Geek-sass

No, not geeks ass. Geek. Sass. Well, maybe both.

[todays-xkcd]

And over heeee[...]eeeere (i)s Saturn.

Space Typography [Explained]

Transcript Under the Cut

[A grayed-out sentence in the Times New Roman font reads "Optimistic aliens measure space typographically". The "O" in "Optimistic" is dark black and indicated as representing the Sun (not to scale). The dots of the letters "i" in the sentence are similarly dark black. The dot in the first "i" in "Optimistic" is indicated as representing Mercury; the dot in the second "i" represents Venus; the dot in the third "i" represents Earth. The dot in the "i" in "aliens" is indicated as representing Mars. The dot in the "i" in "typographically" is indicated as representing Jupiter. A measurement bar indicates that the distance between the "O" and the third "i" in "Optimistic" is equivalent to 1 AU (astronomical unit).]

[Caption below the panel:] Space tip: if you're ever lost in the inner Solar System, you can just type out the phrase "Optimistic aliens measure space typographically" in Times New Roman and use the dots as a map.

[ladepanda]

Reasons why I like tumblr

1. None of my family is on here

[keep-chasing-rainbows-deactivat]

2. Barely anyone in my life knows the website even exists.

[celestialdeth]

3. employers won’t ask for my tumblr handle

[batsarebetterthanpeople]

4. this site is the surrealist nonsense I wish to see in the world

[the-gnomish-bastard]

5. Wizard

[official-megumin]

6. Explosions

[brokensocialscone]

7. Blorbo from my shows

8. You have to talk to yourself before you get followers

9. No al gore rhythm

10. Skeleton wars

[teler-of-gallifrey]

11. Potatoes, peeled and diced

Rosemary

Paprika

Onion powder

Garlic powder

Parmesan

Crushed red pepper

Salt

Black pepper

Fry in pan with oil

Serve with sour cream

[heir-of-the-chair]

12. Vanilla extract

[sarasa-cat]

13. Big Naturals

[awed-frog]

Okay, you need to make sure you play this game at some point. Maybe not today or anything, because you’ll need about thirty minutes and a serious willingness to understand how it works, but - it’s so worth it. It’s basically an answer to our occasional frustration - why do assholes always come out on top? - and the beautiful thing about it is that not only does it explain how that happens, but also how we can change it.

“In the short run, the game defines the players. But in the long run, it’s us players who define the game.”

[youngnoblewoman]

This is fascinating if you’re into math or sociology or computer programming or all of the above.

[skeptictankj]

Everyone, everywhere, without exception, should play this thing through.

[anathaeum]

Don’t check just this - check out all of Nicky Case’s work. They’re a brilliant creator and I heavily recommend checking out at least one of their projects.  Their website can be found here.

Parable of the Polygons - an interactive experiment that shows how tiny individual biases can collectively cause segregation on a massive scale.

To Build a Better Ballot - an interactive experiment that shows the alternatives to the voting systems we currently use and how they can be more representative and democratic, along with their faults.

Coming Out Simulator - a short interactive story/novel about coming out, based off of Case’s own experiences. Not one I’ve played myself but still one I can recommend.

Loopy - a very simple but useful tool to show how systems interact with each other and how things can self-propagate.

We Become What We Behold - “ a game about news cycles, vicious cycles, infinite cycles.“ A short five-minute game about news and media. Warnings for violence, blood, death and stress.

[imtoobiforyou]

OH MY GOD THIS IS FRICKING AMAIZNG WOW WOW WOW WOW YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS YES INTELLECT 

[poonicorns]

[wherehavalltheflowersgone]

So let me get this straight, in Monopoly if you give one player more money to start out it’s “unfair” but if you do it in real life it’s “capitalism”? 

[carriagelamp]

You know what, I’m going to tell you guys a story.

In my Sociology class a few semesters ago, our prof had us break off into groups and, much to our naive joy, began distributing Monopoly boards! We had no idea what was going on but yay! Games! Of course, once our group, and a number of others, got the board we began to work at setting up and distributing the money…

until suddenly our prof told us to put the money down and pick up the dice.

“Roll the dice and sort yourselves from highest to lowest,” our teacher commanded.  "Now, the highest number is the upper class. The next one is upper middle class.  The next two or three are middle class. The last person is in poverty.“

Well, as the person who rolled a two this was startling and not wholly welcome news.

From that point the game changed entirely. We had to hand out the money so that the “upper class” had this fucking mountain, and then less for upper middle, even less for middle, and I didn’t get any triple digit bills. We would all collect different amounts from passing go as well.

The biggest change though? Going to jail. Upper class didn’t. Period. Upper middle class could go but they only had to stay for one turn or they could immediately pay their way out. Middle class had some pretty easy guidelines for when they could pay to get out. As lower class, it was really easy for me to wind up in jail and REALLY hard to get out. But since I was working with so little money when everyone else had so much I was in jail all the time because there was no “game over”.  If I couldn’t pay I had to go to jail for a certain period of time. I had to take out loans with interest I could never pay back just to get out only to wind up back in it again, rolling dice turn after turn hoping to be able to get out.

It was simultaneously the most enlightening and most awful game I had ever played. I was bored and frustrated and a little terrified about it all. And it wasn’t only me. I would never win, I sort of accepted this, but it was amazing how the middle classes reacted as well.  They were stressed. Because they were always that close to either being able to one-up the upper class or from crashing into poverty with me. They had to fight constantly just to stay in the middle.

(I should also mention that the upper class player in one group felt so bad for the lower income players that they ended up overhauling their entire game and creating a “socialist” society instead. I’m not sure how our teacher felt about that one.)

[kierongillen]

Worth stressing this is entirely in the spirit of the original designer’s aims for Monopoly. 

Monopoly’s  original form of The Landlord Game which was explicitly designed to teach people about the unfairness of rent systems. To quote from the wikipedia entry, just as it’s the easiest source to hand…

Magie designed the game to be a “practical demonstration of the present system of land grabbing with all its usual outcomes and consequences”.[2] She based the game on the economic principles of Georgism, a system proposed byHenry George, with the object of demonstrating how rents enrich property owners and impoverish tenants. She knew that some people could find it hard to understand why this happened and what might be done about it, and she thought that if Georgist ideas were put into the concrete form of a game, they might be easier to demonstrate.

When the usual suspects start making “don’t bring politics into games” noises, I roll my eyes pretty hard. They have no idea of the history of the form.

[the-anarcho-raver]

WOW.. THIS IS CRUCIAL! Thank you for that!!! 👏👏

[aphony-cree]

I read a study where they had people play Monopoly and gave one person twice as much money as the others but didn’t announce this. In all the test groups the person with more money won quickly and bragged throughout the game about how well they were doing and that they were better at the game than the others were. None of them noticed that they had more money or considered that starting capitol may have been a factor in their winning

Rich people like to believe we all have equal opportunities and they’re just better at playing the game

[wilwheaton]

[ammonitetestpatterns]

anonymous pennsylvania dutch fraktur drawing, 1799; watercolor and ink on laid paper.

[luisonte]

....but.... why?

[thewisemankey]

To quote Cave Johnson: "Science isn't about why, it's about WHY NOT!"

[vlanderzine]

I want a knife gun.

[pink-wisp]

me bringing a knife to a gun fight

[thetursithan]

Incredibile!!

[telnaga]

we stole america just to pave it over and abandon it

[telnaga]

when im walking surrounded by empty cracked parking lots choked full of trash. every building empty, furniture piled high in the windows, yet homeless huddling outside them. rows of small businesses dark and vacant inside, homes collapsed for years and never moved. roadkill left to rot in the street. when im surrounded by this, im wondering how this spot looked under the last caretakers. and im wondering what was ever the goddamn point beyond money to the wealthy

[liberalsarecool]

#QuietQuitting sounds like capitalists complaining about their waning exploitation.

[tsunamiwavesurfing]

[spinecutter-archive]

hank kissed a man for the first time and could finally breathe

[punishedvenomsnake]

what the fuck is breaking bad about

[poonicorns]

I'm proud of Hank Green

[mysharona1987]

Well, Fire fighter dude certainly didn’t hold back on his thoughts.

[guerrillatech]

[jaubaius]

🔥 A giant curious moose inspecting a wildlife photographer 🔥

[mornington-the-crescent]

Never forget: Moose are legit Ice Age megafauna that never died out.

[dr-falcon-fox-and-coyote]

He just….just….pet the wild moose…the bravery, the hutzpah

[thegreenmeridian]

The forbidden snoot!

[vaspider]

If I could pet a moose

I would be very happy

[freekbugg]

[perennial-lee]

Anti-revenge narrative this, anti-revenge narrative that, I personally think that Inigo Montoya had the right idea when he stabbed Count Rugen in the gut and said "I want my father back, you son of a bitch"

[galwednesday]

A lot of revenge arcs end with the hero saying "there's nothing you can do to bring my loved one back, so me seeking revenge is pointless." The Princess Bride's revenge arc ends with Inigo Montoya saying "there's nothing you can do to bring my loved one back, so there's nothing that can save you."