US District Judge William Pauley III has ruled it constitutional for federal agencies to use a Facebook friend’s granted access to a suspect’s profile page to gather evidence for prosecution, making our online identities and avatars subject to similar methods of investigation federal agencies normal
The Havard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysicists has released the largest-ever map of space, locating millions of galaxies, quasars, and black holes. The point of all this—besides tempting us to make a Katamari out of it—is to study the past six billion years of universal growth and find out where
In the noble pursuit to inject verisimilitude into the virtual, photorealistic videogames have gone at length to perfect face-capturing technology. Now, Disney researches have taken the captured data out of the database and onto silicon, around a head, then onto a robotic body. Science, Space & Robo
Critical discussions of videogames take place largely on the internet—much of the intellectual runoff filtering into Twitter and Facebook feeds, waiting to be shared. But does our desire to be ‘liked’ and ‘followed’—as critics or artists—come at the expense of honest critical thought? For the New Yo
The payoff of sex, music, and drugs? The guaranteed satisfaction of more music, sex, and drugs. According to this animated video from AsapSCIENCE, this Epicurean triumvirate stimulates our brains’ supply of a neurochemical called dopamine, which always leaves you wanting more. In the same way that a
To many educators here and in the UK, consumable digital technology and social media are only distractions, pastimes, ways to escape the monolithic institution of education. But as schools build firewalls around their classrooms, are they depriving their students from learning how to graduate from u
A new biology textbook called Inquire is being called “the world’s first intelligent textbook.” We’ll take that to mean that all the extra human cognition that goes into reading, interpreting, and teaching—like drawing larger parallels between abstract concepts, reading between the lines—will be spe
In Aldous Huxley’s 1932 Brave New World, “Feelies” are augmented movie theaters equipped with technology that manipulates the audience’s sense of touch. A sex scene, for instance, can be felt as much as it can be watched—i.e. the sensation of silken fur on a bearskin rug as lovers copulate on it. No
Papo & Yo is the forthcoming magical-real, semi-autobiographical adventure puzzler by Vander Caballero, a former EA Montreal developer who broke off to form his own studio called Minority. Here, a cinematic splicing augments the game’s deeply personal narrative: how the young Vander coped with his f
Spoiler alert: In the end, our best fictions can’t be spoiled, according to a new study in Psychological Science called “Spoilers Don’t Spoil Stories.” The results of the experiment, based on the reactions of college students, elucidate why their subjects could greater empathize with a story when th
Are we most content doing the smallest imaginable tasks? Mobile apps can apparently make even the most insignificant market cog-work into a fun sort of game, especially if you’re getting paid. For a story, this Wall Street Journal columnist became a freelance mobile stock-boy—and liked it. This wee
Since last year, educators have made efforts to co-opt Minecraft as the champion of videogames as learning tools. But it’s become like trying to get vice to sublimate into utility—to build utopia out of dystopia. This newest article for Slate and Future Tense by Lisa Guernsey, mother of Minecraft-ob
The Disney execs behind the forthcoming Wreck-It Ralph must have been asking: How do you get more aging gamers to see your videogame movie for kids? The answer: Aggregate cameos from nearly every recognizable videogame character ever. Maybe even make a game out of seeing how many you can spot while
Plunging us deeper into the abyss of bloodless simulacrum, this sketch-up designed submarine offers its crew all the thrilling, claustrophobic anxiety of submarine warfare, except everything that’s not fun about submarine warfare. Metaphorical blip on radar: they’ve volunteered to become the target
Nolan Bushnell, often called the father of videogames, doesn’t see a future there for him. In a recent interview with Eurogamer, following his key-note address at the Games for Change Festival in New York in June, Bushnell manages to steer the conversation away from videogames nearly to a point of d
EA’s recent suit against Zynga for copying The Sims Social in The Ville has the potential to be a precendent-setting case for defining copyright infringement in videogames, perhaps to the aid of indie developers. For Gamasutra, Leigh Alexander spoke with Rutgers law professor Greg Lastowka, who beli
The shovel, the pale, and the subsequent sandcastle seem to fade into antiquity in light of this world-building robot, running on nothing but the humble sun—and a laptop. The Stone Spray Project, in its early stages, mixes a liquid binding compound and sand to sculp arches or stools over scaffolding
We are not, as Richard Brautigan once (ironically) hoped, all watched over by machines of loving grace. Last Thursday, newly installed trading software at Knight Capital, which is designed to anticipate swift changes in the market, ungracefully glitched out, taking an estimated $440 million with it,
Further proof of the quantified nostalgia we extract from the hardware that projects an original story: According to Examiner, an original prototype of The Legend of Zelda will find a new, undisclosed home after selling for a record-breaking $55,000 on eBay. The price is the highest-ever for a Ninte
When the Brooklyn-based, band-of-electro-brothers Yeasayer received word that their album was on “the verge of…being leaked through the cracks of the digital universe,” they spread their own tendrils into that digital universe to co-opt illegal trafficking by—for lack of a better word—gamifying the
If thousands of armed, unmanned, and GPS-reliant drones buzzing over our borders ever seemed way too precarious to believe they were making us safer, here’s why: Researchers at the University of Texas’ Radionavigation Laboratory led by Professor Todd Humphrey took command of a UT-owned UAV, because
Marching one step closer to a future of feeding-tube monitors or subwoofer footbaths, the Black Element Cyclone Edition is a mouse that wields a 6000rpm fan aimed to send cool, dry air through the slimy crevasse between your palm on the plastic. According to Engadget, the creators TT eSports, the ga
Foursquare’s society turf-war was a scary investment for many who feared constant oversight of their daily activities. Now those anxieties might relax in light of a new iOS app that overlays a pixelated, Wes Anderson storybook over Foursquare’s interface. Turf Geography Club takes its cues from Mono
The Olympics are rigged—not the games themselves, but the presentation, at least for those of us watching TV in the U.S.A. Over at The A.V. Club, Ryan McGee’s coverage of NBC’s coverage isn’t redundant—it’s warrented criticism of how NBC’s monopoly on broadcast narrates the Olympics in a very litera
Because games are always better when you can brag about how good you are at them, Kamcord lets you record gameplay and immediately share to Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and email. A large part of what made Instagram so successful was its ability to capitalize on memory-making. You saw something you l
