waka waka waka

7 Comments

1. Nick Pollack says

   Believe it or not, my friends completed that entire grid a little under two years ago. I wouldn’t suggest it if you want to get anything done in your life.

   Posted September 17, 2009 at 8:06 pm | Permalink
2. Meyieaea says

   I started at 9 because a friend (JK) asked me to try it.. in one hours .. by myself…. I have 2 grids and 18 blanks filled in so far.

   Posted September 17, 2009 at 10:55 pm | Permalink
3. Malcolm says

   Well, that’s very good, I think. It’s not easy!

   Posted September 17, 2009 at 11:30 pm | Permalink
4. Meyieaea says

   Not easy but oodles of fun…… I am looking forward to trying to complete it ON MY OWN!… Thanks for posting it.

   Posted September 18, 2009 at 8:55 am | Permalink
5. JK says

   Thank you very, very much Malcolm. I’m fairly confident now that I should keep such things as, “blogs I read daily” to myself.

   And Nick? I sure hope you’re correct. Otherwise, I’m absolutely certain the next “business conference” I attend, I will not be greeted with, “Oh JK, what a brilliant, insightful mind you have.”

   Posted September 18, 2009 at 7:19 pm | Permalink
6. Kevin Kim says

   The problem with this game is that the associations aren’t free: mastery of the game requires learning how the game-maker thinks. As a religion student, I shot over to the “religion” cell on the grid right away, but now am bogged down despite having plugged in a whole mess of common religious terms. It’s possible I’m overthinking, but the judgment “You’re overthinking” is a conclusion that can only be arrived at by matching my thinking with what I believe the game-maker to have been thinking when s/he designed the game. In a different context, one outside the game, my own associative process wouldn’t be considered overthinking at all. So it really is a matter of “How well can you read the designer’s mind?” as opposed to “How good are you at associative thought?”

   I also noticed that some terms won’t appear immediately if they’re located too far along a branch whose proximal members haven’t been uncovered yet. In other words, you can’t uncover Term C, way out on the branch, without first uncovering A and B, the terms closer to any given “hub.”

   So this is somewhat disappointing: the game, ultimately, not so different from what I do when trying to predict how a TV series like “Battlestar Galactica” will end. It’s all about getting into the mind of the scriptwriters, not necessarily about following logic or making one’s own plausible associations. As such, the game rates “cute” in my book, but not “intelligent.”

   Despite my reservations, I have a feeling I’ll be plugging away at this damn thing during my free time for the next little while. I’ve been at it, on and off, for about an hour.

   Posted September 18, 2009 at 7:19 pm | Permalink
7. JK says

   Kevin?

   I think you’re correct (at least I’m hoping I’m reading you right – cause that gives me the “ownership of my delusion.”)

   A woman designed this damned grid.

   Posted September 18, 2009 at 8:59 pm | Permalink