Fun and games

Brian Leiter is on sabbatical and seems to be enjoying a stint in London, most of the time, anyway. Welcome to our city, Professor Leiter, I hope you have fun while you’re here.

Oh, and by the way, you’re right both about the belly-buttons and the buffoon, but try to have closer to the correct change in supermarkets, it’ll make your life so much easier.

I am so glad that somebody finally wrote this piece regarding press fascination with iEverything. (The author does acknowledge Slate’s history with Microsoft.) The article also links to this great spoof ad, which summarizes much of the point quite well.

There is absolutely no need to educate me about the merits of Mac products. I used to and still do own several. That’s not the point here, which you’ll understand if you read the article for what it is.

It’s been a while since I posted one of these. Of course now that I have several immediate deadlines these things find their way to me again.

Cubeoban

Not too easy, not too hard.

If you get stuck on Level 3 then try the hint here.

The hosting site has links to dozens of other games. I won’t even go there though (not now anyway). I really do have to get a lot done in the next few days especially since I just found out that I have to be orientating our incoming grad students on Monday.

These two image collections don’t have to constitute a time sink depending on when you are able to tear yourself away from them.

• The Zoom Quilt
• People staring at screens of people staring at screens of people staring at screens of…

Yahoo! responds to Google Video with The Yammys aka the Yahoo! Video Search Awards launched yesterday. Get those creative juices flowing in the following categories: Road Trips, Office Humor, Bloopers, Pets and Misc (so just about anything else). It’s a nice publicity idea to get some attention for their video search service. That is, assuming you – or anyone you know who likes to send around links:) – get a kick out of watching a dog on a skateboard. [thanks]

Create your own flipbook or browse others’ from the archive containing over fifty thousand.

I have accumulated quite a list of fun sites. So far I have protected CT readers by only posting these occasionally. But I have so many now that I think I am going to make it a weekly feature. As additional warning, I have created a little button to signal these posts. The point of the button is to note: you have been warned, I take no responsibility for the amount of time you end up wasting due to clicking on these links.

Planarity Flash Game

Your job is to reposition the nodes so the links do not overlap. After posting a link to this on the SOCNET mailing list yesterday, a friend of mine remarked: “LOL! That is why we have software Eszter!”. Afterward, a serious discussion about visualization software ensued. Who says games are just for wasting time?

After level 10 I decided it was time to get back to work. [UPDATE: I’ve now gone to level 13, see link to images in the comments section.] That amount of game time made me start seeing the dots and lines even when not at my computer. You have been warned.

Tuesday may not be the best time to post such links, I realize, maybe I will make it a weekend feature in the future.

Let’s see how geographically specific I can make my recommendations.:) (But hey, there are enough Chicagoland CT readers that this may be relevant.) I’ve been so preoccupied with looking up summer events in Chicago proper that I’ve missed things in my own backyard. (Well, technically it’s more in front of the building than behind it, but you get my point.:) This weekend – June 18-19 – is Custer’s Last Stand. I literally ran into the preparation yesterday as I went around the block for dinner. It looks like it will be fun. Then again, Jonathan noted in the comments to the other thread that these neighborhood street fairs can be somewhat disappointing. He suggested we check out the ones in our neighborhood. So this being 100 ft away sounds like a good target. It looks like there will be several other such events in Evanston this summer. Of course, if all else fails, there’s always the beach.

For those in Chicagoland or those contemplating a visit, here are some fun goings on over the summer. I still consider myself relatively new in the area so I’m still actively on the lookout for what goes on here these months. I’m very impressed.

In the past couple of weeks I’ve already had the opportunity to go see a Gospel Music Festival, an Art Fair and participate in other outdoor celebrations. Much more is ahead. The free Summer Dance program started at Grant Park this past Wednesday. It runs until the end of August. On Wednesdays they have a DJ. On Thu-Sun they first offer free dance lessons and then have a live band for dances ranging from Polka to Swing, from Bachata to Waltzes. Given that I have been spending increasing amounts of time in dance classes, this is an exciting and fun opportunity. A propos dance, this weekend is the annual Chicago Crystal Ball national dance competition. I’ll be there although only for part of it since I’m hosting friends over the weekend and we’ll be exploring numerous areas of town. No, I won’t be competing at Crystal Ball, but I’ll be cheering on friends who will.

Next weekend (24-26th) will be the Wired Nextfest for all of us interested in the latest gadgets. I think from there I’ll head straight to Grant Park for that evening’s ballroom session.

A bit later in the summer will be the Chicago Outdoor Film Festival also in Grant Park. This event it free as well. They will be wrapping up with Star Wars on Aug 23rd. Sounds fun.

I have found the following resources especially helpful in finding out about goings-on and keeping track. I recommend them as sources of additional amusement:

• City of Chicago Events page
• Upcoming.org‘s Events listings (this should be helpful also if you are in another metro area in the US)

• Transparent screens [I don’t remember how I found this one, probably on del.icio.us somewhere]
• Human tetris [mpg] [thanks]

:-)

It may be a bit geeky of me to admit this, but I find the following quite fun/funny. A Peanuts and Charles Schulz enthusiast figured out how the book images are generated on Amazon’s Web site. He has documented it in detail so now we can all create our own images. (It looks like he’s not the first one to play with this, but his discussion of the various options seems more comprehensive than others’ so it’s worth a pointer.) I thought I’d display one of my favorite cartoons with a twist. Enjoy! (Or be amused that some of us do.:) [thanks]

As per Nat Gertler’s ethical considerations listed on the right side of the page linked above, I would like to note that the discount percentages in the image above are being used in a purely decorative fashion and do not reflect any offers on Amazon’s site.

Tim Lambert catches John Lott “with his hand up a sock-puppet’s backside”:http://cgi.cse.unsw.edu.au/~lambert/cgi-bin/blog/2005/05#economist123 yet again. Under the reviewer name “Economist123”:http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A2E612F97JB6X2/ref=cm_cr_auth/002-7803436-2896049?%5Fencoding=UTF8, Lott puts up a signed review of Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner’s “Freakonomics”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/006073132X/kieranhealysw-20/ref=nosim/ — a book that criticizes Lott’s work in passing. Lott says:

Not surprisingly, Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner’s new book “Freakonomics” ignores their academic critics. … If Messrs. Levitt and Dubner were correct, crime rates should have first started falling among younger people who were first born after legalization. … But in fact the precise opposite is true. …

John R. Lott Jr.
Resident Scholar
American Enterprise Institute
Washington

Now, if you scroll down through Economist123’s “other Amazon reviews”:http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A2E612F97JB6X2/ref=cm_cr_auth/002-7803436-2896049?%5Fencoding=UTF8, you get to a review of John R. Lott’s “More Guns, Less Crime”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/A2E612F97JB6X2/kieranhealysw-20/ref=nosim/. There, Economist123 doesn’t sign his review, but neither does he mince his words:

This is by far the most comprehensive study ever done on guns. … it is important to note how many academics have tired to challenge his work on concealed handgun laws and failed and that no one has even bothered to try and challenge his work on one-gun-a-month laws and other gun control laws.

I am constantly amused the lengths to which reviewers here will go to distort Lott’s research. … These guys will do anything to keep people from reading Lott’s work.

Given the way he’s misrepresented by his critics, it’s a good job Lott has defenders like Economist123 (“amongst others”:http://cgi.cse.unsw.edu.au/~lambert/cgi-bin/blog/guns/files/lottreviews.html) to back him up.

This just came through on Drago Radev‘s IList:

I was visiting a government office recently and I noticed the following sign at the entrance:

D.

Just because I have a busy workday ahead doesn’t mean others aren’t ready for procrastination. Let the fun begin.

• Guess-the-Google – Care to beat my high score of 387?:) (That’s thanks to my being at home sick last weekend and the game repeating many of the pictures.)
• The original Ooops I Did It Again by Louis Armstrong:) – You will want to have the volume turned on to enjoy this
• Sixfoo 660 – Where social networking sites network (this is probably most amusing to those who have already tried Yahoo 360, here is an example)