BB reader Sarah says,

Roy Rosenzweig, founder of the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University, died on October 11, 2007. He was a pioneer in digital history and pushed for open access and for use of digital material in historical scholarship.

Matt sez, "Cool arts and culture site Dark Roasted Blend offers this exclusive interview with New Weird fantasy author Jeff VanderMeer. The article is accompanied by about a dozen of the weirdest illustrations culled from Jeff's books and stories."

New Weird is a type of urban, secondary-world fiction that subverts the romanticized ideas about place found in traditional fantasy, largely by choosing realistic, complex real-world models. It creates settings that may combine elements of both science fiction and fantasy. New Weird has a visceral, in-the-moment quality that often uses elements of surreal or transgressive horror for its tone, style, and effects - in combination with the stimulus of influence from New Wave writers or their proxies (including also such forebears as Mervyn Peake and the French/English Decadents).

New Weird fictions are acutely aware of the modern world, even if in disguise, but not always overtly political. As part of this awareness of the modern world, New Weird relies for its visionary power on a "surrender to the weird" that isn't, for example, hermetically sealed in a haunted house on the moors or in a cave in Antarctica. The "surrender" (or "belief") of the writer can take many forms, some of them even involving the use of postmodern techniques that do not undermine the surface reality of the text.

(Image credit: Back cover of Vandermeer's book The Situation, by Scott Eagle)

See also:
Urban spaces and sf: interview with Jeff VanderMeer
Economics in fiction with Stross, VanderMeer, et al
Photos of you acting dead needed for indie film
Thackery T. Lambshead Guide to Eccentric and Discredited Diseases

A discussion thread on using shipping containers as housing on Making Light turned up a fantastic wealth of material on the subject (it turns out that the world's imbalance of trade with China means that most ports have mountains of abandoned containers originating in China that no one wants to ship back there). Teresa Nielsen Hayden (who doubles as Boing Boing's comment-moderator) did a round-up post organzing dozens of links thematically. Clicktrance ahoy! Link

(Photo credit: Naomi Schiphorst's photo of student housing made from shipping containers in Amsterdam, found on Mimoa)

The Vatican has published a slew of centuries-old documents about the Knights Templar, a Christian military order that operated in the Middle Ages and remains a source of endless fascination for conspiracy theorists, Holy Grail seekers, occultists, and Dan Brown readers. The documents are collected in a 300 page book published by Scrinium. The cover price is $8,377 and only 300 were printed. Tomorrow is the 700th anniversary of the day that King Philip IV ordered the Order's members in France to be rounded up, charged with heresy, tortured, and burned at the stake. Philip later insisted that Pope Clement V arrest all remaining members of the Order, take their money, kill many of them, and disband the group. From the Associated Press:

The publishing house said the new book includes the "Parchment of Chinon," a 1308 decision by (Pope) Clement (V) to save the Templars and their order. The document was misplaced for centuries in the archives and found again by researchers in 2001.

According to the Vatican archives Web site, the parchment shows that Clement absolved the Templar leaders of the heresy charge, though he did recognize they were guilty of immorality, and he planned to reform the order.

However, pressured by Philip, Clement later reversed his decision and suppressed the order in 1312.

Trey says: "The Netherlands are banning the sale of 'magic mushrooms' after a French woman died from jumping off a building after taking them."

Calls for a re-evaluation of the drug grew after a 17-year-old French girl jumped from a building after eating magic mushrooms during a school trip to Amsterdam in March.

Other incidents involving the drug have included an Icelandic tourist jumping from a balcony and breaking both legs and a Danish tourist driving his car wildly through a camping ground, narrowly missing sleeping campers.

"It's a shame, the media really blew this up into a big issue," said Chloe Collette, owner of the FullMoon shop, which sells magic mushrooms in Amsterdam.

Russia's culture minister, Alexander Sokolov, announced that he is banning a Bansky-inspired photo of two kissing policemen, and 16 other works, from a Paris exhibition of contemporary Russian art.

[Artist Alexander] Shaburov said that he and fellow artist Viacheslav Mizin had created Kissing Policemen as a homage to the celebrated British graffiti artist Banksy. "We were inspired by Banksy's iconic image of two constables kissing. We wanted to do the same but in Russia," Mr Shaburov said.

The image had nothing to do with gay people, he added. Instead, it was an absurdist fantasy about what might happen if everyone showed mercy and tenderness to each other. "Given the fact the state has banned it, we haven't quite reached this point yet," he noted.

Previously on Boing Boing:
• Many Banksy stories here

Mark Mauer says: "Josh Olson, who wrote the Oscar-nominated screenplay for A History of Violence tells a bizarre story in LA Weekly about a friend of his who falls in love with someone over the internet who is not what he claims to be. Yeah, yeah - old story, but this one is seriously twisted, goes for almost two years, results in a woman leaving her husband and deciding to move to another state to be with this imaginary man who is a firefighter/cowboy/poet/9-11 survivor. It's a sad, scary yet funny story where Harlan Ellison of all people comes to the rescue."

(Illustration by Ronald Kurniawan) The strange thing about something like this, about an encounter with a genuine monster, is that our minds tend to default to what’s normal, to what we know. We found ourselves talking about the situation as though Audrey had simply made friends with an eccentric person we didn’t like. Surely, it’s Audrey’s business whether or not she wants to be friends with Janna, isn’t it? Then someone would remember that a potentially dangerous lunatic was in the house with our friend.

I called Harlan. He understands people like no one you’ve ever met. We were at dinner once, and he started chatting with two biker dudes at the table next to us for a couple minutes. He asked one guy, “How long have you played chess?” The guy was stunned. Harlan had deduced from the way the guy carried himself in idle banter that he was a chess player. I’m pretty good at figuring out what makes people tick — you have to be to be a decent writer — but Harlan knows. He thought my plan was pretty solid, but offered one variant on it that was brilliant, and completely out of left field.

Jenny says: "I spotted these two guys chatting today on Oxford Street in London." Link

Ken was tired of little punks cutting across his yard, so he built a "Water Hobo." It consists of an infrared vision system that detects people that trample across his lawn and an automatically-activated water nozzle to soak them. Be sure to watch the videos. Link (Thanks, Alex!)

Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego? After decades of being on the loose, she was discovered in an airport lounge a train station. Link

Over at Instructables, Isr_Raviv posted a neat simple HOWTO, with video, on making crystal clear ice.
Link

Today at Boing Boing Gadgets we saw a bed-mounted gun rack, twelve unlocked phones you can easily hack (without getting the stinkeye from Apple), turret-on-weighted-companion-cube porn, Simon Pegg as the next Star Trek Scotty, possible inadvertent Israeli jamming of satellite TV, paintings you have to plug into a wall, another attempt at music subscription from Universal, a nifty riff on a "see through touch screen," the new Zune interface, yet another asshole airline, me deciding baby wipes are the greatest keyboard cleaner, a water bottle I inexplicably didn't realize could be used as a bong [pictured], and a prototype "Clapper" TV remote.

And of course: Deals and hypertext links.

All these gadgets will be lost in time, like tears in rain.

Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge, wife of industrial music pioneer Genesis P-Orridge and member of Psychic TV, died of heart failure on Tuesday. Lady Jaye and Genesis were in the midst of an ongoing life-art project to make them look more alike through matching breast implants, haircuts, and other body modifications. The aim was to merge their identities into a single "pandrogynous" being, named Breyer P-Orridge. We send our condolences to Gen and the extended Psychic TV family.
Link

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Web Zen Home and Archives, Store (Thanks Frank!)

According to a new study, lap dancers who menstruate regularly and are in their most fertile periods receive better tips than dancers who are taking the hormonal contraceptive pill. According to University of New Mexico, Albuquerque psychology professor Geoffrey Miller and his colleagues, this research provides more evidence that women go "into heat," hormone-induced estrus, like other female mammals. From New Scientist:

But the study does appear to show that the dancers somehow advertise their fertility to men, who then consider them more attractive during this fertile phase, as reflected in their tips. How they advertise, however, and whether they do it consciously, is unclear. "We don't know the mechanism of attraction," says Thornhill, who is also at the University of New Mexico but was not involved with the study. "Are the men detecting the scent of oestrus? Or does the women's behaviour change?" he asks.

Reporters Without Borders have just released "Journey to the Heart of Internet Censorship," an in-depth report on the internal functioning of Chinese Internet censorship. Included in the report is a selection of messages from the official censor to Chinese media outlets, such as:

Dear colleagues, regarding the death of a radio presenter while she was at the deputy mayor's home, do not disseminate any reports, do not send any new articles, withdraw those that have already been posted on the site, and ensure that forums, blogs and messages no longer refer to this case. Please reply. (30 May 2006)

Dear colleagues, the Internet has of late been full of articles and messages about the death of a Shenzhen engineer, Hu Xinyu, as a result of overwork. All sites must stop posting articles on this subject, those that have already been posted about it must be removed from the site and, finally, forums and blogs must withdraw all articles and messages about this case. (17 June 2006)

Regarding the issue of unequal income distribution, please use articles from the Central Committee's main information mouthpieces and nothing else. Please do not spread rumours about this matter or conduct online polls. Please reinforce monitoring of comments, discussion forums and blogs and immediately block any violent or obscene message. (28 June 2006)

Tireless Valleywag gumshoe Paul Boutin has an exposé out today on those subliminally fleeting 8-bit characters you see in Boing Boing tv's new animated intro.

Adam "Ape Lad" Koford created 36 frames with iconic references to kooky stuff you find on Boing Boing, and filmmaker Syd Garon designed and directed the animation, which makes me smile every time I watch it. Sound by Carlos Bêla of Golden Shower, and logo critters by eBoy.

Paul's Valleywag piece includes a link to Syd's photoshop file with all the frames as layers, so you can remix (noncommercially/with attribution plz) to your heart's content. Link.

Today's episode of Boing Boing tv is an homage to Blade Runner, with a built-in Unicorn Chaser. Link.

Oh, and we couldn't include this in the episode, but here are some very good new LOLBLADERUNNERs by Jay Bushman: Link. And this one is my favorite yet, below, by Jamais Cascio of WorldChanging. Someone should make one where the animatronic court jester in Sebastian's flat laughs "ROFL." Ah, lazyweb.

Henrik sez, "I've started the first Lego animation festival in Northern Europe, and it takes place for the first time tomorrow (Saturday that is) in Örnsköldsvik, Sweden. There will be three blocks of short brickfilms and the venue is a 300 seat theater. Hopefully, it will eventually go mobile and tour the country and perhaps the Nordic countries. The festival will feature not only 20+ independent brickfilms but there will also be stands with computers and cams where people can try out Lego animation themselves if they want." Link (Thanks, Henrik!)

Glyn sez, "A patent infringement suit has been filed against Novell and Red Hat for allegedly infringing user interface patent. The first ever patent infringement litigation involving Linux. IP Innovation LLC filed the claim. Groklaw has more details and also tracks the flow of Microsoft employees into the company just before launching the law suit."

And now let's play, where's Microsoft? You know, like where's Waldo? Betcha he's in the tree's leaves somewhere if we look close enough. We had our first hint when Steve Ballmer said in his speech the other day that he figured other folks besides Microsoft would want Red Hat and FOSS to pay them for their patents. Remember? Is he a prophet or merely well informed? Or is there more to this? When I lay out all the research, you can decide.

EFF's legal director Cindy Cohn has written a great op-ed in today's San Francisco Chronicle about the Democratic Congress's move to immunize AT&T from liability for its complicity in illegally wiretapping every single American Internet user for the NSA.

Now is the time for Speaker Pelosi to make good on that promise, or at least prevent any further harm. In the last couple of weeks, the Bush administration has stepped up the pressure on Congress to surrender even more of individual citizens' privacy and civil liberties. At the top of the Bush administration's list: granting retroactive immunity to the telecommunications companies that have been participating with the National Security Agency in the widespread and incontrovertibly illegal warrantless surveillance of ordinary Americans since 2001. Granting this immunity could prevent the courts from ever ruling on the legality of the "dragnet" surveillance and from imposing needed restraints. Not content with the sweeping new powers granted to it by Congress in August, the Bush administration is essentially demanding that the now Democratic-led Congress cave in to a cover-up.

Kidney Notes sez, "For anyone who's wondered how (or even whether) to cite blogs in formal academic medical papers, the National Library of Medicine/National Institutes of Health provides a style guide. (They used Kidney Notes as one of the examples -- I'm honored.)"

KidneyNotes.com [blog on the Internet]. New York: KidneyNotes. c2006 - [cited 2007 May 16]. Available from: http://www.kidneynotes.com/.

The Singularity Institute has posted the audio from this year's Singularity Summit, including such speakers as Paul Saffo, Steve Jurvetson, and Ray Kurzweil. Link (Thanks, Jonathan!)

Fred sez,

Next week, Free Culture @ NYU will be hosting the first American screening of the 2007 film Good Copy Bad Copy. The documentary highlights the current state of copyright and culture, and features prominent copyright players such as Girl Talk, Lawrence Lessig, Renaldo Lemos, and Dan Glickman.

We're especially excited to announce that immediately following the screening, we'll be hosting a question and answer session with the film's award-winning Danish co-director, Henrik Moltke and Fritz Attaway, the MPAA's Executive VP and Special Policy Advisor. If you're at all interested in these issues, or want to meet a director working in free culture, or even just want to meet someone from the MPAA, you should absolutely come! The film is a wonderful introduction to the topics that Free Culture @ NYU deals in and this screening will be a fantastic opportunity to learn more about what we’re working towards.

The event is free and open to the public. Check the link for the time and place!

See also: Good Copy, Bad Copy: superb copyright documentary on the remix wars

Pablos sez, "I hacked my iPhone and now I'm suing Apple and AT&T for trying to stop me. This isn't a frivolous case, we want these companies to respect the legal limits on what they can do to their customers. I'm sad to be suing a company I've loved since third grade, but adopting the worst practices of other industries makes them a lot less lovable. The complaint for this class action suit was filed last Friday, and I encourage everyone interested to read it." Link (Thanks, Pablos!)

Shocking Autopsy is a Operation-style game that shocks you if your tweezers touch the edge of the metal lined cavity.

Stay calm and remember your medical training as you remove the weapons from this poor soul. But operate with care -- one false move and you're in for a shock! Includes a shock-free setting for kids or anyone who doesn't like shocks.

Sam installed a IE plugin called Web Viewer today, and when he clicked on the license "agreement," he noticed that it contained this clause:

The Software may contain third party software which requires notices and/or additional terms and conditions. Such required third party software notices and/or additional terms and conditions are made a part of and incorporated by reference into this EULA. By accepting this EULA, you are also accepting the additional terms and conditions, if any, set forth therein.

At the upcoming Maker Faire Austin, October 20-21, art car hero Harrod Blank will help visitors transform a Toyota Matrix into a music-themed artwork on wheels. Blank is perhaps best known for his Camera Van, seen here. Check out the announcement on the MAKE: blog for suggestions on music-related detritus that you can bring to contribute to the group build! From the MAKE: blog post:

The art car is going to be featuring images from album covers, sheet music, photos, guitar picks, and more. We are looking for your donations--get creative and bring that box of old music memorabilia to the HEYA Activity Pavilion and join the fun!

The blog, Jart in My Head, has scans of "deluxe masks" from the 1977 Johnson Smith catalog, along with funny commentary.

Onward and upward to the Deluxe Demon mask! I'm thinking that if your friend said, "Hey, I've got a deluxe demon mask" you'd be expecting something horrific-ly terrifying! Your knees would knock just thinking about the super scary mask that would be foisted upon your eyes Halloween night. Then he'd show up with this thing on his noggin and you'd immediately have to beat the bejeezus out of him and steal his candy.

Calling this mask a Demon is completely misleading. Let's be perfectly honest here. Demon's are scary. This mask is not. Therefore, this mask is not a demon. It would be far more accurate to call this mask the Deluxe Green Haired, Limited Intellect Ape with Candy Dispensing Nostrils.

Our pals at Gama-Go launched a pretty sweet offer today. Spend $60 on their cool t-shirts, hoodies, bric-a-brac, or accessories featuring Tim Biskup's curious characters and you'll get a free courier bag of your choosing (a $48 value). (In related news, next month, we'll announce the product of the superseekrit Gama-Go/Boing Boing mind-meld!)
Link (via Gama-Go blog)

I just bought this delightful collection of 16 surf-music cover versions of Ramone songs at CD Baby (in MP3 format).

The Ramonetures are the brainchild of Phantom Surfers guitar genius Mel Bergman. On this, their debut album, the band takes on the task of reinventing 16 classic Ramones tunes - in a style that would have done the Ventures proud! In other words, it's all instrumental, baby! And with fuzz guitar legend Davie Allan along for the ride, it's like a wild chopper ride through the surf of Rockaway Beach. Incredible... and a must for any Ramones fan.

The Times Online reports that the former head of Indonesia’s national airline, Indra Setiawan, and his deputy, Rohainil Aini, have been charged with conspiracy to commit murder, after a human rights activist ate an in-flight meal that was laced with a "massive dose of arsenic" and died on the plane.

The poisoning of Munir Said Thalib (above left) in 2004 silenced one of the most ardent critics of Indonesia’s military, a lawyer who, at 38, had spent much of his life exposing the corruption and human rights abuses wrought by its officers.

Before his agonising mid-flight death shortly before landing in Amsterdam, Mr Munir had been preparing a report on human rights abuses in the provinces of Aceh and Papua.

Indra Setiawan (above right), the former head of Garuda Airlines, and his deputy, Rohainil Aini appeared in the Central Jakarta District Court yesterday on charges of conspiracy to commit murder. Their trials follow the 2005 conviction of Pollycarpus Priyanto, an off-duty Garuda pilot found guilty of Mr Munir’s murder but acquitted on appeal to the Supreme Court last year. The murder, claim Mr Munir’s supporters, may ultimately have been the work of Indonesia’s spy agency.

As our pal Mr. Jalopy has remarked, he's not necessarily in favor of things that are old, he's in favor of things that are better. But it often turns out that the older version of something is better.

This photo of a power plant that MAKE magazine online manager Terrie Miller took is a good example.

Swan Falls Dam is along the Snake River Birds of Prey Conservation area. They point out in the signs that the old historic power plant sits right next to the smaller, more efficient modern one. But the old one certainly looks much better. This reminded me of Mr. Jalopy's presentation at Maker Day, where he showed the the packaging for everyday things decades ago was clearly superior in its aesthetic sense.

What does it feel like to drown? If you're decapitated, how long do you remain conscious? New Scientist has a fascinating feature on how it feels to die from a variety of causes. Electrocution, fire, heart attack... what goes on in your body as you shuffle off this mortal coil? From New Scientist:

Beheading, if somewhat gruesome, can be one of the quickest and least painful ways to die - so long as the executioner is skilled, his blade sharp, and the condemned sits still.

The height of decapitation technology is, of course, the guillotine. Officially adopted by the French government in 1792, it was seen as more humane than other methods of execution. When the guillotine was first used in public, onlookers were reportedly aghast at the speed of death.

Quick it may be, but consciousness is nevertheless believed to continue after the spinal chord is severed. A study in rats in 1991 found that it takes 2.7 seconds for the brain to consume the oxygen from the blood in the head; the equivalent figure for humans has been calculated at 7 seconds. Some macabre historical reports from post-revolutionary France cited movements of the eyes and mouth for 15 to 30 seconds after the blade struck, although these may have been post-mortem twitches and reflexes.

Over at Boing Boing Gadgets, intrepid reporter Joel Johnson profiles Len Henrikson who designs safe rooms and bomb shelters. His firm, American Bomb Shelter, sells kits so you can put together your own underground bunker. From Joel's article:

Before he put his mind to designing underground survival shelters, Leonard Henrikson, a gentle Oregonian proud of his Swedish descent, built presses for radioactive waste for the government. But after 9/11, there was again a market for underground survival bunkers. "You couldn't build them fast enough," Henrikson told me.

Henrikson is quick to qualify that he wasn't pitching slapdash shelters up to make a quick buck. "I worked on our shelter design and engineering off and on for six months." He later sold some of his NBC filtration systems—that's "Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical"—to various governments.

Wes Pemberton os Tyler, Texas thinks he has grown the world's longest leg hair. The current world record is 4.88 inches and Pemberton claims that he's bested it. Once his record is verified, he plans to pluck the hair and put it on display. From Tampa Bay's 10:

Pemberton says he works on taking care of the hair, to the point of even washing it with conditioner.

Joel on Boing Boing Gadgets has word that Atwood's handsome little single-piece multi-knives are going into production again, after a hiatus due to Peter Atwood's illness. Joel sums up: "Atwood's multitools, unlike the common flip-out models, tend to be made from just a single piece of metal with various nubs that enhance the functionality. For instance, the 'Mini Son of PryThing' above has a prying tool, a blade, and a bottle opener, wrapped with a simple cord around the hilt that is easily replaceable." Link, Discuss this on Boing Boing Gadgets

BB pal Vann Hall found a terrific selection of odd halloween costumes for children, including this Little Trees car air freshener outfit. It appears to be a Little Trees-licensed product, yet they spelled "Freshener" incorrectly on the costume. Link

And if an air freshener costume isn't quite right for your baby, how about a Woopie (SIC) Cushion or Peeps peep, also available in adult sizes.

UPDATE: Greg from Daddy Types points out that that the trademarked name is indeed "Freshner."

In today's edition of Boing Boing tv: Xeni interviews philanthropist, sci-fi fan, aviation enthusiast, and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen about the $50 million Allen Telescope Array, which advances the search for alien life. We ask if he believes in space aliens, and he answers. And if you would like to know what his favorite space alien movie is, you should definitely watch this episode.

Next, Mark Frauenfelder dons his mad professor garb and teaches you how to make a glorious "boing box," also featured in Make magazine.

You'll notice a bitchun new 8-bit intro animation debuting in this episode, designed by Syd Garon and Adam "Ape Lad" Koford. More info, tonza urls, and Video Link.

Art Fag City Editor Paddy Johnson says,

I just finished a slide show of collections of found and constructed LOLcats inspired by the musical Cats. I've written an introduction post explaining the phenomenon of LOLcats; that they begin with a found cat image file, are then doctored with bold text and LOLspeak to further cutify the animal and have provided a link to the Musical LOLcat slide show complete with click through images and a "memories" midifile.

We've invited Simpsons movie (and television Simpsons) director David Silverman to join us for an interview on a future episode of Boing Boing tv, and this presents an interesting conundrum. OMG what the hell do we ask him? Please tell us what you'd want to know, in the comments.

The Citizen Lab has a new anti-censorware guide, "Everyone's Guide to By-Passing Internet Censorship for Citizens Worldwide." The 31-page PDF covers a lot of ground, with material for anti-censorware activists and users, and is very handsomely put together.

Circumvention and anonymity are different. Anony- mous systems protect your identity from the website you are connecting to and from the anonymity system itself. They can be used for circumvention, but are not designed for this purpose and thus can easily be blocked. Circumvention systems are designed to get around blocking but do not protect your identity from the circumvention provider.

Do not mistake open public proxies for anonymous systems - they are not. Although they may not ask for personal information, they can view and record the location of the computer from which you are connect- ing and all of the websites you visit through them. Commercial services which advertize anonymous surfing may still record your connection information and the websites you visit. Make sure you fully understand the terms and conditions of their use.

The fully loaded chair, made from 450 12-gauge shotgun shells has a "massaging texture" due to the protruding brass tips. Link (via Yanko Design)

Doris Lessing has won the Nobel Prize for literature -- this is one that I can lay claim to twice, for she is, in some sense, both Canadian and a science fiction writer. Woo! Go team!

The 87-year-old has been honoured with the 10m kronor (£763,000) award for her life's work over a 57-year career...

Shortly after the Nobel announcement, her agent Jonathan Clowes told the Agence France Presse news agency: "We are absolutely delighted because it is so well deserved. She doesn't know yet.

"She's out shopping and we are trying to get in touch with her before she discovers it in the news."

(Photo credit: Doris lessing 20060312.jpg is a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike photo taken by Elke Wetzig and hosted on the Wikimedia Commons)

SimCity Societies -- the forthcoming installment in the classic urban simulation franchise -- will include a global warming variable. If your SimSocieties aren't carefully balanced, they'll swamp their environments with greenhouse gasses and die off. The module is produced with BP, who, I guess, are trying to figure out what a giant oil company does next.

The game does not force players to power their cities any specific way, but allows them to make choices, each of which come with advantages and disadvantages. Similar to real-life, the least expensive and most readily-available buildings in SimCity Societies are also the biggest producers of carbon dioxide, an invisible gas that contributes to global warming. Should players choose to build cities dependent on these types of sources for power to conserve their in-game money, their carbon ratings will rise and, at reaching critical levels, the game will issue alerts about the threat of the various natural disasters like droughts, heat waves and others that may strike their cities.

Alternatively, players can strive to create a greener environment and avoid hazards caused by excessive carbon emissions by choosing from a variety of BP Alternative Energy low-carbon power options. Using hydrogen and natural gas plants to wind farms and solar power, SimCity Societies encourages people to learn about some of the causes and consequences of global warming in an engaging, educational and meaningful way. While these power sources maintain nearby property values and keep the cities' citizens safer from disaster, they also mimic real-life in that they cost players more of their funds, and do not produce as much power as less green options that take up similar space. Informative real-world snippets about power production and conservation will also be available in-game, informing players of global warming issues both virtually and in reality.

AT&T has revised its terms of service, removing the section where the company reserves the right to disconnect you for criticizing them ("conduct that...tends to damage the name or reputation of AT&T, or its parents, affiliates and subsidiaries").

Last month, AT&T faced widespread criticism over the clause in their Terms of Service; subsequently, the company tried to mollify critics by promising that they'd never exercise this clause. Many of us were skeptical and challenged the company to put this promise in writing by revising the Terms.

Now they have, and they have included a good statement on freedom of expression (I wish they'd kept this in mind when they were illegally wiretapping the entire Internet for the NSA).

5.1 Suspension/Termination. AT&T respects freedom of expression and believes it is a foundation of our free society to express differing points of view. AT&T will not terminate, disconnect or suspend service because of the views you or we express on public policy matters, political issues or political campaigns. However, AT&T may immediately terminate or suspend all or a portion of your Service, any Member ID, electronic mail address, IP address, Universal Resource Locator or domain name used by you, without notice, for conduct that AT&T believes (a) violates the Acceptable Use Policy; or (b) constitutes a violation of any law, regulation or tariff (including, without limitation, copyright and intellectual property laws) or a violation of these TOS, or any applicable policies or guidelines. Your Service may be suspended or terminated if your payment is past due and such condition continues un-remedied for thirty (30) days. Termination or suspension by AT&T of Service also constitutes termination or suspension (as applicable) of your license to use any Software. AT&T may also terminate or suspend your Service if you provide false or inaccurate information that is required for the provision of Service or is necessary to allow AT&T to bill you for Service.

See also:
New AT&T terms of service: We'll cut off your Internet connection for criticizing us
AT&T snowjob: We won't cut you off for criticizing us, but we won't put it in writing

In shops this Christmas: a voice-changing human-Dalek hybrid fright-mask:

The mask, modelled on a one-eyed Dalek-human hybrid which appeared in the episode Daleks in Manhattan, changes the voice of the wearer to the metallic scream of the doctor's mortal enemies. Games based on films and TV characters will fill Santa's sack this year, according to toy manufacturers who made their annual prediction of Christmas best-sellers yesterday.

(Photo credit: Cropped, downsized thumbnail taken from "A young boy wears a Doctor Who Dalek Sec Hybrid Voice Changer Mask" by Daniel Berehulak/Getty)

StupidFilter is an attempt to automatically detect "stupid" English writing. I'm pretty skeptical of this -- we do a pretty crummy job of detecting spam, and stupidity is a lot more subjective (for example, text-messaging abbreviations and "LOL" are not necessarily indications of stupidity). Still, it seems like an entertaining way to pass the time:

The solution we're creating is simple: an open-source filter software that can detect rampant stupidity in written English. This will be accomplished with weighted Bayesian analysis and some rules-based processing, similar to spam detection engines. The primary challenge inherent in our task is that stupidity is not a binary distinction, but rather a matter of degree. To this end, we're collecting a ranked corpus of stupid text, gleaned from user comments on public websites and ranked on a five-point scale.

Felixe and his friend Marisol (a professional translator) collaborated on this Spanish fan-translation of my Creative Commons-licensed short story Scroogled from Radar Magazine, about the day that Google became evil. This is the first CC-licensed effort from Radar and it's attracted a gratifying amount of fun remixes, including fan art and a French translation.

"Dame cinco líneas escritas por el hombre más honorable y encontraré una excusa para colgarlo" -- Cardenal Richelieu

"No sabemos suficiente de ti" -- Eric Schmidt, CEO de Google

Greg aterrizó en el aeropuerto internacional de San Francisco a las 8 PM, pero para cuando llegó al final de la fila de la aduana ya pasaba de media noche. Salió de primera clase, tostado como una castaña, sin afeitar y con las extremidades ágiles después de pasar un mes en la playa de Cabo (buceando tres días a la semana, seduciendo universitarias francesas el resto del tiempo). Cuando dejó la ciudad un mes atrás, había sido un desastre encorvado y panzón. Ahora era un dios dorado, captando miradas de admiración de las azafatas al frente de la cabina.

See also:
Scroogled: CC-licensed story about the day Google turned evil
Scroogled in the Wall Street Journal

(Photo credit: Scroogled Poster from Stojance's Flickr stream)

Magpie Killjoy sez, "We (SteamPunk Magazine and Strangers In A Tangled Wilderness) have just released 'A SteamPunk's Guide to the Apocalypse,' which is Creative Commons, of course, and freely downloadable from our website, as well as purchasable. It covers most of the essentials that a SteamPunk will need when they recreate their lives and societies in the shell of our soon-to-be-ruinous civilization."

Contagion

Long now have we adapted our Bodies to a Life devoid of Contamination, and it is quite possible that we have grown soft therefrom. Dependant upon Antibiotics instead of Antibodies, Sanitation and Health will be of no small Importance in the Decades to come, are we to survive.

This Chapter is remarkably incomplete, and proper Care ought be taken by any concerned SteamPunk--you among them--to seek out further Instruction.