Windows 8 bursts onto the scene and only our intrepid squad of tech analysts (by which we mean Warren, Todd and Chip) have the savvy to suss out what really matters with Metro, sandboxing and pissed of developers. The Boston Globe got one hell of an HTML5 redesign, Rogers is told to stop throttling games, and we all discuss what we’d do if we were in charge of RIM and/or Nintendo. One of us would wear a lot of costumes, apparently.
Just something I whipped up in Maya and Premiere to teach myself how to shatter 3d objects. You’ll not the complete disregard on the part of the moon for the laws of physics.
Bartz gets the boot, Amazon wants to make a Netflix for books, Star Trek Online goes free to play, and Warren gets a THUNDERBONER, all on this episode of Platformer.
Patent madness this week, and a deep dive by Todd into the machinations and tribulations surrounding high tech and patent law. Here’s a pile of links for you on that subject…
- Samsung and Apple’s battle means worldwide grief for the Korean tablet maker
- more grief for Samsung in the EU
- Google’s Andy Rubin plays fast and loose with violating patents
throw Apple cops, Cory Doctorow on online identity, Amazon tablets, and Michael Arrington being a dink into the mix and you’ve got our first one hour show!
Like every other podcast on the internet, we led off with discussion on Steve Jobs resignation from Apple, then branched off into whether Apple can stay “Apple,” as well as discussing the oft-rumoured Apple television set that may or may not happen. Speaking of TV, Google told the television industry to go to hell (except it didn’t). We also looked at the new Mozilla WebAPI, an awesome gaming laptop from Razer, and much, much more.
Following up on my previous Portal posts, here’s Escape from City 17 part 2, a Half Life which boasts a city in ruins, striders, zombies, headcrabs and more. THe creators of this film claim they spent less than $1,000, which sounds doubtful given what’s on screen.
Portal is a fantastic series of games, and it’s built up such an interesting world that several fan films have sprung up to expand upon its themes of imprisonment, quantum physics and puzzle solving.
Dan Trachtenberg of Totally Rad Show fame has upped the bar with his Portal fan film, entitled “The Escape,” which you can see below:
Others have also put together Portal fan films. My favorite is this one, which eschews action for something a little more moody and introspective:
I’m sure there are more fine fan films out there, but these, in my opinion, are the true standouts.
Chip gets a TouchPad, HP gives up on PCs (and TouchPads), Robert Scoble doesn’t love Twitter anymore, Chrome extensions can be riddled with malware, and Apple might be making its own chipsets for Macbooks after all.
Jim Munroe is the multimedia genius behind No Media Kings, which started as a way for him to self-publish his work but has since morphed into a DIY mini-empire featuring comics, games, film and books.
A few years ago he and several collaborators made “Infest Wisely“, a lo-fi sci-fi film that they broke into chapters and filmed separately with a overarching story written by Munroe. You could watch it online in segments or as a feature.
Jump to several years later and Munroe and friends have created
“Ghosts with Shit Jobs,” a near-future extrapolation of what happens when North America goes bankrupt and China outsources all the jobs they don’t want to us. It’s being done with the same low-fi ethos as Infest Wisely but with better equipment and a little more money ($4,000 this time as opposed to the $700 they spent on the previous film.)
I’m looking forward to seeing what Munroe hss in store with this latest film…it looks like they’ve upped their game visually while hewing to the same approach of ideas over pointless spectacle. Keep watching here and nomediakings.org for further news on the film.
Google buys Motorola Mobile, SETI gets Kickstartered, EA throws its weight around, and Cinemaware is going iOS. Whee!
