Diablo III in 3-D

Kyle Barron, a lead software analyst with over two decades of programing experience agreed to answer some questions about new media and its perceivable future.

Eddie Voyles: Thanks, Kyle for taking the time to answer a few questions about the direction of new media.

Kyle Barron: Sure.

Voyles: I don’t want to get too technical, especially right of the bat -- Ginger or Mary Ann?

Barron: Mary Ann. Hehe.

Voyles: How many hours of the day do you spend on a computer?

Barron: Counting work? 14 hours.

Voyles: Wow. What was your first computer, when did you buy it, and what were some of its specs?

Barron: In 1982, I bought a Commodore Vic-20 with 4k of memory, and you stored your data on a cassette deck.

Voyles: How much storage did a cassette hold?

Barron: 300 kilobytes. Today you can buy 1.5 terabytes.

Voyles: What was the first computer language, other than Basic, that you learned?

Barron: Apple 2-C.

Voyles: How many social networks do you belong to?

Barron: One, Facebook. But Netflix is pretty darn close. It has its own community, friends, rating movies; put me down for Netflix too.

Voyles: I would not have thought of Netflix, but I guess you're right. You don't seem to use a bunch of social networks? Do you use Twitter?

Barron: I don't tweet. At home I usually use the internet for news, alotta RSS feeds and also to keep up with my love of Japanese Anime.

Voyles: Are you big into Anime?

Barron: I've probably got over 140 hours of DVDs that I'v bought but still haven’t seen.

Voyles: That's alot!

Barron: Yes it is. I think I'm done buying for awhile. They take up a lot of shelf space.

Voyles: Why has it been so difficult for even hugely popular sites like Facebook, that have over 350,000,000 users, to earn money?

Barron: People expect it all to be free, and people ignore banner adds. Monetization is pretty tough. There’s only a few papers that successfully charge, and those are usually stock market, fantasy sports, or Nielson's rating pages.

Voyles: What do you foresee as the main medium for media distribution in the future - home computer/laptop, cellphone, iPad, or a game console?

Barron: The home computer is still the main workhorse, and I don’t see that changing tomorrow, but the Iphone revolution has just started. I can imagine the cellphone giving the computer a run for its money. Who knows about the iPad. I use my PS3 to watch blue-ray movies, download movies, and store music. I don’t surf the web with it, but you can.

Voyles: Do you play computer games?

Barron: Oh yeah. Just finished Dragon Age -- again.

Voyles: Name your top 3 computer games.

Barron: Whoa, that’s tough. Now you’re making me think -- Spellbreaker.

Voyles: The old infocom game?

Barron: Yep, wait. I’ll say Planetfall.

Voyles: Why Planetfall and not Spellbreaker?

Barron: It was much easier, and it had a great story. Spellbreaker could get insanely difficult.

Voyles: Ok, now there’s two more.

Barron: Baldur’s Gate II, that game had it all: a great story, romance, guilds, so much to do in that game and Diablo II.

Voyles: Did you play Diablo II solo or over Blizzard’s online service.

Barron: Strickly solo. The game really didn’t get going until you finished it two times, but when you reached Hell level then it was game on.

Voyles: Do you play MMORPGs?

Barron: I did but never again.

Voyles: Why never again?

Barron: Those games are time sinkholes. They’re designed to get you to stay on a long, long time. The time spent to advance in those games is too high for me.

Voyles: Not long ago you could go into Best Buy and there would be four rows of PC games, now it’s dwindled down to a single row.

Barron: One row and a section of $5 games like Cabela’s Deer Hunter 2004 and casino games.

Voyles: What do you see on the horizon for new media?

Barron: 3-D. I believe that is gonna be the future. For television there could be some growing pains, but it’s coming. And everything will be streaming. Itunes killed the CD. The DVD is next.

Voyles: Thanks, Kyle for sharing your time.

Barron: No problem. Bye.