perspective
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Reddit's 'Change My View' community becomes a dedicated site
Reddit is known for a handful of communities that have taken on a life of their own, and that includes communities taking their efforts off Reddit entirely. The creator of the popular r/changemyview subreddit, Kal Turnbull, has launched a Change My View site that expands his concept of civil discourse beyond what Reddit could offer. It uses the basic forum structure and rules, but relies on paid moderators, a log of moderation actions, and the Perspective comment ranking system from Alphabet's tech incubator Jigsaw (which also provided a degree of funding) to automatically scrub some abusive behavior.
Alphabet's AI-powered Chrome extension hides toxic comments
Alphabet offshoot Jigsaw is launching a Chrome extension designed to help moderate toxic comments on social media. The new open-source tool, dubbed "Tune," builds on the machine learning smarts introduced in Jigsaw's "Perpesctive" tech to help sites like Facebook and Twitter set the "volume" of abusive comments. Using "filter mix" controls, users can either turn toxic comments off altogether (what's known as "zen mode") or show selective types of posts containing attacks, insults, or profanity. Tune also works with Reddit, YouTube and Disqus.
Google’s comment-ranking system will be a hit with the alt-right
A recent, sprawling Wired feature outlined the results of its analysis on toxicity in online commenters across the United States. Unsurprisingly, it was like catnip for everyone who's ever heard the phrase "don't read the comments." According to "The Great Tech Panic: Trolls Across America," Vermont has the most toxic online commenters, whereas Sharpsburg, Georgia, "is the least-toxic city in the US." There's just one problem.
You don't need a headset to see these 'no-lograms'
Genuine, Princess Leia-type color holograms are still pretty rare. Most of what we think of as holograms are actually Pepper's Ghost, Tupac-style illusions that trick your brain by using 2D images to simulate 3D. A French artist named Joanie Lemercier has taken the idea and added motion tracking to make it work even better. That way, the "no-logram" can change perspective as you move around it, fooling your brain into thinking the objects are truly 3D.
Typos are kryptonite to Alphabet's anti-trolling API
"Don't read the comments" is a cardinal rule of the internet. They're often hotbeds of toxicity and abuse, and rarely does a person come away from them feeling enlightened. Jigsaw, a subsidiary of Alphabet, is working to combat this problem through a project called Perspective, an API that uses machine learning to spot harassment online. But, researchers have discovered that it's easy to game the system.
Alphabet fights 'toxic' comments with machine learning
If you've spent any time at all on the internet, you know that finding civil conversation can be a real challenge. Whether on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter or your favorite news site, trolls can often dominate and derail the conversation. Today, Alphabet company Jigsaw has announced that it is using its machine learning chops to combat the problem. Perspective, which launches today, is an "early-stage" technology using machine learning to identify "toxic" comments. Furthermore, publishers will have access to an API to include this technology on their sites in the hopes that it'll lead to better conversations.
Band accuses Apple of ripping off their music video concept
There was a lot to see during yesterday's epic Apple event, and it all started with a very cool video called "Perspective." The 2-minute clip is a pretty standard event-opening video for Apple, stating some principles the company believes in and patting the user on the back for being part of it. It's shot using an age-old visual trick that exploits the viewer's limited two-dimensional perspective to line up words and phrases that exist only when viewed from that particular angle. It's a great video, but popular rock group OK Go didn't enjoy it, and they're now claiming that Apple ripped off the concept from their video for the song "The Writing's On The Wall." This would normally be a pretty absurd accusation, given the fact that perspective tricks have been around almost as long as video itself, but the band's story as to how both videos came to be is worth a listen. Speaking to Businessweek, OK Go manager Andy Gershon claims that the band actually pitched the idea for the perspective-shifting video to Apple in the hopes that the two could collaborate. When Apple declined, the band went ahead and made the video anyway, and it went on to win an award for best visual effects after its debut this year. Gershon says Apple then hired both the same production company and the same director that the band had used for the video, and tasked them with making the Perspective video that was shown off at yesterday's event. The two videos, while somewhat similar, certainly couldn't be confused with one another, and where Apple's is almost entirely black-and-white text, OK Go's music video focuses much more on shapes, colors, and plenty of humor. Still, if Gershon's story holds water, it's a heck of a coincidence, if not a bit suspicious.
Stick and Rudder: Getting perspective on Star Citizen's development
I recently spent a week enjoying the hell out of Elite: Dangerous. CCP's Valkyrie project -- a virtual reality EVE Online riff powered by Oculus -- is apparently far enough along to merit public demos and a slow-burning hype train. And Star Citizen? Well, I can still solo around in my hangar, fitting ship guns and firing them at cardboard targets. I bring all this up not to pile on Cloud Imperium. On the contrary, I'm OK with SC's development pace, and if you're on the world side of the world-vs.-game debate, you should be OK with it too.
The science of iOS 7's parallax effect
One of the subtle, but cool features of iOS 7 is the parallax effect that gives on-screen elements a sense of depth and movement as you tilt your phone. In a recent article, Macworld's Marco Tabini examines the science behind the visual technology. Tabini boils it down to our perception of perspective, input from the iPhone's MEMS gyroscope and some fancy programming to hold it all together. You can read more about the science underlying this technology in the Macworld article.
Putting Apple's retail traffic into perspective
Two days ago, during an interview with Bill Shope at the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference, Apple CEO Tim Cook mentioned some 120 million people walked through the doors of Apple's 394 (approximately) stores open in 2012. To put the magnitude of those 120 million visitors into perspective, The Mac Observer has put together an interesting article (with charts and all) stacking that number against some of the biggest attractions in the world. For example, Disney's 13 theme parks drew 125 million attendees in 2011; that's a scant 5 million higher than the number who visited an Apple Store in 2012. Also note that the 2012 Super Bowl drew about 111.3 million viewers. Credit the NFL as deserved, though: that was for just one evening, not the entire year! Perhaps the most striking statistic is that, compared to the entire world population in 2012, estimated at 7.07 billion people, Apple's 120 million store visitors equates to 1.69 percent of the world population -- a noticeable and discernible percentage in the total. It's staggering to think that Apple draws such significant foot traffic. For more comparisons -- and charts -- do check out The Mac Observer's post here.
The Soapbox: The stuff from the stuff
There was a great quote from the second season of the short-lived sitcom Sports Night when one of the characters chastises a friend who's overreacting by saying, "You've got to be able to separate the stuff from the stuff." Translated from Sorkinese, it means you need to stop lumping everything into one generic category to be upset about and instead sift through what's important and what is not. I think this is quite applicable to the MMO community, as I see countless examples of people who just can't separate the stuff from the stuff. Everything, for some people, is a matter of utmost importance and worthy of a spontaneous riot on the same level as everything else. There are no degrees of importance; a mild nerf to a player's class is equally demanding of a 10-paragraph rant as a studio going back on its word just to screw players. Not everything is life or death. A sign of maturity is learning to pick your battles and to mellow out the rest of the time. Let's see if we can take some steps together toward that goal.
The Daily Grind: What's your preferred camera distance?
While optional first-person perspectives are pretty common in MMORPGs, I'd be willing to bet that most of us spend our game time looking at the arse-end of our avatars. Some games limit you to intimate over-the-shoulder shots, while others give you such a huge range on your camera that you can pull it waaaay back and effectively grant yourself the equivalent of a top-down strategy-game view. For today's Daily Grind, we want to know where you fall on the camera placement spectrum. Do you zoom way out, way in, or are you one of those odd first-person ducks? In a nutshell, what's your preferred camera distance? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Storyboard: The reflection lies
When I was younger, I got very excited at the thought that therapists would ask people to roleplay. In my mind, this was a great idea. After all, if Joe and Jane go to see a marriage counselor, they could walk out of the session realizing that each of them always has the other's back, especially when facing down an ancient red dragon as a cleric and a fighter. Plus, it's something for the couple to do together. It wasn't until I was older that I found out that the roleplaying under discussion was something different. At least, it's theoretically different. I've talked many times about how roleplaying is many things to many different people, but one of the big potential pitfalls comes when you're roleplaying with people you know because some people play characters that are still, fundamentally, part of the player. And if you're plaing alongside someone whose characters are more personal than yours, it can cause some very odd disconnects that you might not even recognize until after the fact.
The Soapbox: It doesn't have to be for you
Disclaimer: The Soapbox column is entirely the opinion of this week's writer and does not necessarily reflect the views of Massively as a whole. If you're afraid of opinions other than your own, you might want to skip this column. It's a natural problem: MMOs are all about making you feel invested in your character and your playstyle. The best games let you choose your style, your preferred content, the way you want to level, the times you want to play, and so forth. And so it's only natural that you'll gradually start to think of the way you like to play as the one part of the game that actually matters. Sure, you aren't going to say it out loud, but you still think in your heart that PvP or raiding or small-group content or roleplaying or dancing naked on a mailbox is the real core of the game. Or you think that free-for-all PvP or crafting sandboxes or directed themeparks or whatever are the real kind of MMOs and everything else is a pale imitation. And that's a shame because even if you like those sorts of things, not everyone does.
The Soapbox: Don't hate the game, hate the copy
Disclaimer: This editorial column is 100% the opinion of the writer and does not necessarily reflect that of Massively as a whole. If you're afraid of opinions other than your own, you might want to skip this column. If you ask a remarkably high number of players, World of Warcraft is a negative influence on the face of MMOs. Not necessarily for the reasons that many players, current and former, will claim; the complaints of this group have nothing to do with content or overarching design philosophy. No, World of Warcraft has ruined things just by virtue of its very existence. It's WoW's fault that we've seen a flood of games that are, essentially, the same game with a slight twist (WoW in space, WoW with more PvP, WoW in the mind of Derek Smart, and so forth). It's WoW's fault that these games have failed, and it's even more WoW's fault when other games fail. And despite everything, these claims aren't seen as ridiculous. They're often taken very seriously. But really, WoW isn't to blame for its clones or the failures of other games. The fault for those lies exactly where logic would imply.
Wings Over Atreia: Is the dark side stronger?
"Is the dark side stronger?" "No, no, no. Quicker, easier, more seductive." "But how am I to know the good side from the bad?" "You will know...when you are calm, at peace, passive." - Luke Skywalker and Yoda, The Empire Strikes Back, 1980 While diminutive Jedi Masters seem pretty sure that the dark side isn't any stronger than the light, I on the other hand, am unconvinced. People have always been obsessed with the dark, whether its gothic architecture, horror films, death metal, or any number of other subcultures that glorify life in the shadows. Hell, even the old cliche about women preferring bad boys is a cliche for a reason. Looking at online gaming, you can find more evidence of this, whether it's the fact that Warhammer Online's population skewed heavily in favor of the Destruction faction on many servers, or that the scuttlebutt around many The Old Republic fan forums centers on how frakking awesome it will be to dress in black and brandish a red Sith-flavored lightsaber. Join me after the jump, and your journey towards the dark side will be complete.
The Daily Grind: Do you play in third or first person?
MMOs are great when it comes to flexibility; you can play whatever classes you want and however you want as the situation demands. A friend of mine has just tempted -- nay ordered -- me back into the terrifying world of Second Life (via Virtual Ability Island). So I rerolled an avatar (with the somewhat hippyish name of Asha Serenity) and ducked in. I remembered enough from my last half an hour in-world to teleport to the island while my friend, in her best tour guide mode, took me round. Midway through the tutorial, the issue of perspective came up and I had to figure out how much of my avatar's rather shapely butt I wanted to see. I quickly discovered first person is a must for reading signs but the rest of the time, I prefer having the camera positioned a metre or so behind my avatars head. Even in other games, I seldom use first person unless I have to shoot a bow or look at something close up.However I know quite a lot of people who play MMOs in first person -- many of them seem to be seriously into RP and want to literally 'become' their avatars. So, constant readers, I ask you do you prefer first or third person when you play? Do you change perspective depending on when you raid or how much of the screen you need to see?
Holy Halo! 'Here & There' map brings NYC to Spartans everywhere
Just yesterday we were marching through the East Village, thinking to ourselves, "Wouldn't it be great if Manhattan were actually a floating ring planet, with no horizon in sight?" And wouldn't ya know it, someone was way ahead of us. Dubbed the "Here & There" map, Schulze & Webb ltd. has created a horizon-less map of Manhattan (in two views -- uptown and downtown) based on a variety of influences, the least of which being video games. "I don't like the way maps (in-game maps) work in most video games," Schulze says, "I'd love to see a first-person or third-person shooter where the landscape bent up to reveal a limited arc of the landscape in plan over distance." Though we're keen to point out Halo's premise revolving around Mr. Schulze's idea, the map idea he presents is certainly an interesting one. Maybe these two fellas could give Bungie a call and put something together for that Halo 3: ODST we've heard so ... little about lately, eh?[Via Fast Company]
The Daily Grind: First or third person?
It may simply be due to having different gaming roots; it may be down to a simple question of taste. Whatever way you slice it, most gamers have a preference one way or the other. Those who love FPS games tend to veer towards staying in the first-person in MMOs, and third-person seems to be an eclectic game-type mix from those we've spoken to. Since many MMOs are set up to do both points of view, it's obvious the designers intended for the option to be there. That said, which way do you tend to prefer running in - first or third? Is there any particular reason you run your game that way? Or do you switch back and forth, with no real preference for either?
Aion: The Tower of Eternity lore moves forward in a world divided
The fantasy setting of NCsoft's Aion: The Tower of Eternity, known as Atreia, is a world largely divided between the upper world dwellers called Asmodians and the lower world denizens, the Elyos. Once a single united people, the game's lore has been expanding, telling the story of how the rifts between Atreia's people formed. In the wake of the Epic Cataclysm, the Elyos and Asmodians have their own tales to tell. This is the focus of Chapter VII of the Atreia story. The Elyos tale continues with "The Abyss and The Storm Legion" while the Asmodian story is told through "Retribution". Both tales are accounts of the same event, told from opposed perspectives. Check out how Aion's lore is advancing through the dual perspectives of the Elyos and Asmodians in Chapter VII.
