Fifty-Fifth

Ai-ya Tian! Another Monday, another catastrophic screw-up due to a power down. Different office, same shit. Well, slightly different shit anyway. I'm not going to rant about it, because really, who wants to read me bitching for a couple hundred words?

So, my new article is up. At 14,791 reads so far, I'm pleased with that. Most of the comments I've seen here, and on Digg, are discussing the actual games rather than the article itself, which I'm actually pleased about. Don't get me wrong, fourteen thousand views of my article have swelled my ego somewhat, but I'm not a complete toolbox. Not yet anyway, we'll have to see how I handle the fame. I've asked Codemonkey if he's got anything else that he wants or needs an article about - I can't really think of anything to write about, which is annoying, so if anyone has a suggestion, I'd be more than happy to hear it.

I really enjoyed writing the article, more than I expected to. Once I've got an idea for another, I've already promised Codemonkey that I'll try really hard to not take another year to write it.

I mentioned before that I'm a huge Prince fan. You might have heard that his new album, Planet Earth, was released in a free giveaway deal with The Mail on Sunday, a newspaper here in the UK. When I say newspaper, I do of course mean, a right wing, reactionary, knee-jerk, rag. You can chalk that up to US/UK mis-translation if you like.
When it was announced that Prince would be giving the album away free, the record industry almost unanimously filled their pants, and not in a fun way. Apparently, one man giving away one CD in one newspaper in one country is enough to signal the end of civilisation and profiteering the record industry as we know and 'love' it.
There are shedloads of stories out there about his, have a read (if you want) at some of the BBC coverage here, here and here. My favourite quote so far is from a gentleman named Paul Quirk, co-chairman of the Entertainment Retailers Association, who says, "It is an insult to all those record stores who have supported Prince throughout his career.", which I think is just hilarious. Mr Quirk is obviously not referring to the several members of his Association who refused to stock Prince's music over the past ten or so years while he was in the 'wilderness'.

I've listened to the album a few times so far, and I like it. It irritates me that so many critics compare it to the 'golden years' of Purple Rain, etc. but I suppose that's just the nature of the business. I'm not going to launch into a big review right here, I'm trying to discipline myself and keep my word-counts down, and I'd rather devote an entire entry just to the album itself - I'll see what i can do tomorrow.


One last thing, Soupnazzi posted a link to a personality test site. Go check it out here. You can look at my results here. Apparently I'm a Considerate Thinker. I'm always willing to give these kinds of things a shot, and this one seems to be reasonably accurate, and at the very least they get you thinking, which isn't usually a bad thing.