homework. The problem is that video games haven't worked that way in decades! This is also why a lot of "teaching" apps, like Duolingo are actually not great at teaching, because in order to be better pedagogical tools, they would have to be less fun

A lot of the core philosophy behind gameification in contemporary pedagogy scholarship is that it seems like people are willing to do some repetitive tasks and not others, that if we can convince kids to bang their heads against the wall playing a level of Mario, we can do the same with math...

I also need to find the original post about how video games in the '80s were made by hobbyists to be hard to corporations to make you die and put in more quarters, but now they are designed to be immanently solvable, so are actually not remotely the sign of problem solving they were previously

"scoring internet points" used to be a metaphor for how people behaved on forums and was derogatory and now all social media literally has a scoreboard. We are definitely in "we have created the torment nexus" territory. They didn't invent conversation as game, but they made it a video game

I just need to sit down and write a book about how treating everything like an economic game or video game is morass we live in. The through line between '80s style economic games turning everything into a shareholders' report and gameification in internet culture and education that I can't unsee

There's a certain kind of poster that bristles so hard at the idea that there is a right answer because they find it boring when something is settled so will fight hard for "well ackshually it is more nuanced than that..." even when it leads them down silly paths, which I think is also in this stew

It's funny how many of these people have a crystal clear understanding that our political moment is very much supported by "score discourse points seeking nuance and a third way against bad faith interlocutors" but really can't help themselves from doing that exact thing in this issue

I am the student "gifted" was made for--white, male, middle-class, good at testing--and I got myself kicked out of it repeatedly because it clearly excluded my friends who weren't white. This was obvious to me at 8. I went pro in "academic gifts" and I want "gifted" gone from my daughter's school

I agree with many bluesky academics that many things are rooted directly in poppy trade books that present something nuanced that shouldn't escape academic containment which get turned into cults. /Freakonomics/ has done the most damage but internet leftists and Marx is up there

I really try not to be a dickhead about this, but like the flaws with Marx are not remotely subtle, I was teaching and taught this as really basic things for a graduate student to understand parallel to like Freud being very influential but also having ~problems~

One thing we've learned in the last 12 hours: The Sinclair-Nexstar ban on Kimmel, in terms of his reach, means nothing in an era when late-night shows have an afterlife or simultaneous life on streaming. Kimmel's average audience is 1.6M. On YouTube, last night's monologue is already at 8.4M views.

CHOTINER: So You created us right
GOD: Yes
CHOTINER: In Your image
GOD: Yes
CHOTINER: And sometimes we do bad things
GOD: Oh Yes
CHOTINER: And then you send plagues and floods
GOD: OK I think I see where you are going with this

This is a great post and follows up to a fantastic point about the meaningful optimism of immigrants. This has historically been the source of a lot of American civic virtue. The people who thought America was the land of opportunity came here and made it that way

the Will Smith track “Wild Wild West” just came on the radio and:

1) it was weird that for several years whenever Will made a tentpole movie he also rapped about it in partial character

2) we should make more actors do this

Even better Ed Asner was the chairman of the parent company to the NBC analog that wanted a fight with an overreaching FCC. Has any actor meant more to the business of fictional television than Asner?

A lineup with Battleship, Settlers of Catan, Connect 4, a lightsaber, a scooter, cornhole, Tickle Me Elmo, a Spirograph, Trivial Pursuit, and a Furby

Not food-related, but important information! The National Toy Hall of Fame at the Strong Museum (in beautiful Rochester, NY) has just announced the 2025 players' choice nominees for induction into the HoF!

Thoughts?

See link in replies to cast your vote!

i refuse to choose, i live in america, by god, if i want katsu curry for breakfast and tandoori chicken pizza for lunch and a sushi burrito for dinner, i barely even have to leave my neighborhood

This map surely has to be pretending that American metropoles don't exist I guess? Like g could be a circle around Houston and New Orleans and cover most global cuisines pretty well. We're supposed to read this as "soul food, barbecue, and Mexican food"?

I don't agree, but I'm sympathetic to the claim that using social media will let them talk to their friends or find digital communities. There is just nothing actually good about LLM use, the best case scenario is it helps them cheat at homework, that's the absolute ceiling.

Honestly, I think a solid number of them are afraid of being killed. I don't want to give Ezra Klein et al. more credit than is strictly necessary, but I think they'd be nuts if they weren't thinking that at least a little, which explains the bizarre media behavior.

I feel like her response is maybe indicating sincerely that she actually cannot distinguish between the content being delivered and the style with which it is delivered, like it doesn't seem like an exercise in guile, just like straight responding in a way that nakedly conflates these two things

Normally being an overly credulous sucker robs you of money and dignity, but contemporary news media actively rewards these qualities at every turn. It is actually very easy to see the bad faith in which Charlie Kirk was acting but if you get paid to be a sucker, that's a good thing

I feel like I've been winter soldier activated by this phrase. Ready to comply and listen to a mislabeled mp3

Keith David!

I wonder if there's a word for an actual economic downturn which bums you out like a vibecession, but it's not just vibes.

This is not remotely a novel observation, but watching the people who scorched the earth of many programs, policies, and institutions because they hated Affirmative Action also get graded on the very special curve for very special conservatives really floors me every time

ALTERNATE UNIVERSE WHERE CAESAR LOST AT PHARSALUS:

"Honey, would you pass the Pompey dressing? This salad you made is utterly flavorless"

"Fuck off, ASSHOLE"

"Fine, I'm ordering a pizza from Little Pompey's"

Yes, literacy is important -- but literacy means more than "how to use X". It also includes understanding what X (here, LLMs) is and when NOT to use them.

Synthetic text that reads as authoritative but for which no one is accountable is poison to the information ecosystem.