The first action heroine

In the figure of the coltish, resolute Sigourney Weaver, Alien may just be the film that overhauled the old, unreconstructed horror genre and dared to put a woman centre-stage. Because make no mistake: a horror movie is what Alien is. “It’s basically a haunted house film,” explains the critic David Thomson. “The only difference is…

Tips on Writing a Literary Book Review

I’ve asked students in my “Writing about Literature” class to write a book review, in order to establish a connection to the literary world outside the classroom. The Purdue Online Writing Lab has a brief handout, Writing a Book Review, which begins by explaining the difference between a “book report” (written for the teacher who…

Alice and Kev

Robin Burkinshaw has finished Alice and Kev, an interesting exercise in computer-assisted storytelling, using screen shots from The Sims 3 to tell the story of a homeless father and daughter. Originally the story was told serially, with a few posts a week; then there were a few very long gaps, but the story is finished…

Insidious pedagogy: How course managment systems impact teaching

Course management systems (CMSs), used throughout colleges and universities for presenting online or technology-enhanced classes, are not pedagogically neutral shells for course content. They influence pedagogy by presenting default formats designed to guide the instructor toward creating a course in a certain way. This is particularly true of integrated systems (such as Blackboard/WebCT), but is…

The Simpsons on Classroom Technology

Full episode. “Text ‘uncle’! Text ‘uncle’!!” “But why talk… when I could text?” “That text was totally worth the 15 cents it cost to receive it!” “Then Zach Skyped us, liveblogged our spelling bee, and friended us on Facebook!”“Faculty lounge talk out in the halls?” Similar:In October 2001, I was blogging about nothing, apostrophes, the…

Walkthrough (Zork Funk)

Walkthrough pifieErrol Download this MP3 Directly Similar:Making Interactive Fiction Mainstream: ReadersJon Ingold describes the gamelike storyt…AestheticsSelling Point (Audio Drama) I had fun recording this in the stud…AmusingDon't hide your online self when applying for college or careerGreat advice. [I]t is common to hear st…AcademiaVerify or Duck! Journalists should confirm all details they didn't witness.New instructional…

The Fiction Generator

All kinds of awesome metatronics going on here. Similar:The Key To Better Work? E-mail Less, Flow MoreWhat the researchers found was that the …BusinessStudent Newspapers Scurry to Make Ends Meet“After 112 years as The Daily Emerald, t…AcademiaText Adventure Geeks Rejoice: Major Inform7 UpdateI have final grades, an annual report, a…Current_EventsWhy NORAD Tracks SantaThe call had…

Federal Judge Rules Video Games are Protected "Expressive Works"

On Wednesday, a federal district court in Los Angeles dismissed Brown’s claim against Electronic Arts for the use of his image in its Madden NFL series. Judge Florence Marie-Cooper essentially found that video games are “expressive works, akin to an expressive painting that depicts celebrity athletes of past and present in a realistic sporting environment.”…

Online Books, Poems, Short Stories – Read Print Library

A good collection, on a well-designed page. www.readprint.com Thanks for the suggestion, Josh. Similar:Do you get your news mostly from social media? I check NPR, Drudge, and news.google.com.Do you have a regular news-consumption r…CultureLegacy (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season Four, Episode 6) Visiting Yar's Lawless ColonyRewatching ST:TNG after a 20-year break….MediaHere I am sketching spaceships like…

The 15th Annual Interactive Fiction Competition

>get text games Similar:NASA prepares a Mercury probe for orbitNASA’s Messenger probe is about 10 days …Current_EventsThe ballroom of my #steampunk fantasy space cruiser is now a less lonely place. Thanks to watching many, many YouTub…AestheticsEncounter at Farpoint (Season 1, Episode 1: ST:TNG Rewatch) Picard gathers his crew, hates…Rewatching ST:TNG after almost 20 years….CultureMy simulation…

Everyone Appreciates a Little Boost

I just got a phone call from the parent of a prospective student I spoke with on a campus visit over the summer.  The student has decided to come to Seton Hill, and the parent told me that the time I spent talking with the family over the summer was a major factor. (I’m sure…

Clockwords – Unique Word Game

A fun, free steampunk word game. Too bad I have to work today… Similar:Taking Harassment Seriously Requires Serious DistinctionsEditor and columnist Jonah Goldberg ques…CultureThanks to all the students, faculty, staff, and family who joined us to serve meals in Pit…UncategorizedChatGPT Is a Blurry JPEG of the Web Think of ChatGPT as a blurry jpeg…CybercultureHow to fix…

Transcendentalism Today: Echoes of Walden, online and in the classroom

Our students are transcendentalists, but they don’t know it. Speaking metaphorically, Thoreau writes “I have always been regretting that I was not as wise as the day I was born.”  Rather than treating children as wild creatures that needed to be tamed and civilized, Thoreau seesorder and meaning in nature, which is threatened, worn down, and buried by civilization.…

The New-Media Crisis of 1949

Old joke… when’s the best time to air a radio drama? 1937.  Radio is still around, but the salary of TV personality Katie Couric ” is more than the entire annual budgets of NPR’s Morning Edition and All Things Considered combined.” (so says Michael Massing).  If you knew nothing about the internet beyond what you…