“Many people who were classified as feebleminded would now be called mildly retarded, learning disabled, or simply underachievers. Although the eugenicists saw the Buck family as a pedigree of degeneracy, many would now say that they had few problems a bit of money, education, and opportunity would not have solved. Their only sin was to…
“For years, games have been racing to catch up to the visual standards of animated films. Before long, Carmack says, game graphics will rival Monsters, Inc. in their detail. When that happens, technical advances in games will proceed at Hollywood’s more measured pace – incrementally instead of in great, creative leaps. Innovators will focus on…
“I was on the roof of the Ministry of Information, preparing for my first ‘live shot’ on CNN. A producer came up and handed me a sheet of paper with handwritten notes. ‘[CNN President] Tom Johnson wants you to read this on camera,’ he said. I glanced at the paper. It was an item-by-item summary…
“In spite of denials from congressional leaders, the rash of job cuts has some legislators worried that Congress will be fully mechanized within 10 years.|’The House and Senate will always need people,’ Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert said. ‘These machines are a valuable tool, but there’s still no substitute for the wisdom and experience…
“Never, ever pick a fight with a surrealist. Not unless you are packing a kipper yourself, and are prepared to use it. That much I now know. But at lunchtime on Monday, when I tried to slip through the surrealist blockade of the André Breton auction at the Hôtel Drouot, I assumed a black polo…
Perhaps it was the sight of Captain James T Kirk scribbling away on his executive starship tablet. Maybe it’s the recurring dream of reducing computing to its simplest, starkest elements — a screen, an input device, perhaps some sound. It could even be the thought that with the technology now just about able to do…
The bottom-feeding 419 scammers are exploiting the Iraq war now, according to this Spam I just received: “First let me use this medium to introduce myself , I am Mohammed MARGAI from KONO district north of Baghdad IRAQ from the family of late Alhaji Mustafa MARGAI THE FORMAL MINISTER OF PETROLEUM AND NATURAL RESOURCES.”SPAM Scammers…
“Are you out there Dennis Jerz? Are you reading this? Are you keeping track of me? I kind of hope not…it’s weird to know that my anonymous readers aren’t so anonymous. But if you are, that’s OK too.” [Anonymous Blogger] anonymous readers aren’t so anonymous A UWEC student who keeps a weblog is blown away…
At End Of Road You are standing at the end of a road before a small brick building. Around you is a forest. A small stream flows out of the building and down a gully. >how did I get here? That doesn’t matter. You’re here now. >but this isn’t where I want to be I’m…
“I started an e-mail network almost spontaneously several years ago, when my next-door neighbor was mugged walking home from the bus stop at 6:30 p.m. Outraged, I sent out an e-mail to perhaps 20 neighbors, and within 24 hours, a dozen of them had volunteered for neighborhood patrols. | With that, our e-mail network was…
“If you like Interactive Fiction at all, I would like to draw your attention to Ad Verbum, a marvellous game written in 2000 by Nick Montfort. When I first downloaded this, I really didn’t expect it to be any fun at all — I prefer IF that is more a story than a game, and…
“Usability insights also help later in the project, and there is value in fine-tuning user interface details, but late-stage changes impact the final user experience less than fundamental changes early in the design. It’s a rough estimate, but I would say that the benefits from early usability data are at least ten times greater than…
Last week, Elwyn Jenkins provided a good rebuttal to Orloswki’s “second superpower” complaint. When I recently noticed that the good microdoc resorted to an ad hominem argument against Orloswki, I was a bit put off. Can’t we all get along without name-calling? But then I read Orlowski’s rant against the PageRank of his “googlewashing” article.…
“I’ve collected hundreds of rejection slips from agents, producers, and studios. Recently, all this changed. I wrote an article last year called “Hacking Las Vegas” (Wired 10.09), and the next thing I know I’m being approached to turn it into a movie starring Spacey…. But I’ve heard rumors that have made me question my confidence…
“Only a few years ago professors rarely encountered marketing in the Ivory Tower. When we did, the marketing had substance — book dealers with free review copies of books, office-supply vendors with reorder requests, discounts on scientific or literary publications, and the like.|Now we’re deluged with ploys that have little to do with our academic…
“The Sims Online married a hot concept — multiplayer online gaming — to The Sims, the best-selling PC game series of all time. In addition, it was designed in part by Will Wright, one of the game industry‘smost renowned developers. All of this combined into a rich maelstrom of hype: The Sims Online was featured…
I’ve come across two websites that use news photos to tell very different stories. A Tale of Two Cities contrasts photos of anti-war protests in San Francisco with photos of Iraqi citizens kissing US soldiers and celebrating in Baghdad. But “A Tale of Two Photos” shows a wide-angle shot of the site of statue torn…
“With the burgeoning Sars epidemic spreading fear among travellers worldwide, the Hong Kong tourist board must be ruing the day it commissioned a series of magazine ads telling readers a visit to the city will ‘take your breath away’. Shortness of breath is one of the main symptoms of Sars – severe acute respiratory syndrome…”…
“The Matrin County School Board has a new way of post a student’s grades online for a parent to check. Pinnacle is the name of the program, a simple java applet. Not only does Pinnacle log student’s grades, but also attendance and conduct. The way grades are accessed are by inputting the first 6 digits…
Why is such a high-tech nation eschewing texting? | The short answer is that, in America, talk is cheap. Because local calls on land lines are usually free, wireless operators have to offer big ‘bundles’ of minutes?up to 5,000 minutes per month?as part of their monthly pricing plans to persuade subscribers to use mobile phones…