firehose

Electronic Arts' Chief Operating Officer Peter Moore has responded to the company's commanding wins (losses?) in The Consumerist's "Worst Company in America" online poll to say EA will do better, while standing strong on a couple issues it refuses to take heat over.

"Let me cut to the chase: it appears EA is going to 'win.' Like the Yankees, Lakers and Manchester United, EA is one of those organizations that is defined by both a legacy of success, and a legion of critics," wrote Moore in an official post on the EA site. "Are we really the 'Worst Company in America?' I'll be the first to admit that we've made plenty of mistakes."

He continued, "These include server shut downs too early, games that didn't meet expectations, missteps on new pricing models and most recently, severely fumbling the launch of SimCity. We owe gamers better performance than this."

Continue reading EA responds to 'Worst Company in America' poll: 'We can do better. We will do better.'

EA responds to 'Worst Company in America' poll: 'We can do better. We will do better.' originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 05 Apr 2013 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Siskel & Ebert ’80s Outtakes (by CineFamily)

Unexpected PC sensation Farming Simulator is coming to PS3 and Xbox 360 in September, bringing exciting new North American farms along with the familiar European terrain it features now. " New farming vehicles and many other new features will also make their appearance," publisher Focus Home Interactive reveals about a game that we swear is totally real.

The gameplay involves keeping track of many of the duties of a real farmer: "animal husbandry, crops, harvesting, sales of your products, and of course buying new vehicles and machines."

Perhaps convincing console owners, who don't have the same long history with deep simulations as longtime PC users, to try a game about farming is a tough row to hoe, but this game is all about hoeing rows.

Gallery: Farming Simulator (PS3/Xbox 360)

Continue reading Farming Simulator planted on Xbox and PS3 in September

Farming Simulator planted on Xbox and PS3 in September originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 05 Apr 2013 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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“

While backtracking from a statement in which he suggested the Baltimore Ravens cut him because of his gay rights activism, Brendon Ayanbadejo said that a group of four NFL players could come out at the same time in order to “share the backlash” that might accompany such an announcement.

The tidbit was included in a Baltimore Sun story about Ayanbadejo’s continued support for the Ravens, even after his release. One day earlier, the linebacker and special teams stalwart insinuated that his outspoken views on gay rights played a role in getting cut. He clarified that statement by saying he “loves the Ravens” and thinks his release had to do with football and finances, not his views.

But it was a quote buried at the bottom of the piece that was most interesting. Ayanbadejo was asked about his recent statement that an NFL player would come out as gay during his playing career.

“I think it will happen sooner than you think,” Ayanbadejo told the Baltimore Sun. “We’re in talks with a handful of players who are considering it. There are up to four players being talked to right now and they’re trying to be organized so they can come out on the same day together. It would make a major splash and take the pressure off one guy. It would be a monumental day if a handful or a few guys come out.”

This is one of those ideas that’s so brilliant it’s amazing it hasn’t been mentioned it before. There’s always strength in numbers. While I don’t think the backlash will be as bad as Ayanbadejo expects, spreading out the attention minimizes the media focus. Instead of press hordes in one locker room, they’ll have to be in four.

Four men coming out together also sends the powerful message that the gay athlete isn’t a novelty, just an underrepresented group that can finally gain acceptance.

”

- Could four gay NFL players come out at same time? | Reno Gazette-Journal | rgj.com

Discover Dante Alighieri's original Inferno - the inspiration for Dan Brown's new novel - in this modern and acclaimed Penguin translation. "Although I studied Dante's Inferno in high school, it wasn't until recently, while researching in Florence, that I came to appreciate the enduring influence of Dante's work on the modern world," Dan Brown. Describing Dante's descent into Hell with Virgil as a guide, Inferno depicts a cruel underworld in which desperate figures are condemned to eternal damnation.

pleur0thallis:

Did you know that Barn Owls have one ear higher than the other so that they can judge the distance and height that their prey is at…and their eyes are slightly sunken so it kinda creates a ‘satellite dish’ shape so that they can collect more sound waves. Their faces literally capture sound waves.
Animals like this are the reason why I want a life long job with them.

Ryan Holiday writes in Our Regressive Web:

Google Alerts, Delicious and RSS were designed in blogging’s early days as innovations to help readers reduce this noise—to help improve their reading experience. But now those gains are disappearing. I feel that the tech press has allowed this to happen.

I had not realized that Google Alerts was having problems. But it doesn’t surprise me.

I wonder if it will go away on the same day as Feedburner, or whether the two will succumb in separate clean-outs.

An anonymous reader writes "An assistant professor at Ohio State University who recently earned her Ph.D. in literature writes a warning in Slate for others following the same path. She says, 'I now realize graduate school was a terrible idea because the full-time, tenure-track literature professorship is extinct. After four years of trying, I've finally gotten it through my thick head that I will not get a job—and if you go to graduate school, neither will you. ... Don't misunderstand me. There is unquantifiable intellectual reward from the exploration of scholarly problems and the expansion of every discipline—yes, even the literary ones, and even if that means doing bat-s**t analysis like using the rule of "false elimination" to determine that Josef K. is simultaneously guilty and not guilty in The Trial. But there is one sort of reward you will never get: monetary compensation from a stable, non-penurious position at a decent university. ... By the time you finish—if you even do— your academic self will be the culmination of your entire self, and thus you will believe, incomprehensibly, that not having a tenure-track job makes you worthless. You will believe this so strongly that when you do not land a job, it will destroy you, and nobody outside of academia will understand why. (Bright side: You will no longer have any friends outside academia.) ... In the place of actual jobs are adjunct positions: benefit-free, office-free academic servitude in which you will earn $18,000 a year for the rest of your life."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

It looks like Carrie Kelley, the female Robin to Grumpy Old Batman in Frank Miller's classic The Dark Knight Returns, is joining the DC universe proper. She's on the gatefold cover of Batman and Robin #19 (which comes out next Wednesday) in a Robin costume. Does this mean she'll actually be the next Robin? Maaaaybe.

Read more...

WolframAlpha has compiled a growing list of portraits of iconic figures drawn by parametric functions. Some of them are surprisingly good – though, as Joe Hanson points out, there's a decent chance these functions are being churned out by a computer instead of an actual person, seeing as they are OBSCENELY complex. (Here are the parametric equations for the Einstein curve pictured up top, plotted for t from 0 to 152π. Yeah, have fun expressing those curves on your own.)

Read more...

Montreal woman arrested for posting photo of anti-police graffiti to Instagram
A Montreal woman is facing a criminal charge after posting a photo online of graffiti showing a senior police officer with a bullet in his head.

Jennifer Pawluck was placed under arrest on Wednesday, released under conditions and ordered to appear before a judge at a later date to face a charge of criminal harassment.

The picture she snapped is of a graffiti drawing of Cmdr. Ian Lafreniere, a longtime Montreal police spokesman and one of the most visible faces of the force.

Police defended the decision to proceed with charges. Spokeswoman Anie Lemieux says it’s zero tolerance when lawyers, judges or police officers are believed to be targeted. (Instagram)

josephdreamboatlevitt:

senorrandom:

Fuck… This always cheers me up.

amazing.

Believe in this video’s power.

atomicbird:

Users hear about how great iCloud is and how apps can use it to sync their own data. They quite reasonably wonder why your app isn’t using it. Syncing data is a great idea, Apple gives you iCloud, why aren’t you using it, dammit? But if you did use it, the app would be so unreliable that users would (again, quite reasonably) complain that it was a steaming pile of shit.

The town that started as a very rough sketch has now been turned into a full blown map pack, and is for sale on RPGNow and Paizo.

Here’s the rough sketch that started it all:

From that sketch I picked up some great ideas for locations in the town from the community on Google+, facebook and the Cartographers’ Guild. Armed with that list, I dug in, drew the featured locations, all the individual houses and finally added the tone and colour. This is the result!

The map pack contains both labeled and unlabeled high res jpgs. There’s also a muti-page pdf designed for printing at home (in colour and light greyscale, and in letter and A4 for maximum ease of use). When printed out, the map will cover 33″ by 25.5″ – which is a lot of town for players to get lost in.

In addition, the pack includes 33 buildings as individual pngs with transparent backgrounds for use in any personal non-commercial project. So you can extend this town to the north into the fields on top of the cliff, or start anew in another map and build your own city.

As you can see, the town map contains a waterwheel – powering a stone elevator, multiple temples, guildhouses, inns, a stone mason, smith, mysterious stone circle and a lighthouse. What more could you want for a base for adventure and skullduggery? Grab your copy here.

IRVING, TX—In an effort to prevent the multiple championship–viewing player from reaching free agency, the Dallas Cowboys announced this week that the team had signed Super Bowl–watching quarterback Tony Romo to a six-year, $108 million ...

alluringalliteration:

origin-of-frost:

captaingumdrop:

eachlittle-bird-that-sings:

how do you cat?

you dont

cats dont logic

Cats aren’t bound by the laws of nature.

Never apply logic to cats.

thefrogman:

This is an Arabian Sand Cat. You all want one now. 

Doctor Who has gone through many formats and universes, but it's never been animated apart from a few missing episodes on the DVDs. (There was an attempt back in the day with Nelvana.) But now it turns out that the BBC flirted with creating an animated Who pretty recently, and one artist has shared some pitch art.

Read more...

Williamsburg, Brooklyn-based writer and producer Debbie Saslaw edited a supercut video for Slacktory of the best fake websites shown in TV shows. A full list of websites and shows, in order of appearance, is available on Slacktory.

submitted via Laughing Squid Tips

Giphy is a really useful animated GIF discovery engine. Users can search for new GIFs using tags like “cute,” “funny,” or “cat,” and look for specific shows or movies like Doctor Who and Harry Potter. Giphy can also be used to search for reaction images like “happy,” “angry,” or “sad.” Google’s new animated GIF search is useful if you’re looking for a specific GIF, but Giphy is full of the GIFs you didn’t know you needed.

GIFs via Giphy

You'd better make a saving throw for your wallet, because it's in serious danger of its cash points being depleted by this weekend's GOG deal. The digital distributor is rolling out ten classic D&D-based PC RPGs, including Planescape: Torment and entries from Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights, for just $21.10. That's down a whopping 80 percent from $105.90.

The deal is a stacking one, which means for every game you choose to purchase, the price on each one goes down; in other words, you're getting the best value for money if you get the lot. The ten games on offer are Icewind Dale 1 & 2 (both Complete versions), Baldur's Gate: The Original Saga and Baldur's Gate 2 Complete, Neverwinter Nights: Diamond Edition and Neverwinter Nights 2: Complete, Dungeons & Dragons: Dragonshard, Forgotten Realms: Demon Stone, The Temple of Elemental Evil, and Planescape: Torment.

You've got time to rustle up a few more gold pieces if needed, because the deal's good until 9PM PT on Monday, April 8.

[Thanks Shawn]

GOG stacks up D&D discounts, ten RPGs for $21 this weekend originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 05 Apr 2013 10:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Yacht Club's Mega Man-esque Shovel Knight is getting an infusion of genuine Capcom-style music. Manami Matsumae, who composed for the original Mega Man (and Magic Sword, U.N. Squadron, and more) will write two songs for Yacht Club's Kickstarted action game, the developer revealed.

"She even made the original sound effects. The sound of Mega Man dying? The sound of the boss doors opening and closing? The sounds that have permanent residence in your brain and ours? Manami Matsumae is responsible," Yacht Club said. "And now, she is going to be writing two songs for Shovel Knight. We are beyond excited."

The rest of the soundtrack is being done by Jake "Virt" Kaufman, frequent WayForward contributor, Contra 4 composer, and chiptune musician. So expect more than two excellent tracks.

Mega Man composer Manami Matsumae contributing music to Shovel Knight originally appeared on Joystiq on Fri, 05 Apr 2013 11:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The self-identified Bee Queen, Sara Mapelli of Portland, Oregon, is shown in this 2012 video dancing with 12,000 honey bees all over her body. She says she is a “healer, dancer, artist, builder of structures and bee keeper” and that she thinks of her dance as a “duet among many.” She furthers, “The bees push with their powerful wings from each side of my body, I resist and then I let go and flow and move with them. It is a deep meditation and I feel the hive mind surround me, hold me, and expand my body on a cellular level.” Footage from this video is in featured in the film, Queen of the Sun.

A video on how she removed all those bees after the dance:

“Once the bees are on the ground they fly up to meet their Queen.”

via Nothing to do with Arbroath

For Art and Life visit: wildskil.com and graeterartgallery.com

BEE QUEEN Calendars, shirts, bags + more fun visit: zazzle.com/pinkpearldragonposse

Blog: pinkpearldragonposse.blogspot.com

questionabletastetheatre:

Women of the Future, 1902. (via)

By Jim Rossignol on April 5th, 2013 at 11:00 am.

Stood by the Oculus stand at GDC, I heard someone say “the thing about all this VR stuff is that it hasn’t moved on a great deal from the ’90s.” Can that be true? For a moment I assumed this gentleman in the crowed might know something I didn’t, but it turns out that there’s a good deal that VR and head/body-tracking can do in 2013 that it couldn’t do in the 1990s. For a taste of that, you’ll want to read this and watch the video below, which places the user in a Doom 3 level with a Portal gun, and shows off all manner of body tracking and movement cleverness.

Go look!

islette:

If you can’t beat them dress better than them

As discussed in our March 28, 2013 article, Adobe Blank was recently released as a open source special-purpose OpenType font that helps to solve the FOUT (Flash Of Unstyled Text) problem.

The version that was initially released was approximately 80K in size, and included 257 glyphs, 256 of which were functional in the sense that they are mapped from 1,111,998 Unicode code points, though they are intentionally non-spacing and non-marking. I further analyzed the tables, and found a way to trim the size further by increasing the number of glyphs to 2,049, 2,048 of which are functional. The size is now a more modest 32K.

The table that was included in the original article is repeated below, with the data for the 2,049-glyph font added in:

Number of Glyphs	CFF	cmap	hmtx	vmtx
2	259 bytes	>13MB (estimated)	8 bytes	6 bytes
257	1,081 bytes	54,228 bytes	518 bytes	516 bytes
2,049	6,451 bytes	6,880 bytes	4,102 bytes	4,100 bytes
65,535	262,419 bytes	328 bytes	131,074 bytes	131,072 bytes

Interestingly, the largest table is now the ‘name‘ table, which is 10,066 bytes. This is primarily due to the inclusion of its full open source license as its name.ID=13 (License Description) string.

In closing, I am also thinking to jettison its vertical tables, meaning ‘VORG‘, ‘vhea‘, and ‘vmtx‘, which will reduce the size a further 4K or so, but I’ll leave that for another day.

P.S. As of earlier this afternoon, the Adobe Blank sources are now available on GitHub.

hypnosec writes "WebKit developers have already started discussing the removal of Chrome- and Chromium-specific code from the rendering engine in a bid to make the code easier to maintain. Just a couple of days back, Google announced it will go ahead with a WebKit fork to develop a new browser engine — Blink. According to Google, having multiple rendering engines — just like multiple browsers — will allow for innovation as well as contribute toward a healthy open-web ecosystem. The discussion was started by Geoffery Garen, an Apple WebKit developer. He said Google's departure is an 'opportunity to streamline' the code of WebKit, which would eventually make development 'easier and more coherent for everyone.' Garen expects that developers who will be working on WebKit in the future should help to clean up the code. However, Adam Barth and Eric Seidel — two Google WebKit developers — have already offered their help." Google plans on making the switch to Blink in the stable Chrome release in around 10 weeks. They've posted a half-hour video explaining how the transition will work.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Apr 5th 2013 By: Caleb Goellner

Animation: The next animated feature from DC Entertainment and Warner Bros. Animation will be Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox, an adaptation of the 2011 Flashpoint DC Comics event. It's slated for a July 30 release on all of the usual formats. [Newsarama] Toys: Diamond Select Toys and Art Asylum have revealed three more Iron Man 3 Minimates, including the Iron Man Mark 17, 33 and 41 armors. [Marvel]

Art: The Stumptown Comics Festival is celebrating its 10th anniversary with 10 exclusive posters (by artists including Tradd Moore, Faith Erin Hicks, Morgan Jeske and more). They'll all be for sale at the show in Portland April 27-28th. [SCF]

Movies: A new Space Pirate Captain Harlock movie poster shows Leiji Matsumoto's creation standing tall in CG style. [JEFusion]

Lego: David Frank's fantastic Lego recreation of Castle Grayskull... HAS THE POWER!!!!! [The Brothers Brick]

Crowdfunding: Having successfully surpassed its $50,000 fundraising goal, DC Entertainment's We Can Be Heroes indiegogo campaign is adding new perks as it continues raising money to fight hunger in the Horn of Africa. [The Source]