/ / / I began this yesterday night (on FRIDAY)at 9:30 when a fellow Rinky-Dink found that he could not listen to it on IMG2. I thought that there might be more people like that, and, since a text document is much smaller then the wave file I stored on my computer, I decided to type the whole thing out. I finished, today, at 10:20 in the morning. I did sleep last night, but not much. The whole thing comes to 23 pages in Word. Hey, what can I say, the interview itself is over half an hour. There's probably a few errors here or there, but I did my best.

/ / / There were also some portions that were duplicated on the radio interview. I edited those out, frankly, because I didn't want to type them twice. Everything else though, I tried to leave as close to the original as possible (Including the commercials and everything)! My comments are in [square brackets], whenever I have something to say, but I was too tired to say much.

Happy Reading! (And if you reply, PLEASE remove the original!)

_____________________________________________________


VICKI: Greeting everyone! This is IMG2's "Best of the Web". I'm Vicki Love and I'm your host for the next thirty minutes of "Best of the Web". It's FRIDAY! And you know what? Today is pre-recorded. I'm sorry, but, uh, this interview had to be done at a different time, and that's okay, because it's a great interview with Sam Stoddard of Rinkworks. He's the webmaster, he is the mind behind Rink-Works. Rinkworks, R.I.N.K.W.O.R.K.S. dot com. It's a great interview, I hope you stay tuned and listen, the only thing you can't do is call in, but that's okay because Sam is a good guy and his site is fun and informative, so stay tuned.

[cut to weird commercial]

COMMERCIAL LADY #1: Oh, shut up! And what are you picking on us for, anyway? We are not the ones who got fat. Heh.

COMMERCIAL LADY #2: We're pregnant, you half-wit.

COMMERCIAL LADY #1: Oh, yeah, well...I hope your babies look like...monkeys!

[cut to IMG2 guy; play drum banging thing]

GUY-WITH-DIGITALLY-DEEPENED-VOICE: IMG2.com. Experts on demand.

[more drums and an electric guitar. Back to VICKI, and the real (pre-recorded) interview begins.]

VICKI: Greetings, everyone! This is IMG2's "Best of the Web". I'm Vicki Love, I'm your host for the next thirty minutes, and boy I have a great show for you today. I have a guest, and, um, from a great site that I featured last week, Rinkworks dot com; wonderful site, great, uh, great things happening there, um, but, guess what? It's Friday! Yeah! Friday! All right! Heh, heh. It is great. --Oh, and I, also, I have a guest in my, my, uh, studio here. Uh, Cheryl [sp?], my friend, say, just say hi.

CHERYL [faintly, in the background]: Hello.

VICKI: Mmm-hmm. Okay, she's just sitting in here, uh, checking out to see what it's like doing the radio show, and so, it's Friday, folks. Yeah! Hey, it's a special weekend. It's father's day! Did you send your Dad a card? If you didn't send your Dad a card, well, you know what? --uh, and your Dad has a computer, I have a great place to go. I've featured many websites uh, card, e-card sites on this show, but this is a portal, this is the best e-card portal I know of. It's called mypostcards.com. M.Y...My Postcards. You know, M.Y.P.O.S...T.[laughs]C.A.R.D.S. dot com. Don't laugh at me, Jason! [laughs] I don't have it in front of me, I'm just doing it by memory. Uh --

JASON [I think]: You're a writer? That...is that...your job?

VICKI: Yeeess....my job is being a writer. Heh heh.

[Jason says something too faint to be heard.]

VICKI: I can spell, but I like to have it in front of me.

JASON: Just not very well.

VICKI: And it was www dot heh, mypostcards.com. There you can find any type of card you want. You want a funny card, a serious card, a silly card, um, just any type of card you want, there are hundreds of sites. Not -- maybe not hundreds, but at least fifty to seventy-five sites that you can choose from. [Kaz's note: Yahoo! brings up 14 categories and 115 sites when searching for "e-card".] So, uh, go there, father's day, make sure you send your Dad a fish, or a fishing pole, or golf clubs, or something, send him an e-card. He'll like it. You know, dads like that kind of thing too. [Correction: now is when the real interview begins.] Okay, today, we have, uh, Sam Stoddard, who is the webmaster of Rinkworks, he is the brains behind Rinkworks. Rinkworks is an online entertainment site that features all sorts of things that, uh, Sam thinks about, Sam, uh, likes to talk about, plus, Sam has this one -- he's a wo-wonderful, uh, software programmer, and he has this thing called the "Dialectizer," and it's been controversial over the past, mmm, I don't know, about six weeks, two months, and, uh, we'll have him talk a little bit about that. But today, when, uh, when I have the guys here, at IMG2, pull it up and use it on their, on different websites, we had a blast. It's fun. Sam, uh, has a great website and there's everything to do on here. There are Book-a-Minute, Movie-a-Minute, uh, little synapsis [sic] of, uh, films that you've never seen before but you think you might want to see, and it's all humorous. This is a, this is a great site for just kicking back and having a good time; and so, we're going to go to a commercial break here, and when we come back, I'll be talking with Sam Stoddard of Rinkworks.

[Cut to another commercial break.]

DOOFY GUY: I need to get on the web right away. I need to offer my products and services online. I could try to build a site myself [like Sam did], but, no, I don't have the time. Computer, find me a web design company I can use. [clacking sound.]

DOOFIER GUY TALKING INTO A TIN CAN TO MAKE IT SOUND LIKE A COMPUTER IS TALKING: Web design...searching. (beep, beep) Five thousand, six hundred and thirty-four records found!

DOOFY GUY: Well, that's not much help. Computer, find me a web design firm that can set up e-commerce for me. [more clanking and beeping sounds.]

DOOFIER GUY TALKING INTO A TIN CAN TO MAKE IT SOUND LIKE A COMPUTER IS TALKING: Web design, e-commerce...searching. One hundred and twenty-four records found.

DOOFY GUY: Ah, that's a little bit better, but I want a simpler solution. Computer, try looking for a web design company that can handle a web design project from end to end. [Even more clanking and beeping sounds.]

DOOFIER GUY TALKING INTO A TIN CAN TO MAKE IT SOUND LIKE A COMPUTER IS TALKING: End-to-end web design...searching. One record found. (beep, beep)

DOOFY GUY: Ah, that's better. IMG2. E-commerce...webhosting...computer, how do I contact them? (bleep, bleep, bleep, bleep!)

DOOFIER GUY TALKING INTO A TIN CAN TO MAKE IT SOUND LIKE A COMPUTER IS TALKING: On the web, at www.IMG2.com. Or, by phone, at 877-987-9200. (beep, beep)

DOOFY GUY: Computer, dial IMG2, please. [And make coffee too, while you're at it. And clean up my house, and do all my work, and do absolutely everything else for me!]

[NOW the actual interview starts. I think. I said this twice already...]

VICKI: This is a pre-recording of IMG2's "Best of the Web." Stay tuned, it's a good show, [it's FRIDAY,] listen, and have fun.

[Drums and percussion and stuff.]

VICKI: Welcome back everyone, to "Best of the Web", and today I have with me Sam Stoddard of Rinkworks. Hello, Sam!

SAM [Yay! It's about time!]: Hi!

VICKI: Hi, how are you?

SAM: Good.

VICKI: Ah, was that really you at the chat today?

SAM: That was me.

VICKI: That was the -- I use the --

SAM: That was the tail end. I, I didn't realize that was you until you had gone.

VICKI: Right, well, I, I don't use my regular name, I don't use Vicki out there, I always use Kerra.

SAM: Uh-huh.

VICKI: And, so, uh, yeah, it could have been confusing.

IMG2 GUY: You announced that, Vicki, to everyone.

VICKI: Heh heh, well, you know, oh well. Oh well, um, they can't, they don't know how to spell it. And so, yeah, hey, your chat is really easy!

SAM: Thank you!

VICKI: You're welcome! I've been to lots of chat rooms, some of them you'd get on and they'd pop you right off, but yours was really easy. And you were right, the people are very friendly.

SAM: Yeah, I, uh, that was, uh, one --

[Really loud beep.]

VICKI: Whoops!

SAM: What was that?

VICKI: I don't know. It -- oh, it's me. I'm sorry. It was me.

[Sam and Vicki both laugh.]

VICKI: Sorry. I -- I turned my head the wrong way. Um, go ahead, tell us, tell us about your, the people. [I have to wonder if Sam's actually in the studio. That sounded a lot like a cell phone beep.]

SAM: Uh, well, that's one of the areas of Rinkworks that, um, I'm most pleased with because it wasn't something I had any direct control over, which uh, says something. Uh, I just, I just, put up the chat room, and, uh, and, the people who came there, they took it from there.

VICKI: How long has the chat room been there?

SAM: Since [actually, the word "since" is garbled; bad phone connection or recording, probably], uh, December of '99.

VICKI: Really?

SAM: Not long.
VICKI: Really, yeah, not long at all.

SAM: Yeah. But, uh, a lot of the people knew each other before because, uh, the message forum there where you can post a message --

VICKI [rudely interrupting the middle of Sam's sentence]: Oh, yeah.

SAM: -- Not real time conversation --

VICKI [interrupting again]: Right.

SAM: -- Um, has been up since, uh, the summer of '98.

[Another annoying beep, but not as loud.]

VICKI: Oh, wow. Well, um, yeah, now, how long has Rinkworks been; how long have you been doing this site?

SAM: December Fir -- Uh, sorry, not first, eighth, 1997 --

VICKI: Oh, really?

SAM: -- is when Rinkworks opened --

VICKI: Wow.

SAM: -- but uh, the At-a-Glance film reviews feature on there --

VICKI: Uh-huh.

SAM: -- That existed on the web prior to that and actually started in '95

VICKI: Right, now --

SAM: -- uh, and so when I put on [I think he says 'put on', but it's garbled...recording again] more features, I, um, created the Rinkworks name to tie them together.

VICKI: Right, right, um, did you, was it just a film site, a review site at first?

SAM: Yup, that's all it was.

VICKI: And because, ah, you love film -- I can tell --

[Vicki and Sam both giggle]

VICKI: I was there, I was, I couldn't help it, I had to spend, uh, uh, I don't know, ten, fifteen minutes, at uh, a, Film-a-Minute [sic.], it's --

SAM: Oh, yeah.

VICKI: It's hilarious, you guys must have a great time putting that together.

SAM: It's a lot of fun, yup.

VICKI: Yeah, do you actually, watch the movie, and then, ah, come up with your synopsis of it?

SAM: Um...yeah, uh, in most cases. Once in a while, we've done one just on reputation alone --

VICKI: Really...

SAM: -- um, but, yeah, Movie Minute [at least he didn't call it Film-a-Minute 8-Þ], Movie-a-Minute um, is done...pretty much when -- whenever we have the, um, the notion of...Ah, uh, I'm not, I'm not making, I'm not leading up to a point here, I'm sorry.

VICKI: Oh, that's okay. That is okay!

SAM: May I try that one over?

VICKI: Uh, heh heh, yeah! [Of course, both end up in the recording...]

SAM: Ask me that question again.

VICKI: That, I was just won--, you know what I really wanted to know? Your, your friend, what's his, what is his name who helps you with the, uh, the Movie-a-Minute and the Book-a-Minute?

SAM: Oh, that's David Parker.

VICKI: Yes, is he just -- is he your friend?

SAM: Yup, he's a friend of mine, we went to college together --

VICKI: Mmm-hmm.

SAM: -- and um, now he lives over in Colorado, so we'll --

VICKI: Oh.

SAM: So we're half the country apart, but we still talk every day through e-mail --

VICKI: Oh, yeah.

SAM: -- and collaborate on Rinkworks still. He's still quite active on it.

VICKI: Oh, yeah.

SAM: Um, yeah, and actually Book-a-Minute was one of the first features to come to Rinkworks after the film reviews. It opened on the same day that Rinkworks opened --

VICKI: Ohhh...

SAM: -- and, um, and it was just the science fiction and fantasy section. Of, of books.

VICKI: Right, you have the --

SAM: And then we did the bedtime books, you know, kids' books, and then classics, and then Movie-a-Minute came later that year, in '98.

VICKI: Oh, really.

SAM: And, um, whenever we, we, uh, think of a movie that seems to boil down to um, some very, very small amount um, then we do it.

VICKI: Yeah, what about uh, when did the bad movies uh, reviews start? The very, very--

SAM: That's weird, isn't it?

[They laugh.]

SAM: Uh, a lot of people don't quite get why you'd watch a bad movie on purpose, for fun.

VICKI: Oh, I don't know, yeah.

SAM: But some people, um, like it a lot. Dave actually introduced me to that whole thing--

VICKI: Oh, really.

SAM: -- um, because he's, he used to watch bad movies on purpose a lot, to laugh at them.

VICKI: Uh-huh.
SAM: So there are movies so bad out there, that, ah, you wonder what was in the minds of the people making it --

VICKI: Heh, yeah.

SAM: -- and, and it's funny --

VICKI: Yeah.

SAM: -- and, uh, that was his idea. That was Dave's idea, and it's pretty much his feature, although I do contribute to it kind of behind the scenes, but um --

VICKI: Uh huh.

SAM: -- yeah, he, he came up with that idea last year sometime. I'm not, I don't remember exactly when.

VICKI: Well, you have to tell him that I, I'm one of those people who watches bad movies just for the kick of it.

SAM: Well, good for you.

VICKI: I enjoy, I really enjoyed, uh, reading some of the, the, the reviews he has, and his thoughts. Heh. That was your--

SAM: He'll be glad to hear that.

VICKI: Okay, uh, wha-- You know, I'd like to talk about uh, your, uh, "Dialectizer"?

SAM: Mmm-hmmm.

VICKI: I showed the guys here at work this today and they had a blast with it.

[Sam laughs.]

VICKI: Uh, we were all just laughing. This is just a wonderful, you wrote the program for this?

SAM: Um, in a manner of speaking. I didn't have the idea. The idea of that came a long time ago, I think somebody in the seventies wrote the Jive dialect.

VICKI: Mmm-hmmm.

SAM: Um, and, uh, he's credited on the Dialectizer page. And, it was written originally to just convert text documents. This was before internet working was a big deal.

VICKI: Mmm.

SAM: And, ah, you'd just have a text file you'd convert it, and you'd read it there. And these programs were put up as freeware on, um, ah, distributed on the internet --

VICKI: Right.

SAM: -- actually, and uh, I ran across them while I was in co -- uh, I ran across them while I was in collage [I think this is a recording error where they duplicated the recording], in um, around, that'd be '92 or '93 or so. And I got a big kick out of them too. I mean, I can, I can imagine the situation down at the station because that's what we were doing in, in the computer clusters at school. And, and we used to crack up, and so --

VICKI: Oh, yeah.

SAM: -- when Rinkworks came along, I was thinking, well, why not try to use this to entertain people on Rinkworks with that.

VICKI: Oh, yeah, it's great entertainment. It, it's wonderful.

SAM: Yup. Uh-huh. Yeah. It, it was a really neat idea, whoever thought of it. Oh--

VICKI: Yeah.

SAM: -- and so I wrote the Redneck dialect and the Moron dialect, from scratch.

VICKI: Oh, that Moron dialect is the best.

[They laugh.]

SAM: Well, thanks!

VICKI: You're welcome! Erm, what about Elmer Fudd dialect? Did you write that?

SAM: That was a -- Nope, that was another one that was floating around the internet.

VICKI: Oh, that is hilarious! Heh.

SAM: Yeah, the neat thing about that one is that it's quite simple. There's only about -- it, there, it's done by a search and replace operations. It, ah, you see a piece of a word or a whole word --

VICKI: Right.

SAM: -- and it, and it does a replacement. It, it looks it up in, um, dictionary, it figures out what to put in there instead. And Elmer Fudd, every time it sees an 'r' for example, it will put a 'w' in. And the neat thing about that dialect is that it's very short. There's only about, uh, fifteen or so translations.

IMG2 GUY: Hey, Sam!

SAM: Yes?

IMG2 GUY: Um, I'm looking at my, my personal [Garbled. "Server"? "Set"?] now, and I just uh, did the Jive --

SAM: Yup.

IMG2 GUY: -- talk and I'm over here crackin' up in, in the studio over here, and [Sam laughs] 'cuz this thing is so cool.

SAM: Thanks.

IMG2 GUY: I love, it's uh, um, some uh dee paddles duh some credit include Honky Pigs, Quess one, two heh heh heh heh...

[Both laugh]

IMG2 GUY: I mean, that's just so funny.

VICKI: It is.

IMG2 GUY: Love that. I love the Swedish one, too. The chef.

SAM: The Swedish Chef, yeah, from the Muppets.

IMG2 GUY: Yeah. [more laughing]

SAM: Yup. That's hard to pronounce sometimes, or recognize.

VICKI: Oh, okay, you know, here's a question for you. I know about what happened. You had to, well, you voluntarily took it off your site because of--

SAM: Yup.

VICKI: -- of threated, I mean, they were just threatening you, B of A and other, other companies were threatening you because they, they said they were, that you were defacing their websites, and--

SAM: Yeah, they thought it was a violation of their copyrights.

VICKI: Yeah.

SAM: And, uh, it wasn't...I don't know...Threat's a strong word. I'm sure it might have come to that, but, what, all they asked for was that I blocked their sites from being translated.

VICKI: Mmmm.

SAM: Ah, but in the recent, uh, case of Bank of America they sent a, a letter though a lawyer, and, uh, and that obviously concerned me--

VICKI: Yeah.

SAM: And, uh, I didn't, I didn't really want to be dealing with that kind of thing just for an entertainment website and, uh, and so I took the Dialectizer down. All they asked for was just to be blocked though, and I had done that, and would do so quite happily, but the response was huge!

VICKI: It was?

SAM: People kept mailing me from all over, um, about it and so I, I decided that it was probably worth it, um, after all, uh, because it seemed to, uh, entertain a great many people out there, so I did, and, um, and I also put a documentation about how you can block your site from being translated by the Dialectizer without going through me.

VICKI: Yeah, I read that, uh, that's almost like--

SAM: So hopefully that will help and cut down on the angry e-mail.

VICKI: Right, that's like a disclaimer and--

SAM: Yeah

VICKI: --uh, I, I'm, that's perfectly, um, legal and perfe-, I mean, all companies do that. They put up a little disclaimer and then, then there's no fault there.

SAM: Right. It's unfortunate that you have to do that, but--

VICKI: Yeah. It is. It is because all this is is in good fun, and it doesn't deface them or, or anything at all, it's just here at your site.

SAM: Right. It can't be confused with the original work, um, and it, uh, it doesn't record, um, what it, the translation in any permanent or concrete form--

VICKI: Right.

SAM: -- so it doesn't really exist. You're viewing it in, on, in your browser, but it was created on your browser and will disappear immediately when you leave.

VICKI: Yeah, that's, uh, there, there's not problem there; I don't, I don't see a problem.

SAM: I don't think there is.

VICKI: But it gave you a lot of, uh, exposure.

SAM: An awful lot.

VICKI: Yeah, USA Today--

SAM: You know, I got more attention taking it down then I ever had having it up.

VICKI: Yeah, um, uh, Slashdot, I guess, gave, gave you the most exposure.

SAM: Yeah, they, uh, well, they were the first, um, and it certainly seemed like I got the most feedback e-mail from them. Yup. And they drew the attention of USA Today and, uh, the Boston Globe is, is going to be running an article.

VICKI: Really?

SAM: Mmm-hmm.

VICKI: They're going to do a whole article on, on, um, how you did this and what's going on? Is, is is this mixed up with the free speech or is this just, uh, copyright?

SAM: It became a free speech issue, yeah. And that wasn't something that I was expecting to get involved in, uh, because the situation was viewed, um, as a big corporation trying to shut down somebody who was having a harmless website.

VICKI: Right. Right. Well that, I, I mean that--

SAM: And they weren't. I mean, I don't want to convey the impression that that was the case.

VICKI: Right.

SAM: But they were certainly, um, had, I think, an erroneous view of the law in this case.

VICKI: Yeah, well, I hope they don't any more, but it is, uh, it is freedom of speech, and you're only doing it on your site and so I just think, I'm glad that you put it, you put it, put it back up because it, it's hilarious, it's funny, and we just had a kick today, and I'm sure that we're going to be going back with our favorite websites and plugging them in and doing, it's fun.

SAM: Translate your own!

VICKI: Ye-yes!

SAM: IMG2.com.

VICKI: That's the first thing I did, it was hilarious. I did the moron, I loved it!

[both laugh]

SAM: Too bad you can't hear the radio station that way too, but...

VICKI: Oh yeah, oh. I, uh, I--

SAM: You might not like what it does to your voice!

VICKI: Oh, I don't know, it would be funny. Heh heh. It could be any--

SAM: Unfortunately, no. That, that's for a future technological age.

VICKI: There you go, yeah. Uh, what, 50 years from now, maybe not even.

SAM: Right.

VICKI: Huh. Ok. What about, uh, StoryHunt is your, is your brand new?

SAM: That's new, yup.

VICKI: Yeah. What is that all about? It's like a, a treasure hunt?

SAM: Yeah, kind of. That's a little something for the people who, uh, have been around Rinkwr-- Rink-- [cool tougue sound] Rinkworks for a while and, um, and would like something, uh...... No, I'm not going anywhere with that either! Heh heh.

VICKI: Well, yeah, there, there's the, um, let's see. I'll pull up the titles here, for everyone.

SAM: No, I, I can do that.

VICKI: Yeah.

SAM: Storyhunt is for somebody...no, I can't.

VICKI: No?

SAM: Nope. Storyhunt is for people who have been around Rinkworks for a while because, unlike most of the other features on Rinkworks, it's not independent. It refers to the other features and it, it is like a treasure hunt. Uh, you read a chapter of a story and, within the chapter, there's a clue about where to find the next chapter, and the clue can be found somewhere else on Rinkworks.

VICKI: Ohhhh, I get it.

SAM: So if you're good enough at tracking these clues down, you can eventually read a whole story.

VICKI: Now, do people e-mail you or do they go to the, the posting area to let you know how much they liked this, or, or, uh, how long has this been up? Now very long, has it?

SAM: No, just a few days.

VICKI: Oh, ok.

SAM: And, uh, since it has gone up the chat room has been predominantly people asking for hints about a certain plot.

VICKI: Oh yeah, yeah.

SAM: Yeah, and there's a bit of that in the Message Forum also.

VICKI: Yeah, well, as--

SAM: I'm not sure how people like it. They seem to be, uh, using it a lot--

VICKI: Yeah?

SAM: --but mostly they're kind of bitter about it. Heh, heh.

VICKI: Really, Heh Heh.

SAM: "I like this, but it's Evil."

VICKI: Did you make it too hard for everyone?

SAM: Um, too hard for some people, some people kind of had an easier time with it then others. Um, it all depends, it, most of it is how familiar with, er, familiar you are with Rinkworks in the first place.

VICKI: Right, right.

SAM: But it's also, uh, my sneaky little way to encourage people to visit other parts of the site.

VICKI: Yeah, that's a good, that's a good idea. But okay. Let's, let's go to, uh, "Pea Soup for the Cynics Soul". When you said sneaky, I just had to go to the cynical area.

[both laugh]

VICKI: Because, now, this is the first place I went because I, uh, live in the cynic world and, um, now, is this a parody of the Chicken Soup for the, you know, for the whoever and--

SAM: Yes, that group of books.

VICKI: --and the soul and the teenager?

SAM: Yup, we make fun of them.

VICKI: Yeah, this is great.

SAM: Yeah, and I'm, I'm kind of amazed at the, uh, well, not amazed, but it's interesting that you didn't just move on from there because, uh, it certainly shows our more demented side.

VICKI: Yes. Demented is good.

SAM: We've have e-mail from people who really though we were sick people and should not be putting this on the, on the web, but, um, the rest of them really like it. It's a love it/hate it sort of thing.

VICKI: Oh, well, I mean there are those people, but for, for most of the people I know like this.

SAM: Good.

VICKI: Yeah, uh, and then you know, uh, I, I want to touch on a lot of things. How about -- how long has, have you been doing this poll. The, the reader's poll?

SAM: Yeah. I don't know, uh, two months, anyway.

VICKI: Yeah?

SAM: Yeah.

VICKI: I'm, I love those quizzes and polls on different sites. I, I'd, I do them all the time, and the other day I went to your mashed potato one, and I just thought that was so; that was a great idea. Who comes up with these questions?

SAM: All, all over. I mean, I make up some of them--

VICKI: Mmm-hmm.

SAM: -- and sometimes I [part of the recording here is missing] some of them, and e-mail me a bunch.

VICKI: Ohhh...

SAM: I held a contest, actually, about who could come up with the most interesting question--

VICKI: Really?

SAM: --and I got all kinds of the suggestions, from all the submissions.

VICKI: Oh, that's great! That's really great!

SAM: Oh, but you'd...I, I need a lot of ideas, you know, I have, changing it about once every day.

VICKI: Oh, well, I can understand that. Uh, wha -- Okay, now, you also have, uh, a couple of games? You have more than a couple of games on your site.

SAM: Yeah, a few.

VICKI: Okay, um, let's see, well, I want to go to Adventure Games Live and Enchanted Forest. Are--Those are two different places, right?

SAM: Yes.

VICKI: Okay, well, what--

SAM: They're two different games. They were the first two games to show up.

VICKI: They were?

SAM: Oh, no, I'm sorry, the Site Market Game, if you count that one, was first.

VICKI: Oh, okay. Okay, now, Adventure Games Live, is that an interactive on, you know, with other people?

SAM: No.

VICKI: No?

SAM: No, it's just a single player game. It's, it's like the text adventures that used to be popular, before um, great gra -- we had great graphics and computers that could handle them --

VICKI: Uh-huh

SAM: -- at a reasonable speed. Um, like the Zork games.

VICKI: Right.

SAM: Um, except these are menu-driven. You don't type in what you want to do; you have a li-- a menu, uh, that says all the different things you can do, and lets you use, do those things.

VICKI: Oh.

SAM: So the question is, where you are going to go in the game, to find the thing that you need to do, um, not what you have to do once you get there.

VICKI: Ohhh...

SAM: And so, um, Adventure Games Live is actually a site that will eventually have more games on it, um, but the only one of significance there at the moment is Fantasy Quest. Um, and that's, um, a fairly large text adventure game.

VICKI: Right.

SAM: And, um, yeah, that was the first major game project that I, I had done. It was an adaptation of game I wrote in BASIC --

VICKI: Oh, really?

SAM: -- not for the web, in 1990 or '91 or so.

VICKI: Oh, wow.

SAM: So I just had to change the engine so that it worked on the web, and, I mean like, I didn't have to invent the game all over again.

VICKI: Oh, that's cool, that's good! And then, the "Game of Ages"? Is that...

SAM: Yeah, that's my, that's my project that's...in the making, and has been for a long time [laughs].

VICKI: Yeah...

SAM: Because I'm writing this from scratch and, um, and I'm, ah, being a perfectionist about it; I want it to be really good and very elaborate, big, and, um, satisfying my, ah, expectations for this thing is making it last a long time in development--

VICKI: Oh, yeah...

SAM: -- and I've been burnt out on it twice already, and so I've had to put it aside for months, sometimes and then go back to it. Uh, it's about two-thirds to three-quarters done at the moment --

VICKI: Yeah?

SAM: So I don't think it'll be too much longer, heh.

VICKI: Yeah?

SAM: But I am in the middle of a break from it--

VICKI: Oh, really?

SAM: So, yeah, so, hopefully this year.

VICKI: Well you know, that sounds just like, ah, how you write a novel. Um, it's just, it becomes this big thing, and you love it, and you hate it, and you put it away for a while, you go back to it, you get really wrapped up into it, and then you just, oh, I gotta get rid of it, and--

SAM: Wow.

VICKI: Yeah.

SAM: Yes, that's exactly like what it is.

VICKI: It is, exactly! Exactly. Sometimes creative people don't understand that the creative process, no matter if you're writing a, writing a game or some kind of a, any kind of a program or writing a novel, or working on real, real, uh, epic poetry or something, it's all the same. You know, we get sick of it, and then we love it again, and uh, --

SAM: Yep. What I find particularly exhausting is, it's not only the creative part because, that, uh, but I have to code it also--

VICKI: Oh, yeah...

SAM: --so I'm trying to use both halves of my brain--

VICKI: Right.

SAM: --to not just write the story and the puzzles, but make it work at the same time.

VICKI: Oh, that's what, you know, that's another thing I like about, uh, your games. You have puzzles, you have mind-twisters, benders, um, you have so much here. It's it, there's not enough time to talk about everything [Sam laughs], but, yeah, your puzzles are great!

SAM: Well, talk fast.

VICKI: Okay, is your, your puzzles are great. Do you come up with those, how do you get those?

SAM: You're talking about Brain Food now.

VICKI: Yes, Brain Food.

SAM: Um those are, some of them are made up and some of them are collected.

VICKI: Yeah?

SAM: Yup.

VICKI: That's, ah--

SAM: Some of them are, are famous puzzles. Um, the one I get the most requests about is the, the, is one that floats around the Internet. There are three words in the English language that end in "gry". And, ah, it's the rather silly and disappointing riddle, but nobody knows the answer, and they're always asking me, and I don't know why they're asking me. Um, why do they pick me to ask? I don't know. But, the puzzle is on the site, on Brain Food.

VICKI: Oh. Well, that's great. Uh, the--

SAM: Among others.

VICKI: Okay, and then, okay, let's, let's skip down because I'm running out of time here. Uh, tell me about the Poetry Pool. We talked about that on the phone the other night, and just, um...it's under hobbies here. There's um, you have--

SAM: Yup. For lack of a better category.

VICKI: Yeah. The, I like this Dave's Somewhat Complete Sci-Fi, Fiction...that's your friend Dave, right?

SAM: Yup.

VICKI: And then, ah, the okay, but what about the Poetry Pool?

SAM: Oh, I just thought it would, it might be a nice idea to have a collection of poetry to kind of round out the entertainment on there, and so I posted an ad on the main Rinkworks page and said that I would be, ah, doing the poetry site soon, and that if you'd like to have your poetry, um, appear on there, to send me some e-mail, just send a submission. And, when I came up with enough that I liked, um, I opened it up, and the submissions keep pouring in.

VICKI: That's great. That's great. A...lot of people write poetry. Some of it's good, some of it's...not so good, but still, it's good that you've, you've opened something up like that. And then, it, um--

SAM: Yeah, I found it to be quite rewarding myself, because I get to see what everybody else has written--

VICKI: Yeah?

SAM: Without having to be the writer.

VICKI: Yeah, you do have to write a lot on this site, and, uh, I have to commend you on that. It's, ah, it's a great site, you don't get any money for it, correct? I mean--

SAM: Oh, no, I do, I, I get a little money for the advertising.

VICKI: Oh, you do? Oh, really, cool! Good!

SAM: I, I, I mean, I don't think it really pays me for my time, but um, it is, it is a nice bonus.

VICKI: Well, good for you! And then, okay, uh, and then your humor, you have, ah, Humor Bites?

SAM: Yup.

VICKI: The uh, just explain your humor. Just a little bit.

SAM: It's...inexplicable.

[They both laugh.]

SAM: You can't explain my humor. Um, the hu--, ah, well, there's two humor sections. There's one at the top --

VICKI: Right.

SAM: -- which, um, has bigger sites which get updated more frequently. The Humor Bites are just kind of one-shot deals where I had an idea not good enough to maintain--

VICKI: Mmm-hmmm.

SAM: -- but good enough to write something real quick about and post it. And um, so I don't know that there's anything more to say about it.

VICKI: Okay, then, okay, let's talk about quickly, about uh, Things People Said, ah, Computer Stupidities.

SAM: Yup, those two kind of go together.

VICKI: Yeah. They do. And, do you, ah, have submissions from people?

SAM: Tons of them.

VICKI: Yeah? And so--

SAM: Yeah. Computer Stupidities is the second most popular feature, behind the Dialectizer. And, um, what it is is collections of stories about people messing up with computers, and, ah, and in one way or another. And, ah, so, and I had no idea, how many different ways you can mess up using a computer. I get so many stories submitted to me for inclusion on that page that I'm about two years behind in processing them. [Vicki laughs.] Um, Things People Said isn't as bad. That's basically the same idea, except it's not related to computers; it's related to anything, really.

VICKI: Yeah.

SAM: And ah, the, the submissions aren't quite as backlogged for that one. There's still...

VICKI: Hmm...

[Sam says something that got garbled.]

VICKI: Well, um, unfortunately, we're out of time, and, uh, this has been a great, a great, uh, interview. Sam, I, I'm really happy that you agreed to do this.

SAM: Yup. My pleasure.

VICKI: Uh, Rinkworks is, is fun, and it's wonderful, and I, uh, I want all kinds of people to keep going there, and I will mention to --

SAM: Well, I do too!

VICKI: Yeah, well, I'll continue to mention it on my show.

SAM: All right, that's good.

VICKI: And as you, ah, add more things, I will tell my listeners about it, because this is, this is a great thing that you do. We don't have enough, ah, fun in this world, and you provide it for us.

SAM: Well, um, I'm happy too.

VICKI: Well, um, thanks--

SAM: Fun for me too!

VICKI: Oh. Well, see, good! I'm glad to hear that! Well, um, thank you very much, and, ah, I'll stay in touch--

SAM: Thanks.

VICKI: -- because, uh, you know, something, something happens, bring you back on, okay?

SAM: Alright, I look forward to it.

VICKI: All right, well, have a nice weekend, and uh, I'll talk to you soon.

SAM: Okay. Thanks.

VICKI: Okay, good luck.

SAM: Bye.

VICKI: All right. Bye.

[Music starts]

VICKI: Alright, well, we've gone a little over, sorry everyone, but Sam was a great guy, and Rinkworks.com is a wonderful site. Go to it! For IMG2's "Best of the Web", I'm Vicki Love, and have a great weekend! Bye!



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-Ka"Ok, is this the longest single post yet?"z!