Posted in Personal, Technology by Thomas Themel on March 31, 2009.
Another vignette from the jump-through-hoops-to-make-us-take-your-money circus: I wanted to read Arthur C. Clarke’s Superiority. My first search result was unhelpful – reviews, obituaries and quotes. But behold, on refinement, I stumbled on a link to Sony’s eBook store. USD 1.99? An eminently reasonable price! I get a legal copy, content creators (or rather, heirs of content creators) and publishers get paid, everyone is happy! Except for…
Want this eBook?Our eBook Library Software is required to purchase and download eBooks. Download it here.
Meh. Again. For a six page short story. Even opening a PDF feels like overkill on that format. Well sorry, I just had to add the quote that initially triggered my search to the Google terms and find the inevitable free fulltext PDF of dubious legality linked above.
Posted in Personal by Thomas Themel on March 19, 2009.
An innocent link on Penny Arcade hooked me on Dwarf Fortress. You shouldn’t even consider trying it if you don’t have massive amounts of time to waste and are in any way curious about the intricacies of dwarven life. If you can spare the time, the rewards are amazing – ASCII graphics, a hugely complex dwarven economy and social system, deadly trap systems and cruel and unusual punishment await!
(Life will never be the same after you’ve spent a couple of hours constructing an elaborate system of channels and floodgates to create a remotely triggered drowning chamber for a goblin that wandered into one of your cage traps, only to realize that the swamps you tapped to provide the water will only raise the water level to 5 or 6 out of 7 and thus not drown the goblin….)
