Nerd News: Gamer in Politics, Demonized for playing World of Warcraft (WoW)

I Tweeted about this yesterday, http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/10/candidate-for-maine-state-senate-attacked-for-warcraft-character/

Here is link to Republican Flyer attacker her https://www.mainegop.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Lachowicz-2.jpg 

I have uploaded and inserted it below, in case it "disappears" from the link, since this was a political flyer pretty sure I should be able to reproduce the image for comment!  [The image is also on the Ars site.]

Today Colleen Lachowicz has responded http://www.colleenlachowicz.com/?p=106


Lots of things bother me about the Republican flyer.


First of all, that IS my world, Esports & Gaming!

If the Republicans, who paid for and wrote this flyer, took any time to learn about Gamers & gaming, instead of viewing people through the eyes of a bigot, they might actually realize what kind of message they are sending.

But then perhaps they do realize what kind of message they are sending?  They spent money and time on it after all.

Also, they don't have a clue about DPS?!?  That is Damage Per Second as anyone that even Googled it would know, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damage_per_second

For those that don't know, the use of Brackets ie "[]" inside the quotation means it was inserted by the person doing the flyer, not from the original comment.

See these links on Brackets and Grammer for more detail:

• http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/marks/bracket.htm
• http://www2.ivcc.edu/rambo/eng1001/quotes2.htm

Honestly seeing those types of errors, in basic simple research, that I  have taught Elementary age students to do, makes me wonder if these Republicans are smarter than a 4th grader?

Do you want people that limited in research skills or knowledge to be making laws?

Especially when they hate other people for just being different from their group?

Play Expo October 13 & 14, 2012

For my readers in UK & EU, you might want to go to this event, in their own words this "show is the only UK video games expo which caters for every aspect of video games – from console, PC and mobile to classic gaming including arcade and pinball right through to pro gaming/eSports and even cosplay."

For more information see their site at http://www.playexpo.net/

Nerd News: Mrs. Violence gamertag hacked

I blog mainly RTS, but Kelly Kelley, aka Mrs. Violence, is one of the FPS pros I follow on twitter.

She had her gamertag hacked here is a snippet from http://www.analoghype.com/video-games/xbox-360-video-games/xbox-live-hackers-target-pro-gamers/ (click for full story):

How did Xbox try to help resolve the issue?
They claimed that due to the fact that someone hacked into my account, and actually stole money from me, I would have to wait at least 12 days for them to contact my bank and 100% guarantee my money back. I’m somewhat understanding about all of this, but the man says that there’s nothing he can do to get me my tag back until those 12 days were up. I even asked for something in return like a one month xbl Gold Card (which are free), and the man replied that there was nothing he could do in return. Now, even though the man knew exactly who I was in the gaming industry, I didn’t get any special treatment, knowing that this will effect my daily life of a pro gamer.

AFAIK nothing has been done about this yet.  I urge everyone to read the full story at AnalogHype and follow Mrs. Violence on Twitter for updates

More about the hacking in general http://www.analoghype.com/video-games/xbox-360-video-games/xbox-live-vulneribility-exposed-microsoft-ignored-the-truth/

Nerd News: TTimo (the linux man at ID) has left ID

TTimo said, "I joined a small startup in Dallas, gaming related, but not fps or esports." Read his entire blog post at his blog http://ttimo.typepad.com/blog/2012/01/onwards-.html

I wish him well!

I was an ID fanboy before I found Blizzard games, they are still my favorite companies for games.

Nerd News: SOPA list of Supporters and Opposition

Found this source today, from my preliminary checking they seem legit, though I am not sure what biases they might have.

This link http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-h3261/money provides a list of groups that support and that oppose SOPA.

There is a lot more information available on OpenCongress.

Gamers Solving Problems for Scientists

From the Journal Nature.  The Game can be found here at http://fold.it/portal/ now you can tell people you game for Science as well as Charity