Oh yeah, these (Anime USA 2009 pictures)

I spent my Friday evening and Saturday at Anime USA in Crystal City. I’m getting a very special guest post coming up to talk about what went down (said poster is detained this weekend, sadly). But here are some awesome pictures by yours truly.

Soapboxing

I’m balancing quality gaming time with lots Towerlight writing and course work. I’m working my way through next week’s Tyler Tech, which will be about how Google is straying from its “Don’t Be Evil” philosophy and how maybe having its hand in everything might not be such a good thing. I have seen the beast, and it may soon be Sergey Brin. What do you guys think?

Also, coming soon (tomorrow, probably, when I get around to uploading): Anime USA pics and rundown.

Happy Caturday

It’s Caturday and since this blogger is out of town, keep the party going.

Post some cats, people. The best will be highlighted upon my return.

Conventional Wisdom

View Larger Map

Map of various area cons compiled by the Baltinerd.

Photos by the Baltinerd.

Tom Stidman has racked up his fair share of frequent flyer miles. The 31-year-old customer service representative for Diamond Comics doesn’t travel for business. Rather, as his Facebook page puts it, “Fandom is my lifestyle.”

You’d need a third hand to count the conventions Stidman has been to. He has traveled up and down the East Coast, across the country and even to other countries to go to anime and science-fiction conventions, meeting new friends and chatting with his personal icons.

This is too good to not post.

An Illinois boy called 911 on his own parents for taking away his Xbox. Serious business. The cops, unfortunately, disagreed.

 

(via Destructoid)

Quiz time

Name a video game set in Baltimore. No wiki-ing. You may win a very special prize.

Edit: And no, damnit. Sports games don’t count. The game must be one where the primary action is set in Baltimore.

Unconventional Thinking

Hey readers! Yes, all four of you.

I’m looking for people who frequent Baltimore-area anime, video game and sci-fi cons for a story coming down the pipe. Email me, comment here, send a carrier pigeon. Just do what you need to do.

Free Wi-Fi now landing

Courtesy greaterbaltimore.org

I have a theory that airport concourses are one big racket, much like stadium concessions. There’s $10 lunches, $2 bottled water (since you can’t bring in your own anymore) and, of course, the $10/day or so wireless Internet access.

At least one of those is going away for a while as Google announced plans to provide free Wi-Fi in 46 airports (BWI is the only one in the region included) and on all Virgin America flights through mid-January. Woot.

(Protip: Virgin America only flies out of Washington Dulles in these parts, but they’re the best way to go if you’re going to SF or LA.)

From looking at the site, this seems like just a promotional thing, at least for the in-flight access. It’s entirely possible the free airport hot spots could just keep going and going and going…

Now if only Google could do something about the bottled water.

One other thing from TEDx

“One picture’s worth a thousand words? You give me a thousand words. I’ll give you the Lord’s Prayer, the 23rd Psalm, the Hippocratic Oath, a sonnet by Shakespeare, the preamble to the Constitution, Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, the last grafs of the speech by Martin Luther King to the march on Washington and the final entry of Anne Frank’s diary. And I wouldn’t trade you for any picture on Earth.”- Scott Simon, on the power of stories

TEDxMidAtlantic post-show report

Andy Carvin (NPR's social media guru) takes a picture of the infamous timer that ruled the day. (Photo by the Baltinerd)

It was a fantastic day down at the Brown Center, to say the least. TEDxMidAtlantic was a resounding success. Never having been to a TED conference before, I learned that TED isn’t so much about its acronym (Technology, Entertainment, Design) as it is a conference of ideas, thinkers and dreamers. The people who spoke were exactly that. You had Tony Geraci, who is helping to change the way students in city schools think about food. You had Sonja Sohn talking about taking a year away from her work for something she really believed in. You had Mark Walsh delivering a “modest proposal” on how to fix a broken Internet.

The theme of TEDxMidAtlantic, specifically, was “The Power of Stories,” and some of the stories told today I’ll have trouble forgetting. Like the diabetic child Geraci met in New Hampshire who motivated him to make a difference. Like the Sarajevo teen who moved Scott Simon. Like the funny and heartwarming way Peter Agre went from humble beginnings to Nobel laureate. Like Tyler Cowen’s hyper-meta stories about how stories are deceptive and misleading and terrible. But that’s another story. >_>

The lobby was packed during breaks. Like way packed. (Photo by the Baltinerd)

 

You’re probably thinking, “Gee, Tyler, this is all well and good, but I wasn’t there. Can you do anything else to rub it in my face?”

My answer? Sure I can. But I don’t really need to. If you missed anything (as I did, due to work engagements), video from all the speakers is posted right over this way.

And speaking of video, I caught up with curator Dave Troy afterwards to pick his brain…