I don't post stuff about myself that often, so I'll let my narcissism kick in for a bit. Hello all, if you came from the IIDEX2016 page (which I doubt, seeing that the link is a little broken at the moment), I am Ryo, and this is my blog.

I'm a designer, with a bachelors in industrial design from Carleton University. I should be working in the industry, but I've decided to go back to Masters to do some academic works. I'm not sure what exactly I'm gonna be doing over there, but I kinda wanna do something education related. Only time will tell.

I'm a fan of Extra Credits' YouTube Channel, and have recently started binging on their vids. From the insightful and well produced videos, I came across a topic that has lots to do with what I want to pursue in Masters -- but in a slightly different theme. The question here is: "how do we educate (game) designers for RL work?"

So, uh, Glico, the company behind the comic-con staple Pocky released an app that teaches basic coding concept to kids.  It's your generic make-a-robot-move-using-arbitrary-blocks-that-mimics-coding-but-not-really idea -- but this time, it's brought to you by chocolate covered biscuit et al. The app-tly named "G L I C O D E" app does just that. It's basically a simple puzzle game that the player must use arrows in the shape of confections to guide a morbid-looking character through its blocky world.

My gosh, this whole Pokémon thing really started joggin' ma noggin'. I'm all riled up and the only way I can rant is by posting drivel on my own personal blog -- that nobody but the bots and occasional lost souls read. Ah well. In case that this site blows up (which is probably never, 'cause I've got no theme in what I'm writing about, meaning I've no idea who my audience would be), they'll have a cringe-worthy time skimming through the heaps of trash known as Ryo's sick, twisted mind.

In any case, the topic for this post are trends. Those that follow, and those that don't.

With the recent Pokémon GO craze happening throughout the world, I've begun to wonder: people are really obsessed with collecting things. It's like our inner bird awakened and we want to hoard all the shiny jewels. It's not just Pokémon, collecting is something we all do at least once or so in our life. Some collect stamps, baseball cards, pressed flowers, fine art, etc., etc.

And if we don't collect something of personal value, we simply collect dust.