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Exit Interview: An Ex-Mormon Who Used to Marry the Dead
by Ella Morton September 25, 2015
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints temple in Salt Lake City, Utah. (Photo: Michael Whiffen/Creative Commons)
Much secrecy surrounds the sacraments that take place in the temples of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. For Mormons—whose numbers can be difficult to quantify—the temple is the center of family and community life. It is also where "eternal marriages" take place.
Known within the Church as "sealing," eternal marriages bind a couple together forever. As in, forever—beyond mortality. In fact, sealings can be performed on people who have already died, to ensure they are eligible for entry into the highest echelons of Mormon heaven. Posthumous sealing—in which a deceased person is wedded to either another deceased person or one who is still alive—is performed regularly within the Church, but the details of the ceremony are not usually disclosed to people outside the faith.
To get an insight into what happens before, during, and after a posthumous sealing, we spoke to Eldon Zeller*, a 36-year-old ex-Mormon. Zeller is the youngest of seven, born into a family that has been Mormon for several generations. He grew up in Utah, served a two-year mission in Brazil at 19, and left the church five years later, in 2003. He now lives in California, where he'd rather not be known as the ex-Mormon guy—hence the pseudonym.
Could you talk a bit about the concept of sealing in general?
Mormons believe there's various degrees of heaven. In order to gain entrance to the highest one, where you get to be a god and create your own worlds, you have to have received certain ordinances. They call them "keys." And one of those is being married. So people who have died and never had the chance to get sealed—that's what Mormons call getting married in the temple—can have it posthumously done for them. And that's the point of going to the temple and doing sealings.
So during your time after you did your mission, you began performing sealing ceremonies?
Yes. So the way it works is, throughout your life in Mormonism, at different ages, typically, you are old enough to perform certain ceremonial rites. You start doing stuff when you're eight—that's when you get baptized. And if you're a male, when you're 12, you get the priesthood. And there are various levels in the priesthood that you sort of upgrade to. There are higher levels as you have different birthdays.
By the time you're 18, 19 years old, which is older than you need to be to be eligible to be a missionary, then you get to do the big one, which is go to the temple and take out your endowment. And once you've taken out your endowment, then, the point of visiting the temple from that point on is doing those ceremonies for the dead. So the first time, you go to do it for yourself, and then on repeat visits you're doing it for the dead.
A statue of Jesus at the temple in Salt Lake City. (Photo: Steve Jurvetson/Creative Commons)
Can anybody who is in the Mormon faith who has reached that age of priesthood—or whatever level it is—perform those sealings?
No, you have to be a "temple recommend" holder. So that means that you have to visit your bishop, who is over your local congregation, and you have a worthiness interview with them. He runs through a set of questions to ask about your personal worthiness and purity, and if you can affirmatively state to all the questions that you're worthy, then he will sign your temple recommend. And all that should be signed by your state president, who's a little higher up. And that recommend is good for, I think it's one year. Then when you go to the temple you have to show them your current recommend to be allowed in.
Do you remember any of the [worthiness interview] questions that got asked?
Yeah, some of the questions are, "Do you pay your tithings?" You know, you have to pay 10 percent of your income to the church. "Do you keep the word of wisdom?," which is the Mormon rules about not drinking alcohol or coffee, or smoking or taking drugs. "Do you associate with anyone whose interests are counter to the church, or who are enemies of the church?" You're not allowed to have membership in groups who could be deemed as enemies. And then just your standard, "Do you believe in God and his son, Jesus Christ, and do you accept him as your savior?" That kind of stuff.
Assuming you pass all that and you get recommended, you are then able to perform sealings?
Yes, then you have a current temple recommend and you can go whenever you want.
The Mormon temple at La Jolla in California. (Photo: SD Dirk/Creative Commons)
The people who have died, who become part of these sealings, does there have to have been a demonstrable desire before they died to become sealed to a particular person?
No. The Mormons think that this has to be done for every person who has ever lived. And then, on the afterlife side of things, there are Mormon missionaries going around who tell people, "Hey, somebody on Earth did this ceremony for you, would you like to accept it or not?" And they just say yes or no.
Oh, okay. So they're informed in the afterlife.
They're informed in the afterlife that that was done on their behalf, yeah.
So take me through how that ceremony looks, what the process is.
You dress all in white, so men would wear white suit pants and a white shirt and a white tie. And probably a white suit coat. White shoes. Women would wear a white dress.
When there's the endowment ceremony, which is where you make a series of promises to God, and you promise to keep the whole temple ceremony secret and never talk about it. You do the special hand positions and handshakes at that point. And you put on different clothing. You put on a robe and a hat and an apron that is green and looks like leaves to symbolize Adam in the Garden of Eden, when they realized that they were naked and they dressed themselves in leaves. You're wearing all that stuff, the apron and this robe and the funny hat. I think you're wearing all that when you do the sealings. Because the sealing is like the highest ordinance. It's the holiest thing.
The Mormon temple in Preston, Lancashire. (Photo: Matt J Newman/Creative Commons)
But it's not just the person performing the sealing who wears this, it's everybody in the temple?
Okay, so you've got a woman and you've got a man, and they're kneeling. There's a special room—a set of rooms in the temple so they can do a lot of these at once—that has an altar in it, and there are mirrors on all walls. And then there's basically a priest. The priest is wearing a white suit, he's not wearing the whole get-up. And he's performing the sealing, so he's saying, "Do you take her to be your blah blah blah for all time and eternity?"
When he says the names, he uses the names off of a card. And you know that you're basically like an actor. So my name is going to be Tom Smith and I died in 1750. That's what it will say on the card. And her name is going to be Mary Jones and she died in whatever year. And I'm there representing Tom and she's there representing Mary.
So it's by proxy.
That's actually the word they use, they call it a proxy.
And is it always two dead people being married to one another, or can one dead person be married to a living person?
They actually do sealings where one person is alive and one is dead. So if you were married in your lifetime and your husband died, and he wasn't Mormon, but you were, you could go to the temple and get married to him in a Mormon wedding. And then that would count when you're dead.
A temple in St George, Utah. (Photo: Jeffrey Pratt/Creative Commons)
You mentioned before that two people who were actually married when they were alive would get sealed. Is that because their marriage doesn't count within Mormonism?
Right, it does not count. If it didn't happen in a temple, by a priest in the temple, then that marriage ended when the person died.
You were saying that a living person can be [sealed] to someone who has died. Can the living person re-marry a living person after that?
Yeah. So what people will do is they'll marry—like I said, you loved your [non-Mormon] husband and he died, and you get sealed to him. Then it's like, when you die, he'll be waiting for you. But while you're here in life, you still have some time yet, you may as well have fun and get married to somebody else. But that one you're not going to do in the temple, you'll just do that one at like, City Hall. And then when you die, that one's over and your eternal marriage to your husband picks up.
Okay, so that's the one that really matters.
That's the one that really matters. The other one was just for the time being while you were still alive.
What would be the benefit of sealing two people together who have been dead for hundreds of years?
Well, because the way they think about it, Tom and Mary got married in real life and they loved each other and then they died. They never had the chance to get married in the Mormon temple, for whatever reason—probably the church didn't exist yet. [Joseph Smith's Book of Mormon, the church's foundational text, was published in 1830.] So they would love to be married in the afterlife, and they need someone on Earth to do that in the temple.
(Photo: jon collier/Creative Commons)
Is this related to the [Mormon practice of] baptism by proxy?
Yes. You get a whole series of things. You start with baptism, then you upgrade to getting your endowment, and then the last piece is you've got to be married. They're sort of like the keys to heaven.
Right. And this is all so that people can trace their genealogy and make sure that their entire family is certified as Mormon for eternity?
That's not really the point though, no, the point of it is that God told his followers that everybody had to do this. You know how Christians think that they need to share the truth with other people? That's the whole idea of proselytizing. Same thing goes for the dead. The Mormons are just doing this because they know the truth and they're going to do you a favor, because "God told me to do so, to get this stuff done for you." And going to the temple and doing these things is like doing the Lord's work.
What was the reason you left the church?
Not really a specific reason, I just kind of stopped believing in it. I think it's similar to how people grow out of things, you know, like at some point in your life you don't believe in the tooth fairy or Santa Claus. I actually decided I was atheist and didn't believe in the church or anything, so I just sort of grew out of it, I guess.
So now that you're not in the church anymore—looking back on these ceremonies, how do you feel about them?
Well, I realize how strange they are, of course. They were just kind of part of growing up, because when you're young, once you're 12 years old you can go to temple and do baptisms for the dead. So you kind of get used to the idea, from being raised in the church, of going to the temple. And the temple is the central focus of Mormon life and Mormon communities. So it's just kind of built in. I guess I didn't think it was weird at the time, I thought it was just kind of like a real special holy thing. And I was pretty into church back in those days, so I liked it.
*Name has been changed.
Correction (9/25): The introduction originally stated that a Mormon temple is the only place where you can be baptized into the faith. It is the only place where you can be posthumously baptized into the faith.
Fleeting Wonders: Super Blood Moon
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Lionsgate UK will release hope-filled film The Secret: Dare to Dream
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Jessica Brown Findlay stars in This Beautiful Fantastic
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Q: How to log in via OAuth so a cron job can run Not 100% sure I worded the title correctly, but here is what I want to do.
I have written a small page that is mostly JS & a small PHP scraper.  The script runs, connects to Trello, based on what it finds, it scrapes another site using the PHP scraper, and then updates some cards in Trello.
This is fine as a page I can load up in a browser, but I want to set it up as a page that runs as a cron job on our server.  I don't know how to modify my script to automatically log into Trello.  I know I could run it once, authorize for 30 days etc., but ideally I don't want to keep having to do that.  I'm a little unfamiliar with this, so any reco's on how best to approach it are welcome.
**Moved from webapps

A: It's probably easiest to generate a non-expiring API token, instead of trying to simulate logging into Trello.
First, generate an application key at
https://trello.com/1/appKey/generate
Then, generate a non-expiring read/write token at
https://trello.com/1/authorize?key=substitutewithyourapplicationkey&name=My+Application&expiration=never&response_type=token&scope=read,write
That should be enough to do board and card GETs and PUTs, and you don't have to worry about getting a new token, because it won't ever expire.
For example, you could read a board:
GET https://api.trello.com/1/boards/id_of_board?key=substitutewithyourapplicationkey&token=substitutewithyournonexpiringtoken
or modify a card
PUT https://api.trello.com/1/cards/id_of_card?desc=New%20Description&key=substitutewithyourapplicationkey&token=substitutewithyournonexpiringtoken
For more details, see https://trello.com/docs and https://trello.com/api

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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My thoughts of Lao…..
This country is AMAZING. The people are genuinely friendly, the stall holders will say hello even when you are just passing. This is a genuine hello and not hello…..expecting you to stop and buy something.
The country is just raw. Nothing is commercialised, it is sad because you just know the big companies will be coming here…..
We loved visiting the school with Big Brother Mouse and seeing the children's faces light up when they received a book……what we take for granted……some of the children have never seen a book or do not know how to handle it. The Big Brother Mouse taught the children to respect and handle the book with care.
I really want to come back to Lao, but am saddened to think that when we do return it will be totally commercialised and full of tourist…..tourist who want to visit the big chains!
This is a great place as well…..!
Vientiane is the capital and largest city of Laos, situated on the Mekong River near the border with Thailand. Vientiane became the capital in 1563 due to fears of a Burmese invasion. During French rule, Vientiane was the administrative capital and, due to economic growth in recent times, it has now become the economic centre of Laos.
The estimated population of the city is 754,000 (2009). The city hosted the 25th Southeast Asian Games in December 2009 celebrating the 50 years of SEA Games.
A temple opposite our hotel
Wat Sisaket in Vientiane
As the temple was closed for lunch we also decided to go for lunch
Vegetarian in the Golden Age
Buffet for 25,000 kip
We recommend getting there early as the food will taste fresh and will be hot
Afterwards we walked back to the temple
I misread the entrance fee instead of 5,000 kip I read 50,000 kip. We took out way too much money!
Walking through a mall
Back outside the temperature was a mild 26 degrees C
Back to Wat Sisaket in VIentiane
Wat Si Saket is a Buddhist wat in Vientiane, Laos. It is situated on Lan Xang Road, on the corner with Setthathirat Road, to the northwest of Haw Phra Kaew, which formerly held the Emerald Buddha.
Wat Si Saket was built in 1818 on the orders of King Anouvong (Sethathirath V.) Si is derived from the Sanskrit title of veneration Sri, prefixed to the name of Wat Saket in Bangkok, which was renamed by Anouvong's contemporary, King Rama I. Wat Si Saket was built in the Siamese style of Buddhist architecture, with a surrounding terrace and an ornate five-tiered roof, rather than in the Lao style. This may have kept it safe as the armies of Siam that sacked Vientiane in 1827 used the compound as their Headquarters and lodging place. It may now be the oldest temple still standing in Vientiane. The French restored Wat Si Saket in 1924 and again in 1930.
Wat Si Saket features a cloister wall with more than 2000 ceramic and silver Buddha images. The temple also houses a museum.
Next was Haw Phra Kaew which was built between 1565 and 1556, on the orders of King Setthathirath. The temple housed the Emerald Buddha figurine, which Setthathirath had brought from Chiang Mai, then the capital of Lanna, to Luang Prabang. When Vientiane was seized by Siam (now Thailand) in 1778, the figurine was taken to Thonburi and the temple was destroyed. After it was rebuilt by King Annouvong of Vientiane in the 19th century, it was again destroyed by Siamese forces when King Annouvong rebelled against Siam in an attempt to regain full independence. The revered Buddha now resides in Wat Phra Kaew, Bangkok. The temple was rebuilt for a third time by the French between 1936 and 1942, during colonization of French Indochina.
Looking out to the gardens the temple is behind us
We took a tuk tuk to Pha That Luang ('Great Stupa') is a gold-covered large Buddhist stupa in the centre of Vientiane, Laos. Since its initial establishment suggested to be in the 3rd century, the stupa has undergone several reconstructions until the 1930s due to foreign invasions to the area. It is generally regarded as the most important national monument in Laos and a national symbol.
Pha That Luang according to the Lao people was originally built as a Hindu temple in the 3rd century. Buddhist missionaries from the Mauryan Empire are believed to have been sent by the Emperor Ashoka, including Bury Chan or Praya Chanthabury Pasithisak and five Arahata monks who brought a holy relic (believed to be the breast bone) of Lord Buddha to the stupa. It was rebuilt in the 13th century as a Khmer temple which fell into ruin.
In the mid-16th century, King Setthathirat relocated his capital from Luang Prabang to Vientiane and ordered construction of Pha That Luang in 1566. It was rebuilt about 4 km from the centre of Vientiane at the end of That Luang Road and named Pha That Luang. The bases had a length of 69 metres each and was 45 metres high, and was surrounded by 30 small Stupas.
In 1641, a Dutch envoy of the Dutch East India Company, Gerrit van Wuysoff, visited Vientiane and was received by King Sourigna Vongsa at the temple, where he was, reportedly, received in a magnificent ceremony. He wrote that he was particularly impressed by the "enormous pyramid and the top was covered with gold leaf weighing about a thousand pounds". However, the stupa was repeatedly plundered by the Burmese, Siamese and Chinese.
Pha That Luang was destroyed by the Thai invasion in 1828, which left it heavily damaged and left abandoned. It was not until 1900, when the French restored to its original design based on the detailed drawings from 1867 by the French architect and explorer Louis Delaporte. However the first attempt to restore it was unsuccessful and it had to be redesigned and then reconstructed in the 1930s. During Franco-Thai war Pha That Luang was heavily damaged from Thais air raid. After the End of World War II Pha That Luang has been newly reconstruction.
The architecture of the building includes many references to Lao culture and identity, and so has become a symbol of Lao nationalism. The stupa today consists of three levels, each conveying a reflection of part of the Buddhist doctrine. The first level is 223 feet (67 metres) by 226 feet (68 metres), the second is 157 feet (47 metres) along each side and the third level is 98 feet (29 metres) along each side. From ground to pinniacle, Pha That Luang is 147.6 feet (44 metres) high.
The area around Pha That Luang is now gated, to keep traffic out. Previously visitors could drive around the whole complex. The encircling walls are roughly 279 feet (85 metres) long on each side and contain a large number of Lao and Khmer sculptures including one of Jayavarman VII.
Patuxai (literally meaning Victory Gate or Gate of Triumph, formerly the Anousavary or Anosavari Monument, known by the French as Monument Aux Morts) is a war monument in the centre of Vientiane, Laos, which was built between 1957 and 1968. The Patuxai is dedicated to those who fought in the struggle for independence from France. In romanising the name from the Laotian language, it is variously transliterated as Patuxai, Patuxay, Patousai and Patusai. It is also called Patuxai Arch or the Arc de Triomphe of Vientiane as it resembles the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. However, it is typically Laotian in design, decorated with mythological creatures such as the kinnari (half-female, half-bird).
Had to complete the day with ice cream! So back to Swensens.
In the evening we walked to the banks of the Mekong River to view the sunset
The land across the Mekong River is Thailand
You walk through Chao Anouvong Park in which stands the majestic statue of King Anouvong. The park was named after the King and he is highly regarded amongst Laotians. The statue was constructed in 2010 during Vientiane's 450th Anniversary to commemorate the King's noble contribution to Vientiane during his reign.
Chao Anouvong was the last king of the Lao Kingdom of Vientiane. During his era, he struggled to fight against the Siamese invasion of Vientiane. In the end, he was unsuccessful and was captured and the Kingdom of Vientiane was forced to surrender to Siamese rule and ceased to exist. Because of his persistent attempts to defeat the Siamese forces, Chao Anouvong is considered a courageous hero who fought for Vientiane until his death.
Chao Anouvong Park
Me looking at the statue
And not at the sunset
You maybe asking why?!
Whilst looking at the statue I saw families having their photographs taken, by a local photographer. This photographer wears coloured top and carry badges to say they have permission to take and sell photographs. They are totally genuine and I am sure their charges are reasonable, otherwise, locals would not use them. Anyway, once the family takes a photograph they go for a wander whilst the photographer develops the picture. The family return to collect their picture and are mesmerised by the picture, some laugh whilst others are in awe of how is this possible, their in this piece of paper. They then very carefully handle the picture so as to not damage it. For them it is a very precious memory of the trip out. This made me appreciate what we take for granted…..between us we have a digital camera, iPad and two iPhones which we use as cameras, we take them for granted. The poor camera gets thrown about but it still serves us well. The iPhones get dropped every other day but still serves us so well. We always expect it to work as it should regardless of how we treat it. If not we would just buy another one and not think about it. Here families really do appreciate every little thing. The picture of them. Their family walk on the beach. I noticed in Luang Prabang their dinners around the family table. Watching their car battery powered televisions as a family. Here throwing away items e.g a radio, television is not an option. They treat it well if a mechanical fault does occur they will fix it, in the west if a mechanical fault occurs we throw it away and buy another one!
Sangeet took amazing pictures of the sunset, here they are…in fact 99% of the pictures on this blog are were taken by Sangeet.
The statue from behind
Whilst walking through the park we came across an aerobics class
Aerobics in the Park
On the way backup the hotel we walked through the night market
Night Market, Vientiane
Royal Visit…..
Today we looked into flights to Vientiane there are two companies we can use Lao Airlines or Lao Central Airlines. Lao airlines worked out best for us in terms of times. The tickets are booked for Saturday.
We had a wander around town, visited Phou Si temple (climbing around 300 steps to get there!), Buddhist footprint, other temples and a Buddhist monk school.
Phou Si
The main hill in the city from which you have a good view of the whole area. It's not a very steep climb from the bottom and sunrise and sunset are particularly rewarding times to go up. There is a near-panoramic view from the top. There are 2 entrances from ground level: 1 on the north along Sisavangvong Road, facing the Royal Palace, and another one on the East, on Sisavang Vatthana Road. The northern entrance has about 130 steps up to the ticket counter, and another 190 steps to the top. The eastern entrance is longer than the northern one by a factor of 2 or 3, and is hence less steep and has more points of interest along the way, which are perfect excuses for stopping for a breather on the climb. Entrance fee 20,000 kip. Here there is a Buddhist footprint.
Temple at the ticket office
looking across to the Royal Palace Museum
The next steps up
the temple from the outside
Another temple at the bottom
Monks studying
Afterwards we had a walk around town popping into the Big Brother Mouse offices (more information in my post for tomorrow) and Ock Pop Tok (a fair trade textile shop which is linked to the Living Craft Centre). The shop assistant was curious and asked what religion we are We told her, she then wanted Sangeet to tie a turban on her. She also gave us her email address and wants information on Sikhi.
Big Brother Mouse
Ock Pop Tok shop, the lady liked Sangeet's turban and wanted Sangeet to tie one on her.
We then popped into saffron cafe for a strawberry smoothie.
Red chillies
We wandered around town for a while then made our way to The Royal Palace.
The Royal Palace (official name "Haw Kham") in Luang Prabang, Laos, was built in 1904 during the French colonial era for King Sisavang Vong and his family. The site for the palace was chosen so that official visitors to Luang Prabang could disembark from their river voyages directly below the palace and be received there. After the death of King Sisavang Vong, the Crown Prince Savang Vatthana and his family were the last to occupy the grounds. In 1975, the monarchy was overthrown by the communists and the Royal Family were taken to re-education camps. The palace was then converted into a national museum.
On the way back through the night stall which was being setup we stopped at the vegetarian stall for a late lunch / early dinner. We were the first to arrive so were able to enjoy the buffet whilst fresh.
In the evening I went to pick up the laundry from town and also had a one hour foot massage. It was a bargain at 40000kip (around £3)!


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Basketball Rules & Hand Signs
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Professional Football Rules for the Player in the Neutral Zone
by M.L. Rose
What Does It Mean to Shadow in Hockey?
What Is the Leaping Penalty in Football?
Basic Rules of Badminton Including Serving Faults
The Basketball Rules for Crossing at Half Court
In football the neutral zone -- the area between the offensive and defensive lines -- is established when the ball is ready for play. At that point, neither team is supposed to enter the zone. The neutral zone only lasts until the ball is snapped, at which point the entire field of play becomes fair game, until the whistle blows and the ball is again marked ready for play.
A defensive player who enters the neutral zone will be called for a 5-yard penalty in certain cases. Under Rule 7, Section 4, Article 4(a) of the NFL rules, if a defensive player moves beyond or is parallel to an offensive lineman before the ball being snapped, and if the defender then has an "unabated" path to the quarterback or kicker, play is stopped immediately and the defense is called for the infraction. The defender is not given a chance to return to his side of the neutral zone. Pursuant to Article 4(b), if a defender enters the zone and causes an offensive player in "close proximity" to move, the defense is charged with an infraction. Players in close proximity include linemen within 2 1/2 positions of the defender. If the defender is over the center, for example, the five linemen from tackle-to-tackle, plus the quarterback, are considered in close proximity. If the defender is in the gap outside of an offensive tackle, only the tackle and guard closest to the defender are in close proximity, as well as any receiver lined up on the defender's side of the ball.
Neutral Zone Non-Call
A defensive player who steps into the neutral zone doesn't automatically draw a penalty. If a linebacker takes one stride beyond the point of the football, for example, then returns to his side of the ball before it's snapped, no penalty will be called, provided he neither makes contact with an offensive player nor causes an offensive player to move.
Offside and Encroachment
If a defender crosses the neutral zone and fails to return to his side of the zone before the ball is snapped he is guilty of a 5-yard offside penalty. This includes a player who lines up in the neutral zone. If a defender violates the neutral zone and makes contact with an offensive player before the snap, he is called for a 5-yard encroachment penalty.
An offensive player can only be called for a neutral zone penalty if he lines up offside. Once an offensive player other than the quarterback is set in his stance he may not move until the ball is snapped, except for a legal shift. Therefore, if a lineman takes his stance, then moves before the snap, he's called for a false start, even if he steps forward into the neutral zone. The idea is that offensive linemen may not try to trick defenders into violating the neutral zone. The quarterback, however, may try to draw defenders into the zone via a tricky snap count. For example, the quarterback may alter his cadence or yell a preliminary snap signal particularly loudly to fool the defense into believing the ball is about to be snapped, hoping they'll surge forward into the neutral zone and draw a penalty.
NFL.com: Rule 7 -- Ball in Play, Dead Ball, Scrimmage
NFL Rules Neutral Zone
Nick Laham/Getty Images Sport/Getty Images
M.L. Rose has worked as a print and online journalist for more than 20 years. He has contributed to a variety of national and local publications, specializing in sports writing. Rose holds a B.A. in communications.
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This is part 5 in a series on how to playtest games (click through to parts 1 2 3 4 6).
This time, we'll be looking at how to measure those things that can't easily be put into numbers: from player reactions and sticking points to interface feedback.
This is going to be a longer post, as there are really two things that I'll be going through: different ways of measuring qualitative data, and how to write good interviews and questionnaires.
Qualitative data usually involves player reaction and emotion: whether they are frustrated or happy, where they have trouble and where they are engaged. It also involves gathering responses and suggestions by the player.
There are two main ways of gathering this data: observation and questioning.
Observation involves watching the player as they play. It can involve noting down their emotional state as the game progresses, or what they say. In HCI circles, a notable technique is to ask the user to 'Think Aloud' during the test, so that you know exactly what the user is thinking (this is especially useful in discovering 'perceived affordances' - that is, what an interface tells a user about its function). The issue with the think-aloud technique, particularly in the realm of games, is that it alters response times: in an action game, it will likely make the game prohibitively difficult; while the technique is often helpful in puzzle games, where the player thinking aloud will allow them to deduce the solutions more quickly.
Think-aloud is, therefore, a very useful technique which you should use with caution. It can give you a much deeper insight into the player mindset as they play, but can fundamentally affect this mindset as well.
The alternative, straight observation of emotion, is fraught with difficulty, not least because the player will react to the observation itself. Recording the player (audio and video) can help, as it allows you to review their reactions without watching them personally. This only works, however, if you have time to go over all the footage.
The other way to get qualitative data from players is by asking them: through interviews and questionnaires. It's important to start off every playtest with a questionnaire that will tell you important data about the tester themselves: their experience and knowledge in gaming and the specific aspects you are testing. You should then ask the players questions about their experiences with the game after each level or section, so as to get the freshest view on each of these.
So do you use an interview or a questionnaire? Questionnaires are good at asking direct, specific questions. They are often faster to perform, and can be done without your presence. Interviews are generally better for exploratory tests, and allow you to adapt your questions to better find the cause of a specific gripe or issue. They do, however, take longer to perform, and require your presence.
Both of these techniques require you to design questions (you can perform an interview on the fly, but it's better to have some basic questions to both start things rolling and ensure you cover everything you wanted to.
To continue the theme of 'two things to talk about' that seems to be threading its way through this post, there are two basic types of questions you can ask: the 'make a choice' kind and the 'describe' kind.
Making a choice comes in three basic forms: Rankings, ratings and Likert scales. Rankings involve the player ordering levels or powerups in terms of challenge, usefulness, fun or any other number of aspects. Likert scales and Ratings are about asking the player to rate a property from 1-5, 'Very Easy' to 'Very Hard', and so on.
Likert scales and ratings should always have at least 5 options (for instance, 'Very Hard', 'Hard', 'Neutral', 'Easy' and 'Very Easy') and should always have an odd number of options (this always allows the player to take a middle ground). Likert scales allow the player to choose a value on a scale between two extremes, while ratings are used to give magnitude to a specific property. It's often useful to create lists of each of these (either asking the player to rate a number of aspects in a row in, for instance, how well they understood them; or asking them to rate how well the design informs the player of different metrics they might need to keep track of for effective play).
In both of these, it's very important that the language you use to describe the choice doesn't lead the player in a particular direction. Use 'Rate the challenge of the level from 1-5' rather than 'Rate how hard the level is', as 'hard' is one end of this scale (thus pointing the player towards that end of the scale). It's also important to label the ends of the scale (is 1 'easy' or 'hard'?), and to beconsistent about your labels throughout the questions (changing 1 from 'easy' to 'hard' between questions only confuses the player). There are certain circumstances in which it's useful to swap these, but these are incredibly rare.
Rankings, on the other hand, are about being able to pinpoint which of a number of aspects of a game requires the most attention: which levels are most in need of work, for instance.
All of these choice-based measures only give you half of the story - they're usually good at pinpointing what you need to work on, but are much less useful for working out why. This is why most questionnaires will include a 'Why' after each rating question, to find out what, particularly, lead to a less than perfect score. A great technique to use here is to combine a questionnaire with an interview: get the players to answer 'make a choice' questions on paper, and then get them to justify these in the interview.
What was your favourite aspect of *? Why?
What was your least favourite aspect of *? Why?
Did you find the powerups/skills/units useful? Which was the best one and why? Which was the worst and why?
And that's about it. I had to cover a lot of stuff here in a single post, and so some of it might be a little generalised (please let me know if you find this the case - I can return to some of these topics later to explore the subtleties of them if needed). Next time we'll look at the actual running of the playtest, and what you do on the day!


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Q: Кроссплатформенное приложение с интерфейсом в стиле FAR Одной моей ученице на первом (!) курсе задали написать игру "змейка". Чтобы внятно объяснить ей, как такое писать, я решил для начала написать это сам и в ходе действия столкнулся вот с какой проблемой.
Они работают с Visual Studio. Для разработки программы, которая что-то рисует в консоли, требуется функция очистки консоли (чтобы перерисовывать игровое поле, напечатанное символами псевдографики), функция позиционирования в консоли (чтобы перерисовывать не всё игровое поле, а только её необходимую область) и функция обработки клавиш со стрелками для перемещения змейки.
Все эти функции есть в Borland C++ Builder (ещё и с раскрашиванием консоли до кучи), но в Visual Studio есть только последняя (getch), и то это нестандарт. Для очистки консоли надо написать system("cls") (я так понимаю, cls - это команда оболочки Windows, которая не факт что будет работать в других ОС'ах), а чтобы реализовать аналог gotoxy, вообще необходимо подключить Windows.h и вызывать функции WinAPI. Но когда я это делаю, у меня перестаёт компилироваться программа при включенной опции компилятора Disable language extensions. Сами Microsoft пишут, что эта опция нужна для обеспечения кроссплатформенности. И вот тут я задумался, а возможно ли вообще написать кроссплатформенную программу с подобным интерфейсом, раз получается, что её невозможно сделать, не используя ни борландовские, ни майкрософтовские расширения C++? Ведь в справочнике по C++ ясно сказано, что стандартная библиотека в принципе не позволяет обрабатывать ввод одиночного символа без Enter.
Я попробовал погуглить, как с этим в насквозь кроссплатформенной Java, и у меня создалось впечатление, что на Java такую программу вообще написать невозможно. Кстати, даже если не пытаться делать что-то такое олдскульное, как графика в консоли, в окошках с кроссплатформенностью тоже не так хорошо: например, вот: Иконка в трее в Java. Кроме того, я сталкивался с тем, что одна программа, написанная на QT (тоже типа кроссплатформенном) работала, только если в мастере совместимости программ отключить для неё визуальные стили Windows, в противном случае вместо окна на экране отображалась узкая полоска.
Единственное решение, которое мне приходит в голову - это взять заголовочный файл conio.h в борландовском варианте, где всё нужное есть, и реализовать его самостоятельно в отдельном файле *.c, и реализация этого файла будет разной для разных платформ. Собственно, примерно так я и сделал. Возможно, другие пользователи знают решение лучше.


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Has Marion Cotillard's Role Been Revealed? / It's Just Movies Has Marion Cotillard's 'Secret' Role Been Revealed?
Has Marion Cotillard's Role Been Revealed?
Yesterday, we got to witness some major scenes between Batman (Christian Bale) and Bane (Tom Hardy), which basically confirmed that the storyline for Nolan's final Batman installment is being inspired by "Knightfall" after all — and it looks like today that another secret of TDKR has been revealed.
Remember when Marion Cotillard officially joined the cast as the character "Miranda Tate" — which she referred to as "a secret role"? Well, looks like her secret role isn't that secretive any more.
Now does that looks like something a board member on Wayne Enterprises would wear? It looks like fans' suspicions might have been right all this time – Miranda Tate is, in fact, Talia al Ghul, the daughter of Ra's al Ghul (Liam Neeson).
It's not a big surprise to me — with her incredible performance as Mal from "Inception" (who was sort of a villain), I had a feeling her role in "The Dark Knight Rises" would be someone big when it was announced that she was joining the film. Christopher Nolan wouldn't bring in such an incredible actress and give her a role as small as "Miranda Tate" – especially for his final Batman story.
So now a new mystery rises – what is Talia's business in Gotham? Looks like Bane won't be the only one Batman has to look out for. Now let's see until next time whether Joseph Gordon-Levitt's role as "John Blake" could be in fact be another DC Character, perhaps a third villain?
"The Dark Knight Rises" — starring Christian Bale, Gary Oldman, Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Tom Hardy, Anne Hathaway, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Marion Cotillard – is scheduled for a July 20, 2012, release.
Follow Andy Behbakht on Twitter at http://twitter.com/Haoh93.


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Publication Highlight | Jonathan Browning's GLORIOUS! In Search of China's New Elites
"Browning's photos – compelling portraits of socialites, entrepreneurs, and philanthropists – slyly and skillfully display a new reality of present-day China." Isaac Stone Fish, Senior Fellow, Center on US-China Relations, Asia Society, New York
WITH MODERN CHINA'S rise to greatness have emerged new kinds of social elite in the country, dramatically different from the political class that has guided the nation since 1949. Young, rich, cosmopolitan and well connected, many are the overseas-educated progeny of families that made their fortunes in the post-reform boom years of the 1980s and 1990s — what is known in popular culture as 'children of the yuan percent'.
Spared the nation's agonies in the 20th century, these new elites are the pinnacle of a gilded generation. Sometimes the recipients of eye-popping inherited wealth, their extravagant lifestyles have frequently attracted media finger wagging in a country where poverty and thrift were long the norm. Yet for millions of Chinese millennials more attuned to mobile commerce than Marxist ideology, these new rich represent an ideal version of material success to be aspired to and imitated.
Today, as this generation comes of age and makes its mark in business, media and the arts, it bears the responsibility of continuing the country's extraordinary success story and delivering the so-called 'China Dream'.
This fascinating series of more than 70 images, taken between 2014 and 2016 by British photographer Jonathan Browning, reveals a cross-section of these new elites; at home and at work, from bankers and art dealers to tech entrepreneurs, fashion designers and property developers.
What emerges is a snapshot of a social class caught in the process of defining itself. In its choice of fashions, its taste in interior design and its social habits, it is a community whose self-image is still a highly variegated mix of traditional Chinese and international designer brands, reconfigured in a country still coming to terms with its status as a 21st-century superpower.
Jonathan Browning is a British press photographer. From 2007 to 2016 he lived in China and contributed to publications such as the Times of London, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and Der Spiegel, among others. He lives in the UK.
Publisher: 3030 Press (2018)
Format: Hardcover, dustjacket, 72 colour illustrations, 295 x 220 mm
Pages: 124 pp
Limited Edition of 500 copies
3030press.com
tags: Publication highlight
categories: Special Report, Post-Mao period