Peter’s Evil Overlord List

Peter Anspach posted this list. Here are some of my favorites. My Legions of Terror will have helmets with clear plexiglass visors, not face-concealing ones. My ventilation ducts will be too small to crawl through. My noble half-brother whose throne I usurped will be killed, not kept anonymously imprisoned in a forgotten cell of my…

Dennis G. Jerz | Associate Professor of English -- New Media Journalism, Seton Hill University | jerz.setonhill.edu

When the Reporter Becomes Part of the Story (Aggressive Reporter Covering Pittsburgh Zoo Death)

Students who are new to journalism often introduce a quote like this: When asked about a habit he’d most like his journalism students to break, Dennis Jerz said, “Usually when I see the phrase ‘when asked about,’ I look for things to throw.” We only encounter that phrase in reporting, so when students start writing…

Seton Hill Student Journalists Launch Local Election Coverage

Students in my journalism class are publishing short articles on the U.S. election, starting with advance stories today, then continuing with live updates on Election Day and afterwards. This year, students have already started publishing articles online as soon as they are ready, rather than waiting until after the print edition has been sent to…

Why ‘Gangnam Style’ Is Actually a Study in Mind Control

I’m not sure “thank you” is the right way to acknowledge this painful link from Paul Crossman. “Oh, come on,” you’re probably saying. “It’s not the music that’s addictive. It’s the dance, from the goofy video. That’s what went viral.” (There’s that word again.) Well, it turns out that this programming effect could be embedded…

Shatoetry iPhone app lets you put… words… in… William Shatner’s… mouth

William Shatner and technology go way back, but it’s taken him until today to get his own smartphone app. Then again, he is a man known to take long pauses. Dubbed Shatoetry, the new app (iPhone-only, for the moment) lets you string together a variety of pre-recorded words — each with three different versions —…

Canada’s Stratford Festival losing ‘Shakespeare’ from its name

Attending this was one of the handful of cultural treats my wife and I splurged on during our grad student days. LA Times – Canada's Stratford Festival losing 'Shakespeare' from its name. Similar:"Oliver Twist" is a story of redemption for PICT Classic Theatre.Carolyn started rehearsals for PICT Clas…BooksWhat's a Snollygoster? Even lexicographers are wrong sometimesThis is…

Cover your Backside with B-roll on Vimeo Video School on Vimeo

Great resource. Cover your Backside with B-roll on Vimeo Video School on Vimeo. Now consider this:   Similar:An unreal Mars skylineThat awesome image showing Earth, Venus …AestheticsHard Time #StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch (Season 4, Episode 19) O'Brien deals with the implanted m…Rewatching ST:DS9 A haggard O’Brien, wi…JusticeMultimodal Composition: Every time a student submits a narrated PowerPoint,…

Addis, LA: Little Orphan Annie stopped for speeding

  Addis, LA: Little Orphan Annie stopped for speeding | #Beet’s B.O.O.T.. Similar:Our Publication Stands By the Decision to Give a Platform to the Sea Monster Trying to Dev…We understand many readers find the krak…AmusingI'm just getting around to watching this speech from Arnold Schwarzenegger. Impressive!I really never paid much attention to Sc…Aesthetics"Oliver Twist" is…

FDR in Annie

I’ve accepted the role of FDR in the upcoming Stage Right! Production of Annie. Auditions for the little ‘uns are Friday afternoon. My 10yo daughter and her tweeny friends are sticking out their chins and grinning and singing “Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow / Creeps in this petty pace from day to day” or whatever…

Google Trends: blog, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook (2004-2012)

I rather expected this — popularity of the search term “blog” from 2004-2012. And this, too, was not a big surprise — Similar:The Irreversible Damage of Mark Zuckerberg’s SilenceWired, obviously having worked on a thin…BusinessUnderstanding Shakespeare: "Pick a play. Click a line…"Pick a play. Click a line. Instantly see…CultureI just looked up the context for…

Quidditch Comes to Seton Hillwarts

Visitors often remark the campus reminds them of Hogwarts, so it’s fitting to learn that a Quidditch goal has been assembled at Seton Hill University, in preparation for a charity tournament Monday. Similar:The boy wins once again. #chessGamesWeb Literacy for Student Fact-Checkers: Four MovesThe confirmation bias describes the very…AcademiaGetting a little bit better with each…

Monsters are People Too

Study used D & D characters to test how subjects responded to eyegaze in human, humanoid, and monster characters. Observers were presented with images selected from the popular fantasy game Dungeons and Dragons (D&D; figure 1a). The images could be of humans, creatures with eyes in the centre of the face (humanoids), and creatures with…

Testing Facebook Thumbnail

Why does Facebook always use this image for the thumbnail? This image isn’t the first or the last on the page. It’s not embedded into the post, it’s part of the template. Lately, even when I specify a different thumbnail, Facebook uses this image. I’m using a plugin called Social, which does a great job…

For campaigns’ traveling press corps, social media has changed way game is played

“Once we got to the Internet/cable-news cycle, really in 2004, there was no capacity to control” the message, said Dan Pfeiffer, the White House communications director. “I leave it to others to judge if the power has gone from us to the reporters. I don’t know that, and it probably depends on the day, but…