Dr. Chuk Moran has recently completed his dissertation on the undo command (ctrl-z) and received his PhD in the Department of Communication at UC San Diego. Unfortunately, Improbable has not been able to track down an online copy of the dissertation, but we did find this short essay on the implications of ludological undoing. BONUS: […]
Tag: games
Shuttlecock aerodynamics : part 4 : an enigma
The 16 feathers traditionally used to construct traditional shuttlecocks are normally organised in an overlapping spiral arrangement. As a result, the shuttlecock tends to whirl in flight, adding spin-stability to what would otherwise be a more haphazard trajectory. But raising the question, in which direction should it rotate? The Badminton World Federation (which oversees international […]
Shuttlecock aerodynamics: part 3
“The shuttlecock soars upward In a parabola of whiteness, Turns, And sinks to a perfect arc.” This extract, from one of the few eminent poems to prominently feature shuttlecocks, is by Amy Lawrence Lowell, (Men, Women and Ghosts, A Roxbury Garden,1916) and is quoted in the latest research regarding the aerodynamics of shuttlecocks. A study by […]
Gamification and deGamification
The origin of the word ‘Gamification’ is not entirely certain, but some attribute it to professor Richard Bartle FRSA of the School of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at the University of Essex, UK who was working on MUD circa 1980. The exact meaning of the word is slightly fuzzy around the edges too – […]