Castle Anthrax will live on in our hearts

We're going on a hiatus from weekend gaming so everyone can get more studio time.
Thanks for playing, guys. I had a good time catching up and chewing the fat. I've posted the world file for posterity. [Link.] The image below links to a more legible world map.

Lecture round-up

• [Link.] [Via.] There are some important insights in this talk about creation and feedback loops. The lecturer says some things about user interface that I don't agree with, but I think that it's been obvious for a while that we're not moving towards One-True-U.I. so I think there's room for everyone's opinion. I myself have what I think are some important insights into art making, feedback, and the proper use of computers, but when I've tried to articulate them they've come out somewhat hippy-dippy. So I'll save them for now.
• [Link.] [Via.] I enjoyed these Alan Watts lectures on my commute this week.
• [Link.] This is a good talk by KRS-One about the origin and spirit of hip-hop. I was at Temple in 2004, but didn't hear about this.
• [Link.] Who knew that bagging on Damien Hirst could be such comedy gold. Thank you, Google filter bubble.

P.S. Ubuntu 12.04 is out. With some trepidation, I typed "sudo do-release-upgrade" into a terminal last night. I haven't noticed any ill effects thus far.

Happy Monday!

El Empleo / The Employment from opusBou on Vimeo.

(Via.)

Borderlands 2... Ready Your Treasure Sack!

Start Your Weekend with Rammstein!

One Billion Dollars

Red Hat Becomes Open Source’s First $1 Billion Baby (Wired)

Maybe something like this could convince the architects in Pennsylvania that open source software can be a legitimate and stable corporate business enterprise.

Dungeons & Dragons News

Dorktower sums it up nicely.

-Players Roll the Dice for Dungeons & Dragons Remake
(New York Times, in January)

Some good critical commentary about the announcement that I stumbled upon.

-5th Edition D&D Is in Development — Should We Care?
(Wired blog - Geekdad)

The links in that article lead to an insightful run-down of why confidence in the official D&D is at an all time low, especially how Hasbro overreached and alienated the gamers.

-Past . . . Present . . . and Future. (the Escapist)

And here is how I accidentally found out a new edition is being developed at all.

-Call for diversity in D&D rulebooks (BoingBoing)

The Calyx Institute

Happy Zombie Jesus Day!

Ladies and Gentlemen; I give you James Howard Kunstler

"In the drunken, drug-crazed twilight of its run as Leader of the Free World, America's collective imagination swerves from one breakdown lane to the other while the highway patrol throws a donuts-and-porn party down at headquarters and the news media searches the gutter on hands-and-knees looking for the spot where it dropped its brains...."

"Shadowrun Returns"

"That's Depressing!" - The (mostly) Podcast Edition

This American Life - Take the Money and Run for Office

"For anyone who has ever heard the term "Washington insider" and felt outside — we are with you. So this week, we go inside the rooms where the deals get made, to the actual moment that the checks change hands — and we ask the people writing and receiving the checks what, exactly, is the money buying?"

Dan Carlin's Hardcore History - Logical Insanity

"After many listener requests, Dan examines the issue of the morality of dropping the Atomic Bombs in the Second World War."

Paul Kingsnorth - Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist

"It could be all that, but it probably isn’t. It’s probably me. I am thirty-seven now. The world is smaller, more tired, more fragile, more horribly complex and full of troubles. Or, rather: the world is the same as it ever was, but I am more aware of it and of the reality of my place within it. I have grown up, and there is nothing to be done about it. The worst part of it is that I can’t seem to look without thinking anymore. And now I know far more about what we are doing. We: the people. I know what we are doing, all over the world, to everything, all of the time. I know why the magic is dying. It’s me. It’s us."

Minna Linou Benedict

Born the 29th of March, 2012 at 11:08 AM.

Berlin's Struggling Artists Demand Share of the Pie

An keen overview of arts funding in Berlin, trying to explore every side of the issue in two pages. From classic opera houses to small half-hidden stages.

As a side note, I installed many aspects of the exhibition shown above. ((Are those fine looking info-diagrams in the picture or what?)) Also, reading the second section of the article closely, particularly the part labelled Presenting Shared Demands, my wife has been working on this lobbying effort as part of a larger arts network and representatives of the Berlin Senate will be meeting, what is here oddly translated as "the protesters" by Der Spiegel, in our space at the WerkStadt in May to talk about what to do with the proposed money for independent spaces. ((Huzzah!))

Link.