Don’t do me like that

Here’s my question: Why does customer service at store for geeks suck?
Today a new game, Shadowbane, was released. I saw an ad for it at Fry’s in the newspaper. As expected, when I went to Fry’s at lunch they acted like I was asking for the Easter Bunny. There were of no help. I stood there trying to call other stores looking for the game and none of the other stores even picked up the phone.
Typical.
Almost every geek store you go to has terrible customer service. Radio Shack, Fry’s, CompUSA, Best Buy, etc… They all suck.
Other kinds of stores usually have good customer service. Shoe stores, music stores, and even supermarkets have better service.
Why do stores for geeks suck so much?
The only good news is that Mister P. found a store that did have the game and bought me a copy. He rocks!
Pride
On another theme, I’m very proud of my eldest daughter, Zoe. For a while now she’s been saving up money in a special box. Yesterday, I had to return the Gamecube game we rented to Blockbuster. She said she wanted to keep it. We discussed it a bit and she said she wanted to use her money to buy the game. She had savd up $31. I told here I’d cover the rest if it cost more.
We drove to the local Gamestop store and she walked in with her money in a clear box. Her eyes went wide when she saw all the games and systems inside. I saw my genes in action in her. She talked with the woman behind the counter and soon enough, Spyro – Enter the Dragonfly, was ours. I was so proud when she put her box of cash on the counter and said, there’s $31 in there.
When we got home, she told me that saving money was good and that she had big plans when she saved up more…
Next
There’s more on my mind, but I’m going to go read the Shadowbane Manual instead… Later.

I’m a geek, how can I be popular?

A couple days ago I made the trackback explanation because Anil & Dave were talking about it. I didn’t think much about it. I mean, I have made dozens of pages about stuff from building a cantenna to how to BBQ on a charcoal starter and not many paid attention.
Evidently, I posted the link to the explanation in the right place. I checked my stats today and suddenly I’ve got a ton of hits.
Here’s what my traffic looks like:

The last two days are a bit out of the ordinary to say the least.
I looked at the referrer logs and see tons of hits from assorted weblogs, boingboing, and several of the weblog stat sites: Daypop, popdex, and blogdex. It seems like once a link gets a little popular on a few weblogs, it can get very popular quickly.
People must be looking to see what’s popular and as a result makes it more popular. It’s a neat effect but the popularity is fleeting.
Perhaps I just hit a spot that needed clarity and people swarmed on it. I wonder what other concepts out there need more clarity?
LOTR Photochops
Below are the photos I took at the LotR viewing. It seems Travis’s buddies have begun to photochop them.
Here is my favorite by Mad Bushman:

Night folks. I got to present at an 8:30 AM meeting tomorrow with a bunch of heavy hitters in the company. Although it’s not like I can go to sleep now. Michele’s hogging the bathroom while she dyes her hair some color…

Now with more TrackBack flavor

The prolific Trott’s have taken the time to write up the canonical reference: A Beginner’s Guide to TrackBack.
It does the topic much more justice than I did in my attempt to explain TrackBack simply.
Heaven help the blogging community if Ben & Mena ever decide to have kids. I can envision a nanny being paid for bloggers so that the Trotts have more time to work on MT. 🙂
I guess I could offer them free entrance to Disneyland…

LotR:FotR discussion group

First of all, I gave into desire and purchased a large number of Japanese iced coffees. I was driving by the Mitsui Japanese supermarket and felt the cans calling to me.

Hopefully these will last a while.
LotR:FotR discussion group
At the office, the group I work with are mainly geeky guys. We chat about computers as often as sports. When sci-fi and fantasy movies come out, it a topic of discussion and debate.
A couple of the guys are bonafide Tolkein geeks. They’ve read the Silmarillion and even the book of letters Tolkein wrote about his ideas. A few of the guys have never read the books and have only seen the movies.
After seeing the second movie, Michael “Mister P.” Pajaro asked, “Why were there four hobbits? I thought there were only two.”
Upon hearing this, Brad & Travis were aghast. They are the Tolkein geeks and couldn’t comprehend how Mister P. could not have understood this basic plot point.
At this point, a plot was hatched to teach Mister P. the finer points of Tolkein. The plan was to watch the extended DVD version of Fellowship of the Ring with Mister P. and stop the film whenever a point needed clarification. I had questions too and was invited to the discussion.

Travis volunteered his home as the location of the viewing. Kim, Travis’s girlfriend, graciously allowed this to take place in the house and even let this map of Middle Earth be taped to the wall. I must say, the map made things a lot more clearer.

Travis and Brad prepared 26 sheets of information on the characters and places in the movie for Mister P. to peruse during the film. Quite a resource if I do say. They were quite nice with pictures and text.

Here you see Mister P. (center) listening to Travis (right) explain a detail. Look at the suspicion on his face.

After spending about five hours watching the movie, Brad was shown the beauty of the LotR video game on the X-Box.
Overall, it was a fun time. Watching movies with friends and agreeing to stop the movie and discuss points is a lot of fun. I can only imagine it is something like film school.

Killing Nazis

Last night instead of doing much productive, I ended up watching Dogtown & Z-Boys, a documentary about the early skateboarding scene in Santa Monica in the 70s. Amazing stuff. Lucky for the world, Craig Stecyk and Glen E. Friedman were there from the beginning with the Z-boys, armed with film and movie cameras to record everything. It’s an impressive glimpse at the crew that brought the world everything we consider to be an Extreme Sport. It’s on cable, so set your Tivo to snatch it up. It’s also on DVD if you want to Netflix it.
After the movie, I got into my Nazi Killing groove. I understand some of you don’t understand what I mean when I say that. There is a game called Battlefield 1942 in which you play the role of a WW2 soldier circa 1942. You can use a multitude of weapons, including tanks, artillery, and even aircraft.
Here’s a picture:

Here you can see me about to execute a knife kill. In this type of game, getting close to the opponent and scoring a kill with a minimal weapon like the knife is a mark of skill.
Getting into the world of BF1942 makes me focus on the game and let’s the other stress in my life fade in the background. Michele doesn’t like the killing aspect of the game, but I find that it is a definite pressure relief for me.
In other news, some the people I met at SXSW have introduced me to Friendster. Friendster looks like it’s orginally intended as a dating/match-making service but is being used now as way to keep track of friends and see the inter-relations between circles of friends.
I haven’t spent alot of time examining the details or even writing about others yet (sorry Mike & Rannie), but it looks to have potential for fun. SO don’t be suprised if you get a Friendster invite from me someday soon.
OK, time to get ready for work. I’ve got a thrilling 9AM kickoff meeting about Forecast & Planning Software. Woo hoo! Who needs coffee when you have a meeting like that?

Dani Bunten

Salon has an excellent article on Dani Bunten. Dani was the creator the best computer game I ever played, M.U.L.E. She also made Seven Cities of Gold, a revolutionary game for the time that was the forerunner for all the RTS games that followed.
It is truly sad that a woman that brought so much innovation to gaming was stuck by cancer just as the internet opened up a whole new world of gaming.