Hundreds of websites that used to give their content away for free are now charging for their services. This weblog chronicles the changes. —The End of Free Similar:"We are not Amazon franchises": booksellers respond to Amazon Source Wonderful snark from an indie bookselle…AmusingTurnitin's slick new iPad app almost erases years of web-based GradeMark traumaI have…
Yelling out of cars, turning your speakers out the window to blast your music onto the street, setting off M-80 firecrackers, firing automatic weapons into the air—these are all well and good. But none of them create a merry atmosphere of insouciance and bonhomie quite like a revving motorcycle. —Wow, Check out that Motorcycle Revving! (The…
You have not truly lived, until you have seen Star Wars rendered as ASCII animation. The FAQ page includes the answer to “Why (oh, God why)?” Similar:The Complete Deaths: all of the Bard's 74 scripted deaths in one new play.Over the past four centuries, the brutal…AmusingCrossfire #StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch (Season 4, Episode 13) Odo's feelings…
is an open-source encyclopedia. If it doesn’t have an entry for something, you can write it yourself! —Wikipedia Similar:Parchmap – Interactive Fiction with automapping, autocomplete, navigation, note taking, an…Parchmap is a wonderful expansion to the…AwesomeNot a #carguy but I pried open the hatch of the van to change 4 bulbs. #adulting PersonalPost-publication review as an efficient…
‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house / Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse… [More or Livingston? Authorship uncertain.] —“A Visit from St. Nicholas” Similar:What Twitter Changes Might Mean for AcademicsThis is one of the reasons I still consi…AcademiaThose mean fake news people at the Washington Post are at…
Very sad: “Sixteen mothers, all of whom were pregnant on Sept. 11 and lost their husbands in the terrorist attacks, and their babies are photographed with news anchor Diane Sawyer.” —Sept. 11 Widows with NewbornsAP via Yahoo!) Similar:Capitalists Tell Facebook They've Had EnoughIt started as a murmur of dissent, but o…BusinessTrump admitted he attacks press…
Programming bugs have bedeviled many a scientific researcher. Now, some researchers in Japan have programmed a bug. Thanks to a surgically-implanted device, scientists can control the motion of “Robo-roach.” —Weird Science (Guardian) Similar:Anti-globalism Is Common Factor in Social Media Conspiracy Theories, says UW ProfFascinating academic effort to find a pa…AcademiaGoogle’s healthcare AI made up a…
“An experiment to uncover the world’s funniest jokes has found that some computer-generated gags can be more amusing than those thought up by humans.” —What Kind of Murderer has Moral Fibre? (New Scientist) Similar:Canada's Stratford Festival losing 'Shakespeare' from its nameAttending this was one of the handful of…CultureThe intelligence coup of the century: For decades,…
Children born to high-tech nerds appear more likely to show signs of a behavioral disorder similar to autism. Silicon Valley cases are booming. —The Geek Syndrome (Wired) Similar:What blogging wasI’ve maintained this blog since the spri…CybercultureHave you been "workslopped" by a bot?If you have ever experienced this, you m…AcademiaHarvard revokes admission of several students for…
“We are confident that you will have many years of trouble-free enjoyment if you carefully read these instructions and follow them.” (Note: Anybody who bothers to read instructions at all is probably already grouchy and impatient.) —IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ CAREFULLY! Similar:Yellow Journalism Did Not Cause the Spanish-American War (Role of Sensationalized Headlin… When a correspondent…
“Does Jackson’s effort remain reasonably true to Tolkien’s richly imagined universe? And will filmgoers not inculcated with the lore of Middle Earth enjoy it anyway? The answers, happily, are ‘probably’ and ‘definitely.’” —Ring: One for the BookWired) Similar:Another #neovictorian control panel for a personal #steampunk project. #design #aesthetics…AestheticsThis Is Not a Book: Thomas Jefferson &…
Search an index of 6000 frequently-updated weblogs, news summaries, and opinion pages; or, see a list of the top 40 pages cited by the ‘bloggers who create Internet buzz. My new second-favorite website (after google). —DayPop.com Similar:A tale of two headlines: CNN and Fox shade their reports of UFC crowd's reaction to TrumpHeadlines from CNN…
Over a century before Orson Welles’s “War of the Worlds” hoax, the New York Sun‘s moon hoax claimed that an astronomer discovered life on the moon. The website also describes many other hoaxes —Museum of Hoaxes Similar:Don't Be Cruel[M]angled syntax, disordered thinking, a…AcademiaSome editing and cropping makes this cartoon a perennial. EthicsThe Unstoppable Rise of…
(book review) : “…the activity stilled, the cars, houses and workplaces buried beneath layers of volcanic ash, the artefacts of a single moment preserved. What could we learn…?” —Imagine Silicon Valley Buried Like Pompeii Similar:Highlighters and Intellectual Growth in CollegeTucked away in this article on how to av…AcademiaYou are in a book. There is a…
“Much web design has suffered from an over reliance on graphic design principles. Too many graphic designers have tried to force the Web to be what it is not…” —Information Architecture vs. Graphic Design (New Thinking) Similar:A Tribute to a Journalism FavoriteAs my news writing students work on seve…AestheticsMy simulation project does not require me…
“My cookies, cakes, and brownies are always the highlight of our church bake sales, and everyone says so,” said parishioner Connie Barrett, 49, openly committing the sin of pride. —All Seven Deadly Sins Committed at Church Bake SaleSatire from The Onion) Similar:"I'm a geek. Deal with it." –my 11yo daughter. #geekgirlproblemsAmusingLet’s Make the Academic Job…
“From Oklahoma City to New York, we’ve turned violent human loss into epic narratives of suffering and patriotism. Does this help people heal or hurt them?” —Trauma Culture (Salon) Similar:Over time, Google has made paid ads harder to spot In 2007, Google changed the long…BusinessWhat Jonson meant by Shakespeare's "small Latin and less Greek" Jonson…
An informal 1998 survey by John Rhodes yielded the following advice: create your content first, then design your website; keep your design simple; use proper grammar. —How to Gain the Trust of Your UsersWebWord) Similar:Loved part 2 of Romeo and Juliet @thepublicpgh #pptplaytime (Next week: Tartuffe)CulturePositive Feedback on a Blogging AssignmentA former student who is…
“For a game that is so unfair, stylistically inconsistent, and frustrating, it has been tremendously influential. This was the first of its kind — using words to create a rich simulated world. Nobody had seen anything like it; it spread quickly across the Internet.” Dennis G. Jerz [Recently updated.] —Colossal Cave Adventure Similar:The Big Boy…
—All Your Usenet Are Belong to Wesley Crusher Similar:The Way of the Warrior #StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch (Season 4, Episode 1) Worf joins the station…Rewatching ST:DS9 We cold open into a…MediaDisruptions: Texting Your Feelings, Symbol by SymbolBeing a word-oriented thinker, I don’t h…AestheticsWhy Student Athletes Continue to FailWhen student athletes were asked how muc…AcademiaAllegiance (#StarTrek #TNG…