First off this is not a research paper nor will I be backing this with any statistics or graphs. This is merely my own feelings, and how I perceive things. If it turns out I am way off the mark, then I will change my views. If anyone feels the need to yell, “Hey man, you don’t know anything about this!” then I’ll have to refer you to the title of this site.

The debate about piracy around the web has been going around for a long time. I am not the first to comment on it, and I will not be the last. There are convincing arguments for both sides of the debate. “Piracy” is becoming the “abortion” of the digital age (I’ll stop the similarities there at them both being hot, sensitive issues).

Is piracy a bad thing?

The record companies will tell you that it is killing the album sales. CD sales are at their lowest in years!! What the record companies neglect to mention is that digital sales are soaring. If you look at total numbers sold, the industry is actually coming out ahead.  (If you don’t believe me there are several article out there and you can google them or just take my word for it.)

Ok, fair enough Yorke. You pointed out that the record companies are skewing things to fit their argument, but you aren’t addressing piracy. Maybe those digital numbers could be higher.

You know, I think I can agree with you digital numbers could be higher, but I don’t think it has to do with piracy. I’ll get back to this in a second.
First off, there are studies out there that show people that download music “illegally” buy more than those that don’t. there are also studies that say otherwise. I’m gonna say that people that download “illegally” are also the ones that are more likely to purchase music through legitimate channels. Let’s go step by step through my thought process.

1. People can “sample” or preview full albums not snippits of songs before buying.
2. I can decide if I think the album is worth buying.
3. If it’s not worth buying, I probably wouldn’t have bought it without listening to it, so either way the record company doesn’t get money.
4. IF it turns out I do like it, I may end up buying this album or others by the artist (I found a lot of indy bands I would never have found without pirating. They have since received lots of my money).

I do believe that “pirates” download a lot more than they buy. However, they end up buying more than the average Joe. I’m gonna pull some numbers out of my ass to use as an example. Mr. A doesn’t download anything. He buys 2 albums a year. Mr. B downloads 20 albums a year, but he buys 4. One could argue he didn’t pay for 16 of those and that is true, but he wasn’t going to buy them anyway. He did end up buying 2 more than Mr. A.

Still confused with my logic (maybe it’s flawed)? Over the course of a year Mr. A hits on one girl at a bar and he gets lucky and takes her home. Mr. B. hits on 50 girls (not in the same night) and is able to take home 5 of them. Who was more successful? Mr. A with a 100% pickup rate? Or Mr. B and his 5 girls? I would say the winner is Mr. B. Yeah, he didn’t get them all, but if he didn’t talk to them he wasn’t gonna take them home.

The record companies are afraid to lose anything, even if it means an overall gain. I think it’s funny because my mental image of a record exec is a womanizing douche of a dude that is probably the one hitting on girls twice his age and taking them home.

Ok, so let’s say you are right Yorke. You said that digital sales could be higher, but it’s not because of piracy?

Yes, I did say that earlier. Let me talk about that now. Digital sales could be higher if the record companies/retailers weren’t sending people back to pirating.

Despite shitty music being produced, Napster was able to single-handedly destroyed the record industry and Metallica. For myself and many others Napster, was a great place to get lots of free music. The only problem was a lot of the songs were poor quality rips or some tracks were cut off. Nothing better than listening to “All By Myself” and having it cut with a minute left in the song.

So here we were downloading crappy quality rips of songs. Even as a poor student in those times, I would find myself discovering some stuff I liked and buying the CD, because I wanted to enjoy the music in better quality. Along comes Apple with iTunes (and other companies with their services). Now you can download full albums (slightly cheaper than a CD) or just the individual tracks you want, and in better quality. People were still pirating, but when you have something at a cheap price and makes getting music easier than removing spyware, that’s a recipe for success.

So we have iTunes and people still pirate. Why are they still pirating?

First, I already mentioned some people like to preview stuff. Itunes offers a preview of songs, but to be honest I want to hear the whole song.  The reason I think a lot of people continue to pirate is they don’t like the DRM. I don’t like it either. If I buy a product from Apple, then I can only use it on an Apple device. That’s all fine and nice now while I’m using and iPod, but what if in the future I use a different mp3 player. I would to be able to listen to my music on it too. Sony CD players don’t only play music released on Sony CD media, so why should an mp3? Recently this isn’t too much of a problem since iTunes+ songs are DRM free. If it’s DRM free I usually just go ahead and purchase it (or rip it from my own CD).

Some people will continue to pirate no matter what though. I think that the industry needs to look at the quality of what they are releasing as well as looking at overall growth in sales (not just CDs). For the artist, a lot of money can be made doing shows. I read an interview with Lady Gaga last month, and she said she didn’t care if people downloaded her music for free. She asked the interviewer if she had any idea how much Gaga made off concerts. Ms. Gaga pointed out if artist really want the cash then do shows, because it’s a gold mine (She said she uses a lot of that money to produce her concerts, which in turns makes more money. Lady Gaga you are a well oiled lubed machine!).

I’m not sure how much the record execs make off live concerts, but honestly, fuck ‘em. They are antiquated middleman. There is a reason the ruling samurai class in ancient Japan put merchants below peasants and artisans in their caste system. It’s because they don’t actually contribute to society but mooching off the work of others.

I was gonna keep writing about movies and other forms of piracy, but I’m going to wrap it up since I will most likely just be repeating myself. If people want to get rid of piracy then you need to make it easier to get things through legitimate channels, and offer it at a price people are willing to pay (Netflix comes to mind). Perhaps companies should look at internal reform rather than complaining. Treat the problem, not the symptom.

Closing Rant: For us people overseas, movie execs might want to think about global release dates. I have to wait six months for a movie to come to Japan and pay over $20 to see it in the theater?! Same with TV show released to rent on DVD in Japan (they put half as many episodes on a disk than if you were to rent it stateside). I know there are regional companies that own local distribution rights, but well you can negotiate shit.

Ladies and gentlemen! Boys and Girls! Welcome to another blog post here at The Know Nothing Nerd. Tonight we’ve got an exciting writeup for you folks. We are going to take a look at an amateur comedy show that happened a little over a week ago. You can watch it here.

This was the second time the Pink Cow in Shibuya hosted their Mad Cow Comedy Night. The first show was back in the first weekend of May. Keeping with tradition the second show was held the first weekend in June.

Organizers Jazz and Trevor worked night and day organizing the show. They lost countless hours of sleep to the hard pressing, grueling physical labor that they had to endure and over come. At least, that is what one presumes happened. Perhaps we will never know what transpires between each show…

Come the night of the event, the performers arrived a little early to fuel up on liquid courage, for no one knew what would await them once they were on stage and left to the mercy of the crowd. Improv took the stage first. I was safe for a little while longer. People laughed. I took that as a good sign. It was time for a break and then stand-up would follow.

Enter dream sequence. We can see a baseball stadium. It is the top of the 9th inning.

I was batting third this evening behind Trevor and the rookie Arniel. Trevor started us off with a lead off hit.

Arniel went to a full count, 3-2. The crowd was silent. All you could hear were crickets roaches. Arniel took some mean swings, smashing the ball towards the outfield, but they were just shy of being fair. There was no doubt though, this kid could hit. On the eighth pitch the rookie watched as the pitch came high and inside and took his base. Good eye kid.

Next up was me. No outs with two men on base. All I had to do was just play it smart. The count was 2-0. The pitch came and I stepped into as I connected with the ball, or I thought I should have connected with the ball. STRIIIIIIIIKE. Shit. I regained my composure and stepped back in the box. I let the next one go past without even swinging. STRIIIIIKE. Damn it! I had forgotten to swing. [For those wondering where I am at, this is just after my T-shirt rant. I forgot my make-em-laugh line.] The next pitch came and it was a little outside, but I didn’t want another to get by me, so I swung.

I connected and the ball landed just past the infielders and rolled to the center-fielder. He held onto the ball keeping Arniel at second.

Next up was Jamie. Jamie went to a 2-1 count before swinging. He connected and drove the ball deep in the outfield between center and right. Arniel was running to home, so that is where the ball went. Safe. Jaimie had his single, but that’s now how he plays. He plays how he likes to, and made the dash to second as the play at home was unfolding. The catcher saw it and threw to second. Jaime dived head first. Safe.

As Jazz stepped up to the plate the crowd was going nuts. 2 runs in, no outs and now the hometown favorite was stepping up to the plate. The count was 2-0. These guys were scared, and you could tell. The next pitch was a wild one, but I ran in from third to score another run. [Loosely, we are up to the point that Jazz has just referenced me.] The count is now 3-0.

It’s quite clear now that they were going to walk him. Jazz had none of this. The pitch was high and outside but he leapt over the plate, yelling like some crazed action star, while swinging and smashed the ball. It cleared the left field wall. Homerun!

Dream sequence fades out.

And that is how the show pretty much went. There was much rejoicing.

If you want to watch the show you can do so here. I go on stage at about 1:11:00.
The Pink Cow is located in Shibuya, Tokyo, and offers up excellent eats. It’s a great place to hang out with your friends and relax. Check it out sometime.

The digital age is here and it’s not going anywhere. With new products like Amazon’s Kindle, Apple’s iPad, and a variety of ebook readers out there, it is likely that we will see a shift from the traditional dead-tree format, to digital books.

I for one love the nostalgia that I get from reading a book and turning the pages, but I can’t ignore what is on the horizon. Since I live in a small Tokyo apartment, an ebook device is something that can help me save a lot of space and allow me to hang on to thousands of pages of literature, reference, and throw away novels. I also support ebooks, because it eliminates the publishers and puts more money into the author’s hands. An author can now afford to sell less copies of a book (they don’t want to of course). What this means is if an author wants to write a sequel or experiment with different genres they can do so more easily. The risk is all on them, but it’s a smaller risk than a publisher would have to take.

I’m not going to get into it, because one I’m not an expert on it, and two there is an author that can explain it better than I can. New York Times best-selling author Michael Stackpole has issued a challenge. Basically if his novel Talion: Revenant can sell 10,000 copies he will write the long awaited sequel. He has not been able to do so in the past for whatever reasons, including commitments to publishers et cetera. From the money he makes from the 10,000 copies he can live off of it for a year and write the sequel many of us desperately want to read. To read Stackpole’s blog please go here.

Talion: Revenant is available in epub (iPad and other e-readers) and Kindle formats for US$5.00.

So yesterday I finally broke down and bought a PS3. I also picked up “Torne” (pronounced to-ru-né). It is a PS3 peripheral that let’s you use your PS3 as a DVR. This is a Japanese region only product, so if you aren’t in Japan, don’t import this. It’s a pretty cool device, and works well. However, I am not going to write about it today. I did pick up Braveheart on BluRay, and man it looks awesome!

Braveheart is well known for Mel Gibson’s character, William Wallace, crying out, “FREEEEEEDOM!” towards the end of the film. If you have no idea WTF I’m talking about you need to get off the internets right now and go watch the damn movie. As much as I would like to write and talk about this awesome movie, this is not what I came here to write about.

Flat coat, no decals.

I came to talk about Freedom, the Z.A.F.T. built Gundam from the TV series Mobile Suit Gundam SEED. This was the latest in my Gundam builds. I built a 1:100 Master Grade (MG) kit. There were probably a few points where I could have done some puttying to hide seams, but the way this thing is constructed, you really don’t need to. Where the part come together is where you would “naturally” find seams.

For the painting I used a variety of paints. For the white, I decided to just go straight up white and used a rattle can. I kept the parts on the trees when I painted, but I trimmed away a lot of the trees before spraying. For the rest of the parts I used Mr. Hobby Paint. I like their acryllic paint and that is what I normally use for my models. However, since I had mistakenly bough some paints at Toys R Us I had some Mr. Hobby water based paints. I used these for the “red” you see on the kit, as well as the gold in the eyes. The only big difference I had with these is using water as a mix instead of thinner.

Decals on. Side view.

Once all was painted, trimmed, and ready to go I put things together. I then applied a flat clear coat. From there I applied some decals. The really small ones are just like peel stickers. The larger ones are scratch on. You place them where you want them to go and then rub over the area with a ballpoint paint. After that you peel off the plastic and the decal stays on the model. I took some liberty and applied both Z.A.F.T. and Hiro decals to my liking. After all this, I applied another clear coat.

I am thinking to go back and do a few panel lines, and possibly some light weathing. Maybe some silver dry brushing and a black wash. I am still debating this though. I don’t like the trim on the gun, so this may be an excuse to hide that (Also, I got the color wrong; it should be blue. I don’t really care though). Enjoy the pics.

Hi! I have a badass rifle and a double-bladed light saber. Not to mention four more guns hidden in my wings. I will f@#k your world.

Somehow I missed the release of Versailles’ newest album by about two weeks. Since I have picked it up, I have been listening to it almost non-stop. It is the first major-label album released by Versailles since they signed with Warner Music Japan. Due to some copyright jumbo, the group is know as Versailles Philharmonic Quintet in the U.S. of A. If you see promotional photos for the album with only 4 members, it is not another misuse of English by a Japanese band.

The band’s bassist, Jasmine You, fell ill in August and later died from his illness while hospitalized. The band took a short break, and the release of the album was pushed back. After returning from their break, guitarist Hizaki picked up the bass recording to finish up their album. Their first single released since his passing, “Serenade” is quite obviously a tribute to the late Jasmine. Translated from the Japanese the lyrics include images of “sleepless nights wanting to see you; You were the bright light in the night’s tear clad sky.” You get the idea. With the melancholy tone, the piano, and the orchestra this ballad really brought me back to some of the ballad’s Yoshiki wrote for X-Japan. (Keep scrolling down after the video.)

The talent from this band does not cease to amaze either with this new album. I feel that while overall it is not as heavy as Noble, Jubilee shows that Versailles can do more than just hard rock and metal. The song “Amorphous” shows that they can produce an excellent song that could be heard on any popular music station in Japan, or perhaps the song’s intro for some commercial’s BGM.

A song like this is something the visual kei scene really needs in Japan. Since the first split of X-Japan, the death of hide and Luna Sea calling it quits, the visual genre has been in a state of decline in the mainstream market here in Japan. A more pop friendly song is just what is needed to pull people back into visual kei and the awesomeness that it has to offer.

Even though there are some lighter tracks on this album (“Reminiscence” makes me want to sail the ocean for some reason) there are still the heavier tracks. My personal favorite is “Gekkakou” which means Tuberose. To me this song has the heavier tone that we know from their past releases. It could be because this was one of the first tracks recorded after signing with Warner and before Jasmine’s departure. In fact it was included as a B-side to last summer’s single release of “Ascendead Master.” All in all this album doesn’t disappoint. It has a little bit for everyone. If “Reminiscence” doesn’t put you in a good mood then you are probably lame. Peace out, and enjoy the tunes.

I promised more frequent updates, but the truth of the matter is I have no time. No time, because since the release of patch 3.3 for the World of Warcraft, I have been playing nothing else. My friend hosted a LAN party at the beginning of the month which I attended virtually via a webcam and a dedicated screen at his house with my face on it.

I acquired Dragon Age, Assassin’s Creed II, and Batman Arkham Asylum for my Xbox over the holidays, but haven’t had the time to dive into them yet. Since I was off for a week, this meant I wasn’t working as much, so I didn’t have any need to play my iphone.

For those few that drop by and read my blog, I can make a few suggestions of some good i-device games. N.O.V.A, iBlast Moki, and Beat It! are a few good choices to check out.

I know I talked about turning this into more a gaming focused blog in the past, but I have decided to stick with my original concept.  Expect my final write-ups related to Gundam soon. And by “soon” I mean whenever I stop doing dailies and dungeons in WoW.

So I am thinking about what I can do with this website in the future. I originally set out to explore different things and write about them here. The theme being that I look at something from a “nerd” POV. I think I will continue to do that, but I want to put a focus on review. Would others enjoy it? Or how can it be approached so that a newbie can enjoy something without much frustration. Newb frustration can probably be seen a lot in the [Trade] channel in World of Warcraft major cities. A newb asks a simple question, expecting a simple answer and they get a rather condescending elitist-infused response from some 12 year old (or some adult that probably sucks at face-to-face social interaction).

What I want to do is show someone, hey I am a newb, so follow me as I try and get into this strange world. When I first went to shop to buy a gundam kit, it was quite overwhelming. Not only did I have no idea the a Zaku was not a Gundam (same series, different mobile suits) I had no idea what kind of paint to use. Hell, I actually still don’t know the benefits of using different paints, but that’s more to laziness than to the lack of knowledge. I think for my next post, I’ll write up and review my first Gundam making experience. I’ll try and rate it on a scale with how easy it would be for a complete beginner to make a decent looking Gundam kit.

That’s it for this update. Rather long winded, and I’m not really sure if there was a point. Let’s hope I stop playing WoW long enough to write another post.

Given the amount of downtime I sometimes have at work, and riding the train around Tokyo, I recently finished two more iphone games. Both games, while not perfect, were well worth what I paid. One was a puzzle game and the other a Real-Time Strategy, or RTS.

Get the gears and get out!

The puzzle game was one that has made its round on the AppStore; Boxed In. You are a Robot and you have to push boxes around the stage to clear a path or on to spots that will unlock gates (In the picture you can see the spots outlined by a color, that will make the corresponding colored block disappear). The game is very simple and has an easy learning curve. It starts off simple and increases in difficulty. Towards the ends boxes that look like they are the obvious choice to use to unlock a space will turn out to only get in the way later. A bit of planning is required in the later stages.

Before you can leave a stage you must collect all the gear pieces (Hey, you’re a robot. I guess that’s what robots eat when they are drinking oil). This is what makes the stages more challenging, because sometimes you have to clear a path one way, and then go back and make one to the exit. I didn’t find any level overly difficult where I wanted to throw my iPhone across the train, but they were stimulating enough that I didn’t feel like an invalid.

There is a “lite” or free trial version on the AppStore you can try, but for 99 cents you can’t really go wrong. If you want something you can play while waiting in line somewhere or even even for longer play sessions, then check out Boxed In. My Score 8/10 for your money.

This is Joe killing a naughty robot.

Next up, I played Robocalypse. A fun little RTS that has a humerous plot revolving around some robots that have gone rogue and your army that goes after them to foil their global domination. The story is pretty straight forward and often pokes fun at itself. The characters often point of flaws in game design, like why would a villain leaves keys to a gate on our side of it. By not taking itself seriously you can laugh along and focus on the gameplay. The gameplay itself is rather straight forward.

Like most RTS, you click on buildings and then the type of units you want to build or upgrade. Moving around your units is done through actions flags. This is different from a lot of RTS like StarCraft or Command & Conquer where you click on a unit or group of units and tell them where to go or what to attack. Action flags signal a task that you would like done. You can lay out several action flags and your forces will split up to accomplish different tasks. Hero units are different and you can give direct commands to them, similar to traditional RTS games.

The action flag system works well, but I have some complaints with it. At times I want all of my forces to go attack an area. To accomplish this I usually need to lay down several flags around an area. If I lay down one flag only a portion of my troops would move to the location. By laying down several flags at a location I guess my forces are divided up and each goes to a different flag. The end result is what I want, but it would be nice if there were a way for me to designate the number of troops I wanted at a location. Overall though I found the game to be enjoyable and worth the download.

I have not played the DS version, but I believe this is a port. Since the price difference between the two is great (29.99 for DS and 4.99 on the AppStore) I would recommend the iPhone version. My final score would be 7.5/10. If I had greater control over my troops I’d probably bump the score up a point. Downloadable additional missions would be nice as well.

This is What Boring Looks Like

So I was looking for a baseball game on the iPhone. I was hoping to find one with an official license for the NPB (Japan), but there wasn’t one. Since the Power Pro brand is well known and usually good I decided to get it. Considering all Konami games were on sale for 99 cents I figured it would be a steal. It was, but not for me; it was for Konami. It was incredibly boring and lacked any sort of fun feature or game play. I think at one point I had hit over 10 foul balls in a row off the same pitch. *yawn*

I decided to head over to IGN and see if there was something I was missing. There wasn’t. I did pick up the name of a game that was everything Power Pro should have been. Baseball Superstars 2010. For $4.99 it is an awesome game and one of my favorites. Coming from Gamevil, the people that created Zenonia this isn’t really a surprise though. There is plenty to do with mission challenges like hitting a certain number of RBIs in a given time, to Home Run derbies, to creating and leveling your own star. Oh, and there is a season mode too. Everything about this game is incredible when placed next to the feces pile that makes up Power Pro Touch. There is a free version of BS2010 on the app store you can check out if you are a skeptic.
I agree with the 8/10 IGN gave this. After playing Power Pro I give it a 9.9 (there are some typos and small errors that need fixing).

The View from the Plate

Shootin' the Breeze with Coach

So I decided to write about iPhone games from my iPhone using the new WordPress app.
There are currently a ton of tower defense games on the app store. I was first introduced to the genre with GeoDefense Swarm. I must say for the $1.99 it is well worth it. I have probably gotten more than 15 hours out of the game so far. There are three difficulty levels with ten stages each. The last stage of each level is a never ending one. You will want to come back again and again to try and beat your previous score. If you’re a competitive person the online leader boards will keep you fighting for that top spot in the world.
My only complaint is my recent high score was not saved or recorded which was quite frustrating, but then again I don’t really care if I beat a 12 year old with tons of free time.
If you’re a fan of tower defense, puzzles, or strategy games check this out if you haven’t yet.