Eleven (11) days ago (relative to publishing), while scoffing down the excess amount of pizza available at the Nexus contributor meeting, I found a copy of Nexus, issue five (5) from 2005 (two thousand, five). For those not 4th year or older, it was an issue dedicated to nerds and nerdihood. Josh then proceeded to point out the nerd figurine atop the arcade machine, and at that point I nearly cried when I saw it had been disfigured.

One of the articles was what it is like to be a nerd. As I sit in one of my COMP papers, looking around for my girlfriend’s sister’s boyfriend who is supposedly also doing this paper (that said I’ve never seen him in here…), it gives me pause to think of how far we’ve come over the last few decades. Nerding has really become an accepted part of society, or at the very least we’re no longer at the bottom (to which we owe the emo and emo-esque crowd for displacing us up the chain). But, before I get all boring and philosophical, I call to enlighten all Level one (1) and higher nerds;

For those not in the know, the new library that the uni is building actually has less space for books than the current library (read: Wintec Student Hub). As such, books that are “of no value” to the uni library are going to be stored by Crown Relocations while the new building is built, and afterwards will be destroyed. Most of the books on this list haven’t been checked out in a a few years, and are deemed to have no or little significance. That said, at the SCMS BoS meeting, a few interesting titles were brought up which have geek cultural significance.

These titles include books written in the 1980s (nineteen eighties) about AI and one that was written by two NZ computer science professors. For nostalgic types these are the goldmine collection, and it’s a shame we don’t have storage capacity. The most interesting fact about this disposals process however is that departments will not be able to take these to-be-destroyed books and put in their offices, tearooms, private libraries etc. If you’re interested you’d better get in contact with someone from the library (sorry, didn’t catch any names. To quote former editor Roz; “This is professional journalism”).

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My room is an absolute mess. Normally I have crap piled on my desk, but today the crap has found it’s way to the floor. Unlike some days though, today is a particularly good day, as it just concluded a weekend that I look forward to: the World Cyber Games NZ Qualifier (aka xLAN).

For those not in the know, it’s an annual event held in Auckland. The winners of some selected tournaments go on to compete in the APAC finals, and then the world finals (this year held in Germany). It’s held on the weekend before the second semester starts back, people come on Friday and leave Sunday afternoon. Sleeping is optional, and very few people get over 12 hours of it. Many cans and cans of energy drinks are consumed. This year we had 760 people, so after crew, tournament computers and expo people, about 850 computers. About 900 amps of power was being constantly used, and you thought your last power bill was bad!

It’s not all tournaments though, as many people come to just have a few fun games with their friends. And not to mention, there are quite a few of us from waiKato who are crazy enough to volunteer, but we all love it. Especially when Zapman (aka Daniel (congrats, 4th ever plug!)) starts to be… himself. I’m the network administrator, and It’s no small job running an enterprise grade network comprising of computers you’ve never seen or configured before.

I strongly suggest anyone with an interest in computer gaming to come along next year, although you have to get in quick as seats sell out quite quickly. A splendid time is guaranteed for all. Ok, I’m going to end it here before my brain really goes to mush from tiredness (according to Google Docs this is 7th grade level writing… I’m very disappointed). And, finally, yes I did dance again. 4 times. Only one of them was any good IMO, I was very disappointed in myself, but if you wanna come back to my site in a few days, and I’ll of hopefully uploaded it by then.

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We fellow geeks generally tend to stick to the internets, after all, happiness is a warm mouse. But every now and then, we take a venture outside with a little help from our friends. Ventures like the SCMS pub crawl for example, is generally accepted as an enjoyable outing, and a splendid time is guaranteed for all.

But recently, there has been another reason for us to emerge from our darkened rooms; Geohashing. Simple description; people go to random locations around your local area every Saturday. Long, nerdy description (for geeks who don’t follow XKCD); First you find your graticule (the 1°x1° geographical co-ordinate, i.e. waiKato is -38,175) then you take the opening value of the Dow Jones, MD5 it, split into two 16-bit values, convert to binary and append it as the decimal point to your graticule and voila, you have a location. All you need is to find your coat and grab your hat, and hopefully a crowd of people turn up (for the benefit of the environment, you should catch the bus).

To give you an idea just how vast an area is covered, the area around waiKato extends from Te Uku (2/3 way to Raglan) to just beyond Waihi, and then from Papakura down to Te Awamutu. A lot of this area is private property and some of it ocean, and so it’s not always feasible to make it to a point. And of course, being a fairly recent concept, it’s not incredibly popular with those of waiKato yet. So far there have only been 3 known geohashes here; twice by a guy who likes to wear pirate gear (InvaluableKiwi; congrats on my 3rd ever plug!), and once by myself and my girlfriend.

So, would you like a bit of adventure on any given Saturday at 4pm? We’ve got a Facebook group going (search for NZ Geohashers), or read the wiki at http://wiki.xkcd.com/geohashing/. Who knows, if the Nexus ed and the rest of the club band is as keen as they claims they are, you might even score a t-shirt or something. Hell, I might even score a t-shirt or something… Final note; Across the Universe, like most things with Evan Rachel Wood, is a movie that you should watch at least once. Now. But before this Saturday.

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