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Too Many Secrets

Random Thoughts

One of the great things about the Internet is how easy it has become to post and find job listings.

One of the horrible things about the Internet is that once you put your resume on one of these sites you can never ever truly get yourself removed.  Take it off one site, you’ll find it on another.  Get it off all the sites, you’ll discover that many placement companies have already saved a copy of your resume and contact information.

The only way to really be safe is, each time you start hunting for a job create a new email address (there are dozens of free email companies) and when you are done, abandon that address.  And get a throw-away phone.

Anyway, I’ve never done that, and in fact I’ve always used an address on a domain I own (this one) and I use it for everything.  So, despite having a job and not being on the market, I get emails, probably a dozen a week, about positions I might be interested in.  The one thing all of these emails have in common is that they lack details.  What’s even worse is that even if I were to respond and talk to them about the job, details would still be missing until I actually walk in the door for the interview.

What details?  Simple stuff, like the name of the company.

See, if I get an email that says “.NET Developer position, 6 month contract, may go perm” I’m not really interested.  I have a job, not a contract, and that just doesn’t make me want to consider jumping ship.  If it said, for instance, “.NET Developer position for Amazon.com, 6 month contract, may go perm” I might want to go to that interview anyway, because, you know, working at Amazon might be awesome.  Even if it isn’t something as awesome as Amazon, a company name means I can look them up and see if it’s something I want to be involved in.  “.NET Developer” for a technology company, I’m intrigued.  “.NET Developer” for Joe’s Country Plumbing and Septic Tank Repair… not so much.  Sure, hiding the name might help get applicants for the latter, but it is also going to lead to disappointment for most.  Better to be honest and actually talk to people who want to work for the smaller company.

Once upon a time, I got an email about a programming job.  The details I got were that it was “a small company” and the position was for a “.NET Developer” and required experience with “data warehouses”.  I went around and around with the recruiter trying to get more details, but she never gave any and so when I finally agreed to interview it was more out of exhaustion than excitement.  I walk in the door and discover, oh by the way, the company is Hi-Rez Studios.  Um, what?  If the recruiter had lead with that piece of information, I’d have been chomping at the bit and probably brought in samples of my work and been a lot more prepared.  Instead, everything I’d gotten lead me to believe it was going to be another endless stuff dull job like the one I was leaving, and I walked into the interview cold and shocked, dumbfounded and stuttering.  I did manage to get a second interview, but damn, a little warning next time would be nice.

Another bad part is often a recruiter won’t tell you the name of the company until after they’ve submitted your resume.  Problem is, many companies, when dealing with recruiters who get paid a commission for placement, have rules about excluding double submissions.  So you might actually have the most awesome job listing in the world ready to submit me for, but if a competing recruiter has already submitted me then all you are going to do is get me excluded.  Sure, you asked me where I’ve been submitted to try and avoid this, but your competitors use the same tactics so I don’t know where I’ve been submitted.  And no, I’m not going to use just one recruiter when looking for work.  Why should I limit myself just because you want to keep secrets?

And you know what?  Stop putting things like “solid company” and “great work environment” in your email because it’s in EVERY email.  You cheapen the meaning by using them for every company, especially when it’s marketing and not necessarily true.  Of course they all say that.  No company is ever going to say, “Tell them we are a large unwieldy mass of middle managers who micromanage with lots of unpaid overtime.”  Not gonna happen.

Is a little openness and honesty too much too ask?

Real Issues with Real ID 2

Gaming

Continuing from here and in light of Blizzard’s decision to tie real names to forums posts…

It is frightfully easy to find information on people.  You can only control so much of the data.  Sure, you limit your Facebook and what you put out there, but the government, the phone company and so many other places have public records that you are not invisible (unless your name is so horrendously common that you can’t throw a rock without hitting someone with the same name).  Go to Spokeo or Zabasearch, put in your name and see how long it takes to find you.

But… we are talking about an MMO.  A fantasy world where you get to be someone else.  Of course, we’re also talking about World of Warcraft, which has gone to great lengths to tell us their game is about levels and loot, and the world it happens in is just window dressing.  Want proof?  Just look at the sheer number of real world jokes crammed into the game.  WoW is a playground, not a virtual world.  And still, people go there and play characters that aren’t them.  Women play men, men play women, the meek play strong, the social get alone time, shut ins make friends, all possible without the “limitations” of their real lives.

Sure, we all want to reduce the number of asshats that make the forums a cesspool, but much like the other features of Real ID, this could be achieved without your real name.  The real problem with the WoW forums is that you post as one of your characters, which you select, so you get people who create a level 1 character on a server they don’t really play on as their posting persona, and they troll.  It’s the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory.  Instead of real names, make them pick a forum name, which they can’t change, and when they post provide a link to a list of all their characters.  Or make the forums smart and under the forum name put the name of their highest level & longest played character.  If you have a 3 year old level 10 and a 3 month old level 80, the level 80 is posted, if you have two level 80s, the oldest one is used.  Posting in a class forum?  The name of your highest level of that class is posted, or if you don’t have one it will say “I don’t have any characters of this class”.  Or, you know, hire more moderators.

There are many many solutions that would work equally as well for removing trolls.  But… there is a greater thing at work here.  See, Blizzard has all your information anyway (most likely).  Your name, your address and billing info, email, and so on.  They can’t do anything with it though because it is privileged information, it’s private.  However, once Real ID makes certain items public, it becomes sellable data.  Facebook, much to the ire of it’s CEO, lets you keep a number of items private.  However, one thing they absolutely do not allow you to hide are your “likes”.  The reason is that what you like is the most marketable item about you.  At the heart of this whole Real ID situation is a partnership between Blizzard and Facebook.  In the end, Real ID isn’t about cleaning up the forums or even making it easier to communicate with your friends and find them in game.  Real ID is about money.

I quit playing World of Warcraft a while ago because I was bored with it and wasn’t finding what I wanted (strong community) within the game anymore.  I was actually looking forward to Starcraft II.  I participate fairly heavily in a number of smaller, tight knit communities.  I don’t need another bland “everyone is connected to everyone” social network, so I’m going to opt out in the only way Blizzard allows – not to play at all.

Red Dead Redemption

Gaming

Last month, being forced to buy something at Best Buy before a gift certificate reward expired and finding nothing for the both of us, the wife let me buy Red Dead Redemption.

One thing that always kept me from playing the Grand Theft Auto games is that I don’t generally like to play the bad guy.  But RDR’s John Marston is a man with a troubled past as an outlaw who has tried getting out of the life and getting on a more law abiding path.  John’s job is to track down his old gang-mates and bring them to justice, a job he only undertakes because his family is being held hostage.

This game is beautiful, not only in its graphics but also in its overall design.  The story unfolds so well that unless you are purposefully trying to break the system and color way outside the lines it all feels natural.  Well, mostly, but I won’t go into that now.  I want to talk more about this game because it was so good, so well crafted.  There were even two scenes in the game that broke my heart.  For now, let me just say that I absolutely loved playing through this game, and look forward to continuing to play the single player for challenges/achievements and the multi player aspects as well.

I’d recommend this game to just about anyone.

They Never Learn

Gaming

From CVG:

“They’ve got 14 million players! Gimme a million and I’m good! We’re real good at a million, right?” He added: “We don’t need everybody to migrate. We just need some of them – and I’m full confident we’re going to get them.”

So, if you were to, I don’t know, pay attention, how many subscription MMOs have a million players?  Four.  How many of those have a million after you exclude Asia (because, honestly, those numbers are not the same since they don’t all pay the same or even similar monthly fees)?  One?  And the numbers for the sub one million mark don’t look much better, with most of them being at or under 500k.

Do you really want to come out and say you want and are going to get a million subscribers?

I wish them the best.  Really, I do.  And I hope the intonation I’m reading into that quote means that for a business plan they have a much more realistic number in mind for success.  But I’m also fully prepared to mock them when they face-plant.

Movie Round-Up: July 2nd, 2010

Reviews

The Twilight Saga: Eclipse:

No.

The Last Airbender:

M. Night Shyamalan without a twist.  Or rather, I should say without material he created himself.  Based on the cartoon series I’ve always meant to watch, I now want to see the movie first, if only because I’m sure that it will be good but it will be “less” than the cartoon.  By less I simply mean that it will have elements removed to fit the story into a movie length.  Somehow, despite it being around for years, I’ve managed to not learn anything about the story.  The effects and action look good in the trailer, and I’ll walk in with a blank slate.  This movie is on my radar and I plan to see it.

Hulu Plus

Random Thoughts

Yesterday, Hulu announced the details of their Hulu Plus plan.  Of course, being the Internet, it was immediately filled with people saying it was too expensive, not enough content, and that the inclusion of ads was a deal breaker.

You know, on the content end, they are probably right, but that it something that will get better over time.  But the price and ads…  Think about your cable service if you have it.  You pay XX for TV and XX for Internet access.  In my case, with Comcast, those prices would be about $50 and $45 respectively (it varies based on the package you get).  Personally, due to issues with Comcast not having a DVR capable of letting me record 6 shows at a time and their OnDemand service not having everything I already pay for for free, I kicked the TV part to the curb and just pay for Internet now.  At the moment, I torrent, but it means I watch shows a day or two late — minimum (someone has to upload it before I can download it).  But if Hulu were to give me access to even half of those shows on a completely OnDemand basis for $10 a month, even with commercials, I’ll take it.

And about those commercials… oddly enough, Ctrl+Alt+Del ran a related comic and rant.  Are commercials really that bad?  Yeah, sometimes they are annoying, but in general they are informative, about products or shows that might interest me, and then, if I want, I can go buy them.  Since switching to torrenting, where they always edit out the commercials, I’ve been missing my advertising.  New shows will pop up out of the woodwork and be a few episodes in before I’ve even heard of them (you know, because I don’t spend my time trolling TV Network and entertainment gossip websites).  I’ll go to the store and see a product on the shelf and say, “Hey! This is great!” and find out that it’s been available for months, only I’d never seen an ad for it so I didn’t know it existed.  And seriously, why is Hulu for $10 with commercials bad but cable TV for $50+ with commercials okay?

Personally, I’m excited.  This sort of OnDemand a la carte TV watching is exactly what I want.  Sure, torrenting is free, but I’d much rather support the shows I watch in some way AND not have to deal with the annoying limitations of cable TV providers.  I just wish the Xbox version wasn’t being delayed to 2011.

Bypassing the Uncanny Valley

Gaming

If you are familiar with computer graphics, be it in movies or games, you have probably heard the term The Uncanny Valley.  In short, the idea is that the closer you approach realism without reaching it the more striking the tiniest flaws become that actually cause the viewer to become more aware of the “falseness” of it.  Often you’ll hear people talk about the “dead eyes” because they don’t blink or twitch enough, or problems with the way the mouth forms words not being quite right.

For me, new games that try so hard to be super realistic actually result in me not wanting to stare at their graphics for hours on end.  Even my current favorite game, Red Dead Redemption, has issues.  Many of the people in that game look overly dirty, and most of the female characters are downright hideous.  You could brush that off as “people were dirtier in the Old West” and that might be true, but it still doesn’t look right.  That’s why most of the game is played pulled back behind your character.  If it was first person and you had to look all these people in the face to interact, it would be very off putting.

All of this is why what a company called Depth Analysis showed off at E3 this year is just so cool.  It’s called MotionScan and essentially it takes the current motion capture (the suits people wear to get things like Gollum in the Lord of the Rings films) to a whole new level.  It scans the entire body, so that not only motions of the limbs are recorded, but facial ticks and lines as well.  Just check out this comparison from the above linked article:

John Noble in real life and in MotionScan.
John Noble in real life and in MotionScan.

It does look pretty damn impressive.  This has me really looking forward to Rockstar’s L.A. Noire which is going to utilize this technology.