Techie post

It's been a few moons ago (I mean it this time) since the last time I actually talked tech.

So, to make up for it, I'm going back to one of the many strands of roots from which this blog stemmed. (Can't say I'm going back to my roots, since this blog isn't really a tech blog, but a tech+music+personal rant blog).

By the way, it's a long post, so treat it as 3 separate posts, if you prefer. Each part starts with a theme that's in bold.

Anyway, yesh, where were we?

Google Wave. I wanted to post a status on Facebook saying "what is the purpose of Google Wave's existance"? Because from what I see, it's just a massive IM + Google Docs thing put into one. Maybe I'm being old-fashioned here, or maybe I've been living the iPhone lifestyle for too long, but really, why do we need Google Wave? I mean, yes, I know, it's good for collaboration, and I'm sure many people would enjoy working with other people using Wave. But for the rest of us - the average human being who has non-techie friends who can't give a shyte about Wave - it's useless. You'd probably be doing whatever it is you are collaborating on much faster if you met up face to face, rather than working in Wave, because half of the time, you'd be explaining to them how things work.

I mean, did you watch the Google keynote? The Keynote to explain Google Wave took 1 hours 30 minutes+! I mean, that's one product! Apple takes the same amount of time to refresh an iPod line-up! Microsoft takes half an hour to launch Windows Vista! Wave? 90 minutes plus. No average Joe has the attention span of more than an hour to understand what a Google Wave is. I'm sorry, but this Wave thing will not catch on, unless Google can summarise its features in a bullet-point list. Till then, Google Wave sits in the bin of "Things I can use but don't".


K. Topic numero duo: DJ Hero. This disc-jockey game that costs about £99, the last I checked at the local HMV, seems like it should be a popular title this holiday season. After all, it's like Guitar Hero - a music game that uses some Fisher-Price plastic peripheral to play, so it should catch on like its cousin, right?

Well, it didn't. I read an Ars.Technica article last month on why this was so. And after pondering on their theories a little bit more, I think they're right. (Sorry, no link. School PC a bit too slow to handle tabs.)

DJ Hero involves the use of a plastic turntable and a fader on the side. Unless you've been DJ-ing, this is going to be a steep learning curve. To make matters worse, the music you hear have been premixed, so you'll be quite unfamiliar with the music you hear, even though they take parts from familiar tracks like Boom Boom Pow or Hollaback Girls. And to add another layer of "This game is for cool people only", the game is not easy to play perfectly. You have to slide the fader at the right time, and when sliding back to the centre, not slide too much or you'll toss the track to the opposite side. This is done while you basically scratch the disc and mash buttons on it. That's 3 tasks. Plus looking at the screen trying to figure out the controls, you'll be pushing your hand-eye coordination while the turntable itself tries to throw you off, with the 360-spinnable disc and the low-friction fader. All this, while listening to mixes you're unfamiliar with.

Contrast this to the Guitar Hero experience - Mash buttons with fingers on one hand, "strum" with the other, and time strums with the screen, while listening to "Knights Of Cydonia" by Muse. Very fun, very nice, and you feel cool, especially if you don't cock up.

On DJ Hero, you'll get your music taken away from you, you'll be confused at the controls, you'll not like the music, and youy're not having any fun at all. Not cool.

I'm quite sad, actually, that DJ Hero is such a flop. It had the potential to be a new fad, flooding YouTube with gameplay footages of people acing the game. But sadly, it's such a steep learning curve, it's not fun. In the same way I thought MMORPGs are not fun. Because the people who are good at it are socially remote introverts.

Well, most of them.


Finally, before I sign off and disappear to class, I want to talk about Borders.

Borders UK, the bookstore, just went into adminsitration a few days ago, for those outside the UK. It's quite depressing to see such an awesome bookstore suffer so much. If you walk into some of their stores, you'd see the magazine section basically reduced to one shelf of leftover stock, and their books on their display tables like a discount bazaar at a Pasar Malam.

From what I've gathered, they've had a hard time competing with online bookstores like Amazon, and with the supermarkets such as Tesco now taking a share of the market, Borders has tried massive discounts on their stuff to compete with these other guys. Sadly, the massive discounts came at a cost, and Borders couldn't pay their debts towards some of their suppliers. As a result, some suppliers stopped supplying books, and Borders, desperate but unable to get a buyer, tanked.

Which brings me to my main point - online stores. I know people like the online experience of buying goods from their PC and getting them delivered to the door, including groceries (Ocado, for example). But I think brick & mortar stores should still exist, even in the advent of the digital age. How else can you talk to real people, or pick the freshest fruits that they have, or flip through a preview of what the book is like, or .... you get the point. There are some things online cannot replace. This, coming from a person who's pro-technology, might be a bit ironic, I understand. But in all seriousness, I really believe there's still a room for the brick and mortar stores, even in the digital age.

What do you think?

And by the way, how's Borders in Singapore? Hope it's still a great place to go to (other than to buy music. Their catalogue is always in such a mess, I don't even bother to try searching for music albums there anymore.)