Tag Archives: rant

In which I change the plot of “Avatar” by less than 15% and improve it at least 250%

I keep coming back to “Avatar” in my head. Partly because new people in my life keep seeing it and then asking me what I think. They do this for a couple reasons: 1) I’m the avowed hard-core sci-fi buff … Continue reading

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Our (possibly) scary future: two data points

In my RSS reader today, I came across two (seemingly) unrelated posts that ended up colliding in my mind and making me feel, well… a bit troubled about certain aspects of our glorious, technofuture. The first is a video, “What … Continue reading

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Mark Helprin: wonderful author, total tool

“Winter’s Tale” is my second favorite novel of all time. And Mark Helprin‘s other novels are wonderful, too. But I hate loving his work when the guy is such a, well… dick. I’ve known forever that we held different political … Continue reading

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The cure for panic is action

Great Bruce Sterling speech/rant at Wired.com. It’s his speech from Webstock, and it puts a lot of grumpy, gnarly, interesting, scratchy, vaguely troubling ideas into a human zone. I do love me some Bruce. Go read the whole thing, but … Continue reading

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Learning to hunt — Newsweek gets it wrong… and insults a whole bunch of us in the process

I subscribe to Newsweek, and generally enjoy it. Any pub with regular articles by Fareed Zakaria is worth keeping on the nightstand. This last week, though, there was an article about how President Obama’s use of a Blackberry is, well… … Continue reading

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TV, video games, art, artistry, craft and the answers to all your questions.

I have come down from the mountain with wisdom for you, my children. I am going to define “art,” and then discuss how TV almost never is, video gaming isn’t yet (possibly never may be), and why you don’t need … Continue reading

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Dr. Bartle goes off (with my slight addition)

I love Richard Bartle. Not in the way that a man loves a woman, or another, less-hairy man. Or a really, really good steak. But he’s very well spoken, writes very well, is a major figure in the gaming universe, … Continue reading

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