Although it is due to a number of happenings, this is the straw that broke Wikipedia's back.
Wikipedia Tightens Submission Rules - Yahoo! News
"SAN FRANCISCO - Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia to which anyone can contribute, is tightening submission rules after a prominent journalist complained that an article falsely implicated him in the Kennedy assassinations.
"Wikipedia will now require users to register before they can create articles, Jimmy Wales, founder of the St. Petersburg, Fla.-based Web site, said Monday. People who modify existing articles will still be able to do so without registering.
"The change comes less than a week after John Seigenthaler, a one-time administrative assistant to Robert Kennedy, complained in an op-ed published in USA Today that a biography of him on Wikipedia claimed he had been suspected in the assassinations of the former attorney general and his brother, President John F. Kennedy.
"Wikipedia, often cited as a prime example of the type of collective knowledge-pooling that the Internet enables, has some 850,000 articles in English as well as entries in at least eight other languages, including Italian, French, German and Portuguese.
"Since it's launch in 2001, it has grown into a storehouse of information on topics ranging from medieval art to nanotechnology.
"The volume is possible because the site relies on volunteers, including many experts in their fields, who submit entries and edit previously submitted articles.
"Wales said he hopes the registration requirement will limit the number of articles being created.
"While it would not prevent people from posting false information, the new process will make it easier, said Wales, for the site's 600 active volunteers to review and remove factual errors, defaming statements and other material that runs afoul of Wikipedia policy.
"Wikipedia visitors will still be able to edit content already posted without registering. It takes 15 to 20 seconds to create an account on the Web site, and an e-mail address is not required."
I think that my feelings on Wikipedia are summed up by the following quote:
"'I sympathize with this person, but it's really not any different than a posting on an anonymous Web page,' Eugene Volokh, a law professor specializing in the First Amendment, said, referring to Seigenthaler. Volokh added that Wikipedia provides casual readers with a valuable service but that he would never rely on it as a source for scholarly articles."
Monday, December 12, 2005
Sunday, December 11, 2005
Robert Sheckley: R.I.P.
From John Shirley's website:
"My old friend Robert Sheckley has died, of complications following an operation for a brain aneurism. His widow is the writer Gail Dana. Sheckley and I knew each other for some years, and I read him as a boy. I used to hang out with him in Paris, in the late 1980s, when we both lived there. Bob was a great guy, and fine company, never letting his deep-seated stammer stop him from conversation. An old-time Bohemian, Sheckley had periods of partying and wandering, though never ceasing to write. (We had that and other connections in common.) Most importantly, Robert Sheckley was a very, very distinct voice as a writer and a great influence on many people, Douglas Adams and Harlan Ellison amongst others.
"Sheckley was fiction editor of Omni Magazine for two years and recipient of various awards. His fiction inspired works by such avant rockers as Frank Zappa and Brian Eno. Sheckley was a Visiting Scholar at the Artificial Intelligence Lab at MIT in Boston in 1983. In 1991 he received the Raymond Z. Gallun award for contributions to the genre of science-fiction.
"A master of the short story, Sheckley was never short on ideas, and his whimsical, insightful, hipster's take on the human condition, always skillfully expressed, lightened the existential load while somehow acknowledging life's absurdities."
From the New York Times' website:
"December 10, 2005
"Robert Sheckley, 77, Writer of Satirical Science Fiction, Is Dead
"By GERALD JONAS
"Robert Sheckley, a writer of science fiction whose disarmingly playful stories pack a nihilistic subtext, died yesterday in Poughkeepsie. He was 77 and lived in Red Hook, N.Y.
"'The cause was complications of a brain aneurysm,' said his former wife, Ziva Kwitney. Mr. Sheckley wrote more than 15 novels and around 400 short stories; the actual total is uncertain since he was so prolific in his heyday, the 1950's and 60's, that magazine editors insisted he publish some stories under pseudonyms to avoid having his byline appear more than once in an issue.
"Four of his stories were made into films; the best known, 'The Tenth Victim' (1965), starred Marcello Mastroianni and Ursula Andress.
"Born in Brooklyn and raised in Maplewood, N.J., Robert Sheckley joined the Army in 1946 after graduating from high school, and served in Korea. In 1951 he received an undergraduate degree from New York University and sold his first short story.
"Over the next two decades, he was a major force in the development of modern science fiction. His first collection of stories, published in 1954, was hailed as one of the finest debut volumes in the field. In the 1960's he found a wider market for his science fiction in magazines like Playboy.
"Many of his novels were well received, among them 'Journey Beyond Tomorrow'(1962) and 'Dimension of Miracles' (1968), but Mr. Sheckley was best known for his short stories. At a time when science fiction was just starting to grapple with the social implications of technology - from atomic bombs to missile-carrying rockets - Mr. Sheckley turned a satirist's eye on the genre and its concerns.
"Like Ray Bradbury, he was interested in the scientific apparatus of science fiction - space travel, time travel, extrapolated futures - only so far as it served his purpose. While Mr. Bradbury poetically mourns the failure to live up to our dreams of the future, Mr. Sheckley mocked the self-delusions that lead to dreams in the first place.
"He reveled in the freedom the genre afforded him to dramatize the fears and anxieties of everyday life. When he wrote about the war between the sexes, he conjured a future in which disappointed lovers had the legal option of using real bullets to express their anger. When he wrote about alienation as a state of mind, he sealed the reader in an endless loop of disaffection that reduced the outside world to a hallucination wrapped in an illusion.
"Because he leavened his darkest visions with wit and absurdist plotting, he is considered one of science fiction's seminal humorists, and a precursor to Douglas Adams, whose 'Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' (1979) seems to take place in a Sheckleyan universe. But Mr. Sheckley's work is darker than Mr. Adams's; the smiles he evokes leave a bitter taste on the lips. A better comparison might be to Kafka, a fabulist who could never understood why his friends didn't laugh when he read his stories to them.
"Mr. Sheckley's fiction has been translated into German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Finnish and Lithuanian. His work is especially popular in Russia and Eastern Europe.
"Mr. Sheckley's marriages to his first four wives, Barbara Scadron, Ms. Kwitney, Abby Schulman and Jay Rothbell, ended in divorce. At the time of his death he was separated from his fifth wife, Gail Dana. Other survivors include a son, Jason, from his first marriage, a daughter, Alisa Kwitney, from his second marriage; a daughter, Anya, and a son, Jed, from his third marriage; his sister Joan Klein of New York; and three grandchildren."
"My old friend Robert Sheckley has died, of complications following an operation for a brain aneurism. His widow is the writer Gail Dana. Sheckley and I knew each other for some years, and I read him as a boy. I used to hang out with him in Paris, in the late 1980s, when we both lived there. Bob was a great guy, and fine company, never letting his deep-seated stammer stop him from conversation. An old-time Bohemian, Sheckley had periods of partying and wandering, though never ceasing to write. (We had that and other connections in common.) Most importantly, Robert Sheckley was a very, very distinct voice as a writer and a great influence on many people, Douglas Adams and Harlan Ellison amongst others.
"Sheckley was fiction editor of Omni Magazine for two years and recipient of various awards. His fiction inspired works by such avant rockers as Frank Zappa and Brian Eno. Sheckley was a Visiting Scholar at the Artificial Intelligence Lab at MIT in Boston in 1983. In 1991 he received the Raymond Z. Gallun award for contributions to the genre of science-fiction.
"A master of the short story, Sheckley was never short on ideas, and his whimsical, insightful, hipster's take on the human condition, always skillfully expressed, lightened the existential load while somehow acknowledging life's absurdities."
From the New York Times' website:
"December 10, 2005
"Robert Sheckley, 77, Writer of Satirical Science Fiction, Is Dead
"By GERALD JONAS
"Robert Sheckley, a writer of science fiction whose disarmingly playful stories pack a nihilistic subtext, died yesterday in Poughkeepsie. He was 77 and lived in Red Hook, N.Y.
"'The cause was complications of a brain aneurysm,' said his former wife, Ziva Kwitney. Mr. Sheckley wrote more than 15 novels and around 400 short stories; the actual total is uncertain since he was so prolific in his heyday, the 1950's and 60's, that magazine editors insisted he publish some stories under pseudonyms to avoid having his byline appear more than once in an issue.
"Four of his stories were made into films; the best known, 'The Tenth Victim' (1965), starred Marcello Mastroianni and Ursula Andress.
"Born in Brooklyn and raised in Maplewood, N.J., Robert Sheckley joined the Army in 1946 after graduating from high school, and served in Korea. In 1951 he received an undergraduate degree from New York University and sold his first short story.
"Over the next two decades, he was a major force in the development of modern science fiction. His first collection of stories, published in 1954, was hailed as one of the finest debut volumes in the field. In the 1960's he found a wider market for his science fiction in magazines like Playboy.
"Many of his novels were well received, among them 'Journey Beyond Tomorrow'(1962) and 'Dimension of Miracles' (1968), but Mr. Sheckley was best known for his short stories. At a time when science fiction was just starting to grapple with the social implications of technology - from atomic bombs to missile-carrying rockets - Mr. Sheckley turned a satirist's eye on the genre and its concerns.
"Like Ray Bradbury, he was interested in the scientific apparatus of science fiction - space travel, time travel, extrapolated futures - only so far as it served his purpose. While Mr. Bradbury poetically mourns the failure to live up to our dreams of the future, Mr. Sheckley mocked the self-delusions that lead to dreams in the first place.
"He reveled in the freedom the genre afforded him to dramatize the fears and anxieties of everyday life. When he wrote about the war between the sexes, he conjured a future in which disappointed lovers had the legal option of using real bullets to express their anger. When he wrote about alienation as a state of mind, he sealed the reader in an endless loop of disaffection that reduced the outside world to a hallucination wrapped in an illusion.
"Because he leavened his darkest visions with wit and absurdist plotting, he is considered one of science fiction's seminal humorists, and a precursor to Douglas Adams, whose 'Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' (1979) seems to take place in a Sheckleyan universe. But Mr. Sheckley's work is darker than Mr. Adams's; the smiles he evokes leave a bitter taste on the lips. A better comparison might be to Kafka, a fabulist who could never understood why his friends didn't laugh when he read his stories to them.
"Mr. Sheckley's fiction has been translated into German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Finnish and Lithuanian. His work is especially popular in Russia and Eastern Europe.
"Mr. Sheckley's marriages to his first four wives, Barbara Scadron, Ms. Kwitney, Abby Schulman and Jay Rothbell, ended in divorce. At the time of his death he was separated from his fifth wife, Gail Dana. Other survivors include a son, Jason, from his first marriage, a daughter, Alisa Kwitney, from his second marriage; a daughter, Anya, and a son, Jed, from his third marriage; his sister Joan Klein of New York; and three grandchildren."
Saturday, December 10, 2005
Play Infocom Adventures Online
This site requires Java to use it, but once again you too can play those incredibly frustrating Infocom text-based adventure games from the 80s. It only took me a minute to remember why I hated the Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy game. These are for online only use, so no downloads (unfortunately). See the bottom of the post for stuff you can download!
Play Infocom Adventures Online
Zork I: The Great Underground Empire
Zork II: The Wizard of Frobozz
Zork III: The Dungeon Master
Zork: The Undiscovered Underground
Enchanter
Seastalker
Sorcerer
Spellbreaker
Wishbringer
Starcross
Suspended
Planetfall
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Stationfall
Deadline
The Witness
Leather Goddesses of Phobos
The Lurking Horror
Here, on this Infocom fan site you can find the downloads for various versions of the Zork game.
Enjoy.
Play Infocom Adventures Online
Zork I: The Great Underground Empire
Zork II: The Wizard of Frobozz
Zork III: The Dungeon Master
Zork: The Undiscovered Underground
Enchanter
Seastalker
Sorcerer
Spellbreaker
Wishbringer
Starcross
Suspended
Planetfall
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Stationfall
Deadline
The Witness
Leather Goddesses of Phobos
The Lurking Horror
Here, on this Infocom fan site you can find the downloads for various versions of the Zork game.
Enjoy.
Comedian Richard Pryor dead at 65
This is a great loss to comedy, regardless of how long it has been since he performed. This is a great loss indeed.
Comedian Richard Pryor dead at 65
"Groundbreaking US comedian Richard Pryor has died at the age of 65 after a long illness.
"He died of a heart attack at his home in California's San Fernando Valley, according to his ex-wife, Flyn Pryor.
"He had been ill for years with multiple sclerosis, a degenerative disease of the nervous system.
"A series of hit comedies in the 1970s and 1980s - including Stir Crazy and Silver Streak - helped make him one of Hollywood's highest-paid stars."
Comedian Richard Pryor dead at 65
"Groundbreaking US comedian Richard Pryor has died at the age of 65 after a long illness.
"He died of a heart attack at his home in California's San Fernando Valley, according to his ex-wife, Flyn Pryor.
"He had been ill for years with multiple sclerosis, a degenerative disease of the nervous system.
"A series of hit comedies in the 1970s and 1980s - including Stir Crazy and Silver Streak - helped make him one of Hollywood's highest-paid stars."
Wednesday, December 07, 2005
Class Alternatives: Challenger
I'm a fan of the d20 Modern system, however I have never really been a fan of the classes that are in the book. The generic classes just never lit a fire under me enough to make me be able to really get into the system.
To that end, I am working on a line called Class Alternatives for Battlefield Press, Inc. that will be able to be used in place of the classes that are standard to the d20 Modern system. These are not new Advanced Classes, or Prestige Classes, or anything like that. These are fully functioning 20-level classes designed specifically for use in modern campaigns. Most of these classes will be designed around Pulp, "Neo-Pulp," or other adventure fiction archetypes. Each class will be completely self-contained, all that will be needed to bring that character into play in your d20 Modern campaigns will be the core rules and a copy of the class that is wished to be used by players.
As these are still in development, page counts are not exact but each Class Alternative will have all of the information on the class, any new or altered Skills and Feats and appropriate Occupations for that character class. Each Class Alternative will be fully compatible with your d20 Modern campaign, but not necessarily with characters created using the standard d20 Modern rules. Right now, classes in development are the Challenger and the Empowered.
A part of Battlefield Press, Inc.'s Modern Options line, the Class Alternatives bring new concepts, options and ideas to your d20 Modern campaigns.
Working at Penguin
People always seem to wonder, but never quite know, what particular jobs at a publisher actually do. Not very in-depth, but interesting tolook through.
Working at Penguin
Working at Penguin
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Trading bibles for porn in San Antonio
"A group of atheists at the University of Texas in San Antonio is trying to tempt college kids into trading their Bibles for pornography.
"It's part of a program called Smut for Smut sponsored by the student organization called Atheist Agenda."
Trading bibles for porn in San Antonio
Thanks, Jonny!
"It's part of a program called Smut for Smut sponsored by the student organization called Atheist Agenda."
Trading bibles for porn in San Antonio
Thanks, Jonny!
Monday, December 05, 2005
Lego Dice Roller
"Introducing GameByEmail's Dice-O-Matic. Made from Legos, a USB camera, and a bit of software, it's a home-grown, dice-rolling monster. Don't let it's rickety looks deceive you; this puppy can easily crank out the 20,000 rolls a day consumed by GamesByEmail. In fact, at full speed it averages almost one roll a second, well over 80,000 a day!"
Lego Dice Roller [via Boing Boing]
Lego Dice Roller [via Boing Boing]
Green Ronin Online Store: Mutants & Masterminds, Second Edition (PDF)
Green Ronin publishers is now offering a PDF version of their 2nd edition Mutants and Masterminds game, for sale direct from their online store. No associate code here, but I figured it was worth passing along to the masses.
Green Ronin Online Store: Mutants & Masterminds, Second Edition (PDF)
Green Ronin Online Store: Mutants & Masterminds, Second Edition (PDF)
Q-Unit - Greatest Hits
Who knows how long this will be up (it seems like a couple of the sites have already been taken down, but this is a pretty brilliant Mash-Up of 50 Cent and Queen's Greatest Hits. Check them out while you still can.
Q-Unit - Greatest Hits
Note: This is a different link than the one on Boing Boing, that one appears to already be dead. Google is a great thing.
Q-Unit - Greatest Hits
Note: This is a different link than the one on Boing Boing, that one appears to already be dead. Google is a great thing.
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