Okay, so this is more relevant to FPS games but I am sure there are rage fuelling moments in most genres. There's nothing worse than working your balls off to reach a certain point in the game and then - BOOM - game over. Whether that be something from the environment screwing you over, or that self obsessed, no life camper.
Trust me, I have experienced it all. Just tonight I was catching up on some Modern Warfare 3, playing CTF which is one of my absolute favourite game types. The point of this tale is that the enemy team was almost entirely made up of kill-whore rushers, who only captured the flag once per round, within the last few seconds to ensure a victory.
The amount of rage I was filled with during the above game was immense. In fact, I almost threw my controller out of the window. It annoys me so much when people play objective-based game types with no intention of playing the objective. Maybe their intention is to make people angry, that notion certainly works a charm.
On the flip side, I can see why many people are against any form of video game related rage. It unnecessarily stresses you out, can make you cause damage to your home and more worryingly to yourself in the process and is it really worth it? From that 5 minutes of rage, what have you achieved - apart from maybe giving others a laugh.
At the end of the day, you will always encounter a rage moment when playing video games. Whether this be your own or someone else's.
Perhaps if people actually played the game properly, and didn't K/D whore in objective based games, maybe rage would be less prevalent. However, trying to stop those that do this from doing so is a mammoth task in itself. Like anyone else, they are playing the game for fun. I suppose if that makes them enjoy the game then so be it - perhaps back out of the game and try another.
I might start backing out and choosing another game when I can feel rage creeping in. I just may be able to counter a repeat of the many situations I have put myself in before. The only problem with this comes when you are in a party, or playing with others. Just because you're playing really badly, or something is winding you up, should your party have to suffer and back out with you?
It would be interesting to hear others' stories about video game rage. If you have a little spare time and have a memorable moment, why not share it? Comments are open to all and your contribution is greatly appreciated.
Before carrying on any further, take a quick read of Kevin Systrom's recent blog post about the Instagram "sell your photos without permission" fiasco:
http://blog.instagram.com/post/38252135408/thank-you-and-were-listening
What do you think. Genuine confusion or tail-between-the-legs backtrack? I'm struggling with this one but I'm swinging towards the backtrack. Facebook do this all the time. They announce a new policy that will actively affect user privacy then backtrack when said user complains. Seeing as Facebook now own Instagram I would not be surprised if this is a similar tactic.
I'll play it safe and look out for anymore updates.
Does make you think though, doesn't it.
So it turns out that Instagram, the online photo sharing website, has updates its Terms and Condition which will allow them exclusive rights to any photo you upload with the intention to sell them to whoever they like. The worrying part about this is they can do it without your consent, and without you even knowing who your photos are being sold to.
The new terms come into effect on January 16th 2013. Any accounts still active by this date will be tied in with the new terms and they cannot opt out. I strongly advise that if you do not want the company to have free reign over your photos, delete it before the 16th January. The new terms state that any account deleted after the 16th could still have it's photos shared, so this is why you must delete it prior to this date if you are not happy with the new terms.
Facebook purchased Instagram in April for a staggering £616m ($1bn). It wouldn't surprise me if the idea for selling the photos to advertisers comes in light of the earlier dip in Facebooks share prices. They have struggled in recent months to keep investors and advertisers happy, especially when the value of the company when floated on the market didn't even scratch the surface on what they initially estimated.
Earlier this month, Facebook stated that they would eventually "monetise Instagram". Is this it?
To me, it is a very draconian way of doing things. It goes completely against everything that Instagram was created for - a free haven for users to actively share their photos to the rest of the world. If you look at rival services, such as Flickr, who offer everything the new Instagram won't, it's hard to see how they will survive.
On the other side of the argument though, some people do state that this is the price of social media. It is a tool to interact with other people so why should we be bothered if the site is sharing our photos. To counter this, I don't think people are bothered if a site shares our photos, as long as we know where they are going, what they will be used for and what safeguards are in place to protect our privacy. Instagram have completely gone against this by not even telling you who is buying or what your photos are being used for.
As far as I can see, neither Facebook or Instagram have commented on this - even though it has caused a massive public backlash.
I'll update the blog if they make any comment.
