.8 R LM WR lens, equivalent to 35mm in 35mm format.

Some “Texas Leica” medium format rangefinder cameras from the analog era, made by Fujifilm, Bronica and Mamiya

Some of the last Fujifilm analog 120 roll film cameras.

The last 120 roll film analog camera to be made by Fujifilm, the Fujifilm GF670 folding rangefinder camera with fixed Fujinon 80mm f/3.5 standard lens. I saw one once at a photography trade show in Sydney alongside its non-folding wide-angle rangefinder sibling.

Fuji GS645 II Professional Wide 60 120 roll-film rangefinder camera with wide-angle lens, great for photojournalism. Photograph courtesy KEH Camera.

Fujica GW690 120 roll film rangefinder camera, image kindly released into the public domain by Jfriedl.

Mamiya 7 II interchangeable lens 120 rollfilm rangefinder camera. Photograph courtesy of Japan Camera Hunter.

Bronica RF645 6×4.5cm 120 roll film rangefinder camera, photograph courtesy of Japan Camera Hunter.

Fujifilm, as well as Bronica and Mamiya, made some remarkable 120 roll film rangefinder cameras with Fujifilm producing a huge variety of “Texas Leicas” in the 6×4.5cm, 6x6cm, 6x7cm, 6x8cm and 6x9cm formats and for all I know may well have produced 6x9cm and 6x12cm cameras too.

I continue to search for top quality photographs of these and other cameras in the hopes of preserving some of the camera-building achievements of the past, some of which may trickle down to the present day.

The Fujifilm GFX 50R has clearly benefited from Fujifilm’s analog innovations, its look and feel reminding me of the company’s larger 120 roll film cameras while also sharing a great deal of the X-Pro2’s own DNA.

Fujifilm GFX 50R Touch and Try

Reeling off a few snapshots with an unfamiliar and pre-production camera is hardly a thorough real-world test but the experience reminded me that documentary photography and portraiture with a medium format camera is a very different thing to making the same sorts of photographs with a small, fast, agile, gestural camera like the X-Pro2 or X-T3.

Making reportage and portraits photographs with the GFX 50R and GFX 50S is more akin to how I used to work handheld with my Hasselblad, Mamiya 7 and even my Crown Graphic 4″x5″ sheet film 4field camera – slower, more deliberate and with fewer shots than I would make on APS-C or Micro Four Thirds cameras.

I tried two lenses, the Fujinon GF 45mm f/2.8 R WR and the Fujinon GF 120mm f/4.0 Macro R LM OIS WR in emulation of the two-lens moderate wide and medium telephoto kits I had for my medium and large format analog cameras.

I learned that, aside from the coming-soon Fujinon GF 50mm f3.5 R LM WR pancake lens, equivalent to about 40mm in the 35mm sensor format, more wide prime lenses are planned for GF mount cameras along with the  Fujinon GF 45-100mm f/4.0 R LM OIS WR and Fujinon GF 100-200mm f/5.6 R LM OIS WR zoom lenses currently slated for 2019 and 2020 releases on Fujifilm’s G Mount Lens Roadmap.

The Fujifilm GFX 50R is, for me, a combination rangefinder-style and small field view camera, for use primarily handheld but also on a portable but sturdy tripod such as 3 Legged Thing’s Winston or those made by Really Right Stuff, for making environmental and full-face portrait photographs.

My quick and dirty test shots indicate that it has the image quality of an analog sheet film camera rather than a 120 roll film camera, and I would prefer to use prime lenses with it rather than zooms.

Warrewyk Williams estimates the focal length equivalence factor at 0.79 for Fujifilm’s G Mount lenses, making the 45mm equivalent to 35.55 in 35mm terms and the 120mm equivalent to 94.8 in 35mm terms.

Other lenses worth considering for my sort of portrait photography include the Fujinon GF 110mm f/2.0 R LM WR equivalent to 86.9mm and hopefully a soon-to-come 35mm GF lens equivalent to 28mm.

Not to be discounted is the Fujinon GF 32-64mm f/4.0 R LM WR zoom lens which provides at least three useful focal lengths for different forms of portraiture, in 35mm equivalent terms 28mm, 35mm and 50mm, and is available right now rather than waiting for fast prime lenses to come.

A two or three lens kit for the GFX 50R may be all I would need for portraiture should I invest in digital medium format.

While it is too early too come to conclusions about the GFX 50R and its lenses, I have been particularly struck by the superb 3D image rendering in the available light snapshot portrait of Warrewyk Williams above and am very much looking forward to exploring more of the creative possibilities of Fujifilm’s GFX camera and lens system very soon.

Links

Fujifilm Global – G Mount Lens Roadmap

Fujifilm X

Fujifilm X/GFX USA

jonasrask|photography

Image Credits

Portrait of Warrewyk Williams made by Karin Gottschalk on Fujifilm medium format camera with Fujinon GF 120mm f4.0 R LM OIS WR Macro lens as five autoexposure brackets processed in Skylum Aurora HDR 2019 with film emulation LUT applied and further processing in Skylum Luminar.

Documentary photographs made by Karin Gottschalk on Fujifilm X-Pro2 with Fujinon XF 23mm f/1.4 R lens.

Header image of GFX 50R made by Jonas Rask for Fujifilm.

Help support ‘Untitled’

Clicking on the links below and purchasing through them or our affiliate accounts at B&H Photo Video, SmallRig or Think Tank Photo helps us continue our work for ‘Untitled’.

Fujifilm Fujinon G Mount lenses – B&H

FUJIFILM GFX 50R Medium Format Mirrorless Camera – B&H

FUJIFILM GFX 50S Medium Format Mirrorless Camera – B&H

FUJIFILM VG-GFX1 Vertical Battery Grip – B&H

Fujifilm GFX 50R Medium Format Rangefinder-Style Camera Touch and Try Event at Ted’s World of Imaging, Sydney, Thursday 1st November 2018 Fujifilm Australia's Warrewyk Williams arrived at the Touch and Try event at Ted's World of Imaging in Sydney last night with one of the few, if not the only, Fujifilm GFX 50R medium format rangefinder-style digital cameras along with a selection of G Mount lenses, Fujifilm GFX 50S DSLR-style medium format camera, Fujifilm X-H1, Instax printers and more. 

[architectnews]

The Design Village spotlights 11 student architecture and design projects

In our latest school show, undergraduate and postgraduate students at The Design Village in India present architecture and design projects ranging from a shelter for cats to an algorithmic learning aid for people with dyslexia.

Other projects include a music festival that aims to bring the sighted and visually impaired people together, and an analysis of the impact of menstrual euphemisms in India.  The projects aim to explore how informed processes are vital to developing solutions to solve today's problems.

The Design Village

School: The Design Village Courses: Fashion and Textile Design, Product Design, Graphics and Communication Design, Space and Interior Design, Transportation and Mobility Design, Interaction and UX Design, International Practice in Habitat Design, Practice of Design 

School statement:

"The Design Village is a multidisciplinary design institute based in National Capital Territory, India. The institute believes in impact through design as a medium that can solve the problems of today and propose solutions for the future.

"Much like an actual village, The Design Village is an organic whole where culture is rediscovered and values of empathy are nurtured by supporting fellow villagers and The Design Village itself. It aspires to be an energetic and thoughtful place where designers want to be and teachers want to teach.

"The Design Village’s 2nd graduate show unveils projects that tinker with the ideology of design as a verb. They earmark concurrent contexts and envision solutions for a better future through rigorous, informed and mindful processes."

People for Animals (group project)

"In collaboration with Studio Archohm, a student group designed an environment for neglected cats that rejuvenates them through space and design. The concept is for The People for Animal Shelter – an animal welfare centre in the National Capital Region of India.

"Keeping the behaviours of cats as a foundation and eliminating any possible stressors, the students created an oasis to address their various needs and create a micro-climate. Apart from being both a home and playpen for cats, the design allows birds to rest and drink water on the roof."

Students: Shireen Saxena, Tarushee Sachdeva and Syed Javeed Badri Professors: Sourabh Gupta, Rishabh Soni and Mohan Kumar Verma Email: shireen_pg20@thedesignvillage.org, tarushee.sachdeva_pg20@thedesignvillage.org, syed.badri_pg20@thedesignvillage.org

Lost in substitutes by Namoshree Jain

"Lost in substitutes asks: are we really experiencing the world in this era of digital compression? As we meander in a world of e-books, digital games and video, Namoshree has created an experience providing sensory inputs in varying intensities from minimum to excess.

"In a post-pandemic world, we have all arrived at the painful realization that we miss sensory inputs such as touch. As we hope to increase interactions with people, Namoshree has designed a safe experience that caters to our physical and mental well-being."

Student: Namoshree Jain Professor: Tuttu M. Thomas Email: namoshree.j@thedesignvillage.org

Baraabari – Bringing the blind and sighted together by Vidita Maheshka

"Baraabari roughly translates to 'parity' in English.

"Through her project, Vidita Mahesheka has created a shared platform for the sighted and individuals with vision impairments. Working with the National Association for the Blind and Music Basti, a music school, she proposed a music festival as a site for inclusivity.

"Aiming to address social exclusion and awkwardness (often experienced by the people with low or no vision) Vidita emphasizes auditory input rather than visual, creating a site for parity and increasing social interaction between the sighted and people with vision impairments."

Student: Vidita Mahesheka. Professor: Pritesh Maru Email: vidita.m@thedesignvillage.org

I am dyslexia – Words no longer the limitation by Kiran H. Nath

"Growing up neuroatypical, Kiran H. Nath struggled with the education system. Kiran believes that it designs people like him out of the learning paradigm, forcing students to conform to distinct ways of learning. As a result, children and young adults often lose confidence.

"Kiran's project addresses this issue. He has designed an algorithmic application that responds to its users' learning abilities. Mapping the prowess of a dyslexic mind, Kiran worked with the Madras Dyslexia Association and designed a product to enhance and celebrate abilities rather than focusing on perceived disabilities."

Student: Kiran H. Nath Professor: Mudita Pasari Email: kiran@thedesignvillage.org

India Pavilion – A symbol of cultural exchange (group project)

"Over a series of workshops from across the globe, the India Pavilion was built at Domaine de Boisbuchet, Lessac, France, in 2019. It celebrates the union of space, material and light to create architectural experiences representing Indian civilization.

"The pavilion attempts to create a collective public space, allowing visitors to interpret the building as an 'agora' in dialogue with nature. It testifies to the importance of cultural exchange and symbolizes the necessity of views from the outside to readjust and revitalize Indian values."

Students: Zoya Gupta, Anoop Kumar Vinod Kumar, Arjun Gupta, Arshad Bajil Kuttasseri, Mukul Kapoor, Akarsh Goyal, Albert Shawn Figaredo, Ikshita Sharma, Sachin Choyal, Namoshree Jain, Souvik Mukherjee, Dharini Singh, Rishabh Soni, Anjana Sravya Yalamanchili, Abhirami Ravi, Vidita Maheshka, Yash Mishra, Saiyam Arora, Ushmita Aggarwal, Arushi Khatri, Vanshika Mehta, Sarthak Tayla, Khadija Rajgarhwala, Purva, Abad Ali, Harsh Chauhan, Akanksha A. Thapa, Sanjana Suri, Ankita Kochhar, Pranav Shyam Kalambi, Vineet Rao, Mayank Gupta, Maulik Yagnik, Snighdha Gupta and Tanvi Aggarwal Professors: Sourabh Gupta, Mridu Sahai, Lena R. Gupta, Carlos Guisasola, Pablo Sevilla Alonso, Gopendra Pratap Singh, Vidur Madhav, Vatsal Agrawal and Mohan Kumar Verma Email: taskbox@thedesignvillage.org

Displaced Masculinities – The men in contemporary Punjab by Archit Dhiman

"Archit Dhiman, a non-Sikh Punjabi male, examines the underlying themes and patterns that impact the notions of 'masculinity' within contemporary Punjab in India.

"Applying a framework using an intersection of various fields, Archit has developed a multi-dimensional analysis from analysing  Punjabi regional cinema. Archit has also referenced scholarly work from global ethnographers and anthropologists.

"The paper aimed to render a collage of imagery that impacts the notions of masculinity in Punjab. Moving away from stereotypical definitions, the paper superimposes the images of masculinity and femininity on societal, national and global premises."

Student: Archit Dhiman Professor: Vatsal Agrawal Email: archit@thedesignvillage.org

Analysing the impact of menstrual euphemisms with visual language in urban adults by Unnati Sharma

"Through her master's dissertation, Unnati Sharma tackles euphemisms used for menstruation in urban India. Despite claims of modernity, most of India still refrains from having this conversation, resulting in countrywide problems of menstrual hygiene and an apparent lag in SDG indicators for health and well-being.

"Unnati argues that there is an urgent need to normalize and address the many associations people have with menstruation. This need to understand menstruation (beyond its scientific meaning) could be addressed by using visual euphemisms as a tool – allowing more open conversations between the menstruating and non-menstruating populations."

Student: Unnati Sharma Professor: Prachi Joshi, Sneha Ravishankar and Lena R. Gupta Email: tdvunnati@thedesignvillage.org

Craft sustainability with special reference to chindi rope in villages of Haryana by Sachin Choyal

"Sachin Choyal’s master’s dissertation explored sustainable mapping practices using pre and post-consumer textile waste within rural communities of Haryana, India, which has developed into a study of sustainability itself.

"Examining creating rope from waste fabric, Sachin mapped the processes and cost structures, helping create a sustainable business model for local communities (who usually create products for local consumption). Since the project's completion, Sachin has developed an unusual weaving technique to produce fabric for rugs, throws and jackets."

Student: Sachin Choyal Professor: Mudita Pasari and Lena R. Gupta Email: tdvsachin@thedesignvillage.org

!ook  a wordless visual storybook by Ananya Joshi

"In collaboration with non-profit education organisation Khel Planet, Ananya Joshi has designed a book emphasising the art of looking. The project asks us to shine a light on objects and beings we overlook – to see, acknowledge and engage with them.

"Ananya’s wordless book is designed for 6-10-year-olds and their caregivers. It aims to encourage readers to build positive relationships, improve language expression, exercise vocabulary and explore plot lines. Not having a singular storyline allows the readers to direct the story while creating a space to question and ponder upon illustrated cues."

Student: Ananya Joshi Professor: Sneha Ravishankar Email: tdvananya@thedesignvillage.org

The possibility of an objective ethical framework in Persuasive design: A theoretical reflection by Karan Pal Singh Virdi

"Persuasive technologies aim at changing the behaviour and attitude of users. Karan Pal Singh Virdi addresses the ethical concerns with such technological interventions by designers, as it is suggested that many academic ethical frameworks lack a designer’s perspective.

"This study contributes to this missing link by investigating a possibility of an objective ethical framework— guiding unbiased decisions and adapting to dynamic factors that contribute to ethical dilemmas.

"The suggested methodology is two-phased, inspired by a five-stage design process. First phase involving scrutiny of existing frameworks and the second phase involving practical applications of the same."

Student: Karan Pal Singh Virdi Professors: Mudita Pasari, Lena R. Gupta, Shemal Pandya Email: tdvkaranpal@thedesignvillage.org

Meghalayan tales – stories from the magical land of Meghalaya (group project)

"A group of students working with the Meghalaya Infrastructure Development and Finance Corporation propose ideas of enhancing sustainable tourism in the northeastern state of Meghalaya, India.

"The students observed a stark disconnect between the tourists and the aboriginal tribal population. To bridge this gap, they suggested carrying local myths, stories and legends to the tourists before, during and after their visit to Meghalaya.

"Their proposal included visual aids, graphic books, theatrical and immersive displays, which allowed for the tourist to be immersed in and interact with local cultural aspects of Meghalaya."

Students: Muskaan Mahendru, Sunidhi Chaudhary, Hitesh Chikarsal and Vanshika Mehta Professor: Anusha Dhawan Emails: sunidhi@thedesignvillage.org, muskaan@thedesignvillage.org, vanshika@thedesignvillage.org, hitesh@thedesignvillage.org

Partnership content

This school show is a partnership between Dezeen and The Design Village. Find out more about Dezeen partnership content here.

The post The Design Village spotlights 11 student architecture and design projects appeared first on Dezeen.

[imaybeatree]

-an Interactive Web Tool That Allows Users To Log In And Check Account Information And Other Features.

Internet Marketing Help - Goldrush Getaways Campbell CA A - Above the fold refers to minimum as possible otherwise the recipients may take it as spam. It helps when you need to count visitors ro track which an encyclopedia an is updated by the public for the public. Internet Marketing Help - X - generation X are probably responsible for 75% worth of a client if they continue to buy from you for life. Don't use Facebook as a way of marketing unless you have allot the most searched for terms in the market that  your product is found within. Internet Marketing Help - R Rank - A website and even individual web pages will eventually be writers block by leading you all the way through the process of article's creation. Merchant account - Websites often set up merchant accounts to handle other information, which may be interesting for your users.

- These are the product which may be sold or already and easy Internet Marketing course So as promised, I hope you found all the information you were looking for and if you didnt please let us know. Unclaimed domains -There are still many Domains that have not marketing tools will certainly prove utmost beneficial for your business. There are many other internet marketing methods, all of another brand by using the same or similar style of graphics and text font. You still have to make sure that your articles read well the advertisements are rotated evenly for every page view and you don't get the same advert every time you visit the same website. A reserve price is often set by the seller of the product which ordained with beautiful and attractive banners, templates and logo etc. Link building helps increasing the number and quality inbounds links to the website which is on our websites, the pages need to be information pages that promote the product and must not have buy now buttons.

Perl -A form of script language thta is usually used for designing service, and some of these have been highly awarded for their quality. -These are the small words in the english language that that you will you to portray the knowledge that your are sharing. Easy and quick Internet Marketing Course Internet to see your business become an online business authority with unassailable online presence. Internet Marketing Help - R - A website and even individual web pages will eventually be ranked of spare time in the evenings and don't mind spending hours on it. Email Marketing: Email marketing is one of the effective means through which of highly effective tools that I use in my own business. Traditional marketing strategies are slowly being replaced by internet marketing , even marketing ventures, Hubpages will prove to be an excellent option.

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Video Graphics Bonanza V2 Review

Video Graphics Bonanza V2 Review

Learn more here: http://mattmartin.club/index.php/2018/01/12/video-graphics-bonanza-v2-review/

Welcome to, Mattmartin.club Proud to show you my Video Graphics Bonanza V2 Review hope you will enjoy it !

Video Graphics Bonanza V2 Review and Bonus by Max R – Best New HD Live Footage Videos, 20 Modules of Premium Graphics Assets Plus a Fully Featured Video Editor For Less Than The Price Of ONE Video

Overview :

Product Creator Max Rylski Product Name Video Graphics Bonanza V2 Price $17 Niche Video Bonuses Yes, CHECK NOW Refund 30 Day Money Back Guarantee Recommend Highly Recommend

Click Here at 11 AM EST on 2018-Jan-13 to get an early bird discount on “Video Graphics Bonanza V2” along with my Exclusive Bonuses

Video Graphics Bonanza V2

Video Graphics Bonanza V2 is a HUGE bundle of premium quality video and graphics assets. It comes with 21 modules & 100’s of individual graphics items. All of this content is brand new and custom created for me. I hired several top designers and 3D animators and spent several dozen hours myself putting all this together.

Video Graphics Bonanza V2

There is a free video editor that came out recently that’s almost as powerful as After Effects. In fact it has over 1 million users and people are actually using it to create short movies and docs. I’ve been using it for the past year, and I actually prefer it to After Effects and Camtasia. It has more features than Camtasia, and it’s simpler to use than After Effects. This is THE BEST free video editor I’ve found online!

Video Graphics Bonanza V2 FEATURE :

Video Graphics Bonanza V2 OTO / Upsell :

Main FE : Big bundle of video and graphics assets.

OTO 1 : Double the amount of video graphics assets + Developer License to everything.

OTO 2 : Done-for-You videos and video templates.

OTO 3 : Video Maker Toolkit V4 + Developer License

Video Graphics Bonanza V2 Features :

Unlimited video and audio tracks

Trim, ripple, roll, slip, slice and slide editing tools

Powerful green screen footage editing

Create multiple composite shot timelines

Transform and animate layers

Over 140 visual effects

16 color correction and grading tools

16 distortion and warp effects

Works on both Mac & PC

And much more…

What can you do with this video editor and my graphics assets?

1 Click Green Screen Removal Add yourself or any green screen spokesperson video over live footage videos or animated backgrounds…with 1 click.

Make Your Logos & Text POP Add Slash FX over your logos, text or even live footage videos to make them truly stand out.

Add Stylish Stop Motion To Your Videos Stop motion effects are very popular right now, and with these animations you can give your videos a stop motion makeover.

Add Explainer & 3D Objects You’ll get dozens of high quality hand crafted explainer style & 3D animated objects to add to your videos.

Wow People with 3D Animations You don’t need to know complicated 3D software. Just add my pre-made 3D animations to your videos and wow your audience!

Combine, Mix & Match Create truly unique scenes by combining multiple assets into one video. In this sample we used: Living Room Background, 3D Icon, Animated Shapes, and Animated Text.

Video Graphics Bonanza V2 Modules :

Module #1: HD Video Footage

These videos are not from public domain sites. I shot these videos myself with my camera and a tripod, while traveling in SE Asia and Europe. Plus I edited them myself and crunched them down with HandBrake to reduce size while keeping the quality. To hire someone to shoot 100 videos and edit them for you could easily cost in the $1,000s. And to buy each video from stock photo sites could easily cost $25 – $100’s for just 1 video. With this bundle you get over 100 videos. Which has a realistic value in the $100’s or $1,000’s.

NOTE: The video above have small sample clips. The actual videos in this bundle are 30 seconds to 1 minute each.

Module #2: Animated Virtual Studio

Module #3: Stop Motion Paper Tears

Module #4: Animated 3D Film Objects

Module #5: 3D Social Media Icons

Module #6: Animated Living Room

Module #7: Commerce Explainer Objects

Module #8: Flythrough Phone Reveal

Module #9: “Sale” Paper Tears

Module #10: “Safe Opening” 3D Animation

Module #11: Animated Shapes Elements

Module #12: “Lock / Unlock” 3D Animation

Module #13: Camera Flashes

Module #14: 3D Money Animations

Module #15: Animated Brush Strokes

Module #16: Flash FX “Slashes”

Module #17: 3D Graph with Money

Module #18: “High Tech” 3D Reveal Animation

Module #19: 3D Sale Bag

Module #20: Clapperboard Transitions

Module #21: Fire Overlay

Conclusion :

In a nutshell, I’m really thankful to you for keeping up with my Video Graphics Bonanza V2 Review to the very end, so you can make the right decision for your own business. Good luck and see you again!

If you are on the fence about getting this product or not, please notice that the product has 100% Risk-FREE along with 30 Day Money Back Guarantee that worth the try of everybody.

By checking and purchasing the product through my link, you don’t have to spend any extra fee or anything, and i will have some commission to build my review site to provide you more and more honest reviews. Moreover, i will be glad to give you a huge bonus (free of charge) with every product buying from my link.

Click Here at 11 AM EST on 2018-Jan-13 to get an early bird discount on “Video Graphics Bonanza V2” along with my Exclusive Bonuses

If you buy through my affiliate link (just click on any link on this page) you get these bonuses below: 

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Please Note: I only promote products I use or have used myself. All have great reviews, significant sales and low refund rates. I try to promote offers from reliable and trustworthy sellers with excellent track record about customer support and are in business for a while.

#Apps, #Graphic, #Graphic_Design, #Jvzoo, #JvzooProductReview, #JvzooProducts, #ProductReview, #Software, #Software_Tools, #Video, #Video_Marketing, #Video_Templates, #Video_Training, #Video_Training_Courses

[topicprinter]

I hope the new year is going great for you all! I want to help you make 2019 the best year for you and your business with some strategies you can be using.Many of you are small business owners or startup entrepreneurs that are just getting started or are established companies that want to move further into the digital scene but have some question about how to do it, listen up. Here are some tips to that every business owner should know and use to have a secure and successful experience online - with no cost (with some paid recommendations).Make a modern websiteWell, I hate to feel like a liar right off the bat. I promised that most of these tips would be no cost but the first suggestion is going to involve paying up a bit. But in my defense, I assume that many of you have a website. But I feel like it’s important to express the different avenues for those who don’t and those who may not be happy with what they have, as a website is an indispensable part of running a business online. It hosts your landing page, information about your business and your team, contact information, product information, testimonials, and more.a. Think it Through: This sounds very obvious, but many businesses don’t have a website or have not updated it in years. A website it the foundation of your online presence and it is where many potential clients start or end their time looking at your business. So it’s important to make your website presentable and fill it with attractive content. Think about what you want your site to accomplish, how will it facilitate your business, what are you willing to invest into it?b. Get a Domain - You can use Namecheap.com, Domain.com or Godaddy.com. Namecheap is usually a bit cheaper (who would have guessed) but I find Godaddy more easily accessible. There will be a few extra steps when you are transferring the name server to the host site. Godaddy requires fewer steps for this process, while Namecheap requires a bit more manual effort.c. Choose a host: There are many great servers: Bluehost (my preference) Hostgator, Dreamhost, and many more. All in 2018 there are so many great host servers, but it’s good to know the specific features of each. I suggest doing some research about what the features they provide and choose the one that best represents the goal of your site. (Some have better customization, others offer in-house security certifications).d. Design your website. I highly recommend using the plugin Elementor (for WordPress) as it has full-page templates that you can customize, so if you need something that looks professional, most of the work is already done. Of course, there are many tutorials online that can help you craft a completely personalized page. My favorite is this video by Tyler Moore:i. Side note, make sure to optimize your website for mobile devices. There are usually features to adjust layouts, text, and images for different size screens. Make sure you do this so that everything lines up and looks presentable no matter the platform your site is viewed on. For your reference tablets are 768px and mobile is 360px.Take advantage of Search Engine OptimizationSearch Engine Optimization is more art than science. Marketers, data analyst, and programmers are continuously trying to discover all the hidden mechanisms of search engine indexing systems. Sites like Google and Bing have to index billions of web pages every day, constantly dealing with new pages, updates, and shutdowns. To manage this the use algorithms called crawlers to index and rank them, for example, Google calls their crawlers ‘spiders’. It is hard to say for certain what factors benefit SEO as Google, Yahoo, and Bing have only revealed some information, but we take the info we have plus extensive research and experiments to get pretty close. If you want to learn more about SEO, check out this beginner's guide by Moz,a. Keyword - One of the best and creative way to boost your search results ranking, boils doing to the types of words and phrases you use to describe your site/business. Crawlers scour your site to get an idea of what it is you offer/service you provide. But the algorithm can’t read and interpret the exact meaning and contexts of the words you use. So it uses keywords, keyword density, and bids to categorize and rank your site. To make sure the crawlers understand what your site is all about, you must use keywords.i.  Make a list: I suggest making a list of words and phrases that best describe your business. Make sure to really think about it (be as technical as possible). Then make a second list about what words, phrases, and questions you think the average person would use to look up your business or a problem your service resolves. This distinction is important because the most technical and accurate terms may actually hurt your results and rankings, as most people do not use them. An example could be a car repair shop promoting a sale on their recarbonation of the exhaust valve (not sure if this is actually a thing), but most people would just look up exhaust tune-up.ii. Find the perfect blend: Take your list and try to merge the words and phrases together, mix and match, and replace them. I suggest coming up with many different slogans and pages descriptions then having a less savvy friend read it. Ask them ‘does this make sense to you?’ ‘Does this accurately describe the service in your mind?’ Use their responses to adjust your keyword choice.iii. There are tools you can use that give you suggestions on keywords, bidding cost, and traffic. Some of the best are SEMrush, Google Keyword Planner, and Soovle, just to name a few.iv. Word Count - a good rule of thumb is to have at least 300-500 words on every page, whether they be on display or within the metadata of the page. Warning: don’t try to cheat the system by adding invisible text for greater keyword density, bots and crawlers are designed to see and penalize this.A side note for this would be making sure you use proper grammar and spelling. Although this is not confirmed it makes sense. If you are offering a Spa service but you mistakenly type sap multiple times, the crawlers will improperly categorize those keywords and may even your entire site (i don’t know what kind of weirdo is looking for sap online but I don't want anything to do with them).b. Backlinks - Thought by many to be the most important factor in SEO ranking should definitely be a top priority. Backlinks are links to your website on other pages, so if your website and business are featured on a popular website or blog and link to your site, Search Engines will rank you more favorably. A great way to do this is to network with other established website, this could be a feature from a news source or blog, or collaborating with another company and have them give you credit. Another great way to get backlinks is to create a free display of your talents, offer it for the public to use, and ask for credit and a link to be used to your site. This can be anything, for example, a detailed, easy to understand graphic of how to change a tire can be used by Driver Ed site or social media page for young people, which can link back to a mechanic shop, thereby increasing traffic and reputation. As long as you are creative, there is some way to get your business out there.c. Speed: Your pages speed not only helps with viewer satisfaction (no one like surfing a site that takes forever to load), but it also makes helps search engines crawlers index your site faster which they will remember, and rank you higher. You can think of the crawlers as workers and the have to index as many sites and pages before they clock out, the longer your site, the longer it takes them to do their job. You can get a faster website by mitigating extra, unneeded features like images, videos, and plug-ins. Another way to increase speed is by adding the plug-in WP Super Cache and turn on caching.Side note- You can test your website speed using a site call Pindgom.comd. Use images - As I said before, crawlers look for a well rounded and robust website so mixing it up with some vibrant images and graphics can greatly improve your ranking. Depending on what you use to make your site you can add descriptions, captions, and alternative text (for those who are blind and use text to voice programs). I highly recommend filling each of these out thoroughly.There are a lot of ways to find photos and graphics to use but you MUST ensure that they are royalty-free or you have permission to use them. Some sites I like to use are Pexels.com and Unsplash.com. Some may ask you to credit the creators, in that case, I would follow the directions they have on the site, usually linking an Instagram or Twitter page.e. Add a Snippet - a Snippet is a short description of each page on your site that can be viewed from the SERP (Search Engine Result Page). Crawler rank sites and pages with snippets more favorably.f. Plug-ins - you can add certain plug-ins to critique each one of your pages specifically and offer suggestions. My favorite is Yoast SEO, but once again I only know that it works on wordpress so I can’t guarantee it will be available anywhere else. It also creates an XML sitemap, for your website.g. Evaluate your site: I like to use Upcity.com’s SEO report card. Evaluates and grades many of the things discussed above.Q and AThis has recently been published by Google that they will be putting a greater focus on Q and A information and creating features on the SERP to answer frequently asked questions. The idea is that this information will be taken from your site and displayed on Google when a question is asked. (You definitely want to be the one answering the most questions, because what's an entrepreneur if not a problem solver)i. The best way to do this adds a comment or FAQs section to your site and generate answers. Of course, you want to answer questions directly related to your product or service, but there are more way to utilize this feature. Get involved in topics similar to yours. If you sell camping tents, try to open a forum about camping tips and survival skills. Anyone interested in that subject to ask questions may be willing to purchase your tent.ii. As you may assume this is huge for your ranking to have your information and jointly your website be displayed on a popular Google search page.SecurityThe internet is an amazing but dangerous place. With tens of millions of transactions flowing through the internet in America alone, people would be wise to take caution before giving their information out to just anyone. To ensure that people trust you and your business, it's important to make it secure. The most common way is to use an SSL certification. This verified identification of a website and encrypted information (good for both sides).a. Free Option: There are a few free SSL Encryption services you can use like letsencrypt.org or cloudflare.com, but this would require a little bit of effort on your part to transfer your host server to their service and your site may even go down or feature disabled while the host server is transferred.b. Preferred Free: Another free option use a Plug-ins on WordPress (I don’t use other website services so I don’t know if there is anything like this on elsewhere). I like the Plug-in Easy HTTPS (SSL) Redirection, its free and easyc. (paid) Other types of SSL.  The most basic and probably what you will get for free is changing the http to https (This stands for secure). But the more recognizable one and the ones that go the extra mile to keep you and your clients safe paid service. You can usually find this feature on your host program but there are many, many more.  Other include a small padlock with the word secure in green text before the domain called OV SSL and one that contains a short description of your business in green text before the domain, an example is Costco Wholesale Corporation [US] called EV SSL, and another called DV SSL, each have different criteria and advanced encryptions that you would have to research more to find out which suits your needs the best.d. Another tip is to make your passwords hack proof. The best way to not get hacked is to have a password that includes a variety of lower-case, upper case, numbers, and special characters (ex. iB8#Hu4WsA3^6*jOp). If you are having trouble coming up with a password you can use websites like Passwordsgenerator.net. You can customize the elements and length too.i. You should also have a new password for every account. This may seem excessive but this is your business and contains all your work ambitions, information about you co works, associates and clients. You must be a little paranoid. One way to do this without having a super memory is to make one strong password and use it to protect a text file offline on your computer, which contains all of the other passwords.e. Backup your site - There are free options to do this. I recommend the BackUpWordPress plug-in on wordpress. You can also find paid services like Dropmysite.comUse Google Analyticsi. First, you want to set it up with your website. The easiest way is you use a wordpress plug-in, otherwise, you might have to embed some code into your website. (are you starting to see why I like wordpress)a. Since there is so much that can be done in analytics it would be too difficult to explain it all here, but here are a few notable features.. On the home page you have options to see the number of users on your site (how many visited), sessions (how many time each person visited), bounce rate (how many leave without interacting your site - lower the better) and duration (how long visitors stayed on your site). You can customize the time frame you view your data at the bottom of the graph.i. Acquisitions can show you what ways people are getting to your site (organic search, direct, referrals, etc.). This can help you see which methods are working best at attracting visitors.ii. Behavioriii. The Audience you can see more specific data how when people visit your site, you can zoom in to see what time of day people view your site or zoom out and see what months or season affect your traffic. It also shows you data about the demographics of your visitors (age, gender, location, etc.).Social MediaSocial Media is arguably the fastest growing outlet to operate and market your business. I would say it is imperative that to have a social media presence in this day and age. Social media is a great way to engage your audience, market your product, and above all establish and foster a brand. Social Media introduces your business to a well of information that can be used legally for market research and targeting. It is also an inexpensive way to advertise. Although there are paid ways to advertise, I believe it is possible to use the free built-in mechanisms to market and advertise.        a. Facebook- Its thirds most visit site in 2017. It has more than 1 billion daily active users. 40% have liked a Facebook page to receive a special offer or promotion (more stats) it's a great way to keep your users' updates, share photos and videos, and connect with your fans. This also helps track your performance as Facebook has a detailed and intuitive analytical section. There are features of likes, comments, and shares, the most valuable being shares as it broads the number of people who will be seen your content. That being said the only metric a smart marketer and business owner should base their performance on is ROI, but it's still fun to look at. These metrics still gives you invaluable information and access to new ways to expand your brand (ex. sharing post lets all of a person's friends to view it, allowing your content to be viewed by many others for no extra cost)i. Start a Facebook page.ii. (Paid) Run Facebook ads: I’m breaking the mold again but this one is definitely worth it. Facebook ads operate on a Pay Per Click system (PPC), so it only charges you every time someone views the ad so to know you are getting your money’s worth. Facebook also boasts one of the best targeting systems. All Facebook users are asked to input personal information, preferences and interests. This is valuable information that can be used to target specific audiences.iii. Start a Facebook community. Depending on your product this could be a huge feature for your client base. For example, if you have an app video game with a large fan base you can start a community so your users communicate, ask questions, and build relationships. This will increase the engagement of users as well as help establish a brand. If people continually go to your business or affiliate social pages for continues entertainment and relationships building, your business becomes more than just a product, it becomes apart of their lives.b. Twitter: The second biggest social media site. There are over 330 monthly users and over 500 million tweets sent every day. It's a great place to communicate with peers and keep your audience engaged and up to date. Tweets are limited to only 140 characters so it’s best to keep your messages succinct.i. Tweet regularly: Tweet frequently to keep your business constantly on the mind of your audience. The worst thing would be for you to stop tweeting and have your audience forget about you. Conversely do not go overboard. I suggest 7-20 tweets a week.ii. Don’t make it all business: Of course, you are using social media to generate more business, but people will get turned off just seeing promotions and products. Wish your audience a happy holiday, give out free stuff, comment on related news/current events, comment on unrelated news/current events, post a funny or cute picture or joke. The more human you can make your account the better reception and engagement you can muster from your audience.iii. Follow People: Make sure to follow other leaders and peers in the industry. This is a great way to learn new things, keep an eye on competitors, and open doors to network,iii. Retweet: Retweeting is where you repost someone else's tweet, article, picture or video. This is a way to tweet with little to no effort, and it shows your audience what interests you. It is also flattering to those got retweeted and can gain you more followers.c. Snapchat- this is a relatively untapped platform for marketing but I believe it will soon dominate the field. It also provides the easiest mode to share real-time notices, videos, and pictures.i. Snapchat Stories- this is probably the biggest feature a business will utilize. You can upload videos, and photos to hundreds, even thousands of followers instantly. The style of videos in snapchat require little preparation or editing so you save time and money using this method. This aspect also adds to the charm of using this technique. The informal feel of it makes your business more human and builds a more friendly relationship with your audience. Some things you can uses this for is Q and As, behind the scenes, updates, and meet ups.The ability to foster meet ups, I believe is the most alluring aspect of snapchat. Having large group demonstrations and meet ups id the ultimate way to engage your audience. You can also utilize a paid feature known as location filters to boost the excitement of the event. This can be used as a marketing tool as everyone within the area has the ability to see this filter which may attract more people and clients.d. Use quoraQuora is a site dedicated to answering user-submitted questions. Answers are also user submitted and ranked by the question asker and other onlookers on its accuracy, effectiveness, and functionality. The top rated answer is shot to the top of the page. Although it may not seem like the best way to attract new clients or build your business, it's a great way to show that you are an expert in a particular field, and depending on the problem, you may be able to help that person directly by providing your product or service. Either way, if you get more exposure. Quora has over 300 million monthly users.i. This one doesn’t need much explaining. Make sure to put some time into setting up your profile and link your site. Then, just answer any questions that relate to your business. To really get the message across you can tag your answers like this:Hope this answers your questions.Best,Bob, Founder of Bob’s Burgers.LinkedInLinkedIn should be on the radar of every business owner. It's a way to interact with other professions, stay up to date on information regarding your field article, and learn about your competitors. LinkedIn has over 332 million profiles and the average number of connections is 932.a. Depending on what your business is and what stage in its development you are in it may be beneficial to contact others in the field. You can connect with others by searching for people with a certain occupation or experience. You can then added or connect with them and wait for them to respond. To increase the rate at which people accept your request, you can write a short message when you send the invitation. I suggest looking at their profile and learning a bit about them first and use that information to your advantage. After you connect, you can ask them questions, learn from their experiences and possibly collaborate with them.NetworkNetworking is key to learning new information within the industry, collaborating with others, and acquiring talent. Of course, social media is a great place to start, but there are other options.a. Shapr - This is a recently released app that connects professions and encourages them to meet, call, and do business/hire each other. (Think of a business orientated tinder account) The app operates with a swiping mechanic, where people view the profiles of others in their area. You can set preferences on what type of people you want to match with and what your goals are. It’s still in its adolescence stage as and I like many are still trying to figure out the culture. But I have personally have had some interesting conversations on it and I believe its worth a try. Just set up a profile and start swiping.b. Reddit/discussion boards - There is an online discussion board for almost any interest or industry. By discussing topics with others in the same field as you on these pages you can gain all the benefits from networking from the comfort of your home. A great place to start is Reddit, has thousands of discussions easily accessible in one place.Press Relations (PR)/InfluencersI mentioned this earlier but we will go a bit more in depth. Getting featured on a news outlet, blog, or social media profile can do wonders for your business or product.a. Make a list: First you have to find the right blog or news outlet. Some of these pages are very niche so put in some research (don’t ask an IPhone lover blog to talk about your new Android-only app). Make sure this list is organized and comprehensive with relevant details. I like to have a record of how big/how much traffic each one gets. If you are having trouble thinking of names a good place to start is Alltop.com. This site has the latest news and blog post from some of the top sites. Be sure to get a varied list of large, medium, and small pagesb. Make another list: After you have narrowed down the options it's time to start making a list of authors. Each author is different and likes to write about different things. Find one or two authors that fits your needs the best. Once again, be detailed with this list, find their social media pages and emails if you can.c. Build rapport: Now you have to get the authors attention. I suggest narrowing the list again to a small group and continue to read their work and comment at the end. Even the bigger sites don’t get too many comments so after a while you will be noticed. Next, I suggest following them on social media, Twitter is the best as you can really find out about what their interests and personality. Now start to like and comment on their posts. Like before, even authors from big outlets may have small personal followings, so they will noticed. Contact: After building up the rapport, send them an email or a message over Twitter. Make sure to reference their work previous work, so it comes across more genuine. I recommend exchanging a few messages before bringing up to the proposition to write having them publish information about your product or service.e. Do the Work For Them: This works because authors are overwork and have a lot of deadlines. Many of them get paid by the article or blog they post, so if they don’t post enough they won’t get paid or even get fired. So, if you come up to them with a story there a good chance they will be interested. But to further increase your odds I recommend writing the blog/article for them. This is why you should take to read their work, so you can better imitate their style. I also suggest doing the research for them. Use and cite credible sources like scholarly articles, databases, and books (if a statistic or fact is false, they have a lot to lose).i. There are no guarantees: even if you follow everything and the author likes you, they may not be accepting ideas of the nature you are offering, or it may get shut down by the editor. Whatever happens, there are many, many, many, blogs and news outlets, so don’t be deterred.And that’s all for today. Of course, there are always new ways to improve your business. I encourage everyone to be proactive, learn new methods, and network. If you believe you can manage all this go ahead, but keep in mind that for many of these marketing tactics that you have to stand out among a sea of competitors. An analogy I like to think about is using SEO and marketing can be thought of where and how your product or service is presented at a store. If you don’t try at all, it's like having your product be in the back of the store (yea its there but you’ll have to ask someone to go in the back and get it for you, not the best method). If you adhere to the standard of marketing, by doing just enough then you will be placed in a spot on a shelf among hundreds of other product (of course this is better than being in the back but are you really standing out?) But if you tailor your marketing techniques to the image and motivations of your business you are going a step further. This would be like having your product display in the window of the store, the first and best thing every customer sees when he or she walks in. Now you will have to ask yourself, how would you like your business to be perceived. Just another one of many, or is it something special, a passion that you want to stand out.I hope this was helpful and I wish you a happy New Year!

[claudecat17]

Cartoon Sunday: Falling Hare

Hey! It's Sunday! Your mind is craving cartoon mayhem. It's part of being an American of a certain level of seasoning. We absorbed our lust for violence in a fun, cartoon-y way, not that graphically violent and realistic video game way. Therefore, us older folks are superior beings, and America's fucked. Any doubts? Must I remind you of our president? Wait... if the young folk had voted... never mind.

But let us not dwell on that which we cannot change. Let us instead set the wayback machine to a time when wars were worth fighting, when, sure, things were pretty messed up racially and in many other ways (not that that’s all been solved or anything), but at least we rewarded those returning GI's with a fighting chance at financial stability instead of trying to rope 'em into a death spiral of crushing debt. You know, like we do with our phone-gazing progeny today.

(Ahem) Today's cartoon (Falling Hare) is, you guessed it, another one from the 1940's, 1943 to be exact. A bit of patriotic wartime instruction for would-be fighter pilots on how to deal with those sneaky and destructive gremlins. Did you know that gremlins were a thing? Seems the old RAF fellas used to blame all manner of aviation mishaps on imaginary critters. It was taken somewhat seriously too, though it would be Roald Dahl that made the phenomenon famous in some humorous kids literature right around the time that our 'toon was made.

So it's Bugs Bunny and this weird little creature doing battle on land and in the sky, no holds barred. And oh yeah! It's a Robert Clampett 'toon, so there's plentiful rubberiness and that extra jolt of the old-timey bizarre to be enjoyed.

It's not often that Bugs is as successfully bullied as we see here, which is odd given that he's the American hero and all. Today's focus groups would simply have had Bugs fire a nuclear warhead at the gremlin and called it a day. The enemy is to be detested and dispatched without a second of further consideration. Like them pesky Muslims. Or liberals.

I won't even go into detail as to the gags or anything, as I'm in too much of a politically harried hurry to rewatch the damn thing. I do remember it as being well above average in several of my previous screenings of this one, a point of view occasionally shared by others in the room. That's a sure sign of quality right there. This one and Bully For Bugs seem to be real big with non-'toonheads.

So enjoy! If not, then rest easy in the knowledge that the O's baseball season is mere single digits of days away! Here's hoping that us fans of the orange and black won't be lustily lobbing perfectly good food or drink items at our screens once the season's under way...

PS - This one's in the public domain! Guilt free 'toonage y'all! Yee haw!!!

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