| The Human Apparatus |
[09 Sep 2015|02:12pm] |
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http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/books/2015/09/fat_city_by_leonard_gardner_reviewed_by_katherine_dunn.html “Fat City” is old slang for prosperity and advantage—the good life. If you’re in Fat City, you’re in luck. But the phrase is wry irony as the title of a novel that has stunned and mesmerized successive generations of readers since its publication in 1969. This month New York Review Books brings out a handsome new paperback edition of Leonard Gardner’s sole novel, a slim, taut book that has earned its status as a classic by dint of its immaculate, evocative prose, a compassionate but dour view of the human condition, and the absolute credibility of its depiction of the sport of the busted beaks.
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| Babies and Bomb Squads and Bradley Cooper |
[09 Sep 2015|03:38pm] |
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http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/television/2015/09/fall_network_2015_tv_dramas_reviewed_blindspot_minority_report_limitless.html In a span of 10 days, the four major networks will premiere almost all of their new drama series. Doctors, FBI agents, amnesiacs, gamblers, Wesley Snipes, Marcia Gay Harden, healthy French fries, oil rigs, corpses, car crashes, and terrorism will all vie for your attention. Generally speaking, these dramas are not very good. A couple are not very bad. An optimist might point out that a few might get better. After all, judging a TV show by its pilot—which the networks continue to ask critics and audiences to do—is like judging a TV show by its pilot: a judgment rendered too soon, based on very little, in much flux. Another kind of optimist might point out that by this time next year, most of these shows will be canceled. Whatever kind of optimist you are, here’s a guide to eight of the season’s new dramas.
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| Hire (Some of) the Hackers |
[09 Sep 2015|04:13pm] |
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http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2015/09/the_u_s_government_needs_cybersecurity_experts_with_dodgy_pasts.html One of my computer security students came up to me after class recently, worried about his ongoing security clearance for a government internship. “I had a small run-in with the IT staff on campus a few years ago,” he told me. “They just gave me a warning, there were no repercussions or anything, but do you think that will affect my clearance?” We had just spent a week in class discussing the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and reading about all the ways that computer-based misbehavior can land you in serious trouble with the law. So it wasn’t entirely surprising that some of my students—almost all of whom are computer security majors—would be thinking about the potential consequences of their technical expertise.
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