The great medieval poet Geoffrey Chaucer created timeless characters in his Canterbury Tales; archetypal personalities such as the Wife of Bath and the Miller endure to this day. Through them Chaucer could […]
Nota Bene #114: Big Star
“The radio makes hideous sounds.” Who said it?
This is not about Tiger Woods. It's about Billy Payne. And Augusta National. And sexism. And racism.
You may have caught the story last week. Augusta National Chairman Billy Payne stomped the balls off Tiger Woods for … well, if you need to be told what for, then you […]
Nota Bene #109: You Can't Tuna Fish
“It’s absolutely stunning to me, the contempt in which the network holds the audience. The idea that these people have standards is laughable.” Who said it?
Nota Bene #106: [no title due to budget cuts]
“Working for a major studio can be like trying to have sex with a porcupine. It’s one prick against thousands.” Who said it?
Nota Bene #102: Dancing Limbaughs
“What they really want to see is, they want you to chop your fucking arm off, hold up your arm, wave it around spewing blood, and believe me, if you did that, […]
Nota Bene #97: toDwI'ma' qoS yItIvqu'!
“To be truly free, and truly to appreciate its freedom, a society must be literate.”
Nota Bene #96: Saturn's Hexagon and the Bulava Spiral
“Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.”
Politico misquote of Perriello: sorry, but an apology just isn't enough

On September 22, Politico ran an article by Glenn Thrush that egregiously misrepresented the words of Rep. Tom Perriello (D-VA). The subject was town hall meetings and racist comments that he had […]
Les Paul: the man who changed everything
by Wufnik In thinking about technological change, and our relative inability to often recognize the transformational technologies at the time they come along, consider the electric guitar. Particularly the solid-body electric guitar […]