Big Brother sim Orwell is free for the next 24-ish hours.

Link.

Haven't played it myself, but I've heard good things, so be sure to check it out if it sounds like your type of thing.

Turns out Road to Wigan Pier - a book by George Orwell, though this one's without the pseudonym, so it's really written by Eric Arthur Blair, so I'm going to call him Eric to refer to the person and Orwell as his brand - is actually two books in one. The first half is thorough reporting on the poverty of coal mining communities in Britain during the 1940s, a very interesting look into the poverty of the very recent past:

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I finished watching a video by Extra Credits. It's about a so-called "game" that's being released by the Chinese communist regime as a means of competitive civil obedience.

The very nature of it is something that would make George Orwell shake in his boots. Click "Read More" to watch.

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1. Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything barbarous.

“Early in life I have noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie. I saw great battles reported where there had been no fighting, and complete silence where hundreds of men had been killed. I saw troops who had fought bravely denounced as cowards and traitors, and others who had never seen a shot fired

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