Byte Rights: In Our Own Backyard

From telling Iran they shouldn’t torture quite so many bloggers to complaining about China hacking Google, America is big on pushing Internet freedom around the world these days. Even before the Arab Revolutions, ensuring Internet freedom was an official foreign policy objective. But you know what would make us more plausible advocates for a free Internet? If we had one.

Note: This column was originally featured in the Holiday 2012 issue of the magazine.

Every girl crazy about a sharp dressed...computer chip

Long ago, all men’s suits were handmade by tailors. Then mass production made off-the-rack garments more affordable, and now only the wealthy or fastidious buy fully tailored suits. A similar trend has transformed the semiconductor industry, making custom microprocessors a luxury only for well-heeled companies.

Build your own small Steam Box PC using Valve's Big Picture Mode

As PC gamers, we’re big fans of Valve Software’s Steam service and can’t imagine life without it. We’ve got a huge library of installed games, all of our friends are on it, and almost every AAA title is released on Steam, making it indispensable. The only “problem” with Steam has been that its interface was designed for sitting 24 inches away, at a monitor, making it incompatible with couch-bound gaming. Valve has rectified this dilemma with its recently launched Big Picture Mode, which slaps a 10-foot interface on top of Steam and makes it easy to control with a gamepad. Since distance and connection issues can get in the way of running your desktop PC on your HDTV screen, we’re going to walk you through a more workable solution. First, we will advise you on selecting a small-but-powerful PC that’s suitable for a living room, then we’ll walk you through selecting appropriate peripherals, and finally we’ll show you how to get it all up and running, ready for Big Picture Mode deployment.

Note: This article appeared in the Holiday 2012 issue of the magazine.