17 Mar 2003
Virtual Reality for Real

Alternate Reality Games Grab Mindshare [Slashdot]

Pretty strange - especially that it's in the Times and on the BBC. Let me see - strange emails, bogus websites mixed up with legit ones, mysterious voice mail messages .... all the while trying to figure out what the hell is really going on. They didn't mention reverse engineering DSP code originally written in Logo for the 8008, but if they'd throw that in the mix I know the perfect name for this game - call it Software Engineering!

Seriously though, it's not like we don't mix games and reality enough or anything .... what with media manipulations, government disinformation campaigns and the general high level of angst in the world right now, do we really need this? Will it take off?

Only time will tell, I suppose.

00:00 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

All the News That's Fit to Print

This is where depending on the popular media for scientific and/or engineering knowledge will get you. All the News That's Fit to Print .... indeed.

[from Enchanted Learning via InstaPundit]

In 1919, Goddard wrote a scientific article, "A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes," describing a high-altitude rocket; this ground-breaking article was published in a Smithsonian report. Misunderstanding the article completely, the New York Times newspaper ridiculed Goddard in a Jan. 13, 1920, editorial, stating that space travel was impossible, and that Goddard "seems to lack the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." They stated that rocket thrust would not work in a vacuum, apparently believing that Newton's Third Law (that every force has an equal and opposite reaction) was not valid in space. The NY Times did not print a retraction until 3 days before men landed on the moon (p. 43, July 17, 1969).

00:00 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

Hacking Google

This looks like a very interesting book:

Google Hacks [Slashdot]

00:00 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

The Non-Smoking Gun

A great editorial from the San Francisco Gate.

00:00 /Politics | 0 comments | permanent link