People are constantly trying to figure out what kind of “hat” LulzSec is wearing, specifically the color of this hat, which is a waste of time. For one thing, LulzSec has no head. For another thing, thinking of it as a group or an individual with agency is a fool’s errand. It’s a natural “force,” like erosion. And I don’t want any Goddamn part of it. Plus, now they’re going to lap gently at the base of our government institutions until such time as our democracies are reduced to a granular, wholly uniform beach. It's the sort of thing that makes one stockpile seeds.
Like the electronic smash and grab at Sony, I think the endgame here is better security at the places we trust with our data. It’s been an education for me, to be sure: custom passwords everywhere, now, 2-step where available, and when I need a new password I let my daughter go fucking crazy nuts on the keyboard. And then I say who’s my little hash function? Who is it? She knows who.
That doesn’t mean no turbulence. In fact, apparently it means more turbulence, because even after hackers kicked off a month long outage at one of the most powerful companies in the world, it still wasn’t enough to change policy. I want you to think about that future, the one we want to live in. Hopefully it will be some comfort while you are looking over your transaction history, trying to figure out exactly how much of your hard earned savings have been converted into dildos.
I spent a few hours this weekend chawing on the League of Legends Season One Championships at Dreamhack, which - as a newly minted devotee - couldn’t have come at a better time. It’s like when your favorite band comes to town in that white hot week at the core of your obsession.
I like games generally, so I can find something to enjoy in any observation thereof: every system of sufficient complexity requires custom lingo, so even at the baseline I can come away with something like “Destiny Cloud Fist” and feel like I’ve been enriched. But a LoL match has a couple advantages over other games in this regard: for one, it’s a team sport - and the deep roster means that opportunities for the ultra-refined roles you find in normal human sports can be retained. Strategic character bans mix things up. But also, I wonder how much it helps that there is a single map. Sometimes you want more maps, to be sure. People usually want more of X. But as an observer, you’ve got a foundation. You know where the “goal” is, and this helps! You know where the Baron at, and maintaining a healthy power progression means there’s always something to watch. A game you can watch, and understand! Crazy, I know.
(CW)TB out.
