Pokemon Go

My favourite and I want one.

Pokemon Go fascinates from a sociological standpoint. The game has been out here in the UK for a couple of days and it hit the US about a week ago and the reaction to it has been absolutely fascinating.

There have been genuinely uplifting stories to come out of this whole thing. People have been meeting their neighbours and really talking to them for the first time because of this game and discovering places they'd never known existed just around the corner. I've heard of people with depression and other neuro-divergent conditions using the game as a comfort mechanism to help them break out of their routines and comfort zones.

And the programming is fascinating, too, with the GPS data used to match the types of Pokemon you can catch to local geography and even weather. Water-types are more common when it rains or near bodies of water, Ghost-types are found in cemeteries and so on.

Also, apparently, Nintendo of America are trolling the (racist, sexist, homophobic and transphobic) Westboro Baptist Church by... well, doing this to them:

Which is hilarious. They're scum and this is driving them mad.