shakespeare

'Shakespeare's Star Wars' has the droids for which thou searchest

At last, the mother of all mashups is upon us. Boba Fett has met the Bard, and the result is "William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, a New Hope."

Many a nerdy writer type will surely have the same initial reaction I did upon learning of such a brilliant piece of literary pop culture/hipster-clout-raising coffee table candy: searing jealousy for not having thought of it first. Then I read on to learn that the author, Ph.D. and all-around smart guy Ian Doescher, not only rewrote "A New Hope" in the style of Bill Shakespeare, but also wrote it completely in iambic pentameter, a feat for which a very few of us are cut out to even attempt, let alone pull off.… Read more

Virtual monkeys recreate Shakespeare? Methinks not

I was pleasantly surprised today to hear of Jesse Anderson's success in getting randomly typing virtual monkeys to recreate a Shakespeare poem.

Alas and alack, though, I found this tale of computational prowess conquering statistical improbability too good to be true.

Anderson said his virtual monkeys successfully recreated A Lover's Complaint, an astounding accomplishment given that it has, by my count, 13,940 characters in 2,587 words. Anderson, a programmer in Reno, Nev., said on Friday:

Today (2011-09-23) at 2:30 PST the monkeys successfully randomly recreated "A Lover's Complaint." This is the first … Read more

The 404 895: Where we meet a schmuck in a suit (podcast)

Sir Jon of Strick-land is a longtime listener of the podcast, but we never knew he was fluent in Elizabethan English until today's episode--by my troth, this should be good.

Jon tells us about his adventures in cosplay at local Renaissance Faires back home in Georgia, and also gives us a preview of his costume at this year's DragonCon--a Renaissance-themed Lex Luthor!

We'll also hear a voice mail from a listener in Berkeley spearheading a movement to proliferate a sarcasm font called Sartalics--along the same lines as the SarcMark, but way cooler.

The 404 Digest for Episode 895

Follow Jon Strickland on Twitter. Woman gets duped by thieves, buys wooden "iPad." Listener "California from Maya" Photoshops the first Domino's Pizza on the moon. Convey sarcasm online using Sartalics. Survival tips for DragonCon, a gathering of sci-fi and fantasy fans.

Episode 895 Subscribe in iTunes (audio) | Subscribe in iTunes (video) | Subscribe in RSS Audio | Subscribe in RSS Video… Read more

Readdle puts iOS apps on sale for 48 hours

Readdle makes several highly rated "productivity" iOS apps, including Readdle Docs, Scanner Pro, Printer Pro, and PDF Expert. They tend to run a little pricier than your typical 99-cent game, ranging in price from about $4.99 to $9.99, which is why we thought it worth pointing out that Readdle is having a 48-hour sale to celebrate its 4th birthday (it rarely puts its apps on sale).

The developer is also behind the free Shakespeare app that gives you access to the complete works of William Shakespeare. A Pro version that adds features such as a glossary, … Read more

The 404 849: Where we're taking a mulligan (podcast)

Did Shakespeare smoke the devil's lettuce? Joey Kaminski fills in for Wilson today to help us discuss this question and more, like should Jeff go to the world's first tickle spa? How would you evaluate Subway's $5 foot-long sandwich policy? And how do I get free Uncharted 3 and Call of Duty Black Ops (Annihilation)? We'll try our best to answer them all!

The 404 Digest for Episode 849

Capcom tries to kill used video game sales with the one-save game. Instead of pejazzling, Jeff should go to the world's first tickle spa. Twenty craziest job interview questions and the right answers. Crazies exhume Shakespeare's body to see if he smoked marijuana. Did you know that every episode of "Seinfeld" has a Superman reference? Whoa...dude!

Episode 849 Subscribe in iTunes (audio) | Subscribe in iTunes (video) | Subscribe in RSS Audio | Subscribe in RSS Video… Read more

The 404 791: Where we're rolling with the homies (podcast)

Happy 404 Day! To celebrate the second most popular day in April, we've kicked Wilson off the show and replaced him with Mark Licea. Happy Monday! Today we're chatting about an immersive new take on Shakespeare's "Macbeth" story, nude therapists working in New York, an Android bootleg that publicly embarrasses pirates, and Web vigilantes Anonymous joining hackers GeoHot and Graf_Chokolo in their fight against Sony.

The 404 Digest for Episode 791

"Sleep No More" offers a modern take on classic theater. Pirates beware: a bootleg Android app punishes with public shaming. A therapist in NYC meets with clients with clothes on, then slowly takes them off. Speaking of nudes, a Web developer site is looking to recruit nude female Web coders. .01% of Wikipedia is equivalent to 952 volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica...and it's for sale.

Episode 791 Subscribe in iTunes (audio) | Subscribe in iTunes (video) | Subscribe in RSS Audio | Subscribe in RSS Video… Read more

Sarah Palin inspires Shakespeare Twitter meme

There are those who believe that Sarah Palin, the former governor of Alaska, has suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.

However, I believe that she has unquestionably been misunderestimated. It seems clear that she is far more in demand, far more influential, and certainly far wealthier than the majority of her critics.

In order to show just how great an impact her every word can have on society, Palin has inspired a new, vibrant meme on Twitter, one that allows those who were lazy and complacent in high school to finally exercise the relics of their inner literary … Read more

Finalists announced for Twitter star seance

Perhaps you were one of those who voted for your favorite corpse to be one who will participate in the Tweance.

The Tweance? Yes, the Halloween seance to be performed upon the heavenly medium that is Twitter.

Famous and entirely reliable psychic Jayne Wallace is to tweet her way to and through heaven and hell this Friday, between the hours of 10 a.m. and midday British Thoroughly Awful Time (3 a.m. to 5 a.m. Pacific)

We, the grieving earthly leftbehinds, were asked by the organizers--some folks called Angels Fancy Dress--to vote for our most cherished and lost … Read more

Remixing Shakespeare and the art of great code

I bought a book for my wife yesterday at Foyles in London, which I couldn't manage to stop reading once I had started. It's a new Bill Bryson book called Shakespeare: The World as Stage and parses the research around Shakespeare the person and his writing, without ever becoming tedious. It's an excellent read.

What struck me most, however, was just how much Shakespeare borrowed from other writers, and how accepted this was in his day.

[Shakespeare's] success was not...without its shortcuts. Shakespeare didn't scruple to steal plots, dialogue, names and titles - whatever suited his purpose. To paraphrase George Bernard Shaw, Shakespeare was a wonderful teller of stories so long as someone else had told them first....… Read more