The Secret Lair

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As part of last year’s Google I/O, all the attendees received a free Chromebook, to be delivered after the hardware hit the market. I received mine last Wednesday. It was packaged nicely. The weight of the machine was pleasingly light, and their was not much more with it than the power cord and an external monitor dongle. I cleared the detritus away, plugged the machine in, and fired it up.

The screen was nice and bright. The keys felt a little on the cheap side…naturally, there is no back-lighting on the keyboard, but the keys themselves feel a little…Fisher Price. There’s nothing wrong with the size of the keys, and in face, I like the keyboard as much as the one on my old Macbook Pro. It’s the feel of the plastic more than anything. The unit is so light and so plastic that it feels a bit more like a kid’s toy than a piece of serious hardware.

I entered my Google ID, and the box let me in. That’s when I realized that this Chrome OS would never do for me.

It’s the Chrome Browser with a keyboard. That’s it. File storage is just storage…there was no way to even unzip a downloaded archive file. Unless you throw it into developer mode (which I did, naturally), there’s no way to get at the internals of the box for real. There is a file browser, but it’s sauce is weak.

On its own, the Chromebook would never work for me. It might be perfect for certain users, people who only use email, Google Docs, etc, and the same holds true for certain business owners. I can see why the low price would be attractive. But for folks like me, people who tools beyond the browser, the box is little more than a crippled laptop.

That being said, you should know that I’m writing this column on my Chromebook.

Why?

Well…as (bad) luck would have it, after I tested my new Chromebook, I went upstairs to get on my real laptop to get some work done.

I hit the power button.

It refused to start.

After a great deal of cursing, I finally found a use for my new Chromebook. I had to turn it into a real laptop. Luckily, there are a number of hackers out there who have solved the problem in a particularly useful way. I worked with the instructions, made changes as necessary (there are some small differences between developer mode on the CR-48 (the beta chromebook) and the released version) and two hours later, I was running Ubuntu 11.04 on the Chromebook.

After figuring out how to decrypt the old hard drive and move the files, I was happy to find that I now had an ultraportable, ultralight functional Linux machine capable of doing the majority of the tasks I need to do every day. I am, frankly, thrilled with it. The main drawback is the main disk partition is only 9G in size, but add an external hard drive and this is a perfect machine.

And the battery life! With an SSD drive, there are NO moving parts. This little machine has a battery life of six to eight hours, even on Wifi. Generally, I don’t need to take the power supply with me: I unplug in the morning, use it during the day, and then plug it back in before bed.

So…the Chromebook with Chrome OS is useful, if you don’t need anything more than a browser. but if you are in the market for an awesome Linux netbook, the Chromebook is a perfect buy.

Have you used a Chromebook? What did you think?

Gæt en smartphone - Del 2, CC BY 2.0 image by @boetter via Flickr

I’m taking a pause from my mini-tour through deck-building games as I scramble about to get things done before Balticon begins. As with several trips of late, the prospect of heading away for a few days raises a perennial question – do I pack up my glorious but cumbersome laptop to go with me, or can I go solo with my smartphone only?

This query is the start of a more interesting broader discussion, one that balances the natural affection many of us have to acquire shiny tech with the desire to be as streamlined as possible in lives that are packed full of Things That Need Doing. It’s no surprise that this is a conversation many people are having. In recent weeks here in The Lair, xinpheld touched on the impact that a smartphone acquisition has had on his life, we’ve discussed why exactly one of these newfangled tablet things might be worth buying to someone who already has a lot of machinery, and Overlord Miller has examined his experience trying a tablet to completely replace his laptop. Offsite, one of many examples is Mur Lafferty’s reasoning on actively reducing her number of gadgets.

As to myself, I currently have a 17″ Macbook Pro¹ and an iPhone 4². Despite gazing a bit too long at a passing iPad or drooling at Mr. Miller’s description of the Samsung Galaxy Tab, I have no serious inclination to buy a tablet as I have no particular role for it to fill. I’ll use my laptop instead of the phone when both are available, but I’m finding more and more that my smartphone isn’t just a stopgap for when I’m away from a computer, but can actually replicate the desktop experience in many ways. But is it enough right now to ditch a computer altogether? Let’s break down what I actually need a compu-tronic device for³:

• Interwebs access: The iPhone is hampered by Apple’s asinine business-driven lack of support for Flash, but otherwise does a fair job accessing the web. For ease and compatibility, I’m currently wedded to Google for email and other services, and their latest iteration of the mobile sites for Gmail, Calendar, and Reader nearly duplicate the ease and functionality of using them in a full computer-based browser. One of the biggest issues with the lack of Flash support is being unable to display video encoded by most non-Youtube services, although both Netflix and Hulu are supported through apps. Also, apps allow Twitter, Facebook, Skype, and other flavors of instant messaging to work just as well as on my laptop.
• Physicianly work: Via an app, I can access the full remote version of my hospital’s electronic medical record from my phone. Although the interface is a bit touchy, the program is otherwise identical to what I would pull up on any hospital computer, allowing me to do the usual doctorly things – write notes, prescribe medications, and confirm orders, just to name a few. My hospital also uses Groupwise⁴ for internal email and scheduling, which I normally access via web interface when offsite on my laptop, however the phone app version actually has a swifter, smoother interface than the desktop iteration, and so astounds me by working better.
• Gaming, baby: I’m not currently using a computer as a gaming platform; that dubious honor goes to the Xbox 360 and PS3⁵. There are several mobile-specific games that do make my phone a destination device for brief spurts of gaming, however, including the previously praised Drop 7, Canabalt, and DodgeDot, among others.⁶
• Other programs: This is where the phone dies in comparison to my laptop. Document management is a big part of my personal workflow, and on the phone, any sort of document editing is remedial at best. Creation of slide presentations, which I frequently do for various talks, is right out. Additionally, recording and editing of audio for podcasting or other work is totally off the table.

Of course, aside from the above, there are other issues that hold any smartphone back from being a true computer replacement, the biggest of which are processing power, screen size, and ease of interface. To some degree, all three of these are addressed by current and upcoming tablets, as well as portable keyboard solutions⁷. That said, tablets are still stuck in a limbo state – they can do the same things smartphones do, only faster and better, except they don’t let you talk to people like a phone; they can do most of what full computers can do with a better form factor, but they aren’t to the point yet of handling robust programs or graphically intensive games.

What I would love to see in the near future would be a single device that is a smartphone/tablet combination. The tablet would have a built-in lightweight keyboard interface, and enough power to handle fully functional programs for document creation and audio editing. The smartphone component could be easily undocked from the tablet for ease of use, but otherwise the two pieces of hardware would share the same core data, and benefit from the tablet’s better processing power and storage when docked together. That’s my ideal device⁸, at least for the moment.

As to Balticon, the phone will not be going solo, and the computer will be coming with me. Perhaps if I was flying instead of driving, and not giving a slide presentation, I’d go that route – after all, the phone does the basic computerish things well, and allows me to access everything from the hospital at least as well as I could from the hospital itself⁹.

Have you ever gone smartphone only, without a computer of any kind? If you have, were there any surprising successes or abject failures in doing so? Do you even think it’s possible to consolidate all of your tech needs comfortably to a smartphone in 2011?

1. Purchased while under the compulsion of lust for a large monitor, which overwhelmed the more sensible brain regions that were trying to point out that a smaller device would cause considerably less back strain to carry around. [↩]
2. I’m not an Apple fanatic, but at this stage in my life I’m interested in gadgets that are slick, reliable, and don’t require much troubleshooting. Apart from seeming to discover a new error every time I sync my phone with iTunes, Apple’s iStuff suits this busy consumer nicely. [↩]
3. This is entirely separate from all the other neat things smartphones can do that desktop or laptop computers typically do not, such as GPS functionality and other mobile app specific awesomeness. [↩]
4. Which I loathe. Because it deserves loathing. [↩]
5. As a former PC gaming snob, this is pretty much heresy. I try not to think about it too much, and do self-flagellate on occasion. [↩]
6. Angry Birds is not one of these. Please. I have a standard or two. [↩]
7. I was excited to get the Thinkgeek Bluetooth keyboard case for my iPhone for Christmas. I was dismayed to discover that it tripled the bulk of my phone and was awkward to use, so gave up on it after a couple of days. [↩]
8. Well, that and it being open source and DRM-free, of course. Fie on you, Apple! [↩]
9. It strikes me that this may be more of a damning statement against the current hardware status of my clinical practice than a compliment to my phone. [↩]

My laptop died about three weeks ago. It was a Macbook Pro, and was a real workhorse. I’m not surprised it died; I’ve configured it all manner of ways, including a Mac/Win/Unbuntu triple-boot at one point. Unsurprised, but disappointed — it was a nice piece of hardware, and I’m sorry to see it go.

This put me an a tough position. The Money Fairy hadn’t dropped off the bundle of bills that would enable me to buy a new one, and in reality, I wanted to reconsider my computing strategy. Things have changed considerably since I bought my MBP; I do not spend as much gaming, I do not spend as much time writing code, and in truth, I do not spend as much time on the computer as I used to. Even as my MBP was marching toward oblivion I had switched completely over to Linux save for a few activities (Netflix, for instance), and so the idea of running right out to buy a new Mac or Windows machine really did not appeal to me.

I made a decision that surprised my wife and myself; I decided not to go buy a new computer. I have a small Asus Eee netbook which, while tiny, could be hooked up to a monitor and keyboard, and as I would in text this days, all I need to do was check email, browse the web, and use Vim, my writing environment of choice.  I could do all of that from the netbook, and while it was a little slow, it was preferable to hunting for a new lappy.

And so, I adjusted to not carrying a computer with me everyplace I went. It was an interesting, freeing feeling. As much as I appreciate the wonder of the Internet, I like being disconnected from it.  I prefer it to be what it is rapidly becoming; a background process for syncing my data, instead of a destination in and of itself. It was in this mindset that I went to Google I/O.

Anyone who follow tech news can fill in what happened next: at Google I/O everyone received a new Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. I was shocked, surprised, and a little bewildered when I unboxed the new tech; I wasn’t quite sure what to do with it.  Earlier in the month I purchased a used iPad (first gen) for my wife. I played with the device and it annoyed the little hell out of me. So, now I had a new one all to myself, running Android.  What to do with it?

I decided to see if I could use it to replace my laptop. When I returned from my trip, I set the tablet on stand and hooked up a bluetooth keyboard. Viola; I had an ultraportable writing device.

Here is what I’ve learned about using the tablet as a replacement for a laptop:

• The whole setup is less weighty than a laptop, which I adore. I hate lugging tech. I prefer to travel light, and this works extremely well for me.
• The form-factor is excellent for writing: I prefer to work on a paper-shaped space (8.5 x 11) and the fact that I cannot have difference windows up on the screen means less distractions.
• The pairing between bluetooth keyboard and device is a little flaky. Sometimes the keyboard doesn’t like syncing, sometime a glitch of some sort causes keys to “stick” leading to unintended repeaaaaaaaaaating letter s. I’ve had one situation where the only fix was to shut down keyboard completely and then re-pair it with the device.
• Thus far, I cannot use Vim on Android other than by using SSH to travel to a Linux server. I am taking steps to remedy this.
• I have not tried to hook up a bluetooth mouse, and I’m curious to see how that would work, if at all. I will say that tapping the screen to move the cursor around (due to a lack of arrow keys on the software keyboard) makes it extremely difficult to edit text with any sort of speed. The external keyboard helps with this, but because of this limitation, I’ve come to refer to my tablet as a first-draft device, meaning that I have to edit on my netbook if I want to make significant progress. This might change as I get used to working on the tablet; we shall see.
• Gaming is out, natch.
• Skype is tenuous.
• Audio recording and editing for podcast is not possible.
• It is a fantastic media-consumption device; I use an excellent RSS reader called Pulse that links into my Google Reader account and makes reading the news truly enjoyable; it has become my morning newspaper. For reading books I still prefer my Kindle (backlit screens are hard on the eyes), but for short stints, the tablet does the job admirably.

As part of the Google I/O experience we will all be receiving a Chromebook, and I’ll report how that device enhances my laptopless existence. The Chrome operating system should be interesting to play with, but as a command-line guy at heart, I remain somewhat dubious.

Do you have a tablet?  How do you use it? How have other devices replaced a desktop or laptop in your life?

Dropping 7. Or 2. We can drop 2.

This was originally to be a review of you’d-better-own-it-by-now-if-you-have-an-iPhone Drop 7, but quickly slid into the ranting of a discontented grognard when I discovered the news of that game property’s sale to a different company, and it’s subsequent tweaking. Hold on, let me get my beating cane¹… there we go. Let’s do this.

Time was, if you wanted buy a program for your home computer, be it a game or a word processor, you could go to the store and buy it in a box. This was very similar to how one would go out to buy, say, a hardback novel or an eggplant, and came with a similar consumer-minded set of expectations: the thing that you bought was tangibly yours to do with as you please, it was a final product that was professionally finished and complete, and it did exactly what you would expect it to². We have not entirely left this time behind us yet, but new methods for sale and delivery of software, as well as new devices on which to use it, have forced us to shelve this older consumer perspective is favor of wrestling with what ownership, copyright, and even “a finished program” mean in the digital age.

As an old geezer from the heady days of the early retail computer era, I lamented the original changes I saw with the rise of the Internet as a way to aid software distribution. The first steps were baby ones, taken with the screetch and stutter of modemry. These involved shareware/demos/smaller utilities, because there was NO WAY that people would be crazy enough to either distribute or receive full programs online((Well, someone who didn’t have a few days, a hundred floppy disks, and access to a BBS or five of that dealt in something called warez. Which was never me. Nope.)). What stoked my ire was the trend of developers realizing that this new thing gave them an “out” when it came to a finished project – no longer did the thing that was in the box need to work perfectly, or even be the final thing, as you could just provide a patch over the Internet for any problems once the software was released. Of course, business decisions being what they are, this led to cases of software being shipped in an essentially unusable state in order to meet an arbitrary sales deadline, with the assumption on someone’s part that this was okay to do because it could be fixed later.

Fortunately, as we have boldly stepped into the future, good business sense has often prevailed, and instances of such profit-focused shortcutting remain the rare exception. Also, the ever-increasing prevalence of high-bandwidth SKYNET Internet access and the always-improving tech specs of comp-u-tronic devices have led to digital distribution methods for entire, large programs³. That noted, interest of late has surged in creating more streamlined software optimized for digital distribution. The rise of the smartphone as a popular and viable platform has brought this idea to the fore, in the concept of the app. Central to the app idea is not just that it’s a program, but it’s a program that can be updated periodically to add new features, or overcome issues with a new iteration of the smartphone flavor of the week. The end result is a program that, depending on what it is intended to do, may never have a final version.

This makes sense for many apps, but for certain programs and games, once the developer gets it right, there’s never a need to issue another update⁴. But when one is wedded to an auto-update service like iTunes/the Apple App Store for us iPhone users, the potential exists for a developer to not leave well enough alone, and decide to change a program that’s worked just fine for years for inscrutable reasons, yielding a net negative for the consumer.

Let us consider the case of the game Drop 7. *smacks beating cane into palm*

Drop 7 is my first recommendation whenever someone asks what to snag as a game for the iPhone. Owning a bit of inspiration from both Tetris and Bejeweled, Drop 7 is a puzzle game that involves dropping balls onto a 7 by 7 gameboard, using tactical number matching to clear the screen and score points. It strikes the sweet spot for a phone game – short, easy to return to if interrupted, and with just the right mix of luck and challenge – so much so that it’s my reflex to load it anywhere from a prolonged elevator ride to when a commercial comes on live television. Since coming to market in early 2009, it’s been critically well-reviewed and has made numerous Top-Whatever lists for iPhone games. Apart from tweaks for issues with new iPhone OS releases, it hasn’t seen any frequent updates, because it hasn’t needed any. I paid the few measly dollars, I played a ridiculous amount, and all was well.

At least, until a few weeks ago, when Area/Code Entertainment sold Drop 7 to developer Zynga, who then released an auto-update for the game, as well as a completely new version. And as the Internet is want to do, bad reviews commenced.

Zynga decided they needed to release a new version with “enhanced retinal display graphics”⁵, in both a free ad-supported version and a pay ad-replete version. By many counts, the graphics are apparently optimized for the retinas of hagfish, and furthermore, many users are experiencing bugs that make the game unplayable. Fortunately, as an owner of the original version, I am not being forced to download either of the new ones. Unfortunately, Zynga wants to push me towards downloading the new stuff, so released an update for my version that includes an obnoxious screen with the start of every game that asks if I want to download the new retinal-rrific experience. It only stands to reason that in the future, they may phase out the old app entirely.

While it seems a relatively minor quibble, keep in mind that I’m holding a beating cane. Also, it brings up an interesting side effect of auto-update services like iTunes, in that you may be repeatedly prompted to download a new version that you know is inferior to the current one. Yes, you can choose not to update that particular app, but anyone who has used iTunes knows that the momentum of the service is to update everything, and to retain an older version of any app is inconvenient at best.

Despite my grumblings, I look forward to the further expansion of digital software delivery, and the eventual death of going to a brick and mortar⁶ to buy a computer program. One of the biggest challenges will be for the consumer mindset to move away from the expectation of buying a box that contains the final, finished program. Digital delivery offers the promise of being able to deliver valuable new content and updates, as well as bug fixes, immediately⁷. One of the largest threats to consumers accepting this is the potential for developers to want to make changes to a stellar chunk of code for the sake of change itself, and being locked in to services like iTunes which don’t give consumers the easy autonomy to avoid unwanted updates. Here’s hoping that other parties in our lovely free market environment can develop delivery systems that allow for more robust user content and update control so that it’s just as easy to stay with a software version that works as it is to upgrade to a newer one.

At Zynga, I point my beating cane disapprovingly. But not for too long, because I can start a new game in the time this takes to upload.

Drop 7 gameplay video

1. I really do need a beating cane. Ideally, it would be a stout and true shillelagh, because I’m 1/8th Irish. Also, if I were able to obtain any superpower, it would be to project bolts of energy through said shillelagh ala Black Tom Cassidy, because, really, who wouldn’t do that if they could. Not I. [↩]
2. This is a separate issue from said software not working because the purchaser was an idiot didn’t ensure that it was compatible with their computer. From my ancient customer service and tech support experience at CompUSA, I can assure you that 99% of the software returns for “it not working” were due to user error, either in terms of trying to use a program on a system it wasn’t rated for, or something the user had done to the hardware or during the install that borked things up; it was a relatively rare thing for it to be totally the software’s fault. [↩]
3. Valve Software’s Steam service is a prime example from the gaming realm. [↩]
4. Barring the predictable future issues with a phone OS upgrade, of course [↩]
5. Really, the person who wrote that ad copy must have worked on Star Trek as one of the people who inserted tech jargon into scripts. [↩]
6. RIP CompUSA, specifically the Dayton, OH, store, d. 2007 [↩]
7. I would not at all be surprised if franchise programs, like office suites or sports games that put out a new version every year or few, eventually move to a subscription model to the end user, instead of requiring the purchase of a new program on a regular basis. [↩]

While I’m not the (some would say) extreme technophile that some others may be on this site, I do have my needs. One of those needs was a device that would compensate for my serious lack of adequate brain power. So about a month ago I leapt boldly into 2007 and got myself a smart phone, namely a Sony Ericsson x10a. Don’t run away; I’m not here to give a late-adopter’s review of the device – although I’m thoroughly enjoying it despite its quirks and Sony’s continued lack of a[n official] 2.1 Android upgrade. (Rooting? What’s rooting?)

I do want to talk about the Smartphone Experience, however. I feel like I’m now connected to another level of social communication that falls somewhere in between texting and Second Life (note: I just had to add ‘texting’ to my Word dictionary– see how far behind I am?). I already had a Twitter account, but that did nothing but fill up my text inbox on my cheaper phone far too quickly and I usually just had the feed turned off. But now I have Tweetcaster, so I can rummage through the follies of Wil Wheaton and Patton Oswalt, catch up on the doings of my connected friends, and pick up some words of wisdom from people I’ve stumbled upon along the way whose words do, I think, seem wise.  But mainly, for me it was a passing fancy.

That was, until #jan25 happened.

Suddenly, I was getting tweets from a number of people that I followed that we in or near Tahrir Square during the uprising, brute squad attacks and the subsequent dictatorial liberation of Egypt. Suddenly, I was a kid again, in my room with a transistor radio, listening in on the weekends to late-night talk shows and gleaning bits of knowledge and information that I wasn’t going to hear anywhere that an advertiser had any say as to the content. Suddenly, I was part of a noetic experiment involving global group will akin to mass prayer for a people who were all done with being held down under foot by a dictator.

It was the first time in a long time that I was actually excited by a bit of technology other than in a selfish, Bigger-Better-More sense. I have my own little crystal ball that opens a tiny window onto the entire world, as long as I point it in the right direction. Sure, Twitter’s not perfect; I’ve got to keep track of whom I’m following, dump ramblers (yes, I’m talking to you, John Cusack), and ban the occasional spambot. But it’s worth the effort, because you never know what the Next Big Thing is going to be, especially with all the dominoes falling across the Middle East.

On to subject number two – Foursquare.

I admit to being on approach to the level of Foursquare Junkie, but I think that’s mainly due to its newness. My wife and I are competing for mayorships in the various places we both frequent, and currently I own both our house and our church (I’m sure it doesn’t hurt that I made both of the check-ins for those, but I don’t know enough about the point system to know if it makes a difference, and, frankly, I don’t care enough to find out).

What I keep hearing about, though, is all the privacy worries. How can I possibly want to advertise where I’m at to the world? Aren’t I afraid that someone’s going to use the information to rob my house, knowing we’re not home? Aren’t I worried that the government is going to track me down?
Um, no. If someone wanted to rob us, they’d find a way. Frankly, I’d rather not be home when they attempted it, lest there be gunfire. And really, if anyone can glean anything of value from us, go for it. We leave the house unlocked, so don’t break the glass, please.

I have no issue with anyone knowing where I am. Really, my life is not interesting enough to have this be a secret at any given time. Then again, it’s not interesting enough for anyone to care, either, but that’s another problem. But I like using Foursquare to advertise for our favorite places, like the new Middle Eastern restaurant that just opened a couple towns over. If I boost their presence, I might just contribute to keeping them open, and then FALAFEL OM NOMZ FOREVER. And as a side note, the evening after my wife and I posted our Foursquare presence at the restaurant, we got Follow notices on Twitter from them. Go @AladdinsEatery!

As far as being hunted down like a dog, there are much better ways than Foursquare to make that happen. If anything, it could be used as a diversionary tactic, faking ones location somewhere else. Come to think of it, that might be a good way to find some private time for myself. “Of course I’m at the grocery store, honey – didn’t you see my check-in? The lines are just SO long…” *sips tea at Panera*

[ACTIVATE READER INTERACTION MODULE]

So do you have a problem with Foursquare broadcasting your whereabouts? Is Twitter changing your life, or just annoying the crap out of you? Do you even give a flying frak about smart phones? Discuss.

Due to an unfortunate accident, The Secret Lair’s official stenographer was eaten by a crocodile last week.¹ While our search for a replacement continues, it has fallen to me to provide show notes for The Secret Lair Episode 0009.² Unfortunately, I’m a very busy overlord lately and rather than delay release of the episode and further,³ I’m going to post the scraps⁴ I’ve got now and fill in the rest once I get an hour or so to myself.

April Fool’s Day

• Economic Stimulation Package. Did American Public Radio’s Marketplace play an April Fool’s Day joke on Chris?
• YouTube rickrolled everyone.
• So did Mahalo Daily.
• The Electronic Frontier Foundation is moving their headquarters.
• Twatr is an interesting new Twitter-clone…for your genitals.

WordPress 2.5

• …has a new administrator interface. Chris isn’t a fan.
• …has a new image/media management system…which doesn’t seem to work on The Secret Lair.
• …has a redesigned Write Post screen. We don’t much care for it.
• Kris has more to say about WordPress 2.5 on his blog.

Unquiet Desperation

• Unquiet Desperation is an online poetry ‘zine.
• It is also Chris’ blog and podcast.
• Awkward!

Minion Recruiting Board

• Thanks to P.G. Holyfield and Scott Sigler, we have a number of job openings at the Lair.
• Fill out our super-secret minion application form, if you can find it.

The Secret Library

• Our current novel is The Sky People by S.M. Stirling.
• Our current graphic novel is Shooting War by Anthony Lappé and Dan Goldman .
• NEW! At the request of our minions, we have decided to add a podiobook section to The Secret Library. Our first selection is The Pocket and the Pendant by Mark Jeffrey. Subscribe at Podiobooks.com.

RPGs

• The Dresden Files RPG bleeding edge beta continues.
• Gunnar scored some WarHammer RPG 2nd Edition sourcebooks and Half-Price Books recently.

Movies and Television

• Kris saw Spider-Man 3 and wishes he hadn’t.
• Chris says it was worse than Batman and Robin.
• Check out How It Should Have Ended. (YouTube)
• The Spectacular Spider-Man is on the Kids’ WB and is far more entertaining.

Housekeeping

• We have a feedback address, where you may send us feedback. At The Secret Lair. Dot Com.
• There’s also a contact form, which no one has used yet. Will you be the first?
• It is entirely possible to join our official community, should you be so inclined.
• Our theme music is “Skullcrusher Mountain” by Intertroubadour extraordinaire, Jonathan Coulton.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 44:03 — 40.3MB)

1. Let’s not be concerned with who may or may not have forgotten to engage the magnetic couplers in the holding environment. Pointing fingers isn’t going to get us a new stenographer and playing The Blame Game isn’t helping morale. [↩]
2. Writing the show notes is not punishment. As co-overlord, I’m above punishment, even if you could prove conclusively that it was me. Which you can’t. [↩]
3. What’s that? Maybe I should have delayed release of the crocodile? Oh, great. That’s very mature. How about this: maybe you should think twice before you go hiring your relatives, okay? People get eaten, gassed, disintegrated, mutated and shunted to other dimensions around here all the time, but when it’s your cousin it’s suddenly a big deal. [↩]
4. Shut up. Just shut up! [↩]

If you question the effectiveness of our Retrieval Squads, you may wish to ask Mr. Ken Newquist about his opinion on the subject. They came in the dead of night and before Ken was even aware that his home had been infiltrated he was subdued, transported to one of our Interrogation rooms and submitted to “methods of inquiry” that would make anyone even marginally acquainted with the Geneva Conventions weep.

Once satisfied that we had wrung every useful iota of information from Mr. Newquist, we wiped every memory of the interrogation from his mind—leaving only a powerful sub- and semi-conscious fear of all things related to The Secret Lair—and turned him over to our Detrieval Squad (which probably needs a better name) who returned him to his home.¹

In retrospect, Ken may not be able to provide the best testimonial to the effectiveness of our Retrieval Squads, but he can certainly attest to the thoroughness of our upgraded memory alteration hardware. More accurately, the recording we present in this episode of The Secret Lair and Mr. Newquist’s complete lack of memory regarding the same should demonstrate that the hardware works quite well indeed.

Our interrogation of Mr. Newquist (or, at least, the bits of it we’re sharing) was primarily devoted to roleplaying games, wikis and open source content management systems. While a roleplaying game about a content management system might be incredibly dull, there are certainly ways in which RPGs can benefit from web-based tools, and such is the core of our discussion.

Roleplaying Games

• Dungeons & Dragons
  • World of Greyhawk
  • D&D 4th Edition
• Mutants & Masterminds
• Savage Worlds
  • The Savage World of Solomon Kane
  • The Pirates of the Spanish Main
• WarHammer 40K
• World of Warcraft

Online Tools for Gamers

• The wiki, a tool that allows multiple users to easily create and link web documents.
  • MediaWiki is the software upon which Wikipedia and Mahalo are built.
  • The Griffin’s Crier wiki is powered by MediaWiki.
• The virtual table top, usually a client-server application, allows remote gamers to play pen and paper RPGs together.
  • OpenRPG is an open source application developed in Python that runs on any OS.
  • Battlegrounds: RPG Edition runs on Windows and Mac OS X.
  • The Screen Monkey GM server runs on a Windows PC, but clients need only a web browser.
• Play-by-Email
  • PBEM-Portal.com
  • PBEM Players
  • Groovy Gamers
• Other Tools
  • RPTools, a collection of tools to help with mapping, tracking initiative, dice rolling and more. [Kudos to Trevor for the link.]

Open Source Software

• Moodle is an open source Course Management System, an alternative to Blackboard.
• Drupal is an open source Content Management System with lots of module support.
• WordPress is the open source blogging software upon which The Secret Lair website is built.

Promos

• The Game That May Be
• Nuketown Radio Active

Ken Newquist is the editor of Nuketown and host of Nuketown Radio Active. His gaming column, Summon Web Scryer, appears in Knights of the Dinner Table magazine.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 47:11 — 43.2MB)

1. Mr. Newquist’s family was totally unaware that he had been abducted, such is the power of our new temporal arrestor. [↩]