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:Phantasms (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season 7, Episode 6) Data's Trippy Dreams; Riker's Brai…Rewatching ST:TNG Data is walking thr…AmusingStudent journalist experiences the 'trickle down' of hostility toward the pressMy own students haven’t described encoun…AcademiaHappy Flag Day! All flags matter, but nobody needs to say that out loud.Happy Flag Day! All flags matter, but…AestheticsWhere…
[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:This Is Not a Book: Thomas Jefferson & Apple's App StoreHumanities professors from the Universit…AcademiaRanked First out of 2 Billion Google Hits for Something Really ObscureI just noticed a mild traffic spike over…Current_Events‘You deserve that’: Commissioner’s wife…
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:Restoring the first websiteVery important bit of history. For a st…CybercultureIs There a Santa Claus?Update, Dec 2020: https://www.youtube.c…CultureThe Die Is…
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:My 4Cs StoryI chaired a session on Friday, and gave …AcademiaFake Kitsch! Not Really the 80s! There is a part of me that misses …AestheticsWhen is the phrase "when asked about…" part of…
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:Creating textures for background buildings in a medieval theater simulation project. I can…Creating textures for background buildin…AestheticsIs this why oldsters love nostalgia? I’m 50. I’m in my office casually sharp…Culture"Chores" — Clip from Snow White: The Musical (Stage Right Greensburg, Sept 2012)Here’s what it sounded like at…
Fascinating software study of the Doom iPhone port.http://fabiensanglard.net/doomIphone/index.php Similar:Google, AI Announcements, and the Future of LearningGlenda Morgan does not sound that impres…AcademiaGenesis (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season 7, Episode 19) The crew de-evolve into hominids, a… Rewatching ST:TNG After Worf lose…DesignTrials and Tribble-ations #StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch (Season 5, Episode 6) Trivial Time Travel…Rewatching ST:DS9 Strait-laced time…
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:Loved part 2 of The Importance of Being Earnest (live videoconference play from @ThePublic…AmusingShall I Encode Thee In DNA? Sonnets Stored On Double HelixIf you took everything human beings have…CultureTwo decades…
Pee-wee Gets An iPad! from Pee-wee Herman Similar:New CarWednesday morning my resourceful brother…BusinessThe Horror… The Horror! How Music in Horror Games Effects Player ExperienceFrom one of my students, a blog-based pr…AcademiaWhy do so many small US newsrooms shun innovation? "The goat must be fed."We started this report to assess the use…CybercultureSound Design and the Wilhelm…
“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,…