• Call Signs by Black Cab

• Stars Out by broaddaylight

• Disorientation by Deep Cut

• Purple Bloom by Purple Bloom

• Colour Trip by Ringo Deathstarr

• Hover by The Sleepover Disaster

• Creatures of an Hour by Still Corners

• Northern Sky by 93 Million Miles From the Sun

• APOK by iVardensphere

• Gravity the Seducer by Ladytron

• Somnific Flux by M.J. Harris and Bill Laswell

• Sheath by LFO

• Like A Slow River by Lull

• 3-D by SPC-ECO

• Big Fat World EP by SPC-ECO

• Psychic Life by Jah Wobble & Julie Campbell

• Bodycode by Diffuzion

• E.P. by drowner

• Treny by Jacaszek

• Common Burn by Mazzy Star

• Lay Myself Down by Mazzy Star

• Do With Me What You Want by Mona Mur / En Esch

• Chao Organica in A Minor by Soriah

• Ofrendas de Luz a Los Muertos by Soriah

• Eztica by Soriah with Ashkelon Sain

• Automatic by VNV Nation

• Back From The Dead by Zombie Girl

It’s been a horrible year for losing giants in the computing industry.

John McCarthy coined the term AI, and was highly influential in time-sharing systems (read: multitasking).

Now, I don’t write AI code, and I’m not an OS programmer, but John McCarthy’s impact on my life is nonetheless immense, because he invented the LISP programming language, and LISP powers Emacs. If a warrior lived and died by their sword, a coder lives and dies by their editor – I’m a tenth as productive in a mundane text editor as I am in Emacs, and LISP is a beautiful (if, to the untrained eye, inscrutable) language.

• beyond within and so on by iszoloscope

• Les Gorges Des Limbes by iszoloscope

• How to Enslist in a Robot Uprising by memmaker

• A Perfect Solution (Deluxe) by Mesh

• Erection Body Mutilated by Obszön Geschöpf

• Atlan by Soriah with Ashkelon Sain

• Conatus by Zola Jesus

If I owe the start of my career to Apple, it’s only fair to admit that I owe the bulk of it to Dennis Ritchie. Dennis Ritchie was a co-creator of unix, the inventor of the C Programming Language, and the co-author of this gem:
I’m long past needing this book, but I keep it on my shelf. Both as a reminder of where I came from, and as a monument to the absolute zenith of technical writing.

There’s not a computer system in the world today that doesn’t owe some of its heritage to either C or Unix. Dennis was a quiet giant of computer science. He wasn’t a public figure like Steve Jobs, but his impact on the field of technology was at least as large, and his loss an equally terrible blow.

My condolences to the Jobs family, and all of their friends. I wish you’d had more time with each other.

The first computer I ever used was an Apple ][+. The first I ever owned was an Apple //c, and I used that machine to learn how to program.

Today, I use a Mac all day, every day, and earn my living writing software for iOS.

Thank you, Steve. You will be missed.

• Mother Ignorance by Army of the Universe

• Animal by Autokratz

• Shades of Grey by Autumn’s Grey Solace

• A Bureaucratic Desire for Extra Capsular Extraction by Earth

• The Complicated Futility of Ignorance by Fudge Tunnel

• Live at Floristree, 1.26.08 by Growing

• Akasha by Isobella

• A.M. by Magnetic Morning

• Death Threat by My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult

• Faults by Seefeel

• Seven Tales of the North Wind by Rhian Sheehan

• Fourteen Summers and Fifteen Winters by The Twilight Sad

• Feindflug (Vierte Version) by Feindflug

• Occult Radiance by Fleeting Joys

• Ascension by Jesu

• Blackest Beat by IS/IS

• Dreamweb by mind.in.a.box

• Neurosis & Jarboe by Neurosis & Jarboe

• Turning Point by Prospero

• Shapeshifting by Young Galaxy

• N-Plants by Biosphere

• Fission by Film School

• Despondent Transponder by Fleeting Joys

• Disappear Here (Widescreen Edition) by Hybrid

• WTF?! by KMFDM

• Ephemeral by Pelican

• Culture of Fear by Thievery Corporation

• Raven in the Grave by The Raveonettes