This eagerly awaited restored version of Fritz Lang’s silent classic uses what it said to be nearly an hour of footage long thought to be lost.This is one of the the most important film archival discoveries in history, as surprising as if the missing ending of “The Magnificent Ambersons” were found. —Roger Ebert According to…
Valentines for Journalists. Similar:Shakespeare’s Choose-Your-Own AdventureIf meeting three strange ladies in the s…AmusingDevil's Due (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season Four, Episode 13) Picard vs. sexy devil ArdraRewatching ST:TNG after a 20-year break….AmusingReport: Many U.S. Schools Can’t Afford Mannequins, Human Urine For Art Classes“It’s sad, but my students don’t even ha…AestheticsOnce again, The Onion gets it right:…
[O]n this chilly morning, as bus No. 92 rolls down a mountain highway just before dawn, high school students are quiet, typing on laptops. Morning routines have been like this since the fall, when school officials mounted a mobile Internet router to bus No. 92’s sheet-metal frame, enabling students to surf the Web. The students…
Walter Frederick Morrison, the man credited with inventing the Frisbee, has died at the age of 90. —Guardian Similar:There are more museums in the US than there are Starbucks and McDonalds – combinedI have no particular problem with the pl…BusinessStarted Making a Journalism Game in TwineFor a long time, I’ve thought about crea…GamesIt not only…
Interesting examination of role-playing, illusion, identity, and power in Kentucky’s Mammoth Cave, one small branch of which was the inspiration for the 1976/7 computer game Colossal Cave Adventure. In the middle decades of the nineteenth century, Kentucky’s Mammoth Cave was a popular tourist destination for travelers from around the United States and beyond. The cave…
Zach Whalen is turning his dissertation into a blog-web-thing, in the hopes of developing a book-thing. In whatever form it takes, it’s an interesting approach to a textual study of video games. This study asks how the design and configuration of text in videogames contributes to their textuality. I argue that videogames are texts in…
There’s a dissertation in here. All I have the energy to do today is imply a connection. Using a police state to market technology in 1984: Using a police state to market technology in 2010: Similar:Brian Williams is Giving NBC an Opportunity to Bravely Break with TraditionNBC has a marketing decision to make, no…BusinessEssay on…
None of this is a surprise to me, but I’m glad to have statistics to back up my impressions. A very small handful of students whose first introduction to online social networking was the SHU blogosphere, before blogs went really mainstream around 2005, are still blogging here, after they have graduated. In 2003-2005 it was…
I didn’t watch the game, but I did catch the buzz about this ad. Yes, I did tear up. (Wired has details.) Similar:Faces the girl makes during her Luisa monologue. (Four more chances to see The Fantasticks…AestheticsPlanet of the Blind: Oprah, If Only You Had Read the Book!I can’t wait for a TV network by…
It is dangerous to use local weather events (such as a heavy or light winter) to make judgments about global climate. With that caveat, I’m blogging the following because I’ve noted a shift in the online discussion about “global warming,” or the more general “climate change”. This essay does a good job exploring the events…
Coming up… we’ll tell you whether you’ll be impaled by sharp, radioactive icicles hurled by mobs of rampaging robots in your neighborhood. But first, people panicking, filling up three shopping carts of toilet paper and canned food. Hear the techno-pop pulse of our theme music, and know that you’re being conditioned to think of us…
Here’s hoping I left gas in the snow-thrower. Similar:At 96, Dr. Heimlich finally uses his life-saving techniqueThe 96-year-old inventor of the eponymou…Current_EventsHappy Flag Day! All flags matter, but nobody needs to say that out loud.Happy Flag Day! All flags matter, but…AestheticsThe Tribune-Review published a nice preview of Dani Girl.My daughter Carolyn, Matthew Hommel, Vin…DramaCelebration of Writing…
Fascinating software study of the Doom iPhone port.http://fabiensanglard.net/doomIphone/index.php Similar:That Uplifting Tweet You Just Shared? A Russian Troll Sent ItProfessional disinformation isn’t spread…CultureAnd Now for This Breaking News Report “Police have cornered the suspect wh…AmusingPresidential RhetoricCultureWhy Did Dial-Up Modems Make So Much Noise?Screeeech . . . hisss . . . squaawk. The…CybercultureGoogle Books ruled legal in…
Our first few readings in my freshman writing course were personal essays, with a clear narrative. We read an academic paper today, and there’s another assigned for Friday. A few students are already reporting feeling a little lost in the detail. I gather this is because they are used to reading textbooks, where all the…
I wish I’d seen this a few weeks ago, before my Video Game Culture and Theory class ended, but it’s still a welcome find. Similar:How Artists on Twitter Tricked Spammy T-Shirt Stores Into Admitting Their Automated Art Th…Yesterday, an artist on Twitter named Na…BusinessPerseverance lands on Mars today! Here's what you need to know Today, February…
Pee-wee Gets An iPad! from Pee-wee Herman Similar:A practical application of close reading skills: Nazi-spottingWhenever I teach a literature class, I p…AestheticsListening to the Text: The Medieval Speech BubbleFrom a culture where silent reading was …AestheticsIn December 2000, I was blogging about typeface snobbery, freedom in video game spaces, th…In December 2000, I was blogging…
“One of the deepest questions in this field,” Nass says, “is whether media multitasking is driven by a desire for new information or by an avoidance of existing information. Are people in these settings multitasking because the other media are alluring–that is, they’re really dying to play Freecell or read Facebook or shop on eBay–or…
I know, I know: Amazon relied on those $9.99 prices to give it a head start in the digital books market. And raising prices to the $12.99 to $14.99 being talked about could certainly slow sales if consumers don’t bite. But here’s the thing: it’s not as if Macmillan is only raising prices for Kindle.…
I usually carry a digital voice recorder with me. In most states it’s legal to record a conversation if all parties consent, although Pennsylvania law requires that all parties to a conversation be notified that a conversation is being recorded. “It is always legal to tape or film a face-to-face interview when your recorder or…
For the one-credit journalism class that I teach every semester, I’m teaching a unit on editorial writing. Students will take a leisurely 10-chapter journey through Style: The Basics of Clarity and Grace. It’s the first time I’ve taught a whole unit focusing on sentence-level phrasing. The class meets once a week, for just one hour,…