geekosystem

Evernote is a very popular cross-platform note-taking app, though personally I prefer Google Keep. It seems, though, that they're not quite content being an app on someone else's device. Evernote CEO Phil Libin says they plan to build "new and magical" Evernote devices. We love new devices here at Geekosystem, but I think the bigger story is that Evernote has discovered magic.

Whatever your Halloween costume this year is going to be, it can't possibly match this magician's, which involves him sneezing his head off his body in an alleyway. Alleyways make everything creepier.

You know the shell game. This game is in magic shows, marketplaces, ballparks, you name it. You put a ball under one of three cups, move them around, and make your audience guess the cup. Here's a wooden machine that plays the shell game when you turn a crank. Nothing special, right? How wrong you are!

As part of a monthlong experiment in playing around with text, Adam Parrish, inspired by Austin Kleon's famous newspaper blackout poems, partially blacked out Magic: The Gathering cards to create mini-poems. In his own words: "Some of these turned out well, some not so well." A few more:

A former Wizards of the Coast employee, Donald J. Henry, is facing felony charges for stealing rare Magic: The Gathering cards from Wizards of the Coast. The theft was brought to WotC's attention after an employee noticed a vendor selling various rare cards at a Magic tournament in Portland, Oregon, and performed some undisclosed fancy detective work and linked the vendor to Henry. WotC launched an investigation and found that Henry took over seventy trips to the storage unit where the Magic cards were kept, which is apparently many more trips than his job would've required him to take.

WotC met with the vendor and were able to recover 1,753 cards worth a bit under $45,000.

The trick is pretty simple to perform, but takes a handful of tries to get right. Balance a quarter on the inside of a coat hanger, spin the hanger, then amaze people. Be sure to tell your audience that it's magic instead of physics, or else the trick won't work.

(via reddit)

I love Inception, and I also love playing Magic: the Gathering. If only there were some way to experience both of those wonderful things at once. Well, I made such a way. For those of you who aren't aware of the recent Magic product lines, they have introduced a new gimmick called "Duel Decks" where two classic foes duke it out with an army of spells. Each deck is designed to reflect the magical style of its protagonist, species, or faction. So today, I am honored to present Duel Decks: Extractors Vs. Dreamers.

Below are two 40-card deck lists and the accompanying card images. Click any card to see it larger in better quality. Print them out or make proxies and let me know if the decks are actually at all balanced, or just throw a Mal Cobb card into your mono-black aggro deck and see if your friends notice. Enjoy!

A Magic: the Gathering card is like a fine wine. It gets way more expensive with age. Apparently, the people over at TheCardKid have gotten their hands on a booster box of the original Alpha set. For reference, a booster box of the most recent set, Rise of the Eldrazi, costs 90 dollars. So how much does this box of old-time Magic cost? Whatever you just guessed, higher. Higher. Higher. Too high. A little too low. That's right, 26,000 dollars. What could possibly justify this insane cost? Oh, just a little something called the Power Nine: Black Lotus, Mox Pearl, Mox Sapphire, Mox Jet, Mox Ruby, Mox Emerald, Ancestral Recall, Time Walk, and Timetwister. This means that there is actually the uncanny possibility that, if you were very lucky, you could even profit on this 26,000 dollar investment. But don't take my word on that. You probably won't. Still, the chance and finding the cards of lore mixed with the general nostalgia factor of playing with the original Magic cards is a tantalizing prospect. It probably just doesn't merit selling your car to do so.