In 10 Years Our iPads Will Be Here

Our iPads will one day be stacked on a pallet, like these old PCs. They’ll be retro curiosities, having done their jobs — empowering us to build even better tools. Similar:Detailed Articulation of Feet in Unity3DI’m following a lot of tutorials, and co…AestheticsThe 1931 Histomap: The entire history of the world distilled into a single…

Ian Bogost – Gamification is Bullshit

This rhetorical power derives from the “-ification” rather than from the “game”. -ification involves simple, repeatable, proven techniques or devices: you can purify, beautify, falsify, terrify, and so forth. -ification is always easy and repeatable, and it’s usually bullshit. Just add points. Game developers and players have critiqued gamification on the grounds that it gets…

Apple, publishers conspired against $9.99 Amazon e-books, says lawsuit

I was doing a lot of impulse buying during the $9.99 days, but since then, on occasions when I’ve seen the ebook offered at a higher price than a paperback, I have just turned to interlibrary load instead. “Terrified” by Amazon’s Kindle e-reader and discounted e-book pricing, five major publishers allegedly acted together to increase…

Students aim for Broadway in musical with true-life focus

David Mahokey of Dunbar, a senior at Point Park University, and Greg Kerestan of Greensburg, a senior at Seton Hill University, wrote the 20-song score and script, respectively, for ″In Control,″ a musical that focuses in part on Mahokey’s real-life battle with bone cancer. Two free performances of ″In Control,″ directed by Anthony Marino, artistic…

Books Without Borders

The heartbreaking thing is that this fall, over 10,000 bookstore employees across America will be out of work. The way the publishing industry is going, many of those people won’t be able to find jobs that are even tangentially related to books anymore; they’ll go on to work in movie theaters and grocery stores and…

Karel Capek Slighted

The layout of this display at the Carnegie Science Center almost makes it look like the Maria duplicate in Metropolis came before Karel Capek’s play RUR (which was written in 1920, first performed in 1921). Similar:Angel One (TNG Rewatch, Season 1, Episode 13) Sexist Amazon chief flips Riker leitmotif, t…Rewatching Star Trek: The Next Generatio…AmusingEducated,…

Carnegie Science Center Model Train

The control panel. Similar:If watching this clip of Punjabi dancers in Ireland doesn't make you happy, I don't know w…https://twitter.com/rtenews/status/13721…AestheticsAdded an overhead minimap to my #medievalyork #unity3d simulation. #mysteryplayAdded an overhead minimap to my #medieva…DesignA news site used AI to write articles. It was a journalistic disaster. Artificial intelligence has been deplo…BusinessChilling on Forbes Avenue…

USS Requin

Images from an extended tour of a cold war submarine. (We liked the tour we took last year so much, my son and I came back.) [portfolio_slideshow size=medium trans=scrollHorz ] Similar:Tales from the Antiquities Theft Task ForceA shot of Kim Kardashian leaning ag…AestheticsGoogle Docs "Writing to Learn" ActivityI created a fresh Google Docs page with …AcademiaContext…

Stage Right Greensburg Wizard of Oz

My daughter, as the wizard, with her talented castmates, in our local theater school’s preteen summer camp musical. Similar:My English major skills crushed the girl in Bananagrams.Wildcard? You mean quitter tile! GamesI can’t fix this broken world but I guess I did okay using #blender3d to model this wedge-…  AestheticsRespect the Text: Teaching Textual Primacy…

Bluejay Catching a Bug

My friend and colleague, Balázs Tarnai, shared these pictures of a bluejay catching a bug on his garage roof. Similar:Minimalist Graphic Interpretations of Philosophical Concepts — Prints by Genis Carreras …Art Prints by Genis Carreras | Society6….AestheticsTwenty-Six Old Characters, The (1947)Sheaffer Pen celebrates the art of writi…AestheticsMe Checking into My #4C19 Conference Hotel RoomI’ll just…

LEGO figures flying on NASA Jupiter probe

LEGO figurines representing the Roman god Jupiter, his wife Juno and Galileo Galilei are flying to Jupiter. (NASA/LEGO) August 4, 2011 — They have launched aboard the space shuttle, visited the space station, and flown to Mars. Now, three more “very special” LEGO figurines are set to fly to Jupiter with NASA’s Juno spacecraft. The…