Brain-Dead Teen, Only Capable Of Rolling Eyes And Texting, To Be Euthanized

via Brain-Dead Teen, Only Capable Of Rolling Eyes And Texting, To Be Euthanized – YouTube. Similar:The First Programmer Was a LadyOver a hundred years before a monstrous …CybercultureThat gut-wrenching photo of immigrant children in a cage? First published in 2014.Don’t blame “the media” for using this p…CultureFigured out how to configure my iPad as an…

Hackers and Makers

A longer-than-usual introduction to a reading assignment in my “Media and Culture” class turned into a useful opportunity to reflect. We are all busy people; yet somehow, many people who say they are too busy to take on another task spend hours reading, interpreting, and debating Harry Potter; some post stop-motion Lego spoofs; some do…

Zombie Code and Extra-Functional Significance | Play The Past

Useless code and comments in code—these are the zombie figures of software. They serve no purpose in a program’s execution, but they exude what Mark Marino calls extra-functional significance. They have meaning beyond the program. They speak not to the machine or the compiler, but to a different audience, another reader. In software development, that…

Tantalizing Details for Colossal Cave Adventure Enthusiasts

The most detail I’ve ever seen about Will Crowther’s other creative projects; here, in a conversation dated 1996, he discusses “different ‘adventures’”, and reveals that he wrestled with many of the same challenges that interactive fiction programmers faced through the 1980s and on to the present. I have at various times made different “adventures.” Two…

Facebook can be used to predict academic success, job performance | ZDNet

A good example of correlation. (Simply changing your Facebook content won’t automatically make you a better worker or student, but certain Facebook details do correspond to achievement in the offline world.) Researchers spent about 10 minutes looking at photos, wall posts, comments, education, and hobbies on Facebook profiles, while answering personality-related questions including whether the…

Bag a Bot Day

At midnight tonight, participants in the FIRST Robotics Competition must stop working on their robots and seal them up in a plastic bag. Here’s the working bot my son’s team built. Pretty good for a rookie team.     Similar:Surprise: Humanities Degrees Provide Great Return On InvestmentCompleting a humanities degree is a good…AcademiaNovel defined: a…

Wonderful Performance of Raymond Scott’s “Powerhouse”

Fantastic composition, deeply embedded into the brains of any kid who grew up watching Looney Tunes. Raymond Scott recorded “Powerhouse” on this day 75 years ago. Similar:After decades lost, Star Trek’s original Enterprise model may have been foundLong before sci-fi shows created their v…DesignWhat is a CRT and Why Don't We Use Them Anymore?I remember…

Gamasutra – News – Second Life developer acquires experimental game studio LittleTextPeople

LittleTextPeople, founded by writer Emily Short and Maxis veteran Richard Evans, has so far focused on the development of software that replicates complex social interaction. For instance, among its internal technology is a simulator that models social behavior and individual personalities. —Gamasutra – News – Second Life developer acquires experimental game studio LittleTextPeople. Similar:Facebook Finally…

You are standing in a field. There is a meme here.

Via David Thompson Similar:Apple faces threat of legal action over ‘in app’ paymentsI haven’t taken the plunge and installed…BusinessSo Long Blogging. Hello—Yep, We're Going to Say It—PloggingI still blog, because I want control ove…BusinessThe captain will shortly address the officers and crew. Please have the custodial bots pol…AestheticsNASA | A View From The Other SideA…

Twitter / Search – “couldn’t remove your contacts” – All Tweets

Twitter / Search – “couldn’t remove your contacts” – All Tweets. Similar:Lawyers who won Happy Birthday copyright case sue over “We Shall Overcome” “We Shall Overcome,” a song that was the…BusinessWhat Could Have Been Entering the Public Domain on January 1, 2012?Current US law extends copyright protect…BooksHide and Q (TNG Rewatch, Season 1, Episode 9) Riker, buffed up by…