adrianhon

adrianhon, 9 months ago to random

Adore this piece by
@annehelen about the gamification of health, which starts with a quote from me and goes way beyond that.

"I want validation for an unscheduled week — or month — on the calendar. I want a smartwatch that does those little explosive emojis when it sees that my body was tired and I listened to it."

"If you could design an anti-growth badge for an app or device, what would it celebrate?"

https://annehelen.substack.com/p/wheres-my-rest-badge

If my watch can measure something as complex as heat acclimation, why can't it offer a Recovery Mode? An obvious setting (not hidden under layers of menus) you can toggle on when you're sick, when you're rehabbing from injury, when you're forcing some rest after a big event - or that you keep toggled on it, for whatever reason, your body needs longterm rest. It seems so obvious and yet somehow impossible, as if these brilliant computers on our wrists have no capacity to understand a "goal" as anything other than the constant push for more. It makes sense, I suppose, that a running watch isn't built to anticipate the needs of someone who's not trying to run every day. But I don't stop wearing my watch when I'm injured, even though the 0.0 in the left hand corner of its screen taunts me. I know people who've stopped wearing their devices altogether during vacations or recovery periods or Covid because the reminders and encouragement to "keep moving" became too much to bear.
Give me dynamism! Give me glorious failure! Give me subdued lateral movement! What about the hard work of showing up for the same volunteer shift every week for years on end? Of building or rebuilding a friendship? Of quitting a high-paying dream job that made you miserable? Of reading so deeply you entered a flow state not dissimilar to what happens during endurance exercise? What if you want to be ambitious in the care you provide others? What if you want to work hard at being someone's Harriet? What badge do you get for that? I want validation for an unscheduled week - or month - on the calendar. I want a smartwatch that does those little explosive emois when it sees that my body was tired and I listened to it. I wish having enough time to sleep as much as you need wasn't quietly interpreted as a sign that you clearly don't have enough going on in your life ("must be nice!") I want to live with challenges, not constantly vanquish them and heed the expectation to take on yet another challenge. I want to decide for myself what's hard and worth pursuing, and when and if I do that hard thing, I want space to process and recover from it, too. I'm bad at that, but thinking hard about how to be better.
And so I'm wondering: What's an area where you feel yourself resisting the push to constantly grow? What have you noticed about your reaction and others'? How have you had to reconfigure your relationship with rest, and how has it affected your relationship with family members, friends, and coworkers? How do we square resistance to the growth mindset with the need to periodically do arduous things, either because they need to be done or because they feel good? If you could design an anti-growth badge for an app or device, what would it celebrate?

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

I know it’s cool to hate on the Galactic Starcruiser (aka Star Wars hotel) but it’s an idea before its time - bizarrely so, given Disney made it.

I already have over 3000 words just in notes - prepare for an epic writeup!

Me on a space atrium
Stormtrooper and Chewie
First Order officer and Rey

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

So, after just a few hours on the Galactic Starcruiser, I’m kind of amazed at what they’ve done - everything works surprisingly well! It looks good! The actors keep remembering my name!

Also amazing: a beer costs £13!!

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

This has never been fun for more than 3 minutes and I am pretty sure it never will be fun

https://www.theverge.com/2023/7/17/23798016/google-taito-space-invaders-world-defense-ios-android

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

From Threads/Meta’s perspective, dangling ActivityPub support to enable federating with Mastodon is a shield against regulators, that’s all - to be deployed at the last possible instance, in the crappiest way, as they always have done.

Anyone believing the contrary has ignored the past 20 years of history.

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

I cannot imagine making a game in this way

https://mobilegamer.biz/how-trailmix-took-love-pies-from-perpetual-pivots-to-record-retention/

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

A lot of Star Trek (e.g. Strange New Worlds) is basically steampunk at this point, in the way it merges future tech with old tech - basic voice recognition, clunky phones, screens with enormous bezels, etc.

Not a bad thing, just increasingly funny as time goes on. Starpunk? Spacepunk? Trekpunk?

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

I just had to do a bunch of Complicated Web Stuff while tethering on the train in the UK, and of course that happens while I’m going through a dead area near Darlington/Northallerton so it’s a mess.

Every time this happens I’m reminded of these people arguing against HS2, saying that we should add free high speed internet to every train instead. Surprise – we have no HS2 and no high speed internet…

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

Once again: if you are ever tempted to say "dopamine" when you mean "addiction", just say addiction.

Dopamine is way more complicated than being a Magic Pleasure Chemical, despite what armchair neuroscientists and psychologists would have you think.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/30/well/mind/dopamine-brain-behavior.html?unlocked_article_code=HQp-8Zo9znXWC5zwXCWJUyb6ksQohGgdBA_XHqNqS0qUQCp0sKY-bD7y7wItPwQZbiVHy6ijtVI9ybGU5-nAMJKQtfVhyWMVIrgQl6qSTtvJbfYlreaBvm0GIfFFOnz9vY1GPpiFsqDvKDsbh0-suLu3GwaDuX1Hfuk6pe8YJCLiq693Z9wzzjjxd5R1iq-qCZBcTvwV8zR0eEFRvj4u6_I3fV7Mk5PmQQnBvui03ROQmxg4BG02xBHBnZtKOs1YNOYYlTWCPoHHzN0w3-c02036fsk14mFJFrKNZi9s2bod_4rUGu3bylYS71NjcLhvpIeRish_iDaKtpbHsJ5ySj9bag&smid=url-share

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

Here's the thing with Elon.

At Tesla and SpaceX, he could hire engineers so passionate about electric cars and building rockets, so frustrated by the slow pace at other organisations, they willingly worked themselves to the bone and covered up for his many shortcomings. Quite how sustainable that is, we'll see.

But there are plenty of other companies with the same mission as Twitter. And software engineers are so sought after, he can't hire the best on peanuts. It can't work.

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

Museums wouldn’t do “Paintings: The Exhibition” or “Fashion!” and yet they insist on doing Videogames 101 again and again. Pathetic.

“There ought to be exhibitions on Myst and Surrealism; The Sims and interior design; Red Dead Redemption, Albert Bierstadt, and the American West.”

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-art-world/the-puzzle-of-putting-video-games-in-a-museum

adrianhon, 10 months ago to random

I’m a simple man, all I need is EXPO, a voice-controlled VR game set in an up-and-coming restaurant where you organise orders in the kitchen

adrianhon, 11 months ago to random

They don’t make ‘em like they used to – or maybe they do, but they’re all hypercasual games monetised by constant ads.

Come to learn about Super Hexagon, stay for a brief diversion on the last 40 years of arcade games!

https://adrianhon.substack.com/p/super-hexagon

adrianhon, 11 months ago to random

On shore leave while my starship’s docked

adrianhon, 11 months ago to random

1. Institution is accused of doing something wrong
2. People get angry on social media
3. Institution issues a brief apology, most of which is “our staff have been subject to personal attacks, which must stop”

Welcome to Corporate Emotional Misdirection!

https://mssv.net/2023/06/25/corporate-emotional-misdirection/

adrianhon, 11 months ago to random

Not to come across as a little grim given the timing, but Bellingcat's Online Investigation Toolkit is great inspiration for anyone planning an ARG or hacking/OSINT-themed game

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/18rtqh8EG2q1xBo2cLNyhIDuK9jrPGwYr9DI2UncoqJQ/edit#gid=930747607

adrianhon, 11 months ago to random

I know the real solution is “write a better story/dialogue and more distinct characters” and yet this is still cool and far better than juggling wiki pages on your phone

https://www.theverge.com/23768971/final-fantasy-16-active-time-lore-story