links & 22 Jump Street

Great writing can make me interested in something I normally don't and this piece on Diplomacy did just that.

I still don’t know whom I should have trusted, if anyone. All I know is that I felt stupid, stressed out, humiliated, and sad. I had several shouting matches with a few of these guys. Some of them got personal. And all I had to show for my loyalty to Brian Ecton and my righteous indignation toward the other players was nothing at all. I was physically exhausted and emotionally abused. I hated Brian, the other players all hated me, and I hated myself most of all. I had to purse my lips extra hard to fight the urge to cry.

It also made me want to read more table top gaming AUs in fandom.


This piece on the big picture of Amazon's new Fire Phone was a good read; it's not divulging any new information, and I'm I have seen these ideas elsewhere, but it was nice to read a piece that looked beyond the specs and addressed the current state of the tech giants.

The goal for all of these companies, with all of these products and services, is not to relinquish an inch of market share to anyone else. As much as they can, they want to own the entire supply chain, from the time a product is advertised, to where and how it’s purchased, to the delivery of that product. And if they can own the device that’s to do all of those other things, so much the better. On Wednesday, for instance, Bezos told the audience how “tens of millions” of Kindle Fire and Kindle owners have driven the explosive grown of Amazon Prime, Amazon’s membership service. No doubt Bezos hopes the Fire Phone will do the same.

I watched 22 Jump Street: ( nothing really plot explicit but just in case )