Well, my work at Tech is done for the summer. I gave my final presentation and research paper to the ECE dpeartment Monday. The paper was decent, but needed more time to review. The theory section was particularly tough because my knowledge of thin layer adhesion mechanisms and their dependence on surface effect scale is lacking a bit. But by comparison to the rest of the people in the program, I think I came off well (shit, one person didn't even show up for their presentation). One wierd thing that happened at the presentations was right after this one guy from India presented he left (to go visit family in India) and on his way out leaned over to me and said, "I have something very important to talk about in two weeks." Then he was gone. It was said in this real bizzare tone, as if either the fate of the world was going to be discussed then or he was going to kill me. I don't know, it was fucking wierd, and now I won't konw what is going to happen for two weeks. I think the only recourse it to assume that I will die, and therefore live life to the fullest for the next two weeks.

In other news I have been listening to a lot of videogame podcasts. Mostly from 1up.com, which does an o.k. job of talking about the industry and a deeper sense and being "impartial." Let me explain, they seem to have a series of partial fanboys from each series. There is a guy for who Sony can do no wrong, and the emergence of blu-ray as the next medium of choice is an inevitability (he calls it "future-proof"), there is a guy who loves his Xbox, mostly displayed as a love of Halo, there isn't a Nintendo fanboy because they all love Nintendo. While this is a generalization, the point for Nintendo is they all will support or destroy the Revolution depending on if it is on a talking point relating to their console of choice. One thing that has been on my mind in listening to these podcasts is one way in which digital media affects the way we can digest a culture. Upon listening to a podcast from this group I immediately went and grabbed every back issue I could and listened to them all. When I was done with that it was another week before more content came out, so I raided another podcast and listen to all of the backlogs of that. The question in my mind is whether or not this type of high-density consumption of a medium is going to be a continuing trend for digital media? Will generic consumption of a variety of goods be transplanted by gorging on one type because you have access to it? Or, is this just a result of me having too much time walking around the city this summer?