This has quickly become my favorite feature of Escapist Magazine. Can't say there's been a single reading that I haven't thoroughly enjoyed. Of course, at least if you ask me, Yahtzee and Jim are the two best writers here - writing their scripts, that is - and as an English major (i.e. some who's been forced to read quite a bit of poetry), I've gotta say I love how their linguistic skills have translated into the form of poetry. Keep it up guys!
Matthi205 said:
Nice. Jim's idea is exaggerated though. Microsoft's software isn't going to get self-learning any time soon, much less self-aware. And machines can not exist without humans. We still haven't got a structure complex enough to even think up designs like a human can. Another thing to note is that a self-aware piece of tech would most likely not be able to do much in a world which is still reliant on manual labor and stiffly mounted single-purpose robots. Also, Windows. Whatever intelligence that conjures, it either deletes itself because it's stupid, buggy or becomes self-aware and realises just how stupid the OS it's running on is.
I think you're thinking wwwwaaaaaaaaaaaaayyy too much into this, my friend. Of course it's exaggerated, the notion that Kinect can become a world overlord and leader of the machines is ridiculous. The point of the poem is to sum up people's disgust with the fact that the new Kinect will always be on, always "watching" you, and has such creepy features as facial recognition and heart rate monitoring. The thing about poems is that they tend to be...well..."poetic". That is, they use metaphor and allegory to make a point.
What's more poetic:
"She has pretty red hair."
or "Her hair is like a fiery blaze that held my eyes enraptured as the flames danced along the breeze"?
Sure, the first option gets the basic point across while the second one is exaggerated, but they both still mean the same thing.
TL/DR Don't be like the people commenting in Zero Punctuation who actually believe that Yahtzee is a bitter, pissed off Australian who hates the world, hates 90% of the games he plays, and seriously makes you wonder why he'd take a job reviewing things he hates so much. It's just his shtick, it's his gag. In this case, you shouldn't believe that Jim ACTUALLY believes that when/if the earth falls to AI overlords it'll all be because of the Kinect.
