Are video games addictive?

I missed my Friday deadline! I apologise and come back to you with an interesting article on the addictiveness of videogames.

The culprit? Dota 2. This game has been tearing through Steam on the back of free gameplay and outstanding game mechanics. It is a joy to play... Kind of. It can also be stressful but never in a demotivating way. Mostly I just feel the need to prove myself after a bad game.

Dota 2 is a multiplayer arena game. It is two teams of 5 fighting head to head on a battlefield punctuated with defensive towers and neutral forces. The core gameplay is blah blah blah boring.

Don't get me wrong, the game is fantastic but I've played a lot of fantastic games. What is the difference with this game?

It's really about the social mechanics at play. It's less about playing for yourself and more about playing with or for your friends or teammates. There's no easy way to describe the feelings you get when everything is going well and everyone on your team is happy. Similarly when it's all going down the toilet because their Sniper has killed you for the 50 billionth time and he already has his Mjollnir, Butterfly and Shadow Blade and you are totally powerless to stop him from building Daedalus.

Let's take 3 examples of fantastic Role Playing Games.

1. Runescape
2. Skyrim
3. World of Warcraft

First, Runescape. Sure, it is an old game and many have described it as boring and repetitive but there was a time when I would play this game every waking hour that I could. Why? I had friends who would play with me. With whom I could compete. With whom I could share the joy of the good times and laugh with hindsight at the bad. Recently I have begun playing again and it is still the same game although much improved. I cannot however bring myself to play it all that much. I don't think about it when I'm doing other things. I don't obsess over how to improve at it. I play it for 10-15 minutes at a time and the log off to play Dota 2 (or go outside... one of the two).

Second, Skyrim. This game is again fantastic and I have played it an awful lot. But without any sort of community to get involved with, I see very little reason to actually play it. I really want to level my archery to 100 but I don't see any real reason to. Who would I tell? Who would care?

World of Warcraft. I'm sure this game needs no introduction. It has consumed the lives of countless people and even claimed a couple of lives. It is a wonderful game which is superbly built and has a sprawling community to keep it afloat. I played this game 14 hours straight for several days running at one point. I did nothing else. Needless to say, I was addicted. But why? I had an awful lot of friends (in the game and in real life) who I would play with. When I wasn't playing with them, I was playing for them so that when I did see them I could talk about what I had done and where I was up to. Recently I came back to the game. It is still the same game with the same mechanics and the same sprawling, vibrant community however I had no interest beyond a passing curiosity. My friends had stopped playing. Even signed into my old account, I could see that none of my old friends were online. I played for about 30 minutes before turning it off and uninstalling it.

Dota 2 has been a running obsession for me and for a lot of my friends. We first met when I was fourteen. She was just known as DotA back then or Defence of the Ancients. From humble beginnings as a custom game type for a popular game called Warcraft 3, the game was picked up by a company called Valve (developers of the Half Life series, Team Fortress 2 and the Portal games) who developed the game professionally and released it through Steam (an online game store) as Dota 2. My friends and I have never really stopped playing. The most significant breaks being due to lack of stable internet connection or due to examinations and degree pressures. I find myself constantly returning to this game whenever I get a chance. The reason I had not written my article in time was because I was playing Dota 2 for about 6 hours today. I actually completely forgot about my promise to publish every Friday. My addiction, I believe, stems not from well crafted gameplay elements or reward systems in the game. My addiction stems directly from the social aspects of the game. It is a chance and an excuse to spend time with my friends who are physically separated from me by over an hour's drive. It is the hearthfire that we all gather around to discuss the weather. It is my way of staying connected.

This sort of social addiction spreads beyond 'hardcore gaming' into the world of casual gaming. Who would play Candy Crush if everyone they knew didn't play as well? How does farmville even work without a social aspect? These games are hardwired to have a strong social dynamic because the developers know that this is what gets people to play their games and then to come play and play again. Every game gets boring if you have nobody to tell about it.

We do not become addicted to games. Games become boring as the challenge decreases. We instead become addicted to the social rewards we get from playing them.

*******************************
By having read this article, you agree
that I am not responsible for any
distress, discomfort, enragement or
offence caused by your reading
of this article. DFTBA.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Follow me on twitter @dancohen447
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

Let's eliminate poverty!

Good morning John! It's Friday and today, I'm going to talk to you about poverty.

First off, is poverty relative or absolute? Is there a certain absolute poverty line below which is poverty and above which is prosperity? Some sort of permanent threshold? I don't think so, I think it's more like that poverty is comparative. As an example I'll talk two different imaginary lower class families. Both are below the poverty line in the UK but both have different outlooks. The first looks out of the window and complains about not having enough, about living in poverty and how hard it is. The second watches the news and reads the papers and looks at third world countries and is thankful that they do not live in such poverty.

I'm going to introduce you (or re-introduce you) to The Bell Curve or Gaussian Distribution.

It figures that the first picture I put in a blog in the past 3 months is a graph.

Before we continue, you must understand that when talking about poverty, about resources, about wealth distribution... this curve is god. Let's say that there are 100 people in the world and they are represented on that graph. We can see that 68 are in the blue area (the areas are separated according to something called standard deviation). These 68 people are neither exceptionally rich, nor are they exceptionally poor. They are the white collar workers. If we step out further from the peak, we come to the red areas, together counting for 27 people. The people in the rightmost red region are the wealthy ones. The lawyers, the doctors, the businessmen. In the leftmost region are the labourers. The builders and binmen. The store staff at Tesco's. Go further afield and we hit the green areas. On the right are the fabulously wealthy. We are getting into the ranks of investment bankers, venture capitalists, CEOs of multinational corporations. On the left we have the unemployed, the people living off benefits etc. If you really want to push it out to the 0.1% tail end we hit both the homeless and the FTSE CEOs.

The economy is a self correcting system. There is a famous quote about the economy concerning an invisible hand and the point is if we raise the income of every one of these 100 people to the same level, the myriad mechanisms guiding the economic system, this invisible hand, would soon re-establish a Gaussian distribution. 

Eliminating poverty is no more possible than eliminating death and disease. Both are laws of nature. The Gaussian distribution is a law of statistics. To eliminate poverty would be to subvert the laws of mathematics. Mathematics is more than just the universal language, it is also the language the universe itself uses to write the rules.

There is one thing that I am sure of. Eliminating poverty within capitalism is impossible. Within another type of societal structure it may be possible, but I lack the knowledge to really say.

Just as some supporting evidence, here is a graph of estimated incomes across the globe.

You can see that not only does each individual sub-population have a Gaussian distribution of income, but the world as a whole (the light purple line) has a Gaussian distribution. How do you like them apples?

*******************************
By having read this article, you agree
that I am not responsible for any
distress, discomfort, enragement or
offence caused by your reading
of this article. DFTBA.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Follow me on twitter @dancohen447
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

What does it take to be a leader?

I attended a leadership course this week called Frontrunner for disabled students and met an awful lot of amazing people. All of us had different backgrounds and different goals and, seemingly, a different idea of what a leader is and should be.

We can all basically agree that the perfect leader has a certain set of characteristics (considerate, thoughtful, just, strong, resilient, intelligent, strategic, personable, charismatic etc.) but as individuals we all lead differently.

What is the goal of a leader? Is it a constant path towards identifying which qualities they posses and then learning how to use them or improve upon them? Is it picking which of these qualities they want and drawing that quality into their repertoire?

For me, being a leader is keeping an open mind, throughout all things you might experience. It is trying to gain something from every encounter. It is the day in day out struggle of every person to decide where they want to go and what they want to do.

I'm glad to know that there are 36 talented, ambitious and inspiring leaders stepping back into the real world to testing their strength; because without leaders where would we be?

*******************************
By having read this article, you agree
that I am not responsible for any
distress, discomfort, enragement or
offence caused by your reading
of this article. DFTBA.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Follow me on twitter @dancohen447
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

Does structure aid creativity?

Here I am; Friday. I have no idea what to write for my blog today... nothing amazing seems to have happened. A couple of weeks ago I promised to write a new post every Friday. Some of my favourite things to do are regularly updated (that sounds a little odd...). Things like Ctrl-Alt-Del which I haven't read in years. Things like the vlogbrothers. In other words, creative work. The idea is twofold. Since I'm updating regularly, you no longer need to see my post on facebook to know I have a new blog entry, you just have to check back on Friday. The second part is that it pushes me to write and to come up with interesting content even when I'm perhaps not inspired to. It's a step towards more professional creative work and I hope it works out for you and for me.

In other news - I'm now the proud owner of a physics degree :) Yay me! Now what?

*******************************
By having read this article, you agree
that I am not responsible for any
distress, discomfort, enragement or
offence caused by your reading
of this article. DFTBA.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Follow me on twitter @dancohen447
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

What's wrong with sex?

We live in the tennies and ever since the sixties, we have been reminding starch collared conservatives that, "Hey man, it's the sixties.... relaaax!" and we have! We have calmed down and become more accepting. Interracial couples, gay marriage and mens' cosmetics. There is a whole new climate of sexuality, gender identity and individuality which is now allowed and accepted by the majority of people.

So I'll take this moment to congratulate everybody on being more accepting, more diverse and more open minded than perhaps we have been for thousands of years. It is wonderful to live in a time like this.... but we are not finished yet.

There are still stigmata to be tackled, feminism is still a developing movement and the LGBT movement can now be known by FABGLITTER to include a whole range of orientations.

One serious stigma is the sexual assault stigma. The quiet murmur that somehow, the victim wanted it, that somehow they are to blame. This is a view pushed forwards by ignorant people who presumably have never been raped themselves. It is almost a Christian viewpoint, the whole guilt complex surrounding sex in many sects of Christianity is deeply ingrained in society and underlies a lot of our opinions on sex. The point is that, although most people disagree with this viewpoint, it is still being said and THAT ALONE is enough to spring the question in the victim's mind - "What did I do to deserve this?". I believe this doubt is the reason so few rapes are reported, particularly when the victim is assaulted by somebody they know and I believe that this doubt is the reason why so many sexual assault victims seem to take it out on themselves. Just as a disclaimer, I am not saying that every rape case is the same, that every case is black and white. I am just saying that every time somebody shouts out this opinion, ignorantly waving it around like a dead rat in the city centre, everybody is affected.

Another stigma is men who are attracted to fat girls, chubby chasers, often being mocked in films or television. This is tied in to a whole body image thing that both women AND men have to deal with. Women are more obviously affected by body image problems with bulimia and anorexia running rampant in certain circles however men are also affected by it. It's a pet theory of mine that the emo movement sprang up as a direct response to the apparent need for a man to be masculine and manly. The reality of the world is that people come in all shapes and sizes (Hello cliché!) and so do sexual preferences and attractions. The sooner we can admit that we ourselves have some esoteric attractions (I know a man in Israel who finds women more attractive if they don't shave their legs and armpits) the sooner we can accept our own bodies and minds for what they are and not constantly punish ourselves because we are not what we think we should be.

The last stigma I will discuss is the stigma associated with having many sexual partners. Why is it a bad thing for people to have a lot of sex? There are an awful lot of reasons for people to chase sex like the hour hand chases 12 o clock. When we judge a person for how many partners they've had we are reaching back to archaic ideals of purity and virginity. The fact is that sex is the most important part of your life because it defines the relationship you have with your partner and by extension the way you relate to the world around you. Mastery of sex is much more important than many people realise and many people admit. There is a reason the karma sutra and tantra have survived for thousands of years... There is no objective reason that I can see why it is advantageous to have sex with few partner many times as opposed to many partners few times. If you know a reason, please tell me in the comments...

Well that's my lot. Have a good Friday!

*******************************
By having read this article, you agree
that I am not responsible for any
distress, discomfort, enragement or
offence caused by your reading
of this article. DFTBA.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Follow me on twitter @dancohen447
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

Why do people thing being gay is a choice?

So, hopefully you are one of those people who believe being gay isn't a binary thing, it is a spectrum of gay and everybody sits somewhere on the number line between 0 and 1 (see fifty shades of gay).

A lot of people find themselves in a position where they have the power to make a decision about how to live their life. They may decide to ignore the gayer parts of themselves and only date heterosexually and hook up heterosexually and for all intents and purposes, 'BE' heterosexual. These people have chosen to 'BE' straight. Similarly I imagine some people choose to 'BE' bisexual and 'BE' gay based on a multitude of reasons.

There are two problems that can arise from this.
1st.
Some people will take offence. In my eyes, it is a simple miscommunication. When people say that being gay is a choice (under this explanation) what they really mean is having gay relationships is a choice, as per the argument outlined above. Actually being gay A.K.A. being attracted to the same sex is no more a choice than liking blue cheese or preferring Art Garfunkel to Paul Simon; it might not be the most common preference but it is both your prerogative and part of your identity, not a choice.
2nd.
Some people use this to put down gay people and try to deny them rights. This is hateful and childish and I will say no more of it.

This is by no means a tried and tested theory, it's just my experience and my understanding. If you have another explanation, please let me know in the comments.

When I really think about being gay in terms of a spectrum, the words gay and straight start to lose their meanings except in terms of a decision people make. Every man and woman who is out of the closet has made the decision to associate with the LGBT community and in this respect they are LGBT. Outside of that context, does it make sense to call an individual lesbian, gay, bisexual or trans? Maybe we should employ a number system. You could introduce yourself as L1G2B8T9 depending on how much you associate with each facet of lgbt?

Labels have their uses. We use them to associate with each other. "Oh you're a fan of Metallica? Me too!" is much easier than saying "Your list of songs that you like by Metallica matches with my list with 73% accuracy! That's cool!". The dark side of labels always have to be handled carefully and, when exploited, the whole community has to stand and be exploited together, to fight against it together, rather than let one of their number fall (I may have gotten slightly off topic here).

*******************************
By having read this article, you agree
that I am not responsible for any
distress, discomfort, enragement or
offence caused by your reading
of this article. DFTBA.
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Follow me on twitter @dancohen447
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

People get too defensive...

We live in kind of a strange world. Yesterday somebody said to me "No offence if you're religious" after mocking religious people for believing in an invisible man who controls the world.

There is a certain culture these days which looks down upon and mocks religious people but at the same time is so afraid to offend anybody that they have to backtrack just in case. Maybe it's just British people being afraid of conflict or maybe it is a more general fear of retribution. There is a powerful theme of political correctness underpinning most social interactions (maybe you noticed). It almost seems like they're (the government, the illuminati, the skull and bones society, the masons, the gardeners, the hairdressers, the newscasters, the orang-utans and the bonobos) trying to whitewash everybody - to eliminate any difference between one culture and another, one way of life and another.

It seems to me to be a terrible shame that we are afraid to talk about this kind of thing. If I just meet somebody, typically the question I'm most interested in asking is "What is it like being you?" but even a question like this is laboured and weighed down by the fear of retribution, the fear of causing offence.

Sometimes, I like to imagine a perfectly safe place, where we can talk, not without emotion and not without fear, but with clearness of intention. Where you can understand why I am asking the questions and I can understand why you are answering them. The conversations are always useful, always interesting and always beneficial.