IGN interviews John Debney

John Debney, popular film composer and creator of one of my all-time favourite movie scores (that would be Cutthroat Island), is interviewed on IGN about his scoring work on Lair.

• Part 1
• Part 2

Domain Shuffling – Done!

If you can read this, the internets should have updated all tubes to accurately lead you to my webpage again. For the longest time, I used Langsuyar.com as my main domain and had various other pages forward to that domain. Email was on the old and trusty Ocrana server, which I have used for over 10 years and gets way too much spam these days. A bit of a mess that I finally wanted to clean up.
After a bit of work the main domain now is Worch.com. You can still reach me under my Ocrana email address, but I will be phasing that one out over the next few months. The new, reliable email address is mattias @ this domain. I’m sure you can figure it out, I want to keep the spambots off my tail as long as possible. The pages should still all work exactly as before. Please let me know if you find anything that’s broken!

Vielen Dank, Deutschland…

Ein Grund mehr, alsbald nicht zurueck nach Deutschland zu ziehen. Ich habe jetzt keine hoch wissenschaftliche Analyse, die diesen Gesetzesvorschlag als halbgaren Aktionismus enttarnt. Der allgegenwaertige, aber nie offen genannte Grundtenor scheint ja immer derselbe zu sein: “Sowas passiert nicht bei uns in Deutschland! Unsere Gesellschaft ist von Grund auf characterstaerker als in anderen Laendern! Wenn es hier jetzt solche Amoklaeufe gibt, dann muessen aeussere Einfluesse Schuld sein!” Und schwupps waren Computerspiele – die ein Beiprodukt der gesellschaftlichen Veraenderung und nicht der Ursprung sind – an allem Schuld. Ich weiss auf jeden Fall eines: das Spielen dieser “extrem gewalthaltigen” Computerspiele hat ausschliesslich positive Auswirkungen auf mein Leben gehabt. Ich habe Freundschaften geschlossen, die auch nach ueber 10 Jahren noch bestehen, mir kreativ neue Welten erschlossen – und dabei nie eine erhoehte Faszination fuer Waffen oder das Toeten realer Menschen entwickelt. Eine Abstumpfung hat ebenso wenig statgefunden. Und Spiele, in denen “Leben gesammelt wurden” haben wir schon als kleine Kinder gespielt: das hiess Cowboy und Indianer oder bestand aus selbstgebastelten Blasrohren und rohen Erbsen.

Aber gut, ich will mich ja gar nicht wirklich gross aufregen. Man muss nicht immer gleich alles so heiss essen, wie es gekocht wird. Hier in Amerika schlagen die religioesen Fanatiker generell um sich, sobald eine weibliche Brustwarze zu sehen ist, und versaute Pfarrer verkuenden, eine dreiwoechige Gespraechstherapie habe sie von der Homosexualitaet “geheilt” (*prust*). In Deutschland sind es halt gewalttaetige Spiele. Ein Land, in dem jedermann vernuenftig, relaxed und groovy ist scheint es noch nicht zu geben (irgendwas in Skandinavien vielleicht?), also warten wir weiter geduldig ab.

New From Apple

Presenting the “iPod”, a digital music player that can hold 1000 songs on its 5GB harddrive. As Steve Job explains in the video, this is a great growth opportunity for Apple and might just revolutionize the music market.

It would be too easy to laugh at the low specs of the original, 1st generation iPod. “Oh, look how quaint it was! 1000 songs? How cute!” But honestly, even back then everybody could project where the technology was going and how fast the product would grow to its current 160GB video incarnation. Maybe I’ll do the “Oh, how quaint!” thing 30 years from now, when I connect to the music collection of the entire world via the microchip that’s implanted in my brain.

What I find much more fun is how low-key this announcement event was compared to today’s keynotes. Small room, quiet crowd, subdued…okay, never mind: same Steve Jobs. But that’s the passion, showmanship and, uhm…”assholeness?” that made Apple what it is today. It starts at the top and trickles down.

GDC 2007 Schedule

Date/Time: Wednesday (March 7, 2007)   9:00am — 10:00am. Here’s the entry on the GDC page.

The Ghost of ILM

Circuit City store #238 always seemed like a bit of an anomaly to me. It’s off the highway and located in the canal district of San Rafael, one of the more affordable areas of the town and mostly populated by Mexican immigrants and various warehouses. Not the best place to put a high-tech store, you would think. Still the store always had a decent inventory when I visited – not great, but always very decent. My theory was that the store owes most of that good selection to a single nearby business: the mysteriously named Kerner Company, which is just a rather well-known cover for the old Industrial Light and Magic offices. Must have been good neighborhood for Circuit City – if you have a company of several hundred technophiles right across the parking lot, business must be pretty damn good around lunch time. Especially on Tuesdays, when new titles are released in the US.

ILM moved to their new offices a few months ago, and I didn’t pay much mind to the Circuit City store, anyway. But the other day, when searching for some good Blu-Ray and HD-DVD titles in surrounding stores, I decided to give that Circuit City a try. I really didn’t expect much; but I felt like browsing a selection of HD-movies-that-I-do-not-really-need-but-will-buy-anyway-because-I-have-Blu-Ray-and-HD-DVD-now. I hadn’t had much luck at other San Rafael stores, so this one became a viable choice.

Well, things have changed at store #238. The first thing I saw when entering the store was a prominent section of Spanish movies and music, titled “Regional Mexican” – something I don’t remember seeing before. Acknowledging the neighborhood, I guess. And hey, why not. But what pleasantly surprised me was the comparatively large selection of HD movies! I saw Blu-Ray and HD-DVD titles in this store that I had never seen in any other store in San Rafael. The late blessing of having had ILM around, I think. The store still gets quantities of the old inventory, but there’s nobody around to buy that inventory anymore. Because – and I say that without any prejudice or ill intent – I don’t think that most inhabitants of the San Rafael canal district are the most likely early adaptors for the new HD movie formats.