Merchants of Cool

(PBS)  A report on the creators and marketers of popular culture for teenagers (teens talk back). —Merchants of Cool Similar:xkcd: Headlines It: nailed. xkcd: Headlines.AmusingDax (#StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch, Season 1, Episode 7) Jadzia Dax faces the legal consequences …Rewatching ST:DS9 Dax is apprehended …CultureHeard any good stories lately?My daughter has a terrible time settling…BooksAn English…

Digital Divide Basics

There has always been a gap between those people and communities who can make effective use of information technology and those who cannot. Now, more than ever, unequal adoption of technology excludes many from reaping the fruits of the economy. —Digital Divide Basics Similar:Microsoft lays off journalists to replace them with AIMicrosoft is laying off…

Debunking the Digital Divide

It may turn out that the “digital divide”—one of the most fashionable political slogans of recent years—is largely fiction. —Debunking the Digital Divide Similar:In Pittsburgh, science gets playfulImagine: sharing a secret with a friend …Aesthetics'Peter Pan Live' Was Never Intended to Be EnjoyedI didn’t watch the show (our cable-less …AestheticsRussian trolls 'spreading discord' over vaccine…

Gettysburg Address on PowerPoint

"After one too many bad presentations, I decided to see if I could do something about it. Back in my hotel room I decided to show what Abe Lincoln might have done if he had used PowerPoint rather than the power of oratory at Gettysburg." Peter Norvig —Gettysburg Address on PowerPoint Similar:The Transformation of American…

The Social Life of Paper

“Computer technology was supposed to replace paper. But that hasn’t happened. Every country in the Western world uses more paper today, on a per-capita basis, than it did ten years ago.” —The Social Life of PaperNew Yorker) Similar:Facebook exec erroneously cites The Lord of the Rings when comparing the social network to…A Facebook executive, Andrew…

Star Trek Chaplains?

The first space colonists will probably take their faiths to the stars. The reference to “Star Trek” in the title of the article is cute, but Star Trek: The Next Generation was almost universally hostile to religious concepts (except when aliens presented them, that is). The more recent TV show Bablylon 5, although created by…

Bush's Orwellian Address

A progressive critique of Bush’s response to the 9-11 attacks, interpreting Bush in terms of George Orwell’s bleak totalitarian novel 1984:  "1984 has arrived. In his address to Congress Thursday, George Bush effectively declared permanent war — war without temporal or geographic limits; war without clear goals; war against a vaguely defined and constantly shifting…

You might have a Ph.D. if…

“‘Nigerian Money Offers’ zoomed from the seventh to the third most common type of online fraud last year, and the reason is obvious. In days gone by, the scammers had to canvass potential victims one at a time by fax and snail mail; now they have the speed, cost-effectiveness and anonymity of the Internet at…

The Last Words

"Asked by the firing squad commander if he had a last request, James Roges said, ‘Why yes. A bullet-proof vest!‘" Christopher Orlet —The Last Words (Vocabula Review) Similar:PAC-MAN: The Untold Story of How We Really Played the GameA fascinating study of the thinginess of…AestheticsMy 11yo, of the opening chapters of a YA novel with an…

Girls Read Twice as Much as Boys

The survey, published by an organization promoting "World Book Day," probably does not count time spent in chat rooms, reading web pages as "reading", but the news item does not raise that issue. Related question: has feminism harmed boys? —Girls Read Twice as Much as Boys (BBC) Similar:Things That Will Freak out Every OCD PersonA…

The Company Therapist

A "collaborative hyperdrama" purports to be the archives of a young psychiatrist offering his services to the employees of a dot-com.  "Through transcripts of therapy sessions, patient diaries and logs, doodles, personnel records, telephone conversations, and other written and graphical materials, the Company Therapist is designed to allow a deep exploration of its characters and…

Fine-Tuned: An Auto-mated Romance

Fine-Tuned is a free, text-based game, playable in many formats. From a review by Adam Cadre: “Not only has the author created an absolutely wonderful world, full of ‘anti-autoists,’ roving herds of goats, and fist-shaking train engineers, but it dares — and manages to pull off — a number of pieces of participatory comedy, which…

Accidental Genius

"In 1044, a Chinese manual on producing gunpowder-based weapons included cannons, bombs for lobbing at invaders, two-stage rockets, and land mines." Chinese researchers stumbled across the formula for gunpowder while researching what they called the "immortality pill".  What forces control the way inventions end up being used? Mark Robinson —Accidental Geniusb> (Wired) Similar:Thinking a lot…

Point and Think

The genius of Web sites for accommodating multiple points of view is nowhere better illustrated than in the recent on-line craze for public diaries, or “blogs.” The term is a shortening of Weblog – and also the name of the easy-to-use technology available at www.blogger.com: “Push-Button Publishing for the People.” Jeff Warren —Point and Think…

It's been six months since

September 11, 2001.It’s been six months since Similar:Snowfall at the White House (Official White House Photo by Tia Dufour, Jan 7) Tweeted by W…My social media feed was full of people …AestheticsValentines for Journalists Mark S. Luckie, MediumAestheticsA comic about Seagulls. If you feel like this…  A comic about Seagulls. If…CultureJames Comey: Trump won’t be…

He Hacks by Day, Squats by Night

If they throw this renegade hacker hero in jail, it’ll be the first time he’s had a steady place to stay in five years. —He Hacks by Day, Squats by Night (Wired) Similar:WordPress 3.8 “Parker”No time to play with this, but looking f…CybercultureCode is not literatureA literate programmer describes his atte…CybercultureIOC spokesman: Journalists free to…

William Shatner's Weblog

: "No more blog blog blog!" — line not quite spoken by Captain Kirk ("Miri," Star Trek).  —William Shatner’s Weblog Similar:13: The Musical Promohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40MbeApiX…CultureWhen we play Star Trek Monopoly, I am the Captain’s chair. GamesThe girl rehearsing as Babette in Stage Right's Beauty and the BeastCarolyn rehearses with Nick Lenz. Her sh…Current_EventsIs There a Santa Claus?Update,…

The re-vision thing: Why are contemporary biographers and historians so afraid of footnotes?

"Not telling someone where you got your information from is a kind of power stroke, effectively sealing your book off from any possible scrutiny, debate or challenge." Kathryn Hughes —The re-vision thing: Why are contemporary biographers and historians so afraid of footnotes? (Guardian) Similar:Carolyn's Theater Bio for Prime Stage's The Outsiders (Mar 6-15) Actor biography…