I’m always amused at conversations that lead into how a specific demographic has a special or implied, exclusive understanding about a specific communications technique. Just because someone knows how to upload a video to YouTube, this does not make them a Social Media expert (nor does it make someone an eCommerce expert because they sell doilies on Etsy).

For some people, today’s youth who knows how to upload a video to the Internet is akin to yesterday’s youth who used to help set the VCR. In each ones time they were both considered tech geniuses regardless of their actual skills.

As the adage goes: “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

This applies to perceptions of any skills competency. Just because a person has an understanding of something you don’t understand, that does not make them an expert in a subject matter (and them being an expert in one aspect of a technology doesn’t immediately make them an expert in all aspects).

Bringing this back to the topic of communications. New doesn’t always involve doing something different. While the tools may change, the fundamentals have always remained the same.

Believe it or not, social media is just one of many tools available to achieve your goals and those old tools? Well, in some cases, they are still just as viable for communications as the new tools. Old is new. New is old. Rinse, repeat.

Today I ran across the question about why when searching through Metacritic there are more high scoring reviews on video games as opposed to other entertainment mediums. It’s a good question on face value, but there’s actually more to the answer then you might think.

Say that you are writing a review of a game on a scale of 1-10. In 1986 a game like Ulitma IV might have easily garnered a 9 or 10 because it was the pinnacle of that genre, remarkable as a video game in general and an overall exceptional game. It had many notable “new” features such as an exceptionally large game world, lots of NPC interactions for the time, a morality system of sorts, etc… It was also cutting edge in the use of audio technology (on the Apple it supported dual Mockingboards allowing 12 channel audio, which was simply unprecedented at the time as most games of this era might only use a computer’s built in speaker, if that to generate clicks and buzzes).

Ultima IV released exactly as it is today as a new game might only garner anywhere from a 5 to a 7 because while it is still a well done game it is now an overused concept and unoriginal by current standards and expectations.

In contrast, an exceptionally filmed movie from 1930 can still be just as visually compelling and artistically comparative to a contemporary film made now. Consider the movie Metropolis. Even today this movie is visually impressive and story wise, quite contemporary in its subjects of worker oppression, class elitism and surprisingly… A.I.. Granted, while the silent presentation and slower pacing may prove difficult for some to watch, it can be quite enjoyable for a modern viewer and it is easy to both acquire and watch without much trouble. The only options for variation in experiencing this movie are between watching in a theater or on a TV. Granted those experience differences can be significant they are typically not considered a factor in a review.

To carry our analogy, Ultima IV may be enjoyable for modern players but they must also endure the added burden of many significant technological barriers to overcome before they can even try to experience the game in a way that in the end almost certainly will not be the same as the experience of 30 years ago. You can still potentially go to a movie theater and watch Metropolis with a live pianist. Finding a complete, working Apple //e with Mockingboards and functional game media is more of a challenge, and that’s if you decided you want to try and play the Apple version and not the MSDOS-PC or Commodore-64 ports (most people these days only play the PC port via DOS emulation). Which takes us to our next topic…

Ratings in video games unlike any other medium are highly context sensitive to the technology used and moment in time they were written for which is why a review generated in 1986 for Ultima IV is more relevant than a review written for that same game today. The prevailing attitude in video gaming culture is that there is literally no way a contemporary reviewer could write a review with the same level of enthusiasm or appreciation and recognition as a period reviewer. To that end, “retro reviews” are typically considered of lower value than period reviews. Another aspect of retro reviews to keep in mind is that many of them now are performed under emulation using non-standard controllers which may effect the overall experience (eg, NES games played on a PC via an emulator using a PS2 style gamepad controller. This is simply not even the same experience.). Even things like up-scaled pixel resolutions or the lack of scan-lines on modern displays (an artifact of CRT based display technology) can effect the visual experience of a game when the designer incorporated something about that legacy viewing system into the visual aesthetics of a game’s art design.

Let’s consider another example… Stunt Race FX for the Super Nintendo. My magazine at the time gave this game a combined review score of 94.0/100 spread between four reviewers. I distinctly remember this game being visually impressive and I spent hours playing and enjoying the game.

Recently, based on those fond memories I dug out the SNES, dusted off the controller, loaded up the game cartridge and tried to play it. I found the game almost impossible to view let alone play. It was an incredibly jarring experience. If a game like that had been released right now on a modern platform and I was reviewing it, I probably would have tanked it.

As I eluded to above, video game scores take into consideration aspects such as the player interface as part of a review (eg, the responsiveness of the controller, the screen resolution of the video output, etc…). For the most part movie reviewers do not consider popcorn quality or sticky floors as a relevant element in a movie rating (granted, the quality of the camera and projection format may impact movie reviews but that’s generally the exception, not the norm), yet in video games, interface elements of the user experience are generally intrinsic to a reviewers scoring.

Lastly, you can’t look at gaming scores as a spread spectrum the same as other mediums. You really need to quantify your data, be it by era, platform, etc… as those extra parameters are just as relevant to the nature of the score beyond the raw play experience itself. I suppose movies and music have similar strata but the differences between eras in technologies aren’t typically as critical to the content as they are with video games.

Years ago, researchers decoded the complete genetic sequence of Smallpox. Since then labs have decoded other variants but for this thought exercise let’s talk about “Variola virus strain Bangladesh 1975 v75-550 Banu”, for which a complete genome decoding was submitted to the CDC in 2006 and is currently available to the public from the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) website. Yes, you read that correctly. You can download the entire genetic sequence for Smallpox from a public web page and have been able to for some time now. As of 2014, complete DNA sequences of roughly 50 smallpox samples are available to the general public.

Granted this availability of the data (even when it was only printed in journals) has been a point of concern and debate in some communities. The common discussion carries around concerns of someone recreating a synthetic Smallpox virus to infect people. This was even discussed as a key concern for why the last strains should not be destroyed just last year in 2014.

What I’m more fascinated in though, and something my wife pointed out recently, is that by carrying the complete genome of Smallpox into a digital form and putting it in a public space the virus has in effect jumped hosts/species.

Countless web crawlers, archivers, and random web users (of all intents) have made copies of the web page holding this code. I’m sure there are even pages that duplicate the content and those too have been crawled, archived, etc…

Even if humanity destroyed all living strains of the virus, this digital version has the potential to persist indefinitely at this point (or at the least, indefinitely from the perspective of you and I). Where the virus goes from here is really anyone’s guess, but for now it is actively replicating and being transmitted globally and automatically by it’s new digital host, the Internet.

And no, I’m not linking to the virus… go ask Google.

I was recently watching a video review on YouTube and in the running commentary one of the speakers made a reference about The Street Fighter movie and how sad it was that it was such a crappy movie and how it was such a waste that it was Raúl Juliá’s last movie he ever made before he died.

I’ve heard this comment trope before and frankly it’s irritating. Regardless of the quality of the film, he chose to work on that project as an act of love for his children. Can you imagine how it would feel to have your father spoken about 20 years later in statements of pitty? Can you also imagine how excited his kids were when he took that role and how amazing it was for them to see their dad doing something so cool and being involved in something that they were personally invested in only to have the world piss all over it? Can you imagine a father’s last major work before he died being an act of love for his kids?

No, you probably can’t. You probably never even considered this aspect of the story until this very moment.

As a father and a gamer, The Street Fighter movie and Raúl Juliá’s part in it represents to me an amazing statement about what an awesome dad he must have been, in addition to being a fantastic actor. And 20 years later his acting is still amazing and keeps his spirit with us. Even if there are only a few people in the world that enjoy The Street Fighter movie, I hope his kids are in that select few as it’s a pretty special thing.

Today’s news: Police are upset that people are tracking their stolen phones down and confronting thieves.

No. No it’s not just a phone. Ten years ago, for most people, it might have still been just a phone. The reality today is that the modern smart phone is closer to what the medical community might call a Mnemonic Aid.

Let’s step back for a moment for those of you who just don’t get it, but may have had the chance to play video games anytime since the early 90’s. Think of it this way. You’re 40 hours into your favorite video game and your save file is lost for some reason (corrupted file, lost memory card, etc…). If you’re like any kid in this situation, you about lost your mind. Some of you said “forget this” and simply walked away from the game. Some of you burned another month getting back to where you last were. Either way, it sucked.

Is that too recent an analogy? How about this. At least for you pre-90’s guys out there. Remember the “little black book” or tiny sheet of paper you kept folded up in your wallet with the scribbled on phone numbers and addresses for every person you ever met. What happened when that piece of paper went through the washing machine? You probably about cried and desperately tried to recover what data you could from those scraps of wet paper in every way possible. You usually failed, but either way, it sucked.

If neither of those two analogies work for you then I don’t know what to tell you. Maybe talk to your neighbor, friend, sibling for some perspective.

But if those analogies touched a nerve… magnify those feelings times a thousand? Times a million?

The modern smart phone is your save file/little black book on steroids. Consider, that for many people, the modern smart phone represents the personal narrative of someone’s life for the last year or two, or more if they have simply been transferring things forward like photos, contacts and who-knows what else. It’s the last photos of their father in the hospital before he passed away. It’s their daughter’s prom photo. It’s the heartfelt text from their now, ex telling them how much they loved them before everything went to hell. It’s the video they made two years ago with their friends in some city, celebrating some special event which was too crazy to post to Facebook, but it’s their favorite memory because they will never have all those wonderful friends together in one place again. For many it’s a device that keeps the proof of better times. For other’s it’s a quick reference to everything that is their life today.

It’s the bookmarks and sometimes phone numbers of every restaurant, club or store that someone keeps track of for quick reference. It’s personal notes, diaries, health trackers, fitness trackers, and in some cases all of a person’s favorite music.

It’s also the one device more so than even your home computer that has instant login access to every important website in your life. It might even store all your passwords as well.

If it was “just a phone”, people would be upset, they’d get over it. You can replace a thing. But it’s not “just a phone”. It’s not just a thing. It’s a personal narrative. It is a slice of life. It is the sum total of all of the most important save file data anyone can have in their life which they happen to carry with them everywhere they go.

Note to the police. People are not hunting down stolen phones. They are hunting down their save files and for some of them, that data is worth dying for.