It turns out that Noam Chomsky was alway s full of shit, and not just when bloviating about areas outside of his supposed expertise. Yes, supposed. While he tends to mouth off about a lit of things, and holds the typically ever-so-liberal opinions on them, he’s given a lot of credence because of his academic chops in linguistics. It also turns out he was fundamentally wrong in his understanding of language learning [http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/evidence-rebuts-chomsky-s-theory-of…
In a day and age where most publishers are stillnot getting the “digital” thing, pricing their books as high as, or more than the paper versions, Baen always had a clue. Not only did they price their e-versions cheap, but they left them clear of Digital Rights Management and copy protection crap, so you could easily read them where and when you wanted to. Better yet, they had a huge free library, often consisting of the first book or two in a series, allowing you to get to know pretty much all…
Well – NYC is disabling web access [http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/09/after-lewd-acts-nycs-free-internet-kiosks-disable-web-browsing/] on the “free” internet kiosks provided (at great expense) to allow people to look at maps, make calls, and browse online. > The tablets will still offer free phone calls, maps, and access to emergency services. New Yorkers can also continue to connect their own devices to LinkNYC Wi-Fi hotspots. But browsing on the publicly accessible tablet…
A long time ago John dumped a bunch of his id into book format, and brought us Mike Harmon, the Paladin of Shadows, and origin of the “Oh John Ringo, No [http://hradzka.livejournal.com/199220.html]” meme (an absolutely hysterical read, btw). One of the things prominent even in the earliest publicly available snippets were references to a song by the Crüxshadows, a darkwave/goth band, called “Winterborn”. So I checked it out. Heavy on opening synths. A danceable beat. Meh voice. Absolutely drive…
Over at the Black Gate, a Game Master discusses why he ran an old-school style game for his friends instead of Pathfinder [https://www.blackgate.com/2016/09/08/why-i-went-old-school-or-swords-wizardry-vs-pathfinder/] , a system he’s also very familiar with. > I used this when explaining S&W to one of my new players. Now, in Baldur’s Gate, he would click on the ‘Find Traps’ skill and if a trap was nearby, it would be outlined on screen in a red box if detected. And he is aware that in a modern g…