my academy, your academy

The Fall's Hex Enduction Hour, which I recently got the re-release of, is even better than I remembered it. If you own just one Fall album, make it this one. And now, links:

1. Pac Man on Trial (via waxy)
   
   
2. Dog owner bites man.
   
   
3. AAAIIIIGH! Cannibal squid!
   
   
4. The "official car" of the Rolling Stones tour is the new Mercedes-Benz luxury minivan. Just retire, guys.
   
   
5. Country singer tries to get away with promoting America's childhood drug abuse gateway drug. Thanks, Gretchen!
   
   
6. Jon Stewart versus Christopher Hitchens (quicktime).
   
   
7. Nutcase Turkmenistan dictator sends his book into space.
   
   
8. The Los Angeles Fire Department has some good information and advice about that "ICE" cellphone emergency contact thing you keep hearing about.

Tales from Bozospace: The AOL Trivia Club

I've been using online computer systems since 1977 or so, starting with a very primitive teletype-and-paper-tape hookup to a school district computer in junior high school. Later I used university systems, bulletin boards, dialup Internet, and most of the online services.

For most of this time I didn't use these networks socially. In the earlier years this just wasn't technically practical. When I bought my first computer I was 25 years old, living in Los Angeles, and heavily involved in the music scene, so I didn't feel the need for any additional social outlets.

However, I've always been a trivia nut. I did College Bowl at UCLA, and our team won and went to the statewide competition. When Trivial Pursuit came out I loved it and won a lot. I even liked the dumb trivia games in bars. So when I found the live interactive trivia games in AOL chat rooms I got hooked right away. There'd be maybe 10-15 people chatting and a game host and a scorekeeper, and you'd try to type in the correct answer before the host typed the "buzzer", but just before! So that others couldn't copy you. The hosts wrote their own trivia games. If you won you got some free time on the service.

( and therein lies the tale )

Long story short: Trivia fans are fucking insane and often dangerous. Gamers are more used to role-playing and less insane. The internet is crazy.