News and Analysis

Some good job news (unless it's a computer glitch), Nokia sues apple (again), a romance adventure game with a hunky male lead (who is also immortal), and plenty of game news (too hard to summarize). Let's get parenthetical and introduce the must know geeky job news (for today!)

Economics/Geekonomics:
An humorous diagram to sum up the Greek Mess.

Was Yesterday's stock market drop a glitch? Looks like it to many, and there's quite a few stories on it. Here's an overview. Sounds like a glitch to me exacerbated by automatic systems.

Job reports are looking better with people working longer and employment up. The unemployment rate is up too, but that can happen when more people look for work.

(By the way, as you can see on the EconomPicData board the person running it is seeking a new position. Give him a buzz if you can help, he's a great guy and the blog he's doing shows he knows his stuff.)

Geek Law:
Nokia sues Apple. Again. And yes, over the iPhone.

Anime and Manga:
A summary of the interview with Voyager Japan's president. Fascinating. He feels DRM is an illusion, talks of the issues of making manga apps (and 30% of Kodansha titles were not accepted by iTunes). Lots of insights (and a bit more insight into Kodansha)

Media:
A fun and interesting look at how Betty White became a focal point of so much interest lately, aka Bettymania. Of course she's been doing a lot of great work for years (and done hilarious turns, such as in Lake Placid), but it seems that at 88 she's the Belle of the Ball. An insightful look at the latest mania.

Movies:
Are superhero movies a bankrupt genre? A fan argues 'yes' and makes some disturbingly interesting points. Plus a look at how zombie films keep going on successfully and growing whereas superhero films may not. If this guy's thesis is correct, the superhero movie genre could burn itself out fast by non-innovation.

Still looking like there may be a Pac-Man film. I got nothing.

Technology:
Startup Infineta has a focus on helping companies deal with bandwidth. They just got $15 million in funding. They are hiring. You know what to do.

iPad international orders to begin Monday. And here we go . . .

Video:
Harmonic acquires Omneon. And why do you care? Well Harmonic does video encoding, Omenon does video production gear and has tons of big customers, and the company's new headquarters is in Geektastic Silicon Valley. Sounds promising, up-and-coming, and of course resume-worthy. It's also a good video on a lot of things we pro geeks don't always see – the people running the infrastructure of things like video. Did you ever think a video production tech company would be bought for $274 million? There's a lot of money there.

Video Games:
Passion Fruit games releases a casual adventure game honestly having hunky male sex objects in their plots (warning, slight nudity). Yes it's Tiger Eye Part I: Curse of the Riddle Box, with a handsome immortal under a curse and a psychic heroine with strange powers involving metal, which sounds pretty much like a guaranteed sell plot-wise. Its a bold and rather straightforward move on their part, and seems to point at a trend in adventure-romance games from the West.

Apple is Nintendo's biggest rival? Nintendo seems to think so. So with it being "game on" what's next here?

Capcom has a 73% drop in profits for the last fiscal year. Ouch. Looks like they're counting to bounce back, but we'll see.

Nexon keeps acquiring companies. I've been very impressed with Nexon's products (oh, how I wish I had more time for Dungeon Fighter), and their savvy. I expect them to keep growing.

QUESTION OF THE DAY: Are superhero movies in a rut, even if one currently making money?

-Steven Savage

Lots of changes in printing, more strangeness from Arizona, and more attention from consumer groups for Facebook.  More is not always better . . . but we do have plenty of geek news!

Career:
Credit checks are being used to determine employability or may get people fired – and a lot of this is illegal. Something to stay aware of – and something that, if more of this comes to light, could generate quite a few lawsuits in an age of less employment.

Geek Law:
On top of all the OTHER stuff in Arizona, Northern Arizona State intends to track class attendance with RFID. Of course there's plenty of ways this can be abused, the necessity of it is questionable, and I'm sure it won't exactly be popular (it certainly doesn't seem to be). I see potential legal challenges here as well – though it is based on some existing practices and technologies.

Publishing:
Scribd, the online publisher, is moving to HTML 5. They're obviously, publically, leaving Flash behind. Of coruse I'm sure the iPad has something to do with it. This is a bit of a blow to Adobe (and makes me wonder what other publishing services and the like will follow suit and how).

Hachette launches a digital short fiction program – Continuing their rather hip and smart strategies as of late. Needless to say, they're one of our crush objects here, and I predict a strong future for them.

Wikipedia allows you to print books out of its contents – I've seen similar tech at other wikis, so it's not surprising, but it is surprising at Wikipedia. Now that we have someone like them doing this, and with plenty of self-publishing online (Lulu, Scribd), are we going to see books neither vanish nor turn into eBooks, but a kind of odd fusion of media where they run into each other?

Social Media:
Facebook's privacy issues are Drawing the attention of consumer groups. Facebook's continuing time in the spotlight seems to be less and less a good thing for it lately, and I suspect we'll see some changes coming very soon unless management is tone-deaf.

Technology:
Google is adding even more functionality to Google Apps. Which isn't surprising considering they're competing with . . . well, everyone.

Video Games:
Nintendo income falls for the first time in six years. Pretty hefty amount (18.1 %), though the reasons seem obvious, sales decreases and a stronger Yen. Not anything shocking, but something to watch, mostly to see what Nintendo does, if anything, about it.

QUESTION OF THE DAY: Will Wikipedia's printing options inspire other websites to do similar?

– Steven Savage