I have student work to grade and yesterday was very full, so I’m going to make this another brief piece. If you must, read this as an overly personal explanation of why there’s no longer piece today on politics or aesthetics or game design, or whatever you very patient people keep coming back here for.
Read MoreIn 1969, three men rode a sky-scraper sized explosive device to the moon using less computing power to do the math than I currently have sitting in my pocket, and made it back alive. Three years later, in 1972, the most progressive major party candidate lost a stolen election by a landslide, and America turned its back on the future.
Read MoreIf you have to come back and play this game tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, then there is only one sensible strategy: cooperate. Accept the lesser reward, and get it tomorrow. Because there’s no reason to trust a betrayer when they come back for another round of the game. But I’m still left with another question: what does it do? What is society even for?
Read MoreHere’s why: due to a family tradition of just fucking impeccable timing, I recently put a cap on two projects, both of which took an inordinately long time. One is a still-pretty-secret translation project, alluded to elsewhere, which consumed my every free hour for eighteen months, as well as much of my brain power the rest of the time. The other is ten years in the making: a novella, entitled The Horn, the Pencil, and the Ace of Diamonds, forthcoming from us. Is that tacky? Yes. But I promise I’m going somewhere this.
Read MoreThe things we make — the things you can just go down to the store and buy if you don’t have them — are made to fulfill a certain set of needs, solve a certain set of problems, and — ultimately — generate a certain set of changes on the mind. A lot of these changes are unconsidered.
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