how is it that TV and movie writers, who i believe are not generally particularly above average people (certainly some are, and some suck too, but on the whole i figure the group is fairly normal morally), anyway, how is it they consistently create characters that are far more likable and more moral than most people, including themselves?

i don't really know if this happens with written stories, cause i rarely read present day stories, and it's pretty hard to judge characters from different eras WRT the morality of ppl in the US today.

i'm not giving examples cause it would be futile. if i gave a dozen examples to try and "prove my point" or something, someone would just give a dozen examples of bad ppl in movies. there are so many movies and tv shows that it'd be pretty trivial to come up with thousands of examples for both sides, so counting examples simply can't be the way to judge the proportion.

I wrote a tetris clone named curi's blocks in python! It took a little over 2 days. It's free unless you really like it. If you really like it you're absolutely required to give me lots of money. My paypal email addy is curi[at]curi[dot]us.

Download it in a here: curi's blocks.zip

It comes with a readme with instructions to run it and key controls and such. But I'll repeat one thing here: you need python and pygame installed to play. Get them here:

Python

Pygame

I tried to make a standalone windows executable version using py2exe and it actually ran but pausing or losing would crash it. So sorry, source code only. If anyone clueful wants to make an exe or app that'd be cool (hint hint).

Oh also, post your highscores in comments!

WARNING: MASSIVE ALIAS SPOILERS FOR SEASON 1

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ok so anyway, my thesis is: Sydney isn't hardcore enough!

For one thing, have you ever seen 24? Did you notice Jack? Jack is hardcore! Sydney's just not. One of Jack's best qualities is the way he shoots people. Sydney almost never shoots people. So that's my first two points: Sydney should be more like Jack, and should shoot people more often. Also, when she shoots people, she should use bullets, and shoot to kill, instead of using tranquiliser darts.

Oh, my other thesis is the show has kinda bad morality. Far worse than say 24 or West Wing or Buffy or even worse than most anime (anime is from *Japan* so the morality is a bit lacking and addressed at a different problem situation. Like they worry about pacifism and have trouble justifying using force ever. The majority of Americans don't have that issue. Though apparently the media does. *ahem* anyway)

so like when Vaughn wanted to report Sydney's dad for being a KGB agent (before they knew about her mother) ... to get him punished. wtf. regardless of his past he (Jack Bristow) is now a double agent working for the US government and a really valuable asset towards like saving the world. and Vaughn would give that up because long ago in the past Jack did bad things? b/c he should be punished? what for? how does punishing him help anything? it doesn't!

so then sydney said no b/c ... he's her dad. her argument was like he shouldn't be punished b/c A) she cares about him and B) she shares genes with him. it's such a bad defense you almost want to see him punished. except nah, cause he's far more hardcore than Sydney, almost like a mini Jack Bauer. ok rather different, but he's still cool.

ANYWAY

and they were pissy about sacrificing (via framing) that SD6 agent to save sydney. but sheesh. jack saved an important double agent who routinely makes the world a better place. at the "cost" of getting a bad guy killed. one who'd done some pretty horrible stuff. and sydney gets pissy b/c somone died. oh how sad. *cough*

and then later she decided "i would have done the same thing, to save someone i cared about" which was supposed to mean it was acceptable to her. nevermind that right isn't in terms of what I (or whoever is wondering) would have done. and nevermind the issue shouldn't be decided by who we care about more -- this was an issue of national security and life and death. it needed an objective answer about the real and major effects each option would have on the world.

and sydney handcuffed anna esperanza (sp) instead of killing her one time. and shot her handbag instead of her one time. etc keeps running away while beingt shot at rather than fighting effectively. (in season 2 sydney fires a machine gun a few times which is cool)

like there was the scene where they (sydney and anna) are trying to climb up a rope ladder at same time, and fighting. everytime one gets advantage they try to climb more, and get grabbed from behind. when obvious thing to do is first throw other person off then climb peacefully.

and Alias uses some unrealistic crap to avoid some hard but right decisions. like when sydney and her father are both captured in cuba (sydney went there to help father, who was supposed to assassinate anini hasan (sp) the weapons dealer), and Hasan wants Jack to shoot Sydney. then he shoots the guards and they win the fight unharmed. what weak sauce guards!!!

He should have shot her irl, i think. assuming guards weren't that lame. cause alternative was them both dying.

update: just saw an ep where sydney knocks this badguy out instead of killing him, then a few minutes later he wakes up, gets a gun, and comes after her. easy victory turned into barely getting through alive.

this is a fairly common theme. sydney always leaves a trail of live enemies behind her. she shouldn't.

UPDATE: this entry is old. go here if you want my tetris.

i wrote a tetris clone is python using pygame. started 24hours 20min ago

the source code comes in 2 files:

[removed]

you wanna run tetris with blocks in the same folder. but first you need to have python and pygame installed.

NOTE: you have to right-click save-target-as to get the files, then name them correctly (tetris.py and blocks.py) because if you just click you'll open them in your browser. this will remain until someone explains to me how to put them up right.

get python here

get pygame here

the game isn't documented yet, but:

KEYS:

KEYPAD 4 or LEFT ARROW = LEFT
KEYPAD 6 or RIGHT ARROW = RIGHT
KEYPAD 5 or DOWN ARROW = TURN COUNTER CLOCKWISE
KEYPAD 8 or UP ARROW = TURN CLOCKWISE
SPACE or KEYPAD 0 = DROP
ESC = QUIT
B = redraw the screen. a debugging function. should never do anything. if it does there was a bug. tell me.

also there are some constants at the top of the blocks file you can change with a text editor. you can change the size of the blocks in pixels, the number of rows and columns the game uses, and the minimum brightness of blocks (they get a random color). changing anything but those 4 is highly NOT recommended unless you're a programmer.

if you find a bug please tell me. hopefully stupid, large bugs, if any, will be found before monday.

UPDATE:

version 1.1 now. a redraw bug fixed. rotation keys swapped. arrow keys added. b key added. game a little faster now. your score displays while you play. keypad 0 drops

INTENDED FUTURE FEATURES:

pausing (p key). game will get faster relative to your score up to a max speed. controls to send piece all the way left or right with one keypress (7,9,c,v keys). you currently can't slide a piece after hitting drop. i might change that. no guarantees (you can if you wait for it to fall)

NOT intended features: seeing next piece and a key to make piece drop faster but not instantly while held down, custom keybindings in-game. music. just play your own.

suggestions welcome, including extra keybindings

green leftist commie types are inclined to "knit their own pasta" ROFL

courtesy of emma in comments

read this

a few things to note:

casual mention that in Egypt nearly everyone knows someone who was illegally arrested. arrested means they disappear, get tortured, threatened, killed, whatever

fire at a girl's school. girls try to escape. religious police get in the way. send some back into burning building to get their fucking abaya's (black dress/robe kinda thing that covers their body completely). girls sent back in mostly burned to death.

this one city needed a sewage system. so the govt gives this guy a bunch of money to do it. he keeps it and builds himself a palace instead. gets away with it. so then this city has no sewage system. then to make matters worse some prince wants to tax sewage trucks that collect sewage. and the companies try to force their drivers to pay the tax, but many drivers can't or don't. so no sewage gets collected for a while! people's houses get flooded. disease, mosquitos, etc the beaches aren't safe. fish dying. and there is this lake full of sewage above the city on a fault line. one earthquake of magnitude like 5 on richter scale and city will be 1.5 feet deep in sewage.

free press? haha. NO

westerners get assassinated.

religious police go around terrorising people. and get paid for each arrest!

omg the segregation of the sexes!

so there's a hajj festival thing and 400 people die. some of natural causes, some (30 or 50 or something) get trampled to death, one swallowed by sand while sleeping, etc etc and this is *no big deal*. so routine not to be noticed.

and it goes on and on and on

same source as last entry.

curi42 (1:23:54 PM): "We got very badly criticised by the Hutton report. Whether that's fair or not is for another time. But if you are that badly criticised it is right for the director general to go."
curi42 (1:24:15 PM): oh dear. no wonder they think bush should go. he's been criticised. whether the criticism is true can wait until after he resigns.

source