This is the best Darwin event ever. Finally we get to see natural selection in action via immersive reality.
Can someone on here explain to me the whole gym thing? Do I have to physically go to one of those points, stand there, and hang out there, and to battle do I have to stand there nearby someone who is also face first into their phone? Is that how this game works? Seems weird to me. I want to hide my shame in my apartment and battle from there, I don't want to have to go to a public place and to do something so embarrassing.
I was never into Pokemon. I think I was too old by a couple years. I'm frankly amazed the franchise is still out there, after like, 2 decades. Never got into the card game, the show, none of it. That being said, this game is pretty rad for a few reasons. As Nett said, it's kinda groundbreaking as far as immersive or Augmented Reality goes. I know there have been other ones before (including the other game from the same developer that Pokemon GO mined most of it's location data and such from). But because of the sheer number of people that have downloaded it and are using the shit out of it, it's going to kinda be the flagship for developing smooth, workable everyday AR in a way that Google Glass was never going to accomplish. Second, and this is still kinda surreal, have you been to a park lately? There are huge, roaming packs of people out in the sun and fresh air (or nighttime fresh air) that are participating in a fun, healthy, community based experience. Let's be honest, many of these people are not really the outdoorsy type. I think Penny Arcade had an excellent summation of why this is cool: There's a feature where you can get some of the more rare pokemon by hatching eggs in an incubator. But you know how you charge the incubator in order to get the desirable shit? Walking. The best ones come from walking 10k, and cars don't work, and treadmills don't work. You have to actually be GPS tracked at a walking speed, meaning for most, the easiest way to get that shit is to simply get out and go somewhere on foot. GPS tracking brings up an interesting feature. People have been posting like crazy on facebook about how the GO app gets into all your provacy settings and accesses all sorts of your metadata. Those people seem to have forgotten that they're posting on facebook. It's just as invasive as any of a dozen other apps most people already use all day. And honestly? It's kinda just fun. I'm sort of into it right now, and it's a good way to get the whole family walking the park or wherever. Me, wife, kid, dog. Good times.
Yes, you have to physically go there and be in range of the gym. Fighting, I haven't seen it where you fight other people that are actively there so much as just fighting NPCs that people have left behind to defend the gym. And when such a large portion of the population is doing it, how embarrassing is it anymore?
So, they have these Pokestops all over the place, right? Like, public parks and all? Now, it's one thing to have a bunch of teenagers hanging around on their phones and shit, but I'll be honest - if I see a bunch of individual 30-something dudes hanging around a park on their phones, I'm probably going to be creeped the fuck out by it. I don't need El Pedophilio pretending to catch a Pokemon while actually lurking around videotaping the kiddos. Or hanging around in their cars outside my house in the middle of the night just because my house might happen to be holding a Squirtle or whatever.
That bit is more about the fact that the app asks for pretty much every available permission when it doesn't need most of them, which is a terrible practice from a security standpoint. It isn't so much that they are accusing Niantic of spying, it's that what they're doing possibly puts a lot of data at risk.
I have very, clinically high social anxiety, trust me, its challenging for this person. I got a day to kill so I'm going to hop on my bike and go for it I guess. Why not right? This game reminds of when GPS came out and morons were driving into lakes and following it to horrible places. Pick your head up, use your brain, be aware of what you're doing. I'd swear some people would wade chest high into a drainage ditch in Florida for a pokemon.
Lela Dunham s leading a campaign to vandalize all the Jason Bourne movie posters because they *clutches pearls* have a GUN on them. Half the movie posters from the last thirty years have guns on them. Sit down and shut up, you has-been cancercunt.
I came across a couple in their 30s that were hunting like hell in my neighborhood a couple nights ago while I was out walking my hound and it was hilarious, they were really into it. I'm not doing it but this is an obvious win-win: Animal shelter asks Pokémon Go fans to walk dogs while they play.
It would be cool if they put these sits at animal shelters and places like that. Dogs are great animals, better than pocket monsters. I imagine if they had a few of these gyms at animal shelters hopefully a few creatures would find loving homes.
I like how they used a Growlithe [a dog Pokémon] and a Cubone for the obvious "dogs like bones" schtick. Knowing my former sled mutt, she's going to try and yank me off my feet if I am trying to catch a Pokémon and she wants to go do something like messily ingest a squirrel or sniff at a particular piece of brush. "You guys got any of them Arcanines?"
I'm with you. However, I do like that technology is getting more of the generation out into the fresh air and sunshine.
Once they get their first data bill they'll be back inside and angry on Tumblr in no time. You can't wifi the planet. Yet.
To return to WDT shenanigans, I just found out I stored Ninkasi and Kraken in my friend's fridge and somehow though I had taken it "home". I blame alcohol and post-sex haze. Apparently I also missed two bisexual girls making out on a trampoline but eh.
Pokemon Go is weird but fun. I just went out because I'm not doing anything else today, I saw so many people who looked like this but staring at a phone, it was weird.