Rudy Rucker

Rudy Rucker is a writer, a mathematician and a computer scientist. Born in Kentucky in 1946, Rucker moved to Silicon Valley when he turned 40. Rucker has published twenty-five books, primarily science-fiction and popular science. He was an early cyberpunk and an editor at Mondo 2000. He often writes SF in a style is characterized as transreal. His most recent novels were Frek and the Elixir, a far-future epic about a boy's galactic quest to restore Earth's ecology and As Above So Below, a historical novel based on the life of the sixteenth century painter Peter Bruegel.  Rucker is a professor emeritus of computer science at San Jose State University, where he created a number of freeware programs relating to chaos, artificial life, cellular automata, higher dimensions, and computer games. He is presently working on The Lifebox, the Seashell and the Soul, a nonfiction book about computers and the nature of reality. Rucker's website can be found at www.cs.sjsu.edu/faculty/rucker or at www.rudyrucker.com.

Brand You... Literally

"We want to be the first people to seriously use foreheads as media," says Richard Kilgarriff, vice president and director of channels for CNX, Cartoon Network UK and Boomerang. "Guerrilla advertising is very popular, but it often lacks a certain charm," he adds. These forehead tattoos are "an extension of the sandwich board, but a bit more organic."

and...

"Nial Ferguson, [from FHM Magazine, which is testing the idea] says he wants to make sure the ad-wearers don't insult FHM when asked about the ad. "These people have to be to a certain extent brand advocates for the magazine," he says. Ideally, forehead advertisers for FHM also should be cool, reasonably fashionable and "good with the ladies."

All I can say is, good luck with a logo on yer noggin.

Discuss

posted by Andrew Zolli at 10:23:37 AM | permalink

Dude, You're Gettin' A Cell...

Art imitates life. Ben Curtis, who plays stoner spokesman Steve in the Dell commercials, has been busted for pot posession in lower Manhattan. I feel bad for him - not only was his arrest front page news on the NY Post, he was arrested after attending a Scottish-themed party, and had to go into a NYC holding cell in a blue-and-red kilt, tuxedo jacket, beige kneesocks and white sneakers (presumably sans laces).

Discuss

posted by Andrew Zolli at 11:28:18 AM | permalink

Auburndale, Massachusetts: Rogue WMD Threat?

This brilliant article by Hector Rotweiller shows how a charming intersection in downtown Auburn, Massachusetts, (with a liquor store, a drug store, a grocery and a gas station) contains, under the "guise" of those commercial businesses, all the chemical precursors needed to make Tabun, a deadly nerve agent. Worse still, mobile transport units (including cars, SUVs, and flatbed trucks) regularly traffic through the area... Who knows where the Auburndalians are moving this stuff?

Discuss

posted by Andrew Zolli at 1:21:44 AM | permalink

The CSI Effect

Police dramas are having an unexpected impact in the real world: the public thinks every crime can be solved, and solved now - just like on television. That bogus expectation is having a real effect on the criminal justice system, changing the way prosecutors and defendants try their cases.

It's called the CSI effect, a phenomenon in which actual investigations are driven by the expectations of the millions of people who watch fake cop and courtroom dramas. District attorneys increasingly worry that the shows taint the jury pool with impossibly high expectations of how easily and conclusively criminal cases can be solved using DNA analysis and other forensic science. Left unchallenged, such expectations could undermine their cases, they say, and -- in the worst-case scenario -- translate into losses in the courtroom.

The problem was even raised at the national prosecutors meeting in Austin, Texas, in November of 2002, and some have suggested that the “CSI effect” may actually drive up prosecutorial costs by requiring prosecutors to perform expensive DNA tests to win simple cases. According to one prosecutor, "People are fascinated with that show. So, if you have physical evidence, (the show) may work to your advantage." If not, it could mean trouble. "They may expect it... ['CSI' fans] think everything's possible."

Discuss

posted by Andrew Zolli at 10:21:02 AM | permalink

Guestbar Archives