While looking for something completely different, I came across a paper discussing bioterrorism in terms of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, called Biological Warfare and the "Buffy Paradigm" (PDF). [via Considered Harmful].

The parallels drawn make for interesting reading. And it includes this fabulous paragraph:

I realize that those of you who are workaholics or who are simply mature and without children or younger relatives may never have seen this show. It is, however, about a teenage vampire slayer who lives in a world of unpredictable threats where each series of crises only becomes predictable when it is over and is followed by a new and unfamiliar one.

7:18:18 PM  (comments [])   

Don't go looking for something crazy different here; W3 is clearly the inbred successor of W2 and StarCraft. But as Martha would say, "That's a Good Thing." All of your Mad Skills learned in those earlier games will serve you here, but there enough new twists to keep things interesting. I'm totally into the Heroes and the smaller forces.

Also, it turns out that if you're in Battle.net, you can whisper to people who are... playing in games. VERY COOL. And they can whisper back. (Don't know if this was in earlier games or not.) There's also a friends list (I think this is new) that lets you see the status of your pals (playing in a game, disconnected, etc.)

We did a 2 player vs 1 computer game, and managed to kick righteous butt, with some amount of struggle. Since I'm still getting build order under my belt, I felt pretty good about that.

Looking forward to more online mayhem later.  2:34:19 PM  (comments [])