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Delicious Library Gambler's Sale enters fourth and final week
You'd better get out those credit cards boys and girls, as the Delicious Monster Gambler's Sale has entered its fourth and final week. For those not familiar with this type of sale: Delicious Monster set aside a secret number of Delicious Library licenses and put the app on a four week sale. Each week, they drop the price by $5. Herein lies the catch: the sale ends when either four weeks are up, or the secret number of licenses is sold - whichever is first.This is the fourth and final week of the sale, and Delicious Library has hit $20. I just purchased my own copy, but only Delicious Monster knows how long you can keep waiting to taking advantage of a killer sale on a killer app.Thanks RP
Henry Jenkins has a blog (and a new book)
Erudite academic and advocate for all things gaming, MIT Professor Henry Jenkins has started a blog titled "Confessions of an Aca/Fan: The Official Weblog of Henry Jenkins." Now you can finally trash all those unofficial Henry Jenkins fansites from your RSS feed, cause this one's official. With only a couple gaming posts -- like this one on games as branded entertainment -- there's still plenty for the interested nerd to uncover and look forward to.But the blog isn't supposed to be all about games, it's about his new book, Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. We could try to condense what Prof. Jenkins is gonna be writing on his blog, but we'd only be doing a disservice to you, reader. So we'll just tease you into it: "Reduced to its most core elements, this book is about the relationship between three concepts - media convergence, participatory culture, and collective intelligence ...."
Stephen Colbert frags Steven Johnson
Steven Johnson, author of the excellent book Everything Bad is Good for You, made an appearance on Stephen Colbert's faux-news show last night to talk about "how today's popular culture is actually making us smarter." Johnson writes on his blog: "... [Colbert] wasn't too over-the-top with his O'Reilly imitation in our chat last night. He played it a bit straighter than I had expected, which made the conversation a little easier. The interesting twist was that he chose not to do the 'you're destroying the youth of America' rant that you might have expected him to do; in fact, his major in character joke was that he agreed with my argument that books are a waste of time. (By the way, if you're just coming to the site for the first time, that's not my argument at all, of course.)"Almost one year ago (to the day!) Johnson appeared on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (video) pushing the same book and the same message. We're suckers for his argument (not that books are a waste of time, the other one: that video games aren't a waste of time), so we don't mind one bit. He name drops games like Civilization IV and Spore as games that are emblematic of his thesis that today's games are increasingly complicated. I don't know about you, Steven, but I can't stop playing UNO on Xbox Live Arcade. Not sure that counts though ...More on Steven Johnson:Why we should take games seriouslyAn open letter to senator ClintonVideo Games Are Good for You, Except When They're Just Bad(Update: video is embedded after the break. Thanks, daneo!)
From Sun Tzu to Xbox; a new book on war and videogames
Firing Squad caught up with Ed Halter, author of From Sun Tzu to Xbox: War and Videogames, to talk with him about the intersection of ... umm, war and videogames. Anyone who's read Smartbomb is already familiar with the intimate and storied relationship between the two, from early Defense Department research to current Army recruitment tools. Halter says:"The Army loves to say that America's Army is 'authentic' but only a fool would believe that real war is like that game. A more realistic form of America's Army, for example, would be one in which your soldier might lose a limb or get brain-damaged in combat, then come home to a Sims-style scenario in which you have to manage the rest of your life that way. Or maybe a game where you don't get into combat at all–you just camp out in the desert, running exercises. But I doubt those kind of game would serve as very effective advertisements."Halter will continue to follow the topic with a blog -- as a supplement to the more traditional dead tree edition and as potential material for a new edition -- that's already full of interesting stuff. Anyone pick this up yet?[Thanks, John]
Books
We have established that I have a fairly large collection of books (and I'm not just talking Powerbooks and MacBooks here). I am constantly on the lookout for programs that can help me keep track of what I have.Books for OS X is an open source book cataloging app which is pretty full featured (and you can't beat the price). Sadly, it doesn't have iSight integration (yet) but if you have an ISBN it will autofill.Take the tour on Flickr.
Keep it Simple with GarageBand
Keep it Simple with GarageBand promises to teach you the ins and outs of Gargageband through a series of simple musical tasks. You start off my 'laying down of fresh tracks,' as people in the biz say, and you end up adding your vocals to the project. The best part is that each segment of the project is available for download, so you can compare what you have with what you should have. You'll be ready to rock out in no time flat. Watch out, Chemical Brothers!The books clocks in at 96 pages and will set you have $14.95 ($19.95 CAD).
The dubious value of a signed game guide
If only I had gotten my vintage, first-edition Zelda game guide signed by the author when I had the chance. Well, I won't make the same mistake twice! I'm a gonna get my Oblivion guide signed by the author! One highly valuable collector's item coming up!In all seriousness, who wants their strategy book John Hancocked anyhow? Is there really a market for this, or is this just misplaced promotion?
Takahashi's Xbox 360 book gets finishing touches
As promised, unofficial Xbox biographer Dean Takahashi has completed the draft of his upcoming book, The Xbox 360 Uncloaked, before his self-imposed deadline of E3 in May. You can check out some info on the book at the publisher's website.Counting down to the book's May 9th release date, Takahashi will be posting portions of an exhaustively detailed chronology of the original Xbox every week. A small snippet of the first installment: April 22, 1999: Craig Mundie lays out rules of engagement, setting up a beauty contest between the Xbox and WebTV teams April 27, 1999: Xbox team meets with Mundie to show him demos of the PS 2 emulation and the PC April 27, 1999: 3-D graphics chip designer GigaPixel visits Microsoft. April 28, 1999: 3Dfx graphics chip team visits Microsoft. April 29, 1999: Dave Kirk, chief scientist of Nvidia, visits Redmond to talk about game business April 30, 1999: Consumer Windows/PC appliance team holds a meeting with Bill Gates The first installment goes from 1983 (Microsoft launches Flight Simulator) to Dec. 22, 1999 (Rick Thompson takes the Xbox team skiing). Prepare to get your minutiae on. [Via Joystiq]
iLife updates abound in Software Update
Fire up Software Update, folks, as the iLife apps have received a boost. Specifically, iPhoto is at version 6.0.1, iDVD is at 6.0.1, iWeb reaches version 1.0.1 and the all-mighty iTunes has 6.0.3 ready to go. According to Apple, specifics on each update are as follows:iPhoto 6.0.1:"This update to iPhoto resolves issues with photocasting, viewing thumbnails in large libraries, and ordering cards, calendars and books. It also addresses a number of other minor issues."iDVD 6.0.1:"This update to iDVD 6 resolves issues with integration with the other iLife applications, importing of legacy projects and some theme related issues. It also addresses a number of other minor issue"iWeb 1.0.1:"This update to iWeb 1.0 addresses issues related to publishing and blogs. It also addresses a number of other minor issues."iTunes 6.0.3:"iTunes 6.0.3 includes stability and performance improvements over iTunes 6.0.2."Thanks to all the TUAW readers who sent this in!Update: iMovie (6.0.1) has been added as well. Thanks, Taylor!
AppleScript: The Definitive Guide 2nd Edition
My love of AppleScript knows no bounds. I often tell people that they should be using AppleScript to help them automate everything from mass file renaming to making their beds (well, not so much that last one. Wouldn't that be cool though?). With that said, AppleScript fails the 'Mom test,' meaning my mother wouldn't have a clue how to use it, however, the same could be said for any scripting language.Luckily for those who want to learn (including my mom, though I doubt she would be interested) O'Reilly has just released an completely revamped edition of 'AppleScript: The Definitive Guide' (though the dog on the cover is still the same). This edition covers Tiger and has lots of new examples that should help you navigate the shoals of AppleScript.
VitalSource: It's like iTunes for eBooks
I spotted this via James Duncan Davidson's blog, where he began talking about it by noting, "The best way to describe it is 'It's like iTunes for eBooks.'"
