All I ever wanted was a world without maps. –Michael Ondaatje This is footage from a flashmob snowball fight in Washington, DC that was organized via Twitter. During the snowball fight, a snowball hit the Hummer of an off-duty police officer, who proceeded to pull over and exit the vehicle before waving his gun around. […]
Plotting the recovery: optimism, SF and Squid Read More »
Via BB, we have this article from Wired about the anti-vaccine movement (specifically the movement which blames childhood vaccinations for autism). As a consequence of my time at OCAD, I’ve spent the past few weeks thinking about H1N1 and when I’ll be queuing up for my vaccine. At the same time, I’ve been utterly agog
Get your kids their #$@*%&^ shots. Read More »
Yes, now you too can watch poorly-dubbed Italian classics like Playgirls and the Vampire, for free, on AMC. This is the perfect way to celebrate Halloween, unless you a) live near abandoned barns you can explore or b) have a goodly amount of small-batch bourbon and a toolbox of Hammer films at the ready. (Parties
AMC now streaming B-movies online Read More »
DeathRay has a saying: “No one should ever cover The Beatles.” Seen, and raised: This is Sungha Jung, a 12-year-old boy from South Korea who now gets invited to the Seoul Jazz Festival by the likes of the Swell Season. He’s “fingerstyling,” which means that rather than focusing on a specific part of the song,
Why you work hard to be good at stuff: Read More »
BB Offworld has a great essay on why there should be more female leads in games: Ultimately, though, I need games to have a few more girls in them because it’s just downright *weird* that they don’t. Girls are pretty much an epidemic. We get everywhere. We do all kinds of stuff. There really are
Another plea for more female leads in games: Read More »
io9 sez that The Dark Knight sequel may feature Miley Cyrus. I’ll wait, while you wash the blood from your eyes. Done? Okay. Moving on. I think this is a good thing. I can wait. Again. Try rolling your abs up into your spine; it helps the vomit come a little faster. Now swish! Okay.
Please hold for unpopular opinions re: Batman Read More »
Somebody cut a square out of a shopping bag just so that they could smuggle this footage out of China in 1990. It depicts the Kowloon Walled City. The Walled City was an act of spontaneous, collaborative architecture in response to political and social upheaval — a spatial harbinger of what the internet would eventually
Speaking of cities Read More »
C. Wess Daniels has a great post wherein he explains Henry Jenkins’ definition of fandom thusly: Appropriation – A person appropriates in their own life a particular text, work, and practice relating to their fan object. Often these objects are reinterpreted in their own life. Participation – There is an openness for people to participate
What fandom can teach us about cycling: Read More »
Still, the “K/S” material confirmed something that I already knew from my own life: that there are just as many heterosexual women who are turned on by the idea of men having sex with one another as there are heterosexual men who are turned on by the idea of women having sex with one another
Samuel R. Delany on slash fic: Read More »
The talented Jetse de Vries asked me to share my thoughts on optimistic science fiction in the anime medium, and I contributed as best I could. Overwhelmingly, anime creates an optimistic sentiment not by depicting a utopian future, but by locating the reason for hope in humanity’s ability to make the right decision — to
Optimism in SF anime Read More »