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[ December 2007 ] | |
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TCHS 4O 2000 [4o's nonsense] alvinny [2] - csq - edchong jenming - joseph - law meepok - mingqi - pea pengkian [2] - qwergopot - woof xinghao - zhengyu HCJC 01S60 [understated sixzero] andy - edwin - jack jiaqi - peter - rex serena SAF 21SA khenghui - jiaming - jinrui [2] ritchie - vicknesh - zhenhao Others Lwei [2] - shaowei - website links - Alien Loves Predator BloggerSG Cute Overload! Cyanide and Happiness Daily Bunny Hamleto Hattrick Magic: The Gathering The Onion The Order of the Stick Perry Bible Fellowship PvP Online Soccernet Sluggy Freelance The Students' Sketchpad Talk Rock Talking Cock.com Tom the Dancing Bug Wikipedia Wulffmorgenthaler       |
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- tagcloud - academics [70] art [8] changelog [49] current events [36] cute stuff [12] gaming [11] music [8] outings [16] philosophy [10] poetry [4] programming [15] rants [5] reviews [8] sport [37] travel [19] work [3] miscellaneous [75] |
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- category tags - academics art changelog current events cute stuff gaming miscellaneous music outings philosophy poetry programming rants reviews sport travel work tags in total: 386 |
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- travel - Spent the 27th to 29th at Genting Highlands with five other 4O peeps, which reminded me of just how much could be done in three days, such as experiencing seventy-two hours of life. 27th December 2007 The journey began with the arduous navigation down to Lavender MRT, an undertaking remarkable if only for the unearthly hour in which it was attempted. Safely arrived alone at about 0630 hours, after an offer to band up was received when I was already at Raffles Place. Loaded onto a coach that suspiciously looked as if it had lost its way from NUS. Passed the border checks at the Second Link, had a chicken burger brunch at a rest stop named Kim Guan or something at about ten, bought copy of New Straits Times. Entertainment provided was a screening of 兄弟. That was followed by Elizabeth: The Golden Age, which brought bad dubbing to new, hilarious heights. The mangled English changed historical drama into riotous comedy, with poor Mary Queen of Scots accused of being guilty of "threesome" at one point (instead of the more prudish "treason"). 
Crystal Huang in 兄弟 by consensus a solid 8 Some floating bridge games, more snoozing, a lavatory break and a skipped rest stop later, the bus huffed its way up the slopes of the Titiwangsa Mountains, and we arrived on schedule at three. Malaysia never fails to give me the impression of unutilized space, with kilometers of forests interspersed with the odd dwelling. Very rustic. 
Trees, trees everywhere Endured a trying wait to check-in, before getting assigned rooms 19825 and 19826 in the First World Hotel (formerly the world's largest with over 6000 rooms). 
From left to right: twm, alvinny, triceo, law, me (colin took this photo). Inset of First World Hotel from Wikipedia (N.B. Faces here and later will be under mosaic as this blog could not afford the requested image rights from the pictured. Blame them for being 太帅了) 
Comfy enough, two beds, three guys each. Plus abstract art Late lunch at Marrybrown, though their Tower Burger was a tad smaller than it looked on the menu. Night saw Mr. A, who wishes to remain anonymous, exercise his gambling skills by making a 70% profit off a video poker machine. Dinner at Kenny Rogers Roasters, where to my chagrin I barely found the Chicken Macaroni & Cheese on my plate. Tiny serving. Not complete, just have a feel Big Breakfast at Macs, got the news that Bhutto was assassinated in Pakistan. Not that much of a surprise really. Alvin and law got a day ticket to the theme park, while I exercised my legs by standing for hours on end - surely the longest such exertions since sentry duty in NS, and maybe longer - observing the going-ons in the casinos. If one looks at casinos as a place to lose money, it is a wonder why they are practically a licence to print money wherever they are opened. Only, there is of course the possibility to turn a profit, however slight. The theory of gambler's ruin asserts that since:
The disadvantage to players, if not explicitly refuted by the casinos, is at least not expressedly mentioned, and they seem happy enough to foster certain misconceptions about the games. The provision of notepaper at the baccarat tables and the helpful maintenance of the outcomes of the previous hands, for instance. Although I would think that there is no relation between the last hand and the next, the display of such information would suggest that smart players can read the patterns and ride on a streak or change sides when a switch seems overdue, giving the illusion of control - and who doesn't like to believe that he is smart? Of course, the pattern predictions will work sometimes, which further reinforce the notion that the game is "beatable" and next time, everything will fall into place. Hope, that most precious of commodities. Anyhow, it proved difficult to infer the finer points of baccarat from watching alone, though the basics of it being a modulo ten system was easy to figure out. For the record, the player and banker remain with two cards if and only if either scores an 8 or 9 on the initial draw of two cards, otherwise more cards are drawn - see the Wikipedia article for the full details. The house advantage is just over 1% per hand for straight player/banker bets. Carribean stud poker involves no decision making other than whether to play a hand, against the dealer who plays on A K or higher and folds otherwise. Interestingly, the house edge appears to be over 5% although A K doesn't feel so difficult to achieve - the four hundred thousand plus ringgit jackpot for a royal flush is also alluring, though it was remarked that even with thirteen cards in the umpteen games of Bridge and Big Two we have played, a royal flush was almost never seen. Pontoon (a Blackjack variant) differs from the above games as players' decisions to draw cards may directly affect the fortunes of all other players, as they change the cards that the dealer eventually gets. Things can get get a bit uncomfortable when the other participants try to influence decisions from evidence of revealed cards, though thankfully this does not seem to occur often. Some participants got into the spirit of things with shouts of "Picture, picture!", though I don't think it availed them much. Another difference is that pontoon admits active strategy, since the probability of receiving certain cards changes as additional cards are revealed. Indeed, the house percentage can be cut down to below 1% with proper counting and possibly even yield a positive expectation with good enough technique - but the variance is huge and requires a large initial bankroll to be worthwhile, and obviously the casinos won't be too pleased and can exercise their rights to ban the counter. Genting already uses continuous shuffling machines for all its card games, so the effectiveness of counting is drastically reduced. Only one brief altercation occurred which brought a mass of people moving towards its source. Definitely bad for business. The croupiers weren't an exceedingly happy bunch either, perhaps due to interaction with customers being frowned upon as a matter of policy, and in fact I only observed one guy who made the effort to inject some showmanship into his opening of cards. One of them even had a low-octane argument over his assigned shift with the pitboss while doing his duties, which required a translator as he knew no English and the pitboss knew no dialect. Can't blame the croupiers too much, as the casino management does not exactly give the appearance of trusting its employees - uniforms are designed with tight sleeves to preclude hanky-panky palming of chips or cash, and the croupiers have to reveal both palms each time they handle stuff to the eyes in the sky carpeting the ceiling. Then again, the nature of the business probably necessitates such precautions. There were a couple of highrollers who put in excess of a thousand ringgit (approx. S$440) a hand. Now that would be some thrill, but I can think of better ways to use money. Pizza Hut for dinner and some walking around the mall. Prices were at or above Singapore levels sadly, with a Manchester United home jersey at 299 ringgit (S$130), about one and a half times the price at Queensway. Watched National Treasure 2 at the cineplex, and as with action films of this sort credulity is stretched thin. Quick question: Would you break into the private residences of a head of state or even kidnap the person on an unproven and vague clue? Well, that is why most of us aren't treasure hunters - we wouldn't have the luck to splash water on exactly the right bit of rock on a nondescript plateau with some bottles of water either. It was then back to the casino for more observation, before retiring at 4 a.m. Our little group got a furtive "Pssshhttt (thanks edchong for duplicating the exact sound effect), 你们要小姐吗？", which was of course ignored. 29th December 2007 
Alvin bids tata. Note Law's matching colour scheme Woke at eleven, BK breakfast, then tottered around the arcade till two-plus. Loaded on the same bus that got us here, which screened I Am Legend for the first half of the journey back. The empty cityscape made a strong impression, though the CGI Infected zombies still had a bit to go. Zombies appear to have sped up of late, as the traditional ones moved at a shamble and simply aren't much of a threat if the humans walked slightly faster away from them and not scuttle off to the nearest corner to scream their hearts out. Since Will Smith has access to an entire armoury, it would have been slightly unfair not to upgrade the zombies too. 
The Petronas Twin Towers in the distance 
Chicken biscuits as recommended by Law A brief local produce shopping stopover, then a repeat screening of 兄弟. Discussion turned to whether counterattacking with a gun at the back of one's head is feasible, from a scene in the movie. Research in The Elite Forces Handbook of Unarmed Combat page 153 maintains that having a firearm pointed at one's head is in fact better than having it at the torso, since the head is quite a bit more mobile. Of course, the enemy actually preferring a live capture helps a lot (which could be assumed to be the case since the trigger has not yet been pulled). Cue Tip #7 for being an Evil Warlord: "When I've captured my adversary and he says, 'Look, before you kill me, will you at least tell me what this is all about?' I'll say, 'No.' and shoot him. No, on second thought, I'll shoot him and then say 'No.'" 
Use only when someone *really* doesn't like you Last meal in Malaysia was a Ramly Burger (supposedly banned in Singapore?), then automated clearance with a biometric passport at the Singapore checkpoint. Two elderly travellers were displeased with having their queue held up, and their belligerence was matched by a youthful customs officer who responded to their not completely unreasonable complaints with "你知道我是谁吗？", which was both rather uncalled for and amusing. Dropped off at Tang Dynasty where it took over half an hour to walk home. And oh, edchong, it's too late for you. The Hamster Fighting Machines are on their way now. 
(Click to enlarge - Source) Good luck.
- academics - + hamsters - So far, whenever I have felt completely sure of an A, usually by come combination of knowing one's relative marks compared to the rest of the cohort and a general sense of being completely in tune with the content, I have been proven right. The corollary which follows, as I have somewhat fewer As than I had hoped for, is that when I feel for some reason that I'm not going to get an A, I don't. Well, the post-mortem: Dunno: CS3208 Undergraduate Research in Programming - IP (In Progress). I sense sleepless nights. I see dead people. Oh, a zombie. In a mirror. Wait, that's me... Below Expectations: MNO1001 Management and Organization - This was the real surprise, and quite an irony since I might not have taken it had I been able to bid for Logic. My best guess is that the final total was a close-run thing on the order of several percentage points separating each grade band, as I didn't do too badly in the assignments that I got back. These things happen. Made some enjoyable acquaintances, as a consolation. Update: Kudos to sel for reminding me that I actually do have an option to S/U this. Repeat after me: Cheh! CS3212 Programming Languages - Less of a surprise, but kind of disappointing as I did quite well in the mid-terms. On balance I felt I deserved a bit more, but that's that. Not being exactly extremely enthusiastic about it didn't help either. My second core B. Met Expectations: EC3333 Financial Economics - The obligatory A+ for the semester. Straightforward and fun. Had the look of an A about it quite early into the semester. CS5340 Uncertainty Modelling in Artificial Intelligence - A. Was wary of this at the start, not helped by the dense readings doled out in bulk. Hopes were raised as the tests and assignments came back, which together with being awarded (joint) best project for the module led to high (and fulfilled) expectations. Exceeded Expectations: EC3332 Money and Banking - Though just an A-, I've learnt to be wary of being too optimistic about essay examinations. The average mid-term results lowered my hopes, but a very high essay assignment score balanced that out somewhat. Still not completely sold on macro techniques, though. SAP after S/U MNO: 4.50 (sad) Overall Comments: Not as good as I had hoped for, but looking at the bigger picture it didn't make a real difference - the key remains to score As in both my UROP and HYP (which needs a minimum A- anyway). With decently high backup from the (not that many) remaining modules. On the bright side, my CAP for postgraduate computing modules remains at 5.0, giving me an almost imperceptible nudge towards further studies. Then again, I believe the required average for a grad student is only 3.0 or so, so it may just be that they 放水 to their juniors and concentrate on their theses instead. Another observation is that seven of my eight Econs modules taken so far have been A- or above (four A/A+). Which matters not a whit since my degree in that won't be a Honours one. At least it looks nice on the transcript... Reliving Man Utd's late comeback against Bayern yesterday on ESPN was nothing short of inspiring - it sure ain't over by a long shot, not yet. They sure did ride their luck as Bayern hit the woodwork twice, however. Time to find solace with the hammies. Sharing a seat on the wheel Hams: Welll? I: According to a BBC report, "...Russian Dwarfs are best kept apart. They will fight, and it will definitely be to the death, followed by decapitation." I trust this will not occur with you two? C: No siree. The first rule of Fight Club is, you don't talk about Fight Club, sir! Oops... Blogger's Note: Triceo's experience with his hams was more towards disembowelment. I: Next, your names. I take it that you two are not happy with being known as "Number One" and "Number two" for the rest of your lives. And 小黑 and 小白 appear out too. WW: All too right. I: Well, you two will be Ham and Bacon and Fish and Chips until we can come up with better alternatives then. Hams: What?! You capitalist, imperialist, ham! I: Guess you two don't like the half-American, half-Fish & Co flag on your territory, huh? Well, one last bit of business for the day. You two got to pick a soccer club to support. Full freedom of choice - here's a list of Premier League sides to pick from. *Hamsters study league table intently* C: Totten Ham sounds nice. WW: I will go with Full Ham. *Burp* I left without the heart to inform them that the "-ham" suffix denotes a settlement (hamlet?) and not a hamster, but they probably wouldn't believe me. They already rolled over laughing uncontrollably when I suggested that God resembles a human instead of a hamster. Ah well, it happens that their two chosen teams will meet at White Hart Lane tonight, but the odds are unattractive. It was just as well as I skipped my virtual punting for the weekend, as the banker on Newcastle vs. Derby that I would have taken didn't come off as Derby drew. No such luck for them against Liverpool. I'll take an 18% overnight interest and run. $100 on Liverpool to beat Derby (at 1.18) A teeny fraction of the price of Christmas - $78100.10 to be exact.
- cute stuff - + hamsters - I've always been partial to pets, but had not been able to accrue sufficient merit to petition for any of the furry kind in my childhood - which may be as well, since my few attempts at fish didn't turn out too well, once supposedly falling prey to good-natured attempts to feed them detergent (but we were very young then). One of the benefits of being almost twenty-four is having an unspoken right to introduce new members to the household (provided they are cleaned up after) - and so after my cousin brought home an admittedly rather rusted cage and suggested that we get some hamsters, I was hooked. Okay, a bunny would have been better. Still, one has to start somewhere. Today then saw a trip down to a local pet store, where we had an eyeful of the fuzzballs on show, then down to Jurong Superbowl where my cousin conveniently egged me on to bowl a couple of games (a surprising 153 with a Turkey in the first, going back sub-100 in the second). There was a pet store there too, which unfortunately only had a tiny selection, but we did purchase a wheel there. Back at the original store, it was 3 p.m. and time to get down to the serious business. Zeroing in on a tank with three particularly fine specimens (one Campbell's and two Winter Whites), the interview began. Interviewers: Okay, how old are you lot? Hamsters: One week, give or take. I: (Unconvinced but recognizing the futility of finding the truth) Hmph. Well, your qualifications seem in order. What are your expected renumerations? Campbell: That tank over there as housing (points to most expensive available), for starters. Winter White 1: Half a standard cup of assorted seeds daily. Winter White 2 runs around wildly when poked. I: That's asking quite a bit given the tight property market, but deal, since you lot are darn cute... H: Cute??!! Man, that's a speciest comment! We are absolutely, certainly, 100% confirm-chop-guarantee not cute! Okay? (shakes teeny fuzzy butts and waves teeny paws and stamps teeny feet) Blogger's note: Now where have I seen *that* kind of response before... I: Fair enough, we take that back. I guess we can work out the other details later. If you two could please place your pawprints here... Campbell and Winter White 1 do so, Winter White 2 runs around wildly when poked. C: Hey, haven't we forgotten something? What are our insurance benefits? I: S$15. C: How did you lot come up with that figure? I: That's exactly how much it'll cost to replace you. C: Um. WW1: Okayyyyy... C: And the working conditions? I: We boast an exactly 100% pet mortality rate. WW1: Um. C: Is it too late to back out yet? WW1: (Hopefully) The half a cup of food a day is guaranteed at least, right? I: Of course, but you understand that it will be taxed according to your wealth bracket, which is astronomical since it is based on your lodgings. And we have the goods and services taxes, wheel taxes for using the wheel, waste disposal taxes, water taxes, you name it. And of course we keep some of it just in case you two outlive the normal hamster lifespan, so we can dole them out to you later. There is a great squeaking and throwing up of paws, but the two new foreign talents (Campbell and Winter White 1) are transferred into a paper bag as stipulated in their contract. And Winter White 2 runs around wildly when poked. With the interview satisfactorily concluded, management now feels it safe to reveal that WW1 was chosen by my cousin for the reason that it does not move a lot and is easy to catch (against some conventional wisdom), and the Campbell was chosen by me since the other WW2 was hard to catch by logical elimination, and moreover the dark stripe on the Campbell made it possible to tell them apart. And the Campbell made a cool buzzing sound like a spluttering electric razor when handled, as opposed to the deficient soundboxes on the other two. Without further ado, the landed property that they sold their souls for: 
Two storeys in prime District Ham We had done our research, and given the balanced pros and cons of wired vs. clear plastic cages it seemed prudent to take half of each. An exercise wheel is a must (visit Lucy of kilometres' fame), as well as a sandbath (hams don't clean themselves in water), a solid (not wired) floor, and hideouts. All accounted for. As a bonus, there's even a tube leading up to a second floor, and the wheel even matched the colour scheme of the tank exactly. 
Winter White 1 meditates contentedly in the bathroom, in the Fuzzy Ping Pong Ball yoga position It was remarked that our pets fit the owners' personalities - my cousin's Winter White went straight for the yummies and then attempted to burn off the calories almost immediately on the wheel. My Campbell snuck off to the yellow tubing, planted its ass there and didn't move for an hour. 
*Definitely* an INTJ Then, WW thought it would be nice to cosy up for a little bit, and the two ended up occupying about three percent of the available floor area for a long period. If we had known that would be their favourite hangout, we would have asked to buy just the tubing, to heck with the shiny tank. 
Get your butt out of my face Here's a close up of WW doing it's usual pigging out in the food bowl: 
Hey, you take that back! I'm not fat, I'm just big-boned! In fairness it's no slouch on the exercise wheel: 
A mandate to lose weight And here's the waterbottle they suck from. We originally thought it was faulty since it didn't have a ball bearing, but it turns out that surface tension is enough to keep the water from spilling. Live and learn (the hamsters did too, as they initially tried to get water from the black neck). 
Slurp In case anyone was wondering, they are both males, so there shouldn't be baby hams to worry about. Fingers crossed that they won't get overly territorial as they mature, though, and we've explained the thing about Section 377A in Singapore too. But they are social creatures, that's for sure - here's a parting video of them in the bath together: PANDA WRESTLING? You kidding me? Hampsters are the way to go
A first requirement of my planned MMOG would be the functionality of accepting and executing text commands. Yes, there will be a cool-ass interface, but in the end those are just shortcuts to individual commands. So yesterday's mission was to whip up a simple parser, which for ease of development allows only a subset of "safe" characters as input, and assumes that all commands will accept a fixed number of arguments, which saves some trouble with quotation marks and whatnot: Haven't added any customised alias capability, but that can wait. On the bright side, I remember my last attempt at parsing took me a few days back in JC, so maybe I've really gotten faster with Perl. It is a reflection on the state of the Internet that a bunch of by all accounts normal netizens can get together and casually start to wonder, "hey, how many five year old kids can I beat up in a fight?" and after thousands of discussion posts, spawn a website to estimate the right number. I know I shouldn't have, but... Which seems a bit on the conservative side. The discussion can then be extended to how much one's dead body will fetch after the Zerglike tykes finally overwhelm one (okay, I think this assumes the body is in good condition): $4990.00 Not that shabby. And the bad parenting warning of the day:  "It was actually kind of cute when they fell... They could have been in a Disney movie" (Not sure if the pics were for this case)
- cute stuff - programming - Finally found the time to catch up on my backlog of match reports for my Grilled Birds team, with it happening to be leading the league for once a great motivator. Thinking up dozens of stories at a stroke was a pain, but that's what happens when one gets lazy for more than two months. I had to first fix a bug with calling the Linux calendar (cal) command, which had worked dutifully for three years before silently breaking without warning. The first step was to make use of the technical support that my delightful web hosting company set up just for these purposes, and I put in a request ticket asking if I still had access to /usr/bin/cal. It wasn't what I would describe as a scripting problem, but that was the closest category I could find. Ten hours later, I was the proud recipient of a polite templated reply appreciating me for my business, and informing me that scripting unfortunately isn't within their support boundaries, so would I please bother my webmaster if I had one, and oh would I be so kind as to complete an online survey? Figuring that I was unlikely to get a direct yes/no answer since I had already pared the query down to its barest form, I shrugged and set about writing my own cal program as a Perl subroutine. How complicated can the Gregorian calendar be, anyway? Duplicating a standard Linux command was a good time to put the C/Unix philosophy into practice, and I find that those words of wisdom are relevant to most programming tasks. The most important mantras are:
With that load off my shoulders, it was time to indulge in some trivia. Did you know that the World Wide Fund for Nature sued the then World Wrestling Federation over their common acronym (WWF) in the year 2000? At first blush it would seem that most people would be hard pressed to be confused given the difference between their agendas, but a more complex explanation may be at hand. 
The WWF has unveiled its masterplan to break into the lucrative professional wrestling industry with a bevy of trained panda wrestlers (hey, you didn't think the use of a panda in a classic wrestler's crouch on the WWF logo was coincidental, did you?). A training match at its Japanese farm territory attracted positive responses, with smarks in the audience surprised with the level of technical ability on display. A brief list of moves to watch out for in the above clip include: Move (Time) Somersault Escape 0:20 Chokehold 0:40 Pushing out of the Ring 0:50 Attempted Pin 1:12 Hand Prodding 1:20 Denying Reentrance 1:38 Great Reversal 1:50 Butt Attack 2:18 Catching Breath 2:25 Stomping 2:40 Selling too Hard 2:43 Escape! 2:49 Slapping 2:55 Just Lost Balance 3:33 Lunge! 3:41 Rolling Kick 4:02 ... Or it could just be two baby pandas having some innocent fun in a zoo. Well, there were other real headlines like students choosing easier classes, World of Warcraft now not only helping to survive moose attacks (see recent posts) but also in the jungle of the business world and "refugees" collecting moolah from the UK to set up shop back home (in which case why the heck are they considered asylum seekers?), but they're not nearly as fun, are they?
Perhaps it would be wise to settle down to several days of completely guilt-free finding of roses to smell. Got started on Claymore after finishing Eyeshield 21, and just completed reading that too. Synopsis: Shadowy nameless organization trains kick-ass female half-fiend warriors (with the requisite bod, looks and gear) to execute the real fiends. Come to think of it, when was the last time I saw a properly average-looking/fat girl in a comic or game? Ugly, stout or downright obese guys are a dozen a dime in contrast. Oh well, it figures that figures like Croft figure in healthy financial figures. 
Claire, protagonist. (from Claymore Extra Scene) The premise isn't completely without precedent - Fans of Dune will catch the similarities with the Bene Gesserit (indeed Claymores are also known as "(silver-eyed) witches"), a sisterhood of frightening abilities, though perhaps they are closer to the Honored Matres in physical/mental balance. Like the Bene Gesserit, Claymores are composed of females only, though for Claymores the reason is that the males were found to Awaken into greater fiends far more readily, while for the Bene Gesserit the males' access to "the part that takes" rather than "the part that gives" in the soul results in them not being able to survive the Spice Agony and gain Other Memory. If that isn't enough, The Wheel of Time also plays on the same concepts, with the Aes Sedai wielding saidar, the female half of the One Power, while there are almost no male channelers remaining due to the taint on saidin. Now, what did they say about there being nothing really new under the sun? Sadly, Robert Jordan has passed on, so the series will have to be tied up by another author. Back to the Dune bit, Dune actually has a direct reference in Hellsing - heard of Seras Victoria's Hellsing ARMS Anti-Midian Cannon 'Harkonnen'? Personally I'm not sure if I like this sort of cross-referencing... 
What's it with drunken prawns? Been thinking a little about how to attract users on Facebook now that the App Rush is petering out. Our professor for the module has jokingly pre-empted any attempts with naughty stuff in the information session, but a cursory check on the stats shows that human nature isn't so easily swayed - over a tenth of the whole Internet is pr0n? Wow. A quarter of all search requests are for pr0n? Double wow. This topic was covered (or uncovered) before here, too, so feel free to take a peek. Looking up may not be the answer, unfortunately. By the way, at least one of our ministers is so morally upstanding as to have never, ever, indulged in this weakness. I guess they do deserve their exceptional pay after all. Today's EPL predictions - these matches are overshadowed by Super Sunday's Big Four Free-For-All tomorrow, but what the heck: Portsmouth 1 Tottenham 1 Birmingham 1 Reading 2 Derby 0 Boro 2 West Ham 1 Everton 2 Man City 1 Bolton 0 Wigan 0 Blackburn 2 Sunderland 1 Aston Villa 1 Fulham 1 Newcastle 3 Quite a few of these were plucked out of the air, and the few I have any bit of confidence in are: $25 on Boro to beat Derby (at 2.12) - over evens for someone to defeat Derby? I'm in (no disrespect intended towards Derby supporters) $25 on Man City to beat Bolton (1.77) - City will lose at home eventually, just not today $25 on Portsmouth to draw Spurs (3.20) - Tottenham have got to live up to their potential once in a while
Not a talker. Forgets names. Stubborn. Ring a bell? Today's rare no-strings-attached post is on personality, in particular the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) ones. There are sixteen types defined under this system, and the tests I've taken so far all agree - I'm an INTJ. 
The type matrix, and USA population distribution. (Source) Bearing in mind the normal criticisms applicable to personality tests and the Forer effect, let's see what an INTJ is and how accurately it describes me. Some traits culled from a bunch of sites [MyPersonality.info] [Lifeexplore] [PersonalityPage] [TypeLogic] [Similarminds]: Plusses: - Introspective (think so) - Analytical (think so too) - Determined (hope so) - Background leadership (hmm) - Strategic (hmm) - Knowledgeable (some things) - Decisive (reasonably?) - Open-minded (reasonably?) - Self-confident (some areas) - Attentive (when interested) - Responsible (things get done, just dun tell me how) - Punctual (on balance, yes) - Scrupulous (no comment) - Insightful (hard to measure) - Pragmatic (most things) Neutrals: - Theoretical (probably) - Observer (many things) - Perfectionist (when interested) - Independent (mainly thoughts?) - Skeptical (yah true) - Expects reason and directness (yah) - Respects competence over authority (yah) - Single-minded (guess so) - Values solitude (in more ways than one) Minuses: - Private (up to a point, or else this wouldn't be here) - Loner (relatively true) - Arrogant (tried not to. passed?) - Tends to be pessimistic (hmm, not especially) - Not very complimentary (very good, methinks) - Not much fun (what sort of fun?) - Socially uncomfortable (nail on the head) - Guarded (true) - Reserved (true) - Cold (on bright side, a little warmth does nicely) - No patience for small talk (well... wit or nonsense helps) - Does not talk about feelings (guess so) - Familiar with dark side (sounds cool) - Hard to impress (show me the bunny) 
Nah... (Source) Intrigued? Try a free test. Remember, it's not set in stone. Spent the first few days of holidays immersed in DotA (very few actual completed games, sadly) and manga. Currently reading: Eyeshield 21 at OneManga (thanks Alvin for the site). One kickabout session too, which reminded me of just how much I have to do to get in shape by 17th Jan for the IPPT. There's UROP and Facebook app stuff to be done too, lest I end up just trying to salvage the short term like this: 
Live to live another day... (Source)
- + gamedev - "A dead Chee Soon Juan will count as a human rights body." "Silence now, good folk, for I would speak of wonder - wonder clean, clear and bright, fit to tempt sages; Yet I will not tell of it with unadorned words, for even as you lot are soothed by the fire's warmth in this cold night, my voice alone will have not power enough to keep sleepy heads awake. And, as well we all know, it is bad luck to doze in the midst of a story, however poorly it may be told." "Neither will I tell it with pretty pictures alone, for then they would be tales of heroes past, in another place far away. I see some of you smile already, you wonder what magic-dust this poor traveler has to cloud your senses, what yarn he will spin that none of you have heard in one of the many alehouses dotting the shores of these immeasurable oceans. Close your eyes, then, and I will pass you into it..." Thus in all cultures listeners have sought the binding spell of the Storyteller, and as words bloom in infant tongues so do epics weave in upon themselves; But stories change but little in the retelling, or at least not hardly as much as they could have, and even if it be just a dream, people sometimes do wish to affect it, as it affects them. For known history, the Art flowed in one direction only. Enter the era of the MMOG. It has been a long-held ambition of mine to create an enjoyable multiplayer online game, and in fact the technical knowhow involved has been acquired years ago. Why then has no finished product been unleashed? Partly because of laziness, partly due to a perfectionist - or at least anal-retentive - streak that has seen myself hung up on details, and quite a bit due to the loneliness of being a one-guy production house. But the main part, perhaps, was not knowing exactly what I wanted to mould, and not knowing that, without a complete vision, I had not the confidence that it would be of any value. Clearly graphics could not be its selling point. Neither simplicity, since that is not my taste in games - it would be simple, but no simpler than it should be. Without further ado, a short series of considerations to take into account (sorta like the pre-pre-meetings of Dilbert fame): Catchupability Early lead - surmountable? If near impossible - rest of game not enjoyable, outcome fixed If doesn't matter - does putting in effort at the start matter at all? Examples: Daytona racing. Trailing cars somehow consistently able to gain ground to challenge again, whereas in real-life racing leads tend to be widened. Chess. Loss of a single major piece without compensation sometimes enough to yield a resignation especially at the highest levels. Skill vs Luck  Do you feel lucky today, punk? (Source) All luck games are by definition not improvable in, as they do not admit outcome improvement by strategy. Question: Is Rock-Scissors-Paper an all luck game? It is when at least one player randomly picks his hand signal, and thus any player can force it into an all luck game by doing so. However, it appears difficult for humans to naturally correctly randomize, as evidenced by tennis players switching service sides too often when trying to "mix it up", so it is not impossible that some skill is involved, especially in the context of a tournament meta-game where the objective is to achieve a significantly better than 50% winning percentage to advance to a later stage. Or at least that's what the RPS Society would have you believe. Interestingly they state that attempting pure randomness ("Chaos Play") has been weak in their tournaments, but perhaps it's partly because people who subscribe to this theory won't think that RPS has much meaning at all and are unlikely to participate? All skill games by definition have no chance involved in the context of the game. In these games, all significant information must be fully available to all players, with Chess as the prime example. As a consequence, however, these games are at least potentially completely solvable. Tic-tac-toe quickly loses its attraction because any half-competent players will always play it to a draw. Checkers is better, but also has been solved as there exists a computer program which will never lose. Chess and Go fare quite a bit better, luckily, and should continue to entertain for a while more yet assuming no exceptional developments in either computing power or algorithms. Many games are a mixture of both luck and skill. These games have the strengths that players gain additional interest in that it is possible to improve (on top of the enjoyment derived) unlike pure luck games, while also having the possibility of defeating better players (though risk aversity may suggest that most people feel worse losing to an inferior player...) This of course begs the question of why upsets can occur in chess despite it being an all skill game. A possible explanation is that player ratings in fact are continually fluctuating and cannot correctly describe a player's strength at every instant. Then, if a chess player is running out of time and uses his intuition to choose between the two best moves he has found so far, should this rightly be partly attributed to luck if he picks the better move? Good question. My answer is that although the player does not know the right move, if it is theoretically possible to compute it, then the action should be classed as one of skill and not luck, as it is the player's lack of (computational) skill that renders him unable to make the correct choice. Contrast with flipping a coin (without sensitive sensors to project its flight path), where no amount of ability allows for a solution. More Examples: All luck - Rolling a dice, tossing a coin (both when conducted properly) All skill - Chess and its variants, Go, Tic-tac-toe, other fully deterministic games Mixture - Poker, blackjack, backgammon, Monopoly, Scrabble, Magic: The Gathering, mahjong, DotA (esp random heroes)... More on Luck The challenge in a game would then be to incorporate sufficient luck to keep the game from feeling like an unfun calculation-fest, but not so much as to turn it into a glorified coin toss. This is no secret, and almost every computer game has a minor chance element, from guaranteed dodges and critical hits to special events and fogs of wars. A potential mental fallacy of note - time is often a factor when balancing the impact of luck. For instance, a single bonus Modern Armour unit might be a yawn in its own era in Civilization 4, but it would be a real powerhouse in the Middle Ages (if that were possible). Thus it is not "fair" to allocate everyone that bonus, but at different times. Another example is in Hattrick, where a superb youth player is far more of an asset to a team in its early stages than later on. In a new league, a single such gem might represent a few seasons' headstart in income, and be the deciding factor in early championship titles. Another fallacy lies in underestimating the level of luck involved. Take a RTS game with the usual trio of units - say pikemen defeat calvary, calvary defeat archers, archers defeat pikemen. It is often the case that a particular unit may only be produced from a particular structure, and thus switching strategies to counter necessarily entails spending the time and resources to construct the appropriate structure. Then, if the building time of structures dominates that of units, it may well be that the game is reduced to the mostly-luck aspect of correctly guessing the opponent's build off the bat. Human Psychology  Spot the psychological differences Some behaviours have been exploited for a long time in other fields, so why not in games? Just one example: Variable reinforcement has been known to produce more effort and takes longer to die out. If a lab rat gets a food pellet each and every time it pushes a lever, it stops pushing once it has enough pellets, and if no pellets are forthcoming the rat quickly figures that there are no rewards for continuing and stops. However, if the pellet falls after a random number of pushes, the rat can always cling on to the hope that it is just on a bad run and continue its pushing, even returning to the lever after long periods to try its luck again. This fact has (sadly) been used to attract gamblers to their ruin with slot machines, where occasional token payouts can convince them that the big jackpot is "around the corner". Less sinisterly, guess what happens when one reaps an enchanted item, or even an artifact, from a monster in Diablo II or most other RPGs? Yes, it's the same thing - the gamer returns to slashing at mobs with renewed ferocity after getting that fulfillment. The phenomenon is covered in more detail here, though I take issue with the author's assertion that "...No one would play Diablo if you needed to camp a mob that only sometimes dropped an item.". Hello, item runs? I will leave the many other psychological tricks for the reader to discover. Gamer Personalities  One man's meat... The famous Bartle Test (original paper) classifies gamers according to what makes them tick - one can be a Diamond who plays for running up huge scores and collecting great gear, a Spade who digs into and explores the game world hoping for quirky discoveries, a Heart who enjoys the social aspect and welcomes the virtual company, or a Club who wants nothing more than... to bash other characters up. Originally written for MUDs, it has proven applicable to other genres too. There are other terms (e.g. M:TG uses Timmy, Johnny and Spike), but the key point here is that different people appreciate different aspects of a game. So, if they can be easily accommodated, why not? Hattrick collected a million players through its popular subject and clear gameplay, but it kept many of them through the active community forums. The Existence Factor The last point (for now), but a very important one - a game has zero players unless it exists. The product will certainly not be perfect, so why not just go ahead and release it if it is not so horrendous as to completely destroy one's reputation as a developer? To be continued... Tidbits of the day - World of Warcraft l33t skills save boy from attack by wild animals. So next time someone sniffs at geeky behaviour, ask them, "And how would you deal with a rampaging moose today?" Still, it was just as well as the kid tried the Hunter's Feign Death skill instead of say the Warlock's Incinerate or the Warrior's Battle Shout cum Charge. USA claims right to kidnap foreign citizens - hey, you gotta like those Americans. No namby-pamby diplomatic actions, no bleeding-heart softtalk. When Uncle Sam wants you, it means he wants you, and he wants you now! In summary, American law states that once they "suspect someone of a crime (under American law, of course)", it is completely legal from their viewpoint to grab the guy from any country regardless of local law. "If you kidnap a person outside the United States and you bring him there, the court has no jurisdiction to refuse - it goes back to bounty hunting days in the 1860s." Now, let's all get back to the pressing question of why some Americans pretend they are Canadian when they are abroad... They do have a pervasive media presence though, and people generally have short and selective attenti... look! Rescued baby hedgehogs! So cute! Closer to home, even Hitler cannot escape the clutches of ODEX. Must watch. $1554.10/$1550. See the rub of the green? Odds are thin as weak stew on the bigger clubs, but one wise punter in the New Paper has revealed his insight, which has been mentioned here often enough - bet against Derby, especially when they are away. There's a bit of time to call all the matches (other than Villa vs. Pompey which is in progress now - nil-two to Pompey at half time): Chelsea 2 Sunderland 0 - Chelsea. At home Everton 1 Fulham 0 - Gut feel Man Utd 4 Derby 0 - Four goals actually is sort of expected Newcastle 2 Birmingham 1 - No win in five games, should begin now Reading 1 Liverpool 2 - If there aren't enough rotations to lift a helicopter Actual puts: $50 on Man Utd (-2.5) vs Derby (at 1.85) $25 on Liverpool to beat Reading (1.50)
It's nothing new, I suppose. Sitting back and asking oneself what the *beep* one is doing. Quite a crazy world we live in, all this shuffling in strange directions to get what one really wants, and often not even coming close to that. If all people truly desired were gentle fellowship, peace, family and the other simple things in life, it appears that many things that we do are redundant - by application of current technology, a single farmer can feed fifty, and even adding all else that is necessary for the "good life", what we do is far, far in excess of that which is needed. The trouble is, of course, that that is not all people desire. We are lazy, and we are ambitious. We seek power, we yearn to be superior, to accomplish, to impose our wills. And in the presence of these "positive" motivating factors, the only sensible response would be to claim power for protection, whether we wish it or not. Oh, we may be the most trustful of beings, in an individual sense; But there is no such abstract hope of reliability when many band together. Presidents and kings smile and speak of their dearest friends, but certainly none will disband their armed forces and shadow men, for all recognize the propensity of people to take what is not theirs, if only so that those bigger than them would then find it harder to do the same to them. 
...and woe to the vanquished. (Source) And so millions of soldiers sit in dimly-lit barracks, and thousands of warheads lie dormant in their ill-borne and concealed crypts, consuming but barely contributing directly to any legitimate want, as a morbid insurance taxed and paid for but prefably never to be called upon. The ancient game of thrones will continue, no doubt, but what is interesting is that strength is so lauded when almost all its utility derives from being pitted against itself. We shout for goodwill and harmony, but we cheer too the conquerors, even when their methods be less than savoury; Vae victis! But there is no counter, for power when accumulated for beneficial means can seldom be proven to be so. A rifle is just as effective on attack as on defense, and organizations made strong for one purpose can often be subverted to other aims. Even where the precedent of goodwill has been painstakingly accumulated over long decades, such as the various alliances between various petty states throughout our history, unconditional trust is still hard to come by, for we cannot so simply shake off the behaviours inherited from our ancestry, us glorified apes. So here I sit, and examine myself. What am I doing? As a prospective computer scientist, a designation for now roughly as misleading as if a new bank hire presented himself as a "banker", I might realistically aspire to design some new algorithm, and for it to be both general enough and better enough than current ones to be significant. As a prospective economist, I could... try to make money. It would be quite out of order to expect that there is something that I can do that cannot conceivably be done by some others - more probably many others - but I do think it is not too much to hope for that one's existence does not have no redeeming value. Then, if I choose to apply myself to programming games, such trifles as to occupy the long hours that pass, should I esteem myself any the lesser? Maybe not, for much of this world is given over to whims and entertainment anyway. Much is manufactured that serves mostly to cajole wearied minds, from the small trinkets of little boys to the car-toys and jet-toys of grown men. As the will of this world is the will of power, of the beautiful lie of equality trampled by the harsh truth of ability - should I care? In many lands the poor have and continue to clamour against the selfishness of the privileged, but it is an open question as to whether the situation would be any better if their roles were reversed from birth. On balance, I would guess no. There would be the same charity dinners, the same pet projects, the same celebrity golf tournaments, the usual token droplets trickling from an ocean of wealth, with the occasional true philanthropist who wills most of what he has. 
Fact One: The Gates Foundation has over US$30 billion to spend on charitable causes. Fact Two: Bill Gates founded Microsoft. Question: Bill Gates: Sinner or Saint? (Source) Questions that I could never dream of, questions that if considered cannot be answered, questions that if answered cannot be proven, questions if proven cannot be imposed, blight our short and flickering lives. As for me? For now, to do my duty and scrape my way to a couple of firsts, I suppose, and to have some fun in the process. After that... this world is a big place. Surely it has some place for me. Was planning to comment on the Pedra Branca/Pulau Batu Puteh case at the ICJ, with Singapore and Malaysia duking it out for sovereignty over a rocky outcrop maybe a third the size of a soccer field. 
Tiny speck by a little red dot (Source) Nothing out of the ordinary, with the usual suspects citing the expected legal nitty-gritty, until the Malaysian representatives pulled out photographic evidence from an "independent source" (a.k.a blog) in support of their case, which for a start is quite a U-turn for an administration not exactly hot on blogs. Quite how a two-month old website by an unknown individual constitutes admissible evidence I do not know. Putting aside also the uncanny coincidence of that particular photograph being posted just several days before the presentation, there still remains the strange fact that the relevant text is plagarized almost word-for-word from Wikipedia. And if all that wasn't enough, the blog owner neglected to change the underlying hyperlink from the original Cape May Lighthouse, even while changing the text link, again very coincidentally, to the Malaysian-supported Pulau Batu Puteh. Well, without casting any aspersions on our esteemed neighbours, I do have to admit to being flabbergasted, and not a little amused, by this move on their part. And on a completely unrelated note, if any large organizations require an independent web source discreetly set up with the content of their choice, for a flexible fee, please do not hesitate to contact me. And I promise I won't need to bail out by insulting readers and censoring all comments (oh, the irony!) either. Nearly caught up in the punting challenge with $1499.10/$1500, just ninety cents short of evens. I'll virtually lay the remaining fifty bucks for the week on United to beat Fulham, short as the odds may be. To profit! $50 on Man Utd to beat Fulham (at 1.10)
Third of four papers done this morning. Not too difficult, the final answers I calculated all made sense, or at least I think they did. So I'm happy I didn't expend too much time on revision. Erm, is that the recommended conclusion to draw? I guess I'll have to wait till I take Logic to know... And a short message from our sponsors, Dill Pickles' Stupid Petunia Bunny Farm:  (You can just feel the adoration here! Quote: "Just look at this bunny here. Look at how stupid he looks. He looks so stupid that I have named him Stupid and tell him so as often as I can... No zoos will take all these ridiculous bunnies - probably because they're so ridiculous looking and stupid with their stumpy ears and legs.") We close with the Sports section. Singapore nil-all draw with Laos in the SEA Games, again not living up to expectations to just about the right degree to raise false hopes. At least the SEA Games is biannual. $50 on Arsenal to beat Aston Villa (at 1.88) in the 1 a.m. match.
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