by Waxy (via Sean Bonner)

When a "seasonal" drink has no "seasonal" ingredients, including pumpkin, what can it be, but simulacrum?

Name your price for great Star Wars comics in Dark Horse's first-ever DRM-free foray, and support the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund!

Sarkeesian was willing to go on with the show at Utah State University — as she's done after all the other death threats that she's received as a speaker —… Read the rest of the article: Anita Sarkeesian cancels Utah campus appearance after threats of a "Montreal-style massacre"

Thom writes, "Oct. 16 is 'Social Media Blackout Day,' so Quirk Books put together a list of books to read that have to do with social media and the internet…because… Read the rest of the article: Internetty reading for Social Media Blackout Day

The San Francisco Bay Guardian has ceased publication after 48 years of yeoman service to the Bay Area. It will be sorely missed.

Up until Obama's "most transparent administration", and throughout the entire history of the USA, national security leakers had received a total of 24 months of jail time. There are many… Read the rest of the article: Obama administration has secured 526 months of jail time for leakers

Stay classy, Brands on sale. (Thanks, Fipi Lele!)

George Pfau writes, "Comedian Dies is a video collaboration between comedian Caitlin Gill and me. Inspired by zombies, slapstick, stock jokes, and the vulnerability that a stand-up comic experiences, we… Read the rest of the article: WATCH: Comedian Dies: horror-slapstick

Richard Kadrey's brilliant young adult horror novel, in paperback just in time for All Hallow's. From my original review:

A week ago, Adobe was caught spying on people's reading habits — they index all your books and send a full dossier to themselves, in the clear. Now, they've responded… Read the rest of the article: Adobe responds to scandalous news of secretly spying on readers (not really)

Students and faculty from a teachers' college in Guerrero state set fire to a government building in Chilpancingo in fury at the disappearance of 43 student teachers believed to have… Read the rest of the article: Protesters burn capital building in Mexican state seat

Jennifer Allaway is a social scientist who studies diversity in games. In the wake of being targeted by Gamergate trolls, she has written an analysis of the movement as a… Read the rest of the article: Gamergate as a hate-group

From one of science fiction's most versatile writers comes a caper novel about corporate sleaze and net-savvy guerrilla activists that is as thrilling as it is trenchant. Cory Doctorow reviews Paolo Bacigalupi's The Doubt Factory.

Dronecode started as 3D Robotics' free/open codebase for UAVs, and it has grown to the point where it has flown off on its own, with a formal, community-run board and… Read the rest of the article: Dronecode: Open, community-maintained firmware for UAVs

Alex writes, "It features censorship, hangings, dissent and criticism, a whole bunch of state and church control, angry queens, sad Stationers, and, of course, our terrible culprit: the printing press."

The Republican Texas Congressjerk maintains a flying squad of political officers who descend upon the NSF to pore through its grant records looking for evidence of ideologically impure science.

I bought one of these at New York Comic-Con this weekend — it's a surprisingly good facsimile of an old NES cart; and the rubber stopper (rated to 10psi) performs… Read the rest of the article: Booze flasks that look like NES cartridges

The Judicial Conference of the US has approved the elimination of Rule 84, a court procedure designed to help small patent-holders streamline their lawsuits, but which has been weaponized by… Read the rest of the article: One weird legal trick that makes patent trolls cry

Parties unknown have hacked websites belonging to various sites linked with Hong Kong's Occupy Central/Umbrella Revolution movements, inserting nasty malware onto them that attempts to take over readers' computers.