The Journal of Rockett Science

[Obama] must not just rally the House Dems, he must rally the country. He must bring us back in. And we must back him up. This is not just about a centrist comprehensive health reform bill. It is about defeating an entire brand of cowardly, cynical, spin cycle bullshit that has brought this country down and promoting an adult and reasonable discourse that grapples with our problems.

That’s what we elected him for.

Maybe there was something in the air during the early ’70s. Maybe it was historically inevitable. But it seems way more than convenient coincidence that Gygax and Arneson got their first packet of rules for D&D out the door in 1974, two short years after Nolan Bushnell managed to cobble together a little arcade machine called Pong.

We’ve never had fun quite the same way since.

OK Go frontman Damian Kulash clears up something I’ve wondered about for a long time: why major music labels often restrict fans from embedding artists’ YouTube videos on other sites. Don’t they want awareness of these artists to spread? Don’t they earn revenue from YouTube’s advertising?

According to Kulash, the answer to the first question is “Yes, but not as much as they want revenue from those videos,” and the answer to the second question is, “They do, but it only works if you watch it on YouTube.com.” It turns out that video rightsholders don’t see any ad revenue from embedded videos, which is new information to me. I sincerely hope that YouTube is able to remedy that situation.

Something else Kulash says touches on something I deal with a lot at my job: the issue of whether to drive people to one site for content, or make that content available on as many sites as possible. There are pros and cons to both, and the option you choose depends on what you’re trying to accomplish. From OK Gos’ perspective, Kulash says “it is better for us to have 40 million hits on one site than one million hits on 40 sites. It makes it easier to advertise ourselves to potential sponsors, or it makes it easier for us to explain to a promoter in Albania why they actually do want us to come to their country.”

The exhibit runs January 23 through June 27 at the Washington State History Museum, and looks at folklore, science, hoaxes and history surrounding the Sasquatch phenomenon. Included in the exhibit will be physical evidence of Sasquatch collected by researcher Dr. Grover Krantz, whose bones are currently on display at the Smithsonian. Yes, you read that correctly.

The Mouse Guard Finger Puppet Kit is a free PDF download from mouseguard.net.