Paul Meyer

Professional stuff: For lots of detail see my resume, but a reasonable summary is that I'm "guru" level on C++ (except for the STL with which I haven't worked much) and Windows (3.x, 9x, NT, 2K).

Things about which I'll gladly discuss, opine, or get stubborn

• User Interface design, especially graphic ones
  I don't care how good your technology is, if people can't use it or don't want to, you fail.
• The Great GUI War
  Yes, we owe a debt to the people who came up with it first, but don't forget who made it affordable. Most of all, don't get religious! Choose products based on what they do and how reliable/usable they are. And unless you've taken a vow of poverty yourself, don't you dare complain about profit as a motivation. I will grant that both of the biggest contenders have done some dirty deeds, but neither is a particular moral giant.)
• Computers Suck!
  They are the world's greatest toys, but they are also a pain in the arse.
• Computer games and game companies
  The computer game market is a nasty one. Making a profit has always been tricky, and recently it has become downright impossible unless you "dumb down" your game for a mass market, because the public's expectations in graphics and sound are so enormous. But even so, and even when times were a lot less lean than now, game companies have a tradition of hiring and exploiting inexperienced engineers. Salaries, working conditions, and especially working hours are ludicrously bad. Game software is notoriously buggy - and a big part of that is the tradition of scraping the bottom of the barrel to supplement the few folks who will tolerate the terrible job conditions because they really want to work on games - and note, that's not "make games", implying much creative input, in most cases.

Here are some of my favorite Web places:

• Jaded's Gaming Pub
  A very nice place to discus games with rational people (many of whom are or were professional game journalists). Not a good place to gush about the latest K00L or KEWL releases, and flame and spam are frowned upon. Bring your brain, or don't bother visiting.
• Computer Games Online
  The website of Computer Games magazine, which used to be known as Strategy Plus. This is the magazine that has taken over the place of Computer Gaming World as the best place for in-depth and thoughtful reporting on games and gaming, since the latter was bought out by Ziff-Davis and rebuilt to attract a larger audience. (CGW is still a decent magazine, much better than the rest of the game magazines which generally qualify as stable sweepings, but S+/CGM is much better.)