held the most important religious office in Sumer — high priestess at Ur; she is also being credited as the world’s first known author, writing only 300 years after written language developed in what is now Iraq. [Why it took a California psychoanalyst to translate her 4,000-year-old poetry is unexplained by the article, but it…
Huzzah! Bigger, more annoying online advertisements will soon be clogging up your Internet connection! (Now is the time to check out ad-erasing software such as WebWasher.) Similar:Futuristic Acrylic Chair (Blender 3D Animation)Yesterday, I sketched a chair I found at…AestheticsStudents Produce Breathtaking 3D Simulation of 17thC LondonThe haze effect lying over the city is b…DesignScat "boop…
“As all parties assess the damage wrought by the market meltdown, 20-20 hindsight shows some startlingly clear mistakes–beginning with a preponderance of money in search of investment, no matter how dubious the venture.” news.com —One year after the dot-com bubble burst Similar:CNN employees resign after retracted articleCNN is pretty upfront; three journalists…BusinessHarvard University says it…
(Interactive fiction) … She might be the model in a perfume ad; the trophy wife at a formal gathering; one of the guests at this very opening, standing on an empty pedestal in some ironic act of artistic deconstruction — You hesitate, about to turn away. Her hand balls into a fist. “They told me…
Eliza was the first chatterbot — a computer program that mimics human conversation. In only about 200 lines of computer code, Eliza models the behavior of a psychiatrist (or, more specifically, the “active listening” strategies of a touchy-feely 1960s Rogerian therapist). Dennis G. Jerz —Doctor Eliza is in Similar:Don’t Text While Parenting — It Will…
“I was strolling past some Korean shops in Chinatown when I overheard members of a Cambodian mafia having a powwow. One of these heathens had welshed on a deal to buy a ghetto blaster and was shanghaied off to the Near East. As if that weren’t hurtful enough, it was Dutch treat all the way.”…
Most teachers I know cringe when students who missed class e-mail to request a transcript of the class they missed. My policy is to say, “Get the notes from a classmate.” Dennis G. Jerz —I Missed Class…Did I Miss Anything Important? Similar:Stapler jam during a midterm exam.My years of watching MacGyver definitely…AcademiaI’m a High Schooler. AI…
As Napster wavers, file-trading network Aimster is using an unusual shield to protect its users from snooping: copyright law sponsored by the recording industry. Wired.com Similar:Wikipedia:VisualEditor – Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaWikipedia is testing a visual editor, in…CybercultureNicholas Winton, “Britain’s Schindler,” Dies at 106Nicholas Winton, a British stockbroker w…CultureAt the Johnstown Flood Museum. (May 31 1889…
It would only take an hour to drive out to the crash site, but Uncle Owen will kill you if you don’t finish this repair by sundown. Do you repair the vaporator or investigate the crash? Mike Helba —Star Wars Legos Choose Your Own Adventure Similar:Cry from a Far Planet by Tom Godwin (WAOB Audio…
Publishing giant Random House goes after tiny RosettaBooks, which has published e-texts of some popular Random House authors. RosettaBooks says they got permission directly from the authors. —Styron, Vonnegut E-Books Spark Random House Lawsuit Similar:Picture Books Languish as Parents Push ‘Big-Kid Books’Picture books are so unpopular these day…BooksPerspective | After Hannity’s travesty, Fox News redeems…
A new generation of three-dimensional printers can create nearly any solid shape as easily as an inkjet printer creates a letter. The trick is to spray layer after layer of thin, fast-drying resin. Rick Overton Similar:Newly acquired technology for teaching writing in the age of AI. (Not for high stakes test…AcademiaIn August, 2001 I was…
“Content certainly has all the glamor. What content does not have is money.” Andrew Odlyzko. —Content is Not King. Similar:Should your grieving mum see your digital secrets?A US state has passed a law that will gi…Current_EventsComputer Interfaces in Star Trek's "Assignment Earth"I was watching classic Star Trek with my…CybercultureSurprise: Humanities Degrees Provide Great Return On…
Tom Van Vleck. (Rather dry reading, but offers an opposing view to The First E-Mail Message) —The History of Electronic Mail Similar:MS-Word's helpful "View -> Focus" mode delays stress-related breakdowns.You won’t usually catch me saying anythi…CybercultureCoronavirus: advice from the Middle Ages for how to cope with self-isolationLike many people, I curate my social med…CultureI was…
A reporter drops in on a Britney Spears chat room and talks about politics. Sort of. —You are in BRITNEY SPEARS Similar:Frozen (Greensburg Civic Theatre, Greasepaint Players)DramaWhat Miley Cyrus Did Was Disgusting — But Not For the Reasons You Think | Anne TheriaultI still have not seen the “performance” …Academia'Jane Austen, Game Theorist' by Michael…
“In addition to selling e-books from their online sites, the stores will be testing numerous methods to cross-market e-books with traditional forms, including in-store kiosks, author appearances and e-book demonstrations.” M. J. Rose —E-Books Are Now on the Shelf Similar:What a fluke (great headline; great story)AmusingThe 7 key components of a perfect elevator pitch Whether…
go hand in hand; and nobody really wants to slow down progress. Jennifer Kahn —Noise and progress Similar:Old English Has a Serious Image ProblemThis fall I will be teaching Shakespeare…AcademiaTouch Me Now: York Plays 2025A cast of hundreds participated in a pub…AcademiaThe Zombie Argument that Refuses to DieThe idea that generations of Shakespeare…Academia'Facebook is simply…
A longtime technology critic has fashioned a prototype of a device that he says could do away with traditional colleges and teachers, replacing them with knowledge-dispensing terminals that look like A.T.M.’s. Jeffrey R. Young —Behold the “Automatic Professor Machine” Similar:A lost generation of news consumers? Survey shows how teenagers dislike the news mediaMore than half…
The Navy is providing handheld computers to almost all of its new officers and giving them to graduates of the Naval Academy and other naval programs. CNN.com Similar:Mars Is a Hellhole: Colonizing the red planet is a ridiculous way to help humanity.Some of Elon Musk’s stunts have caught m…BusinessGoogle engineer put on leave after saying…
More proof that the apocalypse is nigh: “Typing of the Dead” is a typing tutorial that also just so happens to be 3-D computerized gorefest. GamesDoman review of Typing of the Dead. Similar:Saints and Poets, Maybe They Do SomeI wrote the following in 2004, when my s…DramaHaiku'da Been a Spam FilterLatest weapon against junk e-mail:…
(See also: Digital Hollywood- No Resolution) —Latest on Napster Update, Feb 27, 2021 The above links are dead, but here’s a screenshot of what the Yahoo News “Technology Full Coverage” section looked like on February 23, 2001. (Courtesy the invaluable Internet Archive Wayback Machine) Similar:I just had some fun spotting a possible source of the…