Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with Nintendo?

In the past couple of years Nintendo's little porcelain gaming machine has become the single biggest platform of the generation, and by no small margin, so it continues to baffle me that they do not support the games which they need to enure a stable and long term power base within the gaming sphere.

Titles with genuine depth and originality, of which Nintendo should itself ensure a proper level of market saturation for, are being ignored. Even workers at gaming stores were unaware of the existance of MadWorld the day of it's release, Sega had a hand in this issue, but where was Nintendo? Why have they not come in and helped make sure that everyone knows about games like this?

As the holders to the keys of the kingdom of Wii, why does Nintendo not guarantee titles with this kind of potential a serious television marketing budget? Nintendo continues to make obscene profits, yet it does nothing to secure it's long term viability as a platform.

Titles which have serious potential in the North American and European markets, which have already been releases inside Japan, are being ignored. Reggie Fils-Aime, the head of NOA, has on several occasions responded to this criticism by simply brushing them off, as if the titles are worthless and noone would play them, titles like Fatal Frame IV: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse, and Disaster: Day of Crisis, which both are under Nintendo's publishing control, will never come to North American, because despite the amazingly large sums Nintendo is bringing in, it is unwilling to support anything that isn't entirely focused on it's new, "family," image.

This concept has clearly worked rather well for them, with their Wii Sports title, a tech demo that grew too big for it's britches, being one of the most popular titles the world has ever seen. But it has also been a horrible choice for gaming, because it has put Nintendo into a mindset that things like Wii Music and Wii Fit are the direction in which they should focus, and Wii Music has been the single biggest mistake Nintendo has made since the Virtual Boy.

I seriously question the future of Nintendo if it continues to allow the timid people it currently has in it's lead positions to run the company's assets.

Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All Stars, a Capcom title with serious potential as a fighting game will not have all it's cast from the Japanese version in North America... If I had any control in the North American branch of Nintendo, the instant I heard that I would have looked into how Nintendo could help ensure that Capcom could secure the rights to use these characters, and I would make damned sure that you could not watch Power Rangers, Naruto, Bleach or Megaman without knowing that Tatsunoko vs Capcom was coming.

And where was Nintendo when Winter was looking for a publisher, does Nintendo not have money enough to throw at a survival horror game? Are they uninterested in the genre? With Nintendo's backing, and quality control, Wii would have a Silent Hill style game out and being enjoyed by now. But no, Nintendo is interested in WiiFit Plus and Wii Sports Resort.

It's such a shame that Nintendo seems to be under the control of cowards.

Another set of rules...

Stumbled upon another set of Internet Rules, I'll have to take a good solid look at them after I am done chewing the present list I am commenting on.

In a discussion, generalities are treated as absolutes.

Internet Rule 3: In a discussion, generalities are treated as absolutes.

The third rule of the Internet is for some harder to wrap their minds around than that of the first two, while the initial pair of rules cover the concept of self-centredness of users, the tertiary and it's kin are more related to the self-righteousness and hubris of users.  A link to the source material: Internet Rule 1 through 39  Which I have not linked in the prior rule-specific posts because I figure linking it every time isn't needed, but maybe someone reading this may not have started from post zero.

This is true of all places, be they real, online or metaphysical, but because interactions between users on the Internet are often delayed, the responses made by users inevitably jump to conclusions without considering the words used by their honoured co-discusser fully.  One would think the opposite would be true, in a locationless void where a discussion can take the better part of a month to complete, one would come to expect an absolutely engrossed and fine-tuned coalescing of thought every time a user makes a comment.

Should a user state, "women suck at sports," it is very obviously a generalization, and in a face-to-face talk, some may take offence to this statement, indicating several easily regonised examples of women so far beyond the abilities of the average man, as to make the statement not simply invalid, but silly.  In online discussions, the same may be attempted when a flawed generalisation is made, but does not always work, these attempts to correct a piece of faulty logic tend to be steamrolled over, ignored outright, or accepted without question.  Admittedly, this example is not so easily held up in a serious debate, but not all users treat a discussion with an equal level of commitment.

There are innumerable examples of flawed generalisations being used as centre points in arguments, but for this I shall make a singular example available, drawn at random from a Google search.  "White Men Don't Find Asian Women Hot," well, it's hard to put this to a perfect rest, since I don't have a study group, but we'll give it a whirl.  The argument:

The type of Asian women that white men consider hot are the Asian women who bleach their hair (like white women)to a reddish blonde or dark ash blonde color, get boob enhancements (usually), get eyelid surgery (to resemble white eyes), other surgeries (like nose, cheekbones - to mimic whites), and wear lots of makeup (Hollywood). Also, Asian women resort to fake eyelashes to make their sparse lashes seem fuller like some Mediterranean women with lots of hairy lashes.
Of course, white women do these enhancements, too, but they don't try to change their ethnicity like Asians do.
More natural-looking Asian women really aren't considered hot by white men. It's only the Asian women who try to look white that are regarded as hot, but at that point, it's merely the copying of the white image or the pursuit of the white image that white men find so hot.

Now, I find this unusual, because I myself find such things unsettling.  Women who look unnatural tend to give me the heebidy-jeebidies, because they look unreal, perhaps even surreal.  So, who can I call upon in this instance, at least to help fight this unusual perspective?  The Internet of course, Rate This Asian . Com, you're our new study group.  A shame you don't restrict your voters to only white men ages 18 to 45.

We look to the site's, "The Top 25 Hottest Women," to see what appears to be the most attractive 25 asian women this study group is being shown.  This site includes any women from Indian to Japanese, and anything you may find in between.

18 of the women popular in the top 25 have dark hair, 6 do not have a pronounced epicanthic fold around the eyes, 5 do not have b-cup sized breasts, 5 have pale skin, 2 have brownish skin, 1 golden pale, the rest are lightly tanned.  Nothing this poster seems to have stated, if we assume our study group to be white men, is actually holding water.  These people are pretty much just attracted to young asian women with athletic body types.  So no overwhelming hair colour issue exists within our group, and they seem to like women who seem to be east-asian, who look, "squinty-eyed," with lightly browned skinned, instead of darker skinned asians, such as Dravidians or snow white like Geisha dolls.

This does reflect the person's posting about the potential, "whitification," if I can call it that, of beauty, but the points in their argument, which they stated as fact, were in truth over reaching statements without real numbers to back them, there is a range of what appear to be preferred traits in asian women, and while some of those women look more european than others, it is not an absolute truth.

So Hawk, the original poster was, based on this flawed study group, not entirely right, and instead simply over generalised the way asian women are being judged, in this case, by small selection of random people from what can be assumed is a mostly english speaking base, since the entire website RateThisAsian.Com is in english.

I really wish I could have used a better source, but http://www.rankmyphotos.com/ and http://www.hotornot.com/ were awful websites I could not stand using, and I could find no better alternative.

Here ends my look at Internet rule number 3.

All media is pirated, if not prior to its release, soon thereafter.

Internet Rule 2: All media is pirated, if not prior to its release, soon thereafter.

The second rule of the Internet is closely tied to the first, and indeed, to some they are one and the same. This thin seperation between the two is present largely because not everything that is copied is pirated, though obviously all things pirated are copied.

Due to the constant development of new and interesting things, there is always something new and interesting to see or do on the Internet, and a part of this is because of the quick and easy to access nature of ditigal media.  Unfortunately for many, that quick and easy to access nature relates to even things they think are hidden and secure.

Many computers which run anything that directly connects them to the Internet end up being compromised, be it via worms, viri, trojans or some random combination of the three.  The effect of which can do many things, but one of those effects is the ability for outsiders to access otherwise hidden data on these computers, data which may include musical tracks, private company data, software, source code or any number of other bits and bobs which should be kept under a tight leash.  This leads to a great deal of products which are near or have achieved, "gold," status finding their way onto the Internet months ahead of their planned release date.

Songs which may never have been planned for release, or were not of sufficient quality for album release may at times find themselves all over the Internet due to these leaks, not all of which are caused by computer compromise.  At times these premature or even undesired releases come via mistakes by technicians or out of their own particular sense of rebelliousness.  Whatever the cause, these files go out, and are unstoppable, once they escape, the file cannot be brought back under the control of the originator.  Like the fired arrow, you cannot call it back, for unlike the arrow, it has multiplied a thousand-fold before you've even seen it.

While not everything is pirated immediately, everything that is worth paying to have, is worth not paying to have, and is thus pirated.  These later pirated versions of things are often modified to remove protective measures placed by content distributors, these digital rights management tools interfere with the use of the product and can often prevent valid users from taking full advantage of their purchases.  These cleaned versions of items quickly become popular, and are even downloaded by the owners of official copies of products.

An example of a site where one obtains these pirate files is the Pirate Bay, where one can obtain anything from the latest recording from a Gorillaz session to the newest Wii game.

And here ends rule 2 of the Internet.

Intellectual property ends upon entrance to the Internet.

Internet Rule 1: Intellectual property ends upon entrance to the Internet.

This is rule one when dealing with the Internet, remember it, if you have a good idea and you make it known, you only had a good idea, because it is no longer yours.  Anything anyone finds anywhere will be taken as being somehow magically public domain, and you as the creator no longer have control over the content you created, whatever it may be, no matter what medium used.  This is contrary to most law, but is an unstoppable effect omnipresent within the Internet.

If I make a drawing of an original character, whose beauty can only be described as insurpassable, both the character and the original drawing will quickly be duplicated and spread throughout the Internet, with many people citing it's source, but significantly more claiming original authorship and even more simply posting it with no claims or citations.

You give up your control of your work by, "sharing," it with the world, because there are alway people with less talent who wish they had it, who will poach your work.  So remember to either keep it private, or accept that it is not going to stay in yours.

This is also true of other media now, for indeed, the Internet is a pit of despair which consumes all around it, Television, Radio, Records, Films, Games, News Papers and more all are prey to the ravenous beast which is known as the Internet.  Media is regularly converted into digital form for the purpose of propagation, fans of programmes regularly digitize their favourites in order to help increase the popularity of them by ensuring easy access to clips and even full series.  An example is a site like Anime Crazy, which using websites such as Veoh share streaming flash versions of their favourite cartoons, translated by fans and uploaded by fans to increase their own numbers.

Remember this rule when visiting a site such as DeviantArt, where artists are allowed to share their work publically, pirates abound and are simply waiting for something they want.  These pirates exist on the Internet and will take the works they find there outside, back into the real world, and claim them for themself, profitting from your efforts.  Even something as small as your logo or mascot can and will be duplicated by unlawful and distasteful people, such as has been done by Naughty Vend, where they took a copy of a twenty year old BSD mascot.

Here ends rule 1 of the Internet.

And so it begins...

Ah, a blog, the worst and best of what the Internet has to offer.  Herein I shall post wisdom, grand wisdom, and pornography, oh, and comics, oh and things I thought about while masterbating to Star Trek fan-fiction!

Nah, I will just stick to the first one.  And as this is the first one, I shall greet the world's citizenry with the rules of the Internet, as put forth by the anonymous, but collected in many places.  My favourite is at http://nate.my-balls.com/?stuff=rules, but copied to here, since as rule 37 says, everything is copied.

  Internet Rule 1: Intellectual property ends upon entrance to the Internet. 
  Internet Rule 2: All media is pirated, if not prior to its release, soon thereafter. 
  Internet Rule 3: In a discussion, generalities are treated as absolutes. 
  Internet Rule 4: In a discussion, facts are used to imply their user's preferences. 
  Internet Rule 5: As a discussion grows longer the probability of the sexual preference of a participant being questioned approaches 1. Also known as lol fag. 
  Internet Rule 6: As a discussion grows longer the probability of a comparision with National Socialists or Adolf Hitler approaches 1. Also known as Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies, or simply Godwin's Law. 
  Internet Rule 7: In a discussion, facts are used to imply equivalence in their subject matter. 
  Internet Rule 8: In a discussion, key words are always omitted or ignored. 
  Internet Rule 9: A statement made with precision, tact and factual basis will be interpreted in the stupidest of manners possible. 
  Internet Rule 10: If a debate is going poorly, the weaker side will conjure their own facts. 
  Internet Rule 11: Regardless of any evidence, no matter how undeniable or absolute, you can never win an argument. 
  Internet Rule 12: A tangential discussion is vastly easier to have than an on topic one. 
  Internet Rule 13: The fastest way to lose an argument is to base your point of view in logic. 
  Internet Rule 14: Arguing with someone who is provocative and obviously baiting for an argument only fuels further arguments of the same type. Also known as Don't Feed The Trolls. 
  Internet Rule 15: Anything done, said, or made can and will eventually be subverted to be used against its proprietor. 
  Internet Rule 16: The more you show your opposition to something the greater its support becomes. 
  Internet Rule 17: Regardless of the situation, an increased level of cowbell, desu, lense flares, or midi audio will improve it. Also known as meme. 
  Internet Rule 18: Everything that can be labeled can be hated, and is by someone. 
  Internet Rule 19: Originality only lasts long enough for the first person to see it, consequently everything is old. 
  Internet Rule 20: If it looks like a trap, it is a trap. If it looks clear, it's a clever trap. Also known as Akbar's Law. 
  Internet Rule 21: Regardless of your online accomplishments, they will never amount to anything of lasting effect or importance. 
  Internet Rule 22: There is always something more disturbing than that which you just saw. 
  Internet Rule 23: Noone really knows who you are or what you do. 
  Internet Rule 24: Nothing is ever as anonymous as you think, even your neighbor has the Internet. 
  Internet Rule 25: If it can be said, it has, as text inside an amusing graphic. 
  Internet Rule 26: The purer a thing is, the greater the tenacity in its eventual corruption. 
  Internet Rule 27: In the end, nothing is sacred. 
  Internet Rule 28: Female sexuality is the only edge in an argument. 
  Internet Rule 29: Cheesecake is always better received than Beefcake. 
  Internet Rule 30: If it is ever in question, the gender of a user is male. 
  Internet Rule 31: The Internet is for porn. 
  Internet Rule 32: A version of the opposite gender exists of all male characters, while a version of all females characters exist with secondary gender traits. 
  Internet Rule 33: Regardless of what it is, there is an anthromorphic version of it. 
  Internet Rule 34: If it is or was ever a part of popular culture, or if it can be conceived, there is a pornographic version. 
  Internet Rule 35: No matter what it is, there is a fetish for it. 
  Internet Rule 36: No matter how outrageous it is, if it has even the smallest of percentages of profit on a transaction, there is someone attempting it. 
  Internet Rule 37: Nothing dies on the Internet, it is only moved or modified. 
  Internet Rule 38: The lowest common denominator always wins. 
  Internet Rule 39: People are full of shit, take everything with salt.