The Alpha 1 that the Heir got me the Mentor to write about in late March ran into problems, and as is the Heir's wont in such matters, he redid nearly a third of the components, and has certified an Alpha 2, and that's as of 6/16/21.  The Alpha 1 is still historic as it stands as the first test unit of the Tropical Soul Player capable of seriously playing on its own.  But it didn't last because of power compatibility issues.  So now we have Alpha 2, and after the Heir gets a spare battery, he'll feel confident about restarting those field tests we talked about back in March.  One of the Heir's takeaways is that simplicity and reliability wins out time and time again against sophistication and edginess.  The concept of sophistication, both with big tech and with the Heir's experiences with the player, is emerging as a marketing term for convolutedness.  It doesn't matter to the Heir how much marketing big tech does and how many consumers are sucked into believing the marketing, because there's no denying some age-old axioms.  Keep It Simple Stupid.  If It Ain't Broke Don't Fix It.  And where edginess is concerned, that's just another term for riskiness.  It may be appropriate enough for the casinos, like the one in the state neighboring Bachelor Blue State, but it's *not* appropriate for real life.  We in the Bachelor believe that today's naive public who gush about the glamour of "gaming" should really rethink their stances.  1-800-GAMBLER exists for a reason.  You'll notice it doesn't read 1-800-GAMING.  No ifs, ands or buts: "gaming" is gambling.  So, people, stop gambling your lives away, and start actually *living* them.

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