Sabrina, and Ralph Koster.

When I got home tonight my Parents were 30 minutes into Sabrina (the new one, with Ford and Ormond). I decided (in the next room, while sorting through eletronics that I'm taking on my trip) that I would write tonight about Sabrina and dreams and bullshit and how I don't believe that there are Sabrina Fairchild's anymore, and I'm no longer interested in being a Linus or a David Larrabee. That I'd rather not get involved, for love or money, and let other people deal with all the wistful thinking and faith and drama.

It was going to be a long, impassioned rant about how it takes too much energy to maintain hopes that aren't ever supported by evidence found in the real world, where we live and laugh and work and pretend to love.

All because I was had a quasi-lousy day at work and was in a bad mood when I got home.

Instead though, I got online and read a few things*, as I always do, and one of the things that came up was a link from Kotaku to notes taken from Ralph Koster's keynote address at the GDC. they're moderately exhaustive, though not perfect.

The keynote address itself is brilliant. It is all about what constitutes fun, and what fun means, and why games are important, and how games might just be the salvation of a civilization hellbent on commiting self-genocide via simplification and standardization.

It is the sort of thing I can never seem to write coherently, though I think things in similar veins often. I admire Mr. Koster for his ability to boldly point out that maybe not only are games the future--but they aren't all bad.

That's a bold statement in a culture where 'gamer' and 'pencil-necked geek' are nearly synonymous and equally negative. Sure those mentalities are slowly being changed by movies like Antitrust and The Matrix, which made stylish, moderately attractive geeks into heros, and Bill Gates, who can't sleep for more than a few hours at a time for fear that he might drown in the money that rains from the sky wherever he goes (in an increasingly-wealth-driven society, that status means a great deal). But we're still way behind the curve of say, baseball players, or even accountants ("at least they have real jobs." the status quo would argue).

So I commend Mr. Koster on his assertions. I think he's doing good things, and I hope his message gets around. I did my part. And if you didn't follow the link to his keynote yet, consider this: there are also attractive, naked people of whichever gender you prefer included in the margins of the article!

(ok, so that was a lie to make you go read it. . . if it worked. . .shame on you.)

In an unrelated note - I have a blue collar guy in his late thirties that comes into my bar almost every Monday. He and a coworker always come in together, and they are good guys. He's the sort of guy you expect to drive a Ford truck, watch as much football as he can manage, and build his own cabinets.

He's not the sort of dude you expect to overhear saying, as you walk past his portion of the bar, "Yeah, there's other software out there like Limewire and Bearshare, but alot of them include spyware, and you want to avoid that. . ."

Cue blinking and surprised look from me. "What are you using? WinMX?"

"yeah, it's good. I mean, I've found everything on there. I've downloaded whole albums. Cartoons for my [four year old] little girl. All sorts of stuff."

The Old Boy is a file sharer. I have had a file-sharing, copyleft encouraging, RIAA-the-finger-giving old-school redneck Pirate sitting at my bar for months now, and never knew it until tonight.

Small world, 'neh?