The Kinect Effect/L'Effet Kinect

The Kinect gaming experience is surprisingly delightful on its own, but better still are the hacks sprouting up as a result of what it can do.

This isn't just about its potential to bring Star Wars technology out of the fictional realm. My favourite hack turns tourists into statues, but a more dedicated gaming public will probably be more interested in Kinect's possibilities for cybersex.

All that's just iceberg tips. In a rare and beautiful moment of lucidity, Microsoft -- with help from twofifteenmccann San Francisco -- gives us "The Kinect Effect", a human and impactful piece of work that provides a survey of what's been done with Kinect so far, using a voice that both illuminates viewers and seems touchingly grateful.

Humor me ››

Paul Graham on the Heart of Yahoo's Problem

There's not much we can learn from Yahoo's first fatal flaw. It's probably too much to hope any company could avoid being damaged by depending on a bogus source of revenue. But startups can learn an important lesson from the second one. In the software business, you can't afford not to have a hacker-centric culture.

- Paul Graham

(Have you ever read Graham's Hackers and Painters? It's really good. It'll validate your unhappy feelings about high school ... and make you all obsessed with Lisp.)