Tessera

Alyssa Brown

@machinesentience.bsky.social

Comms at UVA Data Science. MA in Media Studies student at UVA researching 1970s Pong clones. Regal Unlimited pass holder and sci-fi enthusiast. Boldness is All 🚀✨ YouTube: https://youtube.com/@arcadiaobscura-games?si=n-S3d-95yxOGIwew

20 Posts63 Follower 65 Folgt

@ourlostarcade.bsky.social · 4w ago

Ron Haliburton is one of the few designers of electro-mechanical games that moved on into early video games! His work with All-Tech and Allied Leisure were stellar examples of late EM design. Check out the article for info on Alyssa' project!

The two-player gun game Crack Shot by Allied Leisure.

https://www.tiltedpinball.com/the-garage/em-arcades/crack-shot/

Flyer for Allied Leisure's Crack Shot game.

Alyssa Brown@machinesentience.bsky.social · 4w ago

I spoke with UVA Today about how the unearthing of a long extinct arcade machine led to my collaboration with Allied Leisure's co-founder, Ron Halliburton. Check it out: news.virginia.edu/content/pres...

Alyssa Brown @machinesentience.bsky.social · 4w ago

Kevin Bunch (ubersaurus)@atariarchive.org · 4w ago

I want to echo her sentiment that 70s coin-op (and even home) games operating with TTL logic are extremely cool and among the most endangered for preservation and historical purposes. Anyone doing this kind of work deserves their kudos.

Alyssa Brown @machinesentience.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Of the belief that everyone needs an arcade machine that they share one communal braincell with

Allied Leisure’s Robot. Featuring
four joysticks and a wooden cabinet. You can see a reflection in the cabinet of me taking a photo.

Orin 🚀🦏@orinoxide.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Happy Leland Melvin day to all who celebrate. 💚

Screenshot of a Twitter exchange in which user @kimerrikin notes that the city of Lynchburg VA declared April 7 2008 to be Leland Melvin Day, and Leland Melvin (@Astro_Flow) thanking them for reminding him.

Culture Crave 🍿@culturecrave.co · 4mo ago

Rocky's catchphrase from 'Project Hail Mary' was mentioned by the NASA team during the Artemis II mission 'Amaze, amaze, amaze'

Knapp Arcade @knapparcade.bsky.social · 8mo ago

53 years ago today, Atari released Pong Developed by Al Alcorn, he installed the prototype machine at Andy Capp's Tavern in Sunnyvale, CA. A week later, the owner called to report it was broken. When Al went in to fix it he found that the coin box was jammed full #pong #atari #arcade #1970s

Retro Computers @retrocomps.bsky.social · 9mo ago

The 1977 Coleco Telstar Arcade answered the question, "What if a game console looked like a Wild West take on the TARDIS console?"

A brown triangular prism. The top side is used to for the triangular top-loading cartridges (this cartridge has Road Race, Tennis, and Quick Draw). The facing side is the pinball interface, with two paddles, a rotary switch, 'Slam Left', 'Slam Right', a skill selector, a power switch, and a reset button. The far side is a racing interface, with steering wheel and gear selector. The right side is shooting game interface, with a realistic looking sidearm and three buttons in holes. The interface panels alternate woodgrain and faux metal.

Alyssa Brown @machinesentience.bsky.social · 9mo ago

The work is mysterious and important #Severance

Halloween costume of Helly R standing in an elevator.

Reaching out to press a button inside an elevator.

Retro Computers @retrocomps.bsky.social · 10mo ago

Man, 80s computer books made even non-relational databases look fun. (Source.)

The cover to the book, "Writing Your Own Program: Creating A Database: Adventure Game." Each line is in its own font. The computer (a black affair with rainbow keys" depicts a scuba diver swimming, handcuffs in hand, as it is attacked by a giant cross octopus; the painted octopus is literally bursting out of the monitor. A tiny little banner in the corner states: "For Commodore 64 And Apple IIe Computers"

Alyssa Brown @machinesentience.bsky.social · 10mo ago

I loved doing this Q&A with @histoftech.bsky.social on the end of AOL dial-up 🌏…☎️💻

UVA School of Data Science@uvadatascience.bsky.social · 10mo ago

On September 30, AOL is pulling the plug on its dial-up internet service. We spoke with @histoftech.bsky.social about what its departure signifies for the fast paced, tech-obsessed world we now occupy. Read our Q&A with Mar Hicks here: https://bit.ly/3IIPqgh

Pixel art illustration showing a disconnected link between a globe and a vintage computer setup, with a message at the top reading "Dialing No Longer In Progress."

Kevin Hardegree-Ullman @kevinkhu.bsky.social · 11mo ago

I gave a talk about my paper last month with this as the title slide. Can you tell I recently watched #Murderbot? 🔭 #Exoplanets

A heavily modified version of a screenshot of the show-within-a-show "The Rise & Fall of Sanctuary Moon" in the Apple TV+ series Murderbot. The title now reads "The Rise & Fall of Sub-Neptune" to reflect a recent paper by Kevin Hardegree-Ullman in which the population of sub-Neptune exoplanets experiences a rise toward cool stars, then a fall when you reach stars cooler than about 3750 Kelvin.

Kevin Hardegree-Ullman@kevinkhu.bsky.social · 11mo ago

Our now published paper can be found here! iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3... #exoplanets

Alyssa Brown @machinesentience.bsky.social · 11mo ago

Sleep Token 📷 First Horizon Coliseum

Vessel of Sleep Token with his arms held wide as he strikes a pose during Granite.

Retro Computers @retrocomps.bsky.social · 11mo ago

"If you want a computer that won't be obsolete in a few years, buy an MSX. If you want one of the best-selling MSX computers in Japan, buy a Toshiba HX10." (Source.)

A full page photo of two computers, side by side; dense ad copy down below. The left computer has a towering 1:5 ratio monitor; the right computer has a squat 4:3 monitor. The left computer reads in vector font: "I'm a Toshiba HX-10. I've got the best bits from every other home computer..." And then it goes on for many hundreds of words about its features, comparing itself favorably to the Commodore 64, the BBC Micro, the Acorn Electron, and the Oric Atmos. The right computer, a not-so disguised Acorn, reads: "Wow. With a specification list like that, no wonder you've got 64K memory."

Alyssa Brown @machinesentience.bsky.social · 11mo ago

How to Send a Bot Off on a Rant? Just Mention Star Trek (The New York Times, 1999)

Text reads, “The following are excerpts from a conversation between Robby Garner’s 1998 Loebner Prize Competition in Sydney, Australia While Albert did not merit the $100,000 grand prize, to be bestowed on the first computer whose responses are indistinguishable from a human’s, the chatterbot did win first place for ‘most human computer.’ To disguise its identity from the judges, the chatterbot used the name Jim Lewis.” The conversation between the Judge and the chatterbot is then featured.

UVA School of Data Science @uvadatascience.bsky.social · 11mo ago

Happy first day of classes, Hoos! 🧡💙 #UVA #DataScience

Four students listening to a lecture with their laptops out.

Two students with UVA hats on look on at a lecture being given.

Alyssa Brown @machinesentience.bsky.social · 12mo ago

Somehow pulled a Fuji KM-2 on Skycards this weekend

Photograph on Fuji KM-2 on Skycards with 5,990 XP rarity displayed

Culture Crave 🍿@culturecrave.co · 12mo ago

AOL is shutting down its dial-up internet after 34 years on September 30

Reactor Magazine @reactorsff.bsky.social · 12mo ago

Three years ago, @davidagranoff.bsky.social discussed parallels between Severance and the works of Philip K. Dick. Now he turns to season two: #Severance reactormag.com/i-am-a-perso...

I Am a Person and You Are Not: Philip K. Dick Themes in Season Two of Severance - Reactor

The world of Severance might look awful familiar to fans of PKD...

reactormag.com

jess reia • 何杰茜 @jhereia.bsky.social · 12mo ago

Are you interested in learning more about how gender is shaped by digitization and platform governance? Join us on Aug 28 11am EDT for the 3rd event in the Gender & Tech Online Talk Series with Julie Owono & Coleen Carrigan. Free & open to the public. Register here: virginia.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

The image displays important information about the Gender and Tech Online Talk Series:Platform governanceAugust, 11:00am - 12:15pm EDTJulie Owono - Internet Sans Frontières & Meta Oversight BoardColeen Carrigan - UVA Engineering and SocietyModerated by Yasmin Curzi.There is a QR code for registration and two logos: DTD Lab and SDS-UVA

Alyssa Brown @machinesentience.bsky.social · 12mo ago

DUNE paintings by John Schoenherr | Best of Omni Science Fiction No. 2 (1981)

A magazine page that reads, “Dune, Here is the moon is your friend, the sun your enemy. The painting features the sandworm and beautiful nighttime desert scenery.

A large painting the features the sandworm, and a caption with paintings below that reads, “Out the haze came sandworms, a massed wall of them, each with troops of Fremen riding to attack.”

More paintings, the Baron on one side. And other, a bleak desert scene. It is nightfall, a green hue casts its shadow on soldiers on the Sardaukar.

A painting of Paul riding atop of a sandworm.

Reactor Magazine @reactorsff.bsky.social · last yr.

We're delighted to reveal the cover for @zanzjan.bsky.social's Ode to the Half-Broken: a new hopepunk novel following a robot reckoning with their past and choosing a new future 🤖🌱 reactormag.com/cover-reveal...

Revealing Ode to the Half-Broken by Suzanne Palmer - Reactor

A new hope-punk novel (with a cyborg dog!) arriving April 2026

reactormag.com

Ted Stryk @tedstryk.bsky.social · last yr.

Jupiter and Io from Voyager 2 on June 25, 1979.

Star Trek Minus Context @nocontexttrek1.bsky.social · last yr.

Star Trek The Original Series scene. Spock is onboard the Enterprise and shown holding a terrifying alien creature. A MONSTER! (The creature is a small dog, probably some kind of terrier, wearing costume of extra fur and a unicorn horn headband)
Closed caption reads, "[music]"

Retro Computers @retrocomps.bsky.social · last yr.

"Paul, we're doing an article about data compression techniques. We just need something that illustrates compressing data." "Say no more, Cliff."

A splash page from the October 1993 issue of Compute magazine. Floating in a vaporwave plane, in the center of a piece of graph paper, a giant ebony floating head is quadrated off; but is missing the pieces in the center. Around the head is the number 4, a triangle, the symbol for pi, a mouse cursor, and various lines of navigation. Behind the head is a sunset. Into the head's open hole flies a microchip, a semicirclular prism, a pole, and a chessboard.

Martha Wells @marthawells.com · last yr.

If you missed it, there's a new Murderbot short story at: reactormag.com/rapport-mart...

Rapport: Friendship, Solidarity, Communion, Empathy - Reactor

Perihelion and its crew embark on a dangerous new mission at a corporate-controlled station in the throes of a hostile takeover… Novelette | 7,540 words They were still three hours out when Perihelion...

reactormag.com

The Spaceshipper 🚀@thespaceshipper.com · last yr.

The Black Hole (1979): The practical model of the USS Cygnus was filmed in front of a starfield, not a blue screen ☝️

The Black Hole model set with a starfield

The USS Cygnus model in front of a starfield

Alyssa Brown @machinesentience.bsky.social · last yr.

The Honeywell Kitchen Computer • At the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California • In the 1969 Neiman-Marcus Christmas Book • In the December 12, 1969 edition of Life magazine

Panel of the Honeywell Kitchen Computer with the silhouette of a smart phone across its white surface.

Magazine page that features a woman in an apron with one hand on the kitchen computer. Text reads, “If she can only cook as well as Honeywell can computer.”

A woman sits in a chair across from her kitchen computer featuring a very long scroll of paper cluttering a kitchen space.