Evil geniuses

Contemplating the new year, I was just thinking that it was about time I pruned the list of streaming media services I’m subscribed to.1 I hadn’t watched a show on NowTV regularly since I drifted away from Lovecraft Country halfway through the season, I thought. I meant to quit NowTV once Game of Thrones finished,… Continue reading Evil geniuses

Seen

Reading stories about Amazon omitting order details in emails, apparently in order to stop other suppliers from scraping the email content, a few months ago I wondered: The mystery isn’t about why Amazon are doing this: I’m just wondering why I seem to have missed out? Yesterday I placed my first Amazon UK order in… Continue reading Seen

Coming soon

Note to readers: do not, under any circumstances, be consuming drinks while you read this tweet. I have a friend that referred to prequels obi wan as ponytail Derek for some reason. This was her first ever watch— Kali (@DWfan3421) December 26, 2020 There I was casually sipping a Diet Coke and scrolling through my… Continue reading Coming soon

US Space Force

Slacktivist, on the branding for the US’s Space Force: I don’t know who came up with this stuff, but these are not the people I want representing the rest of us at First Contact. I realise this isn’t going to be anywhere remotely near the top of the Biden administration’s list of Trump-era decisions that… Continue reading US Space Force

Lockdown, Airfix-style

Dumb joke, nice execution: Quarantine Comix #249 #QuarantineComix I spent SO much time on this very, VERY dumb joke oh my days…To buy the original ink drawing of this comic please go here:https://t.co/7KotGPLRRm pic.twitter.com/wgbeneDn3o— Rachael Smith (@rachael_) December 17, 2020 [Via MetaFilter]

Shameless

Further to this earlier post about how Microsoft planned to have Microsoft 365 track user productivity, Microsoft issued a graceful apology, very likely delivered through gritted teeth for that feature that someone sneaked into the software they were planning on selling to businesses everywhere they could: Jeffrey Snover, a veteran Microsoft engineer and CTO of… Continue reading Shameless

QG: HHH

David Squires shares with the world his take on The Queen’s Gambit: Hungry Hungry Hippos edition: A popular tabletop game that requires considerable guile and skill Has to be said, there’s a small part of me that would have really liked to see this.1 And a large part of me that thinks that take on… Continue reading QG: HHH

Cruel fame

Nice snark from Molly Templeton at Tor.com, reacting to the latest trailer for comet-impact disaster movie Greenland : Greenland takes the general premise of Deep Impact and kicks it up a notch: Why simply have one comet on a trajectory to strike the earth when you could also have many smaller pieces of the comet wreak… Continue reading Cruel fame

ACME-dunnit

A perfect end to the mystery: pic.twitter.com/5q4b87iGKs— 🔸 Richard Starkings 🔸 (@RichStarkings) December 6, 2020 [Via RT by @cstross]

Not Ready

I never got round to reading Ready Player One because judging by the reviews I read at the time it sounded as if the book was unutterably proud of itself for stringing together lists of pop cultural trivia for geeks to recognise. Judging by Laura Hudson’s review for Slate , I don’t think I’ll be… Continue reading Not Ready