Men, computer games and methodological flaws.

Researchers have appearantly found that reward regions in the brain are more active in men than women when playing computer games and, the researchers conclude that this is why men are more prone to be hooked on computer games. The video game they used in the experiment was "a vertical line (the "wall") in the middle of a computer screen. When the game begins, 10 balls appear to the right of the wall and travel left toward the wall. Each time a ball is clicked, it disappears from the screen. If the balls are kept a certain distance from the wall, the wall moves to the right and the player gains territory" (see picture) and the researchers state that "This is a fairly representative, generic computer game" *sigh*

This actually reminds of a story I saw on CNN yesterday about the lack of proper defense for the alleged 9/11 terrorists in their upcoming trial. A political scientist claimed that this is the worst thing the US could do if they want "revenge" on the terrorists, because if they are convicted without having a proper defense, this just removes all credibility from the process. I think there's a similar thing going on with these video game experiments. I do not really doubt that there's a grain of truth in the result, but when making such elementary methodological mistakes and mind-numbing generalization, they really are doing themselves a disservice -- it just removes all credibility from the process. I'm not just picking on this experiment in particular, but I've seen a lot of the same problems with the most cited experiments on violence in computer games, including the interesting but far from conclusive research by Craig Anderson. What's worse it that the media, when picking up these stories, usually omit any caveats and methodological footnotes, which results in the kinds of headlines that ultimately might sway the public opinion.

I think the sensible thing to do is to not jump to conlusion on either side. Allow me to make a sweeping generalization on my own: On the one hand, gamers and hackers too often claim that all kinds of so-called piracy is good and that virtual violence has nothing at all to do with real violence, whereas policy makers and media all too often claim that piracy is just ultimately a form of selfishness and that every murderer out there has been playing violent video games (which, even when true, could by at any end of the causal chain). Neither is true, and in championing either extreme it just makes it more difficult for the sound and carefully weighed considerations to come to the front.

In the words of Jascha Heifetz (which just happened to be the quote of the day on my Google home portal): "No matter what side of the argument you are on, you always find people on your side that you wish were on the other."

I crashed into my building today... with an F-16

I think that one of the reasons why many newspapers love reporting from virtual environments etc. is that it allows them to come up with fantastic headlines. Disappointment often follows, though. So, allow me to offer my apologies for not really having crashed an F-16 into my building... only virtually. I hope I can make it up, however, by pointing out a fantastic easter egg in Google's newest version of Google Earth. Google Earth, as you probably know, is an excellent program that allows you to see the entire world (and even parts of the universe) in astonishing detail. The easter egg I'm talking about can be seen by opening google earth and pressing ctrl-alt-a. This starts up a flight simulator (!). Yes, you can actually take off, from a selection of airports, and fly around the actual earth. I cannot really describe how good it is, but as soon as you get used to the flight controls (which takes some time) you can experience what it feels like to fly 10 feet above the ground in Los Angeles, dive into the grand canyon... you name it. To my big suprise, one of the airports offered is the small airport of my old home town Trondheim. Imagine my joy when lifting off, just to look down on my house (which lies just next to the airport). Taking off from Hamburg, I also managed to fly my F-16 to the University of Twente Campus (where I'm currently living) and, although having lost complete control over the plane, managed to kamikaze myself into my building. In other (more complicated) words, I was sitting at home, flying a virtual airplane that crashed into the virtual building I was sitting in. If you click on the picture above, you can see my building to the right (where there's a transparent pin) seconds before impact... I highly recommend you to find your own building and smash into it. Some pointers for doing so:

• You have to press ctrl-alt-a to toggle the flight simulator the first time. This didn't work for me the first time, but try searching for and zooming into San Francisco Airport first. This did the trick for me.
• The slow plane is much easier to handle than the F-16. Unless you have to travel a long time in order to reach your destination, stick to the slow one.
• If you're lost, you can toggle back to the earth view (exit simulator) by pressing ctrl-alt-a. There you can orient yourself, and when toggling back to the flight simulator simply choose the option to continue where you left off.
• City names, landmarks etc. do not show up in the simulator, but pins do. Thus, if you want to head for a specific destination simple place a pin there. However, the pin doesn't appear until you're relativele close, so if your destination is far away you have to travel blindly in roughly the right direction before being able to navigate towards the pin. This can be done by looking at the compass in top of the screen and/or by toggling as explained above.

Happy flying!

UPDATE (April 4, 2008): I am pretty sure the keyboard combination was ctrl-alt-a back then, but this does not work anymore. Try ctrl-a instead.

My Sorry Second Life

I've had a sorry Second Life since the beginning. My days usually consisted in sitting in a chair or dancing around a pole for money. The pole dancing didn't seem very popular with the surrounding people given that I look like a 70-year old geezer with grey hear, grey beard and wrinkly tattoos. As long as I got my money (which didn't always happen) I was happy though. Still, I didn't really earn more than, at best, 500 L$ per day which doesn't really amount to a hill of beans, or anything else. So, I did what every sucker would do, earn a little cash then head of to the casinos to play Blackjack. Using simple blackjack strategy I managed on occasion to rack up 6-figure sums, but always ended up loosing it all in the end. So, back on the streets, earning money, then wasting it on Blackjack again. It sounds pathetic, but it was my life and I kind of liked it. Then, Linden Lab banned gambling and destroyed my second life. I don't really know what to do now. Perhaps it's a good thing since it forces me to find new things to do (I considered joining an army, but their recruitment policy was to strict). Sadly, however, I've resorted to just scrambling the world for places to earn money by doing nothing and since the gambling obverlords do not provide camping chairs anymore it's not easy to come by. Right now, I am earning money by being impaled on a stick. Honestly, somebody is paying me for being impaled and thereby providing a spectacle for bystanders. What a sorry, sorry life.