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Tuesday, October 17, 2017

Change and Transitions. Hard! AIM and Wii U to Discord and Switch!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Maybe KoopaTV is suffering when its leader is a guy heavily resistant to change? Or is that part of our charm?

The world is changing at a very rapid clip, thanks to the proliferation of technology affecting every aspect of our lives, and the number of ways to fund start-ups and mature companies alike that are all trying to produce the next big life-changing technology are also increasing. And since all of these companies need to compete with one another, that just intensifies the pace of innovation.

What I'm trying to say with that generic paragraph is that I, as they say in the technology adoption life cycle, am a laggard. I'm a late majority at best. That means that I have a lot of trouble dealing with all of this rapid technological and societal change, which is a bit of a problem when I lead a website that writes commentary on technology and society. It's a very rich irony that beautifully textures the surreal intricacies of KoopaTV, but it can be very hard on me personally, as well as the site's popularity.

I used to make fun of the fact that there is an entire discipline called “change management”, but I think I could really use some of that. Right now, I'm stuck in two awkward transitions: The transition between Nintendo's Wii U and the Nintendo Switch, and the transition between AOL Instant Messenger and Discord for KoopaTV's staff communications.

Let's talk about the instant messenging first, since this conversation took place in our recently-made Discord server while I just got on our kind-of-deserted AIM [Koopa Keep] Blast looking to talk to folks:

[8:07 AM] Rawk: Should me and Ludwig just abort AIM already if y'all are already comfortable here?
[8:07 AM] Kamek: Ludwig won't do it
[8:07 AM] Kamek: He'll only do it if no one is there
[8:07 AM] Rawk: He will if he's literally the only dude left.
[8:08 AM] Kamek: Yeah
[8:08 AM] Rawk: Which I think will be the case, lol. 

My staff members, of course, have known me for well over a decade now, so their assessment of me is spot-on. That said, there is no way I want the last discussion in our [Koopa Keep] AIM Blast to be about how Undertale ruins fonts. That's gross! It needs a proper send-off.

As I wrote about a week and a half ago, AOL Instant Messenger is discontinuing in two months. KoopaTV's story, as one of the few organisations in existence that is actually qualified to talk about AIM's death (as opposed to snarky people who stopped using it over a decade ago), actually got a lot of attention when we shared the article on social media. Usually, the Internet's reaction is ignoring KoopaTV or casting us off as untouchables, but we got our biggest social media reaction in a long time with people offering us all sorts of suggestions, including some anti-kyriarchy (that's a word you'll never see on KoopaTV again) activist on tumblr trying to get us to use XMPP. I'm not sure why THAT'S what gets attention and not Governor Jim Justice of West Virginia as a Torkoal.

Anyway, so I guess the rest of KoopaTV has coalesced around using Discord as our communications solution. As the leader of KoopaTV, should I embrace this as a bottom-up approach, or should I keep struggling with the AIM transition? You can see some of the struggle for yourselves in the opening part of the log when we watched the Nintendo World Championships.

What about the Wii U and the Switch? Just yesterday, I asked everyone to buy the easily-affordable Nintendo Switch. And, yet, I use the Wii U much more during the week than the Nintendo Switch. Understand that this is literally just for Miiverse and occasionally Super Smash Bros. For Wii U. I will probably have a lot of trouble with change management with regard to Miiverse, which ends in twenty days. I'll use the time I spend going through Miiverse in the morning either sleeping more, or starting my day earlier.

Television monitor back Nintendo GameCube Stereo AV red white yellow cables Switch Wii U HDMI
A photograph of the back of my television.
Red, white, yellow Stereo AV cables: Nintendo GameCube.
Black HDMI cable: Nintendo Switch.
Grey HDMI cable: Nintendo Wii U.

I still have my Nintendo GameCube hooked up to my TV, so I have a lot of trouble letting things go and moving on. All this change, man, and I'm still in the early-mid-2000s.

I simultaneously get requests from different friends to play Super Smash Bros. For Wii U on the Wii U, and Splatoon 2 on the Nintendo Switch. It's troublesome, since I can't exactly do both at once. I'm trapped in this situation where both consoles still have valid use cases. Of course, the Wii U can't handle any actual games outside of Super Smash Bros. For Wii U, especially since my Wii U GamePad is down to about 5 minutes of battery life before it's flashing red. I guess hardware flaws put in by Nintendo's engineers to get people to switch to the next console help the change management process?

Oddly enough, I had no trouble changing from my Wii to my Wii U. Keep in mind that I've never used the Wii U's Wii mode, and I never transferred my Wii's data to my Wii U. Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection being killed helps a bit with being able to move on from the Wii, leaving the only Wii games I ever still think about being Punch-Out!! Wii (which I don't need to touch again), and Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn (which I have thought about re-re-re-replaying).

I mean, I don't care about my Wii being one of the only ones with Sexy Poker.

How long will I cling to my Wii U? Perhaps this is a reason I should actually WANT a port of Super Smash Bros. 4 to the Nintendo Switch, which is something that I'm actually against? (Make a new game in the series instead!) 


Give Ludwig your feedback on his change struggles in the comments section. Are YOU struggling with the rapid pace of change as well? Comment that, too. While you're giving feedback, why not check out the KoopaTV Feedback Forms and Quizzes? The active ones CHANGE every two months, which hopefully is not too frequent for you to handle. Those feed into the also changes-every-two-months KoopaTV Loyalty Rewards Program! That two months change happens in less than two weeks, so... work on it!


Ludwig can only imagine what kind of change management that someone like Trans-Ashley has to go through.
Ludwig will also have trouble changing the clock in a few weeks thanks to Daylight Savings Time ending. It needs to be abolished!
See how well KoopaTV managed change by checking out our first live reaction log done out of Discord!
Do you want details about how the AIM to Discord transition has been going? With AIM discontinued, we have no choice.
Ludwig didn't mention it, but despite not using the Wii at all, he always had it taking space sitting next to his GameCube. Until now.
Ludwig transitioned off of the Wii and Wii U.

6 comments :

  1. I have been enjoying Discord since I played on a team with the Splarents group for Team Vampires as well as played other Splatoon 2 modes sometimes using voice chat. Splarents is a Splatoon group for parents.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. So I noticed you used the word "enjoy" to describe your ongoing Discord experience...!

      Delete
    2. Had to run away from another server though. They hated I compared an issue that plagues feminism to a certain fandom. Even though it was about an enemy of feminism and I am actually a woman and therefore should be allowed to talk about it.

      Delete
    3. As far as I'm concerned, everyone should be allowed to talk about anything.

      Delete
  2. Change and transition is especially difficult since technology is advancing so quickly. I do not consider myself a very tech savvy person, but if I do not adapt to the changes, I will be left behind before I know it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. (Nice job restating the article's points back at me?)

      Forget about being left behind. I was left behind a long time ago.

      I'm trying to catch up.

      Delete

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