Electric Josh

BW
The Death of Horatio Alger: "The other day I found myself reading a leftist rag that made outrageous claims about America. It said that we are becoming a society in which the poor tend to stay poor, no matter how hard they work; in which sons are much more likely to inherit the socioeconomic status of their father than they were a generation ago. The name of the leftist rag? Business Week..."
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Video games
I don't play video games because it would infuriate both my employer and my family, and nothing good could come of doing either. Why get myself hooked on something I don't have time for? (How sad.) However, this Times Magazine article about the sort-of rebirth of Atari contains the following snippet:

But the fact is that parents who are unsettled by video games -- who have let this phenomenon into their homes without necessarily understanding what it is -- are onto something.

John Hurlbut of Atari tells the story of his teenage daughter playing RollerCoaster Tycoon, one of the least violent games imaginable. In the course of the game it's possible to zoom in on any one amusement-park patron. ''There was this one guy,'' he says, ''who just had this scowl on his face. It really bothered her. She built new rides, she opened up concession stands, she lowered all her prices and she kept checking in with this one guy, but he just kept frowning. So finally, she clicked on him, picked him up, dragged him over to the river and dropped him in. 'Daddy, I tried everything,' she said. 'But I just couldn't make him happy.' ''

I'm completely delighted with this anecdote. Unsettling? This is fantastic! Kids need humor. Half the fun of The Sims is waiting until one or more characters are in a particular room, pausing the game, replacing the doors with walls, and then waiting for the characters to die; or triggering earthquakes or releasing monsters in SimCity; and so on.

Must, get, Playstation...
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