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To: Tenchusatsu who wrote (173531)	3/13/2003 7:25:32 PM
From: tcmay	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 186894

"It's funny you should mention video games, because Japan is a great example of how to blend creativity with the "shovelware" concept (i.e. come out with many versions of the same formula of games). One reason is because the video game market has room for diversity, just like the mainstream media markets (from music to reality TV shows). Another is how the Japanese anime subculture fits perfectly into the computer-generated worlds of video games." This is something they first learned to do with "stereo and television shovelware": every year they came out with a new black-paneled amplifier or receiver or t.v., with slight rearrangements of the buttons. (It was Paul Engel who first drew this to my attention, circa 1980.) Of course, they learned this was from Detroit and from American manufacturers of electronics. "By the way, did you know Nolan Bushnell personally?" I know him well enough to say hello, but I haven't seen him in maybe six or eight years. The friend I was referring to was Al Alcorn, the programmer Nolan hired for programming. Al later was an early investor in RSA, the crypto company. I know him through the Hackers Conference, the Asilomar Workshop on Microcomputers, and our mutual interest in crypto. (I was lucky/prescient enough to get involved in several groups which intersect heavily in the Bay Area: the Homebrew Computer Club (since the mid-70s), hackers (since '88), Cypherpunks (co-founded in '92), science fiction (lifelong), nanotechnology (since '86), VR, etc. This is how I have come to know folks like Ted Nelson, Jaron Lanier, Eric Drexler, Steve Wozniak, Mitch Kapor, John Gilmore, Richard Dawkins, Keith Henson, John Walker, Alan Alcorn, Robert Anton Wilson, Vernor Vinge, and a bunch of other very bright folks. Believe me, neither India nor Japan has this kind of community, and the list I just gave only scratches the surface.) --Tim May