Mastering the Art of Bosslessness

http://lifehacker.com/5955748/mastering-the-art-of-bosslessness

Gay Men and Christian Wombs: Surrogacy’s New Frontier

http://nymag.com/thecut/2012/12/gay-men-christian-wombs-the-new-surrogacy.html

My husband’s secret gay life

http://www.salon.com/2012/12/10/my_husbands_secret_gay_life/

It Happened to Me: I Married My Rapist and We Had 4 Kids

http://www.xojane.com/it-happened-to-me/daleen-berry-married-rape

Believe you can change (Aaron Swartz's Raw Thought)

http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/dweck

Great Geek Debates: Disney Princesses vs. Hayao Miyazaki

http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2012/01/disney-vs-miyazaki/all/

The State Of 3D Printing Is Beyond What Sci-Fi Predicted

http://www.bitrebels.com/technology/the-state-of-3d-printing-is-beyond-what-sci-fi-predicted

Old Man Henderson

1d4chan.org/wiki/Old_Man_Henderson

Methanol toxicity from aspartame may cause autism, spina bifida, preterm delivery and more

http://www.balancingyourchemistry.com/news-23/post-316-methanol-toxicity-from-aspartame-may-cause-autism-spina-bifida-preterm-delivery-and-more.html

The Most Harmful Medical Intervention Is Done to All of Us

http://gaia-health.com/gaia-blog/2012-12-01/the-most-harmful-medical-intervention-is-done-to-all-of-us/

College

http://p10.info/college-22/

Hormones

http://community.sparknotes.com/2012/11/20/auntie-sparknotes-why-do-i-want-to-hnd-all-the-time

World Economic Forum Warns That Patents Are Making Us Lose The Race Against Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130110/09590621628/world-economic-forum-warns-that-patents-are-making-us-lose-race-against-antibiotic-resistant-bacteria.shtml

I Am Going to Dropkick the Next Dudebro Who Tells Me Coercive Sex is Consensual Sex

http://www.xojane.com/issues/i-am-going-to-dropkick-the-next-dudebro-who-tells-me-coercive-sex-is-consenting-sex


There's a problem: in almost everything outside of sex, people say to not give up when refused, and just keep trying. Especially in any sales oriented job. So it sorta makes sense that most men would assume the logic applies to sex too. Even romantic stories often have men continue to pursue a woman after being turned down once.

To get men to respect the word "no" in the bedroom we need to teach respect for the word in other places too. It would help a lot if people simply got taught to respect others in general. There is very little respect for anyone in America.

Going Viral For Something You Didn't Do

http://www.forbes.com/sites/andyellwood/2013/01/07/going-viral-for-something-you-didnt-do/

Man Creates Indestructible Football for Kids in Third World Countries

http://www.odditycentral.com/news/man-creates-indestructible-football-for-kids-in-third-world-countries.html

St Matthew Island

http://randomgag.com/funny-image/11420/

Games Are Best When Things Go Wrong

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/10/23/games-are-best-when-things-go-wrong/

Anderson Cooper: "The Fact Is, I'm Gay."

http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/07/anderson-cooper-the-fact-is-im-gay.html

When someone says they aren't comfortable with another person's behavior: Listen

http://captainawkward.com/2012/08/07/322-323-my-friend-group-has-a-case-of-the-creepy-dude-how-do-we-clear-that-up/

http://yesmeansyesblog.wordpress.com/2009/11/12/meet-the-predators/

U.S. mentally ill and their families face barriers to care

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/12/29/us-usa-shooting-mentalyill-idUSBRE8BS07O20121229

Feminism: still excluding working class women?

http://www.thefword.org.uk/features/2012/03/feminism_still_

Love and Suffering

The amount of suffering in one's life, is tied to the amount of desire one carries.
Complete apathy, leads to happiness. (because nothing is ever wrong).
The greatest suffering, comes from the greatest desires.

Love is desire. Who wouldn't want to ease the suffering of those they love?
A love that does not care about the suffering of others, isn't love.
To love, one must be willing to accept suffering. It is the price of caring.

The greatest love, is the greatest desire. It is the wish to ease all suffering. To aid all. To perfect everything. It is an impossible desire. It will doom any who bear it, to suffer.

For me, to love, is to suffer. If I sought happiness, I'd find it easily, by simply abandoning all care for the world. I would rather abandon my life, than abandon my love. What I seek, is not happiness.

I want to care. I want to care so much it hurts. So, I do.
Then people ask, "Why do you hate living?"
I never really know how to answer this question. I don't know how to explain it in a way they'd understand, and I'm not sure I'd want to. If they understood, they might suffer too. For me, it seems stranger that so many are able to live with so few concerns. To live in ignorance of all the suffering, is not something I'd want. I find it amazing, that so many are able and willing to do so.

How I Unwittingly Infiltrated the Boy’s Club & Why It’s Time for a New Wave of Atheism

http://freethoughtblogs.com/blaghag/2012/08/how-i-unwittingly-infiltrated-the-boys-club-why-its-time-for-a-new-wave-of-atheism/

Infinite Relationships: Relationships without bounds or boundaries, love without limits

http://lawrence.filmsforaction.org/Blog/Infinite_Relationships_Relationships_without_bounds_or_boundaries_love_without_limits/

Fred Grimm: Stroke of luck prevented another horror

http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/12/22/3153777/fred-grimm-stroke-of-luck-prevented.html

Plotters of school killings tend to tip off someone in advance

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-massacre-prevention-20121224,0,5399322.story?page=1

Anatomy of a Murder-Suicide

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/23/opinion/sunday/anatomy-of-a-murder-suicide.html

Study: When resources are scarce, most people forfeit the future

http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/news/science/study-when-resources-are-scarce-most-people-forfeit-the-future-660243/

The Last Closet: Why I Won’t Be Home For Christmas

http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/the-last-closet-why-i-wont-be-home-for-christmas/news/2012/12/23/57097

Men, It’s Time to Stand Along with Women

http://confrontinglove.com/2011/11/25/men-its-time-to-stand-along-with-women/

These Guys’ $5K Spending Sprees Keep Your Games Free to Play

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2012/11/meet-the-whales/all/

Love is Not a Cure For Dysfunctional Relationships

http://iwantclosure.com/relationship-issues/love-is-not-a-cure-for-dysfunctional-relationships/

Why Banning Violent Video Games Won’t Address Our Culture of Violence

http://thinkprogress.org/alyssa/2012/12/17/1343641/video-games-newtown/?mobile=nc

The Myth of Freud's Iceberg

http://www.mgiobbi.com/2012/02/myth-of-freuds-iceberg.html

anomalies

http://www.viruscomix.com/page567.html

Illiterate kids given sealed boxes with tablets figure out how to use, master, and hack them

http://boingboing.net/2012/10/31/illiterate-kids-given-sealed-b.html

Watery Symphony of Kai

www.youtube.com/watch?v=45zLxBV_A1Q

Buy It for Me: My Life As a Financial Dominatrix

http://nymag.com/thecut/2012/10/my-life-as-a-financial-dominatrix.html

Wow.

I find it rather sad that our society is producing people who want to be treated that way. It tells me that many people are living their lives in a way that is not fulfilling to them. 'tis another source of sadness for me.

Star Wars: The Old Republic

I think Bioware should take the class stories in their big MMO, and make single player games out of them. One game for each class, priced $40 each, and I'm sure they could make a bunch of money out of that. After trying and failing to play it when it launched, I'm no longer willing to play their MMO even when it's free. I'd be willing to buy a single player game though. I certainly enjoyed Mass Effect 1 and 2, and have been interested in some of the SW:TOR class stories after reading other people's opinions of them.

Why You Shouldn’t Bust Your Boundaries To Give Yourself A ‘Competitive Edge’ In Dating

http://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/why-you-shouldnt-bust-your-boundaries-to-give-yourself-a-competitive-edge-in-dating/

Asking the Real Questions About Sexual Assault

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/sandra-hawken-diaz/victim-blaming_b_1901185.html

50 Actual Facts About Rape

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/soraya-chemaly/50-facts-rape_b_2019338.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000008

I am a lazy gamer.

I've observed that I am a very lazy gamer. The characters I enjoyed most in City of Heroes were ones designed to require minimal effort to play, often sticking to abilities that required no attention (Toggles mostly, PBAoEs were also nice). EVE Online and City of Heroes are the only MMOs I've played for long periods of time.

In EVE Online, my preferred combat style was to deploy drones and then just wait for everything to die. Defenders were my preferred class in City of Heroes, and I loved to grab the skills from the tertiary leadership set. With a bit of math, it wasn't hard to figure out how to pull my weight on a team with minimal effort.

With some effort I was able to figure out how to make a character in Champions Online I could play in a fairly easy manner, but whenever I go back to it, I find that the gameplay gets bogged down by inventory management. In fact, I find almost every MMO I play, inventory management becomes a major turnoff for me, and a hassle that I hate.

I'm beginning to believe that the main reason I so rarely enjoy MMOs is because so much time is wasted on inventory management, running around towns, or other tedium, instead of actually playing the game. CoH and almost no inventory management, and traveling around town with travel powers was a breeze (though travel before said powers were obtained was rather dull and bothersome). Why can't I find more games like that? Where there's thought put into character building, without the tedium of item bags and constant trashing of random loot.

No, you’re not entitled to your opinion

http://theconversation.edu.au/no-youre-not-entitled-to-your-opinion-9978

Suicidal Threads

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/feature/id/345842/title/Suicidal_Threads

Here’s a Devastating Account of the Crap Women in the Games Business Have to Deal With. In 2012.

http://kotaku.com/5963528/heres-a-devastating-account-of-the-crap-women-in-the-games-business-have-to-deal-with-in-2012?

Body Image: An Apology to My Thinner Friend

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kate-fridkis/body-image-apology-thinner-friend_b_1832171.html

The main reason women care so much about their appearance, is simply because everyone around them cares so much about it.

Convincing Women in China They're Too Hairy

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-10-18/convincing-women-in-china-theyre-too-hairy

One of the problems of capitalism, is the tendency to create problems where none existed, just so they can sell a product that was never needed.

To Succeed, Forget Self-Esteem

http://lifehacker.com/5945018/to-succeed-forget-self+esteem

Artist Can’t Get Pirated Music Off iTunes, Google and Microsoft Stores

http://torrentfreak.com/artist-cant-get-pirated-music-off-itunes-google-and-microsoft-stores-121016/

Computer game to tackle depression

http://blogs.birminghammail.net/technobabble/2012/04/computer-game-to-tackle-depres.html

The fact that a video game is helping people with depression, implies that many people are sorely lacking in basic mental skills. All the video game can do is teach.

10 Ways to Open Your Mind

http://runicshamanism.com/archives/422

While I do like these kinds of lists, they suffer from a problem: In general, they only help people who already know there's a problem, and are trying to fix it. People who are convinced they're right, don't know how to listen or take in critique.

To really open one's mind, try viewing the world through the claim "Everyone is right." It leads to the corollary "Everyone is wrong." and trying to encompass both beliefs simultaneously is awkward (especially when one realizes they need to apply both claims to themselves too). Most people who attempt it will probably end up using the standard cop-out of throwing lots of "but"s around. The real challenge is to find the common thread that exists in all human viewpoints. (If I knew how to explain it in words, I'd do so, unfortunately, my own understanding remains weak.)

Welcome to Life

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFe9wiDfb0E

Al Roth: An economist who saves lives

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20004050

Walmart, the Most Powerful Company in the World, Admits that Protests and Strikes Lead to Wage Increases

http://www.alternet.org/labor/walmart-most-powerful-company-world-admits-protests-and-strikes-lead-wage-increases?akid=9532.1071541.tfV3-x

Code Geass AMV: "Finally Robotic Beings Rule the World"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01lxMedqbEo

3 Steps to Unlock the Power of Bad Feelings

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/eye-the-storm/201106/3-steps-unlock-the-power-bad-feelings

The US presidential debates' illusion of political choice

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/oct/04/third-party-us-presidential-debate-deceit

Locksmiths Pissed Off At Geeks For Letting Out The Secret: Lockpicking Is Easy

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20080717/1932251716.shtml

The Psychology of Hate

http://www.avoiceformen.com/misandry/the-psychology-of-hate/

Sadly, this article complaining about hate, seems to itself be full of hate. Hating hate doesn't make it go away. *sigh*

Ultimately, the main problem being pointed out is due to everyone's insistence in issuing judgement. The need to define everything as either right or wrong, combined with the need to be right, leads to hatred of anything that threatens their belief in their own rightness.

This Amazing Dad Wears A Skirt So His Son Can, Too

http://front.moveon.org/this-amazing-dad-wears-a-skirt-so-his-son-can-too

Why Industries Collapse

http://www.futuristspeaker.com/2011/10/why-industries-collapse/

Delete

http://www.creepypastaindex.com/creepypasta/delete

Cloned canine drug-sniffers are an amazing success in South Korea.

http://www.zmescience.com/research/cloned-canine-drug-sniffers-are-an-amazing-success-in-south-korea-big-leap-for-animal-cloning-in-the-future/

5 Mind-Blowingly Valuable Things Hidden in Everyday Life

http://www.cracked.com/article_20015_5-mind-blowingly-valuable-things-hidden-in-everyday-life.html

Cuil Theory

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfdEdE96En0

10 Lesser Known Economic Issues

http://twoinformcanada.ca/10-lesser-known-economic-issues/

I must kill Roy Phillips

http://thebestgamesiteever.com/2012/06/i-must-kill-roy-phillips/

How Children Succeed

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2012/09/how_children_succeed_book_excerpt_what_the_most_boring_test_in_the_world_tells_us_about_motivation_and_iq_.single.html

Please Don't Tell Me I'm Beautiful

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-devin/beauty_b_1838040.html

When the Right to Resist Becomes the "Duty to Submit"

http://www.informationliberation.com/?id=37975

What happens when you pour lava onto ice?

http://www.geek.com/articles/geek-cetera/what-happens-when-you-pour-lava-onto-ice-2012092/

The Best Birth Control In The World Is For Men

http://techcitement.com/culture/the-best-birth-control-in-the-world-is-for-men

My illegal abortion

http://www.salon.com/2012/08/27/my_illegal_abortion/

Usabilty always seems to go down

I greatly dislike being forced to use the new blogger interface. It's a lot less usable to me. Making posts requires a lot more effort and time than before, and everything just requires more clicks. Very frustrating. I encounter this problem a lot. Older stuff is almost always more usable than newer stuff, with very few exceptions. Every once in a while a company will discover some new UI concept that works well and gets copied a lot. Most of the time though, they think putting less on screen at once will make things more usable, when it really just means I have to spend more clicks to do anything.

Everybody Jump

http://what-if.xkcd.com/8/

Psychiatrist: I hate suicide but also understand it

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/08/21/health/raison-suicide-tony-scott/index.html

9 Insights On Life

http://truthmafia.com/archives/7253

How we confuse symbols and things

http://www.arachnoid.com/lutusp/symbols.html

Why Women Aren’t Crazy

http://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/why-women-arent-crazy/

There's no such thing as a jellyfish

http://redux.com/stream/item/2131020/There-s-no-such-thing-as-a-jellyfish

There are some very strange creatures in the sea.

How much Force power can Yoda output?

http://what-if.xkcd.com/3/

Scientist: Pushing OxyContin addicts to heroin reveals ‘utter failure’ of drug war

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/07/13/scientist-pushing-oxycontin-addicts-to-heroin-reveals-utter-failure-of-drug-war/

Caroline Norton and the custody battle that changed the law

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/you/article-2172010/Caroline-Norton-custody-battle-changed-law.html

Jedi-Ninjas

http://www.ign.com/videos/2011/12/16/jedi-ninjas-by-gakattack-and-team2x

This is Shavarsh Karapetyan

http://d24w6bsrhbeh9d.cloudfront.net/photo/2928636_460s.jpg

Why Storytelling Is The Ultimate Weapon

http://www.fastcocreate.com/1680581/why-storytelling-is-the-ultimate-weapon

The Inequitable Equity of MMOs

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/features/9786-The-Inequitable-Equity-of-MMOs

Guild Wars 2 (opinion: First impressions)

My first impression of Guild Wars 2, is that it's an excellent game for explorers who want a world full of sights to see, places to discover, and events to stumble upon. It doesn't grab me as well as other games do, nor hold me in it as strongly. However, it has possibly the best immersion I've encountered in an MMO, with a very beautiful world and some of the best rewards I've encountered for exploring it.

PvP lovers will love the fact that it's possible to dive right into PvP without needing to gear up or level up first. Levels help, by unlocking utility skills and talents, but they aren't required.

The area where Guild Wars 2 seems weakest, is story. What story I see seems nice and pleasing. Unfortunately, it's rather spread out. I'll do a story mission or two, then have to run around doing random things to gain xp before I can continue the story. Exploring is great, PvP is great, but the story feels like it's in pieces, with large gaps in between where I'm forced to do something else before I'm allowed to continue. I think this is the main reason I find it so easy to put GW2 down and switch to something else.

If you want a big open world to explore and discover, Guild Wars 2 is excellent. If you want massive armies of players colliding in world vs world vs world PvP, Guild Wars 2 is excellent. If you want a story that grabs you and doesn't let go... The Secret World is excellent.

Okay, that's a total change in topic, but I think it is rather amazing how different The Secret World and Guild Wars 2 are. Pretty much everything The Secret World got wrong, Guild Wars 2 got right, and everything Guild Wars 2 got wrong, The Secret World got right. It's weird, and amazing. I hope both do well.

Things other games would do well to copy:

Guild Wars 2 has effective level adjustments to ensure people never outlevel content. It also uses this to help players be effective in PvP regardless of character level.

Having escort quests, defend area quests, and kill target monster/boss quests all be open missions is great. Makes a lot more sense, and helps keep everything immersive.

Why I was Pokemon’s Greatest Villain

http://kotaku.com/5923814/why-i-was-pokemons-greatest-villain

A Team Of Seven Is Making A Game That ‘Shouldn’t Be Possible’

http://kotaku.com/5938305/a-team-of-seven-is-making-a-game-that-shouldnt-be-possible

This is the power of community assisted game development. I really hope they succeed and show other companies the value of their development model.

The Secret World (opinion)

My first impressions of The Secret World, was that it was a WoW (World of Warcraft) clone, mainly due to the fairly standard system of going to the quest giver, taking on quest, doing quest, going back, getting new quest, etc... that so many MMOs have used every since WoW got so famous. However, it's the best darn WoW clone I've played (I don't like WoW, I do like TSW).

The voice acting is overall, very good. General immersion is excellent. The skill system is amusingly complex, yet simple enough to get started quickly. Overall, I've been quite impressed with The Secret World.

A few key things I think more games should copy:

The Secret World has group dungeons available very early. Each zone has one, even the beginner zone people start in after the tutorial. After the game's main story is finished, and the world is explored, what keeps people playing are the dungeons. So I think it's really valuable that they let people get a taste of them early. It always seems dumb to me when a game's key selling point is kept away from new players. When older players have to tell newer ones that it gets better later. Players shouldn't have to play a game for two days, to get to the good stuff. It should be good right from the beginning, all the way to the end.

The skill wheel (it's really a skill tree that's organized in a pretty way) is very well done. They have synergies built into it that makes for enjoyable theory crafting and rewarding optimization. It's fairly easy to understand (Blood Sport applies afflict when you hit an enemy, Salt in the Wounds deals damage when you apply afflict) and gives a lot of freedom in options (though a few severe imbalances do exist). I would very much like to see deliberate synergies and free-form build creation in games. Being able to pick 7 active skills and 7 passive skills from a large variety of options is great, especially when there's so many tricks, and synergies to find.

Last but not least: the dungeons follow a philosophy I think games should look into using more. They are essentially a series of boss fights, but seek to make the fights interesting enough to be worth doing over and over, and remain fun. Many of the fights offer challenges to player skill, requiring focus and attention. A few good fights, is better than lots of crappy ones.

Fire Captain Says:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2012/03/21/this-is-why-we-invest-in-science-this/#comment-497405

In 1973 when I first began my career in the Fire Department, high-pressure water application on structure fires was all the rage. There are basically two kinds of fire pumps on the fire engines. One is the main pump for large hoses, and the second is a booster or high pressure pump for the small rubber hoses on the reels. These smaller hoses are very capable of putting out structure fires as long as the fire doesn’t get too big. The key is optimal water application. We have known for decades that very little water can put out very big fires under just the right circumstances. I remember watching an old 16mm movie shot back in the 60′s on this very subject of high pressure water application on structure fires. This is not new stuff. Because NASA engineers get involved it is treated like no one ever thought of this before.

The fever in the fire service for limiting water damage was so hot in the 70′s they even came out with exclusive high pressure nozzles for fighting structure fires.

Well, as always happens, eventually someone got hurt. Fire and it’s relationship with the environment is very complex. High pressure application of water is not the answer for every situation.

Needless to say some Fire Chiefs with large egos jumped on the chance to make a name for themselves and called for a ban of these nozzles. Ignorant Fire Chiefs across the country began to demand that a minimum of an 1 1/2 inch hose line be used on all structure fires. For this hose line you get about 100 gallons per minute. Most fighters hate trying to fight a fire where you are maneuvering with a 100 gallons per minute flowing. This is a very unwieldy hose to handle. Ironically, the high pressure booster line can also generates as much as 100 gpm at higher pressures. Most Fire Chiefs are too dumb to understand hydraulics.

As the years went by and firefighters were carrying more and more equipment into fires, the Fire Chiefs thought let’s make it even tougher. By the late 90′s they were forcing firefighters to pull 1 3/4 and 2 inch lines into fires. Keep in mind this might be for something as small as a chair fire.

The second comical point of the high pressure study at Vandenberg, is that the engineers don’t understand politics. You think you can help relieve the tax payer by reducing the number of fighters it takes to put out a fire? Don’t kid yourself. There are ugly politics at play. Just ask about the 2 in and 2 out law that the International Association of Firefighters twisted arms of congressmen to push through. They used the guise of “safety” to force congress into creating a bad law to increase the numbers of fighters across the country just to help fatten up their bank accounts but causing great financial hardships on cities and communities nationwide. Not to mention many Fire Chiefs are empire builders. It seems that everyone wants to leave there mark in life and the fire service is frock with this phenom. I am fairly confident that high pressure extinguishing systems will come around again like it or not. Why? Because Fire Chiefs have egos.

They say there are four sides to a fire. Heat, fuel, oxygen, and the Fire Chief. Remove any one of them and the fire will go out.

Space Tech in Everyday Life: NASA Brings Inventions Down to Earth

http://www.space.com/11272-nasa-space-technology-spinoffs.html

Libertarian Paradise! (Parody)

http://www.stonekettle.com/2011/05/handy-man-special.html

Massivity: How Roleplaying Powers MMO Longevity

http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/world-of-warcraft-mists-of-pandaria/1225272p1.html

A robot ballet before impending doom

http://fulltrending.com/a-robot-ballet-before-impending-doom/

Vital Signs Paralyzed by Faith

http://discovermagazine.com/2012/jun/07-vital-signs-paralyzed-by-faith/article_view?b_start:int=0&-C=

Meet pedophiles who mean well

http://www.salon.com/2012/07/01/meet_pedophiles_who_mean_well/

Sadly, people don't get to choose who and what they find themselves attracted to.