“The message behind every movie and book, behind every theme park and T-shirt is that our children’s world needs Disney,” he says. “So they absolutely must go to see the next Disney movie, which we’ll also want to give them on DVD as a birthday present. “They will be happier if they live the full…
In the past, I have pointed out copy-editing weaknesses at Story Book Forest at Idlewild Park, in southwestern PA. When I was last there, shortly before Halloween, my son stopped in his tracks and said, “They repainted the Little Miss Muffet Sign!” And he was right… they repainted some of the signs. Just now, when…
My family saw the American Family Theater‘s production of Babes in Toyland this morning. Barnaby the Bumbling Villain, sneering from under a painted-on handlebar mustache as he gloats over his possession of the widow’s mortgage, pursues the heroes to Toyland. There, after much stock-character humor (cunning disguises, stunning surprises… lovers divided get coincided) the climax…
“It might surprise parents to learn that it is not a waste of time for their teens to hang out online,” said Mizuko Ito, University of California, Irvine researcher and the report’s lead author. “There are myths about kids spending time online – that it is dangerous or making them lazy. But we found that…
As a professor, I collaborate with other authors all the time. But I rarely assign collaborative writing assignments. I often ask students to critique each other’s papers or beta-releases, but that’s not the same thing as having them collaborate to create a single, coherent document. I’m teaching a literary criticism class next term. The last…
Young people around the world are learning, in their pre-teen years, to use tools like Game Maker, Click & Play, Stagecast Creator and others to build simple games. As they move into their teens and twenties kids learn to master and use Flash, modding tools, and even sophisticated tools like C++, game engines and graphics…
A federal jury delivered a mixed verdict today convicting a Missouri mother of misdemeanor charges in a nationally watched cyber-bullying case in which the woman was accused of using a fake MySpace account to torment a teenage girl who later committed suicide. The jurors, however, rejected more serious felony charges against Lori Drew, 49, who…
And then there was light — and it was powered by the sun. The Vatican on Wednesday activated a new solar energy system and announced an ambitious plan that could one day make it an alternative energy exporter. The massive roof of the “Nervi Hall” where popes hold general audiences and concerts are performed, has…
Jason Scott has started a new blog that will discuss the progress of his documentary, GET LAMP. Here’s a good entry on the contents of Steve Meretzky’s basement. As part of the GET LAMP project, I’ve been collecting artifacts and images throughout the commercial heydays of text adventures, and nobody got bigger than Infocom in…
My AT&T long-distance calling card ran out of minutes, so I decided to try to renew it. I checked the website and saw these terms: Minute value applies to state-to-state calling only. A surcharge not to exceed 10 minutes applies to U.S. pay phone calls, a portion of which compensates pay phone providers. One minute…
A poll is just a starting point for discussion, not an ending point that proves any one argument. With that in mind… Results indicate that the Internet is the most trusted news source among all age groups, and overall, more trusted than newspapers and television news combined. FOX News is the most trusted news source…
Via a thought-provoking Metafilter item: The only way to save journalism is to develop a new model that finds profit in truth, vigilance, and social responsibility. The old model was beautifully simple. A newspaper publisher in a monopoly market in the twentieth century was like those counts of Savoy who built a castle on the…
How long has this been around? I just noticed it. Google’s user interface is so streamlined that any change at all is noteworthy. I haven’t had the chance to play with it. I’m not sure how much I want my own biases to affect Google’s search results, so I’m going to have to read up…
Lively.com will be discontinued at the end of December, and everyone who has worked on the project will then move on to other teams. We’d encourage all Lively users to capture your hard work by taking videos and screenshots of your rooms. I never did get around to sampling Lively, since the initial reviews I…
Great little feature from the Chronicle Here are some of the things you learn when you participate in a Milton marathon: Milton is not as boring as you think. Paradise Lost has something for everyone: Hot but innocent sex! (You thought Adam and Eve spent all their time in Eden gardening?) Descriptions of hellfire that…
It’s pretty cool to see a Chronicle of Higher Education blog covering text games: It’s noon and you’ve still got 1,000 words to type. That might not seem like much, but it’s been months since you’ve last worked on your dissertation and distractions are plentiful. To make matters worse, your girlfriend, Violet, says she’s out…
I’m willing to give the new Star Trek a chance. I loved Babylon 5 during its initial run, and I’m intrigued by the possibility of a re-imagined Trek. Similar:Amazon’s Tactics Confirm Its Critics’ Worst SuspicionsThis week, as part of a contract dispute…Books"The threat is no longer simply from government censorship."After using examples from Warsaw and…
[G]ames are inherently about exploration, in the abstract sense of discovering strategies and options, seeing how rules interact and so on. And yes, you can summon screenshots of Warhammer halls bigger than the Taj Mahal, or mountain vistas in Lord of the Rings Onlinethe Other: societies wholly different from mine, cultures built on assumptions so…
Wired reviews Mirror’s Edge When you run, you see your hands pumping up and down in front of you. When you jump, your feet briefly jut up into eyeshot — precisely as they do when you’re vaulting over a hurdle in real life. And when you tuck down into a somersault, you’re looking at your…
The votes have been tabulated, and we have our winners! Congratulations to the top three games, Violet, Nightfall, and Everybody Dies, as well as to all authors for entering. And a big note of thanks to everyone who judged the games. The full results are available below. (IF Comp 08) See the results page. Similar:I…