I was talking to my web programming seminar about regular expressions and made an allusion to the xkcd comic on that topic. Unfortunately, none of them had seen it, probably because none of them were familiar with xkcd.

Students should become familiar with the concepts and practice of the discipline, but also with the culture and in-jokes that will help them fit in when they get into industry or graduate school. I also like to get people to laugh in ways that are relevant to the subject material (yes, I use a lot of cheesy geek jokes — ask me to tell you my LISP joke sometime).

I asked the Twitter community what other geek cultural elements I should introduce the students to, and here are the answers:

• The comics: xkcd, Penny Arcade
• The cute things: Kitty Hell, Pink Tentacle, Cute Overload, icanhazcheezburger (which is also, apparently, a business)
• Current events: Fake Steve, The Onion, Fark
• The blogs: Boing Boing
• The IRC: bash.org
• The shopping: Think Geek, Jinx
• The field trip: ROFLcon (Who wants to go?)

This list is thanks to (in order of appearance) @mediacrisis, @rubaiyat, @techpickles, @mattgillooly, @hempstyle, and @inkedmn.

My research group had some fun controlling SL with a Wii-mote a few weeks ago. It’s easier than you think! Several people have asked how we did it, so I hope these quick instructions might come in handy.

1. Download, install, and run DarwiinRemote.
2. Turn Bluetooth on on the Macbook. You can do this by opening the Bluetooth Preferences Pane (Apple menu, System Preferences and choose “Bluetooth” under Hardware) and clicking the big “Turn Bluetooth On” button. If Bluetooth is already on, you can skip this step!
3. Hold the Wii-mote in front of the Macbook and press buttons 1 and 2 simultaneously. The LEDs on the Wii-mote will flash.
4. As you move the Wii-mote, you’ll see your movement plotted on the screen, as you see below.
5. Drop down the option box and choose “Mouse Mode On (Motion)”.
6. Load up Second Life.
7. Fly! By default, you can control the direction with the direction keys at the end of the Wii-mote.
8. Laugh with glee, because this is cool.

The vendor containing this hat was recently deleted from Virtual Morocco by an employee of Linden Lab without any notification to me. Why? Because an anonymous person complained that it is “broadly offensive”.

Virtual Morocco was created to be both a tourism promotion platform and a space for cultural exchange. It was built entirely by undergraduate students as an educational service-learning project.

We give space in the Marrakesh Marketplace to several Moroccan artisans with virtual goods for sale. Our only requirements are that they keep everything appropriate to the sim’s theme and to the educational context of the space. The vendor selling the hat was owned by a college student (not from our institution) who specializes in items appropriate for the Morocco of the 1940s.

This hat does appear to be in the Nazi style. Even if it is, it is historically and thematically appropriate for Virtual Morocco.

Managing a space for cultural communication is not always an easy task. We have dealt with anti-Muslim intolerance, anti-American intolerance, and other forms of inappropriate behavior. When an incident occurs, I try to use it as a learning opportunity and prompt for discussion for my students and the members the our Virtual Moroccan community.

This incident has implications far beyond one college student and an ambiguously offensive hat. How can we create an academic space – a space for the free exchange of ideas – if our content can be deleted arbitrarily, by a third party?

I’m posting this now because my support request has gone unanswered for several weeks. I will post updates as the situation develops.