Just wrote the first ending to my in-progress journalism game (created in Twine)
3,486 words, 120 links, 57 lexias, and currently this is the only ending.
How Technology Has Changed The Way We Write
Social media services have put writing tools into the hands of people who probably don’t think of themselves as writers, but there they are, captioning photos and picking hashtags and maybe even pausing just a few seconds to edit before they hit “post.” This radio interview offers a good, informal overview of why people who…
Sesame Street Is Moving to HBO, and the Symbolism Is Crushing
I’ve been fascinated by the rhetoric of headlines surrounding the “Sesame Street moves to HBO” story. * HBO gentrifies ‘Sesame Street’ –VentureBeat * Sesame Street Episodes Will Shrink to Half an Hour –Time * Sesame Street Is Heading to HBO, and Getting Even Bigger –Esquire * This episode of Sesame Street brought to you by…
TARDIS from today’s 3D printing class.
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A serious summer activity.
Once classes start again, we will all have less time for the game of life. Let’s do some serious playing while we still can. Similar:Top deck of a #neovictorian #steampunk cruiser needs an airlock at the top of the spiral s… AestheticsYes Virginia the Musical coming to ConnellsvilleCarolyn Jerz may be only 11 but…
Keyboard Shortcuts for Novelists
Use the command-alt functions to add sexual tension, plot twists, or a humorous interlude. —The New Yorker Similar:Perspective | After a stunning news conference, there’s a newly crucial job for the Americ… I have always taken a neutral stan…CultureWhen People Only Read the Headline — Misuse of JournalismThe Society of Professional Journalists …BusinessThank you, male…
Updating Journalism Handouts
Jerz > Writing > Journalism I’ve spent the afternoon touching up some older journalism handouts, seeing which are still in good shape, which need some work, and which new ones I’ll need to create from scratch. I realize I’ve never actually written a handout on the inverted pyramid, writing leads, writing headlines, punctuating quotes from sources… of course there…
Why Teachers, Parents, and Society at Large Have Destroyed Kids’ Love of Learning
I have experimented with rewarding students for embracing complexity, taking risks, and for celebrating their failures. Returning to musical theater after a 25-year break has been a valuable lesson in humility for me, and a reminder of just how scary it is — exciting and scary — to do something new. The truth—for this parent…
Introduction to Twine (Tutorials by Vegetarian Zombie)
I will always love Inform 7, but I chose to develop a journalism training game in Twine (because it will be much easier to teach Twine to my students). To prepare for my game, I spent about 6 hours (during my son’s last chess tournament) roughing out about 20 lexias. Since then, I’ve spent about 6…
The Satellite That Took This Incredible Photo Almost Didn’t Leave Earth
The camera’s first good image came back a month ago, which was cutting things a little close for the July 16 moon crossing (NASA released the images on Wednesday), according to Szabo. “We were very much aware that the moon would be passing in view, and we worked very hard for it,” he says. The…
No girl wins: three ways women unlearn their love of video games – Offworld
Several times I assigned Brenda Laurel’s Utopian Entrepreneur, which described the rise and heartbreaking fall of her girl-centered, girl-positive gaming company, Purple Moon during the 1990s. My own daughter (who is 13) has enjoyed man more opportunities to be both girly and nerdy — something that seems to have been a lot harder 20 years…
A salute lost to history
History is complex and baffling and fascinating. Reading this (an explanation that the stiff-arm salute that we now identify with the Nazis was a general gesture that was common in America before WWII) made my head spin almost as much as reading about the myth of 8 unbroken hours of sleep. A group of about…
Personal Essays: 7 Tips for Expressing Ideas in Words
Wondering how to write a personal essay? Is your personal essay due tomorrow morning? If so, here are some quick tips. Good luck! Your instructor is not going to grade you on how much you loved your deceased family member, how wonderfully you played in the big game, or how narrowly you escaped death. Your…
Sports writing: Once a passion, now merely a job
Once, working for an online sports section, it was immediately stressed that the rule of thumb was to churn out six articles over an eight-hour shift for studies showed quantity resulted in more hits than quality. And beyond that, there is even a growing model in some newspaper titles where a league table exists for…
Started Making a Journalism Game in Twine
For a long time, I’ve thought about creating a game to teach the fundamentals of journalism. Last weekend during my son’s chess tournament I started roughing out the plot, and today I started using Twine to implement it. Since I already had the plot broken up into text chunks, I got a whole lot done…
Oh No, Performers Coming Into Audience
PITTSBURGH—Audience members at the Benedum Center for the Performing Arts are reporting that, oh God, no, approximately 20 extremely enthusiastic actors are approaching the edge of the stage and appear determined to continue their current musical number in the main seating area. — The Onion Similar:How reading fiction can help improve our mental healthIn general, I…
Ursula K. Le Guin: A Personal Take on Go Set a Watchman
Before Watchman was published, I was skeptical and unhappy — all the publicity made it sound like nothing but a clever lawyer and a greedy publisher in cahoots to exploit an old woman. Now, having read the book, I glimpse a different tragedy. Lee was a young writer on a roll, with several novels…
How America fell in love with crazy amounts of air conditioning
By the 1950s, as air conditioners became common in the home, family life in the summer moved back inside, and increasingly centered on a new consumer technology called the television. Amusement parks and playgrounds emptied out, and people retreated from their stoops and the streets to their living rooms. Even attendance at baseball games dropped in the 1960s. —The Washington…
The Geekling Worked a Shatner/Nimoy Tribute into Godspell
My geekling daughter, who in Willy Wonka flashed Mr. Spock’s Vulcan greeting during Veruca Salt’s contract-signing scene, also worked a Star Trek reference into Godspell. Here as she says goodbye to Jesus, she is doing the Vulcan gesture in a tribute to Spock’s death (in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan). The needs of the many outweigh the needs of…
That ‘Useless’ Liberal Arts Degree Has Become Tech’s Hottest Ticket
What kind of boss hires a thwarted actress for a business-to-business software startup? Stewart Butterfield, Slack’s 42-year-old cofounder and CEO, whose estimated double-digit stake in the company could be worth $300 million or more. He’s the proud holder of an undergraduate degree in philosophy from Canada’s University of Victoria and a master’s degree from Cambridge…