e373 – Patently virtually hard to beat

Stories about robocalls, patenting, modding, Nethack at @MuseumModernArt, @Atari ’s 50th anniversary games & @Artiphon ’s Orba.

Michael, Andy and Michael begin this week’s episode with something everyone wants to minimize: unwanted telephone calls. As of 1 July, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in the United States requires small and medium sized phone companies to implement the rules known as Shaken/Stir for caller ID authentication. This means that calls that are placed must have their caller ID signed by the originating carriers and validated by other carriers before reaching consumers per the FCC website. All in all, good news for consumers to make it easier to determine what is probable spam and what may be a legitimate call to take. And of course the James Bond reference is not lost on the cohosts.

The team then covers an intriguing story about how a government contractor attempted and succeeded in patenting an open source concept. After a conversation on hardware hacking, the team turns to games that were unintentionally unbeatable. Nethack is now in MoMA and a modder is making $20k per month by porting popular games to virtual reality. This modder is funded by Patreon backers who are remarkably consistent in their support.

The cohosts discuss Atari’s 50th anniversary, and the updated takes on classic games. Wrapping up this week’s episode, Andy shares his experiences with Bitburner and Michael R demos his new Artiphon Orba.

Are you in the 100% club? Drop us a line at @gamesatwork_biz and let us know!