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  <channel>
    <fireside:hostname>web02.fireside.fm</fireside:hostname>
    <fireside:genDate>Wed, 06 May 2026 16:13:32 -0500</fireside:genDate>
    <generator>Fireside (https://fireside.fm)</generator>
    <title>Topic Lords - Episodes Tagged with “Stephan”</title>
    <link>https://topiclords.com/tags/stephan</link>
    <pubDate>Mon, 22 May 2023 00:00:00 -0700</pubDate>
    <description>Every week, Jim invites different friends to guest on Topic Lords and be excited about whatever they've been fixated on this week.
</description>
    <language>en-us</language>
    <itunes:type>episodic</itunes:type>
    <itunes:subtitle>The only place on the internet you can hear topics discussed!</itunes:subtitle>
    <itunes:author>Jim Stormdancer</itunes:author>
    <itunes:summary>Every week, Jim invites different friends to guest on Topic Lords and be excited about whatever they've been fixated on this week.
</itunes:summary>
    <itunes:image href="https://media24.fireside.fm/file/fireside-images-2024/podcasts/images/3/3597ddeb-e52e-4cda-a59c-c64600489fea/cover.jpg?v=5"/>
    <itunes:explicit>yes</itunes:explicit>
    <itunes:owner>
      <itunes:name>Jim Stormdancer</itunes:name>
      <itunes:email>jim@goombas.org</itunes:email>
    </itunes:owner>
<itunes:category text="Comedy"/>
<itunes:category text="Education"/>
<itunes:category text="Arts"/>
<item>
  <title>187. The Second-Best Whale Playground in Emeryville</title>
  <link>https://topiclords.com/the-second-best-whale-playground-in-emeryville</link>
  <guid isPermaLink="false">5f84c33d-04eb-435e-876b-0b91d5b59ac0</guid>
  <pubDate>Mon, 22 May 2023 00:00:00 -0700</pubDate>
  <author>Jim Stormdancer</author>
  <enclosure url="https://aphid.fireside.fm/d/1437767933/3597ddeb-e52e-4cda-a59c-c64600489fea/5f84c33d-04eb-435e-876b-0b91d5b59ac0.mp3" length="65815287" type="audio/mpeg"/>
  <itunes:episodeType>full</itunes:episodeType>
  <itunes:author>Jim Stormdancer</itunes:author>
  <itunes:subtitle>Lords: Cort and Stephan. We discuss asymmetrical USB-C cables, playground improvement over the last decade, bedtime guitar, Where the Wild Things Are, classic game hardware as a kind of virtual console, and constructing a computing environment as a nested series of cages for a child to escape </itunes:subtitle>
  <itunes:duration>1:08:13</itunes:duration>
  <itunes:explicit>yes</itunes:explicit>
  <itunes:image href="https://media24.fireside.fm/file/fireside-images-2024/podcasts/images/3/3597ddeb-e52e-4cda-a59c-c64600489fea/cover.jpg?v=5"/>
  <description>&lt;p&gt;Lords:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Cort&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Stephan

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://lonelystarsoftware.itch.io/playdapon" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener"&gt;https://lonelystarsoftware.itch.io/playdapon&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Topics:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;USB-C cables that only work in one orientation

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="http://blog.zarfhome.com/2023/04/usb-c-and-plague-of-grackles.html" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener"&gt;http://blog.zarfhome.com/2023/04/usb-c-and-plague-of-grackles.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Playgrounds seem to have gotten really good again in the last ten years&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Bedtime guitar update&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Where the Wild Things Are

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://genius.com/Maurice-sendak-where-the-wild-things-are-annotated" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener"&gt;https://genius.com/Maurice-sendak-where-the-wild-things-are-annotated&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Classic hardware has become a kind of fantasy console

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023/04/wi-fi-in-an-nes-cartridge-super-tilt-bro-takes-the-1985-console-online/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener"&gt;https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023/04/wi-fi-in-an-nes-cartridge-super-tilt-bro-takes-the-1985-console-online/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.thenew8bitheroes.com/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener"&gt;https://www.thenew8bitheroes.com/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.gbstudio.dev/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener"&gt;https://www.gbstudio.dev/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Constructing a computing environment as a nested series of cages for a child to escape&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Microtopics:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Extra plugs.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Mr. Saitou&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;How to sideload software onto the Playdate.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Trying to make Sifteo happen.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Where to find all the fancy MacIntosh dithering algorithms.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Ableton for the Sega Megadrive.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Who Zarf is.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;EU legislation saying that phones must charge via USB-C, which is unsustainable, when the text of the law ought to have been "Apple, knock that shit off."&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Getting rid of your bucket of cables.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Never throwing away wood because you might need one that shape some day &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Never throwing away oddly shaped pieces of wood because you might become a carpenter some day.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Playgrounds getting bad and then good again.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Getting breakfast at the Emeryville Public Market.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Whether swings or seesaws still exist.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Giant wooden castles with bridges going between them.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;How to make the spinny playground things safe.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;A regionally variable playground.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;What countries have and don't have playgrounds.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;The San Lorenzo Community Park.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;A big stone bear you can climb on.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Whether any of those playground speaking tubes have ever worked.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Wanting the world to have magic in it so you lie to your kid about science.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;The Dennis the Menace playground in Monterey.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Periodically removing the poison oak.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Growing up and being on the other side of the memory.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;The Dead Dad playground turning into a fenced-off deathtrap.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Procedural memory for nice melodies.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Mountain dulcimers vs. hammered dulcimers.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Walking around with a bandolier of mountain dulcimers, one for every key.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;What happens when you're living in the Appalachians and you want to make a violin but you can't.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;What to do with your ability to play an instrument when you have no free time.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Maintaining a consistent strumming pattern while singing.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Strumming and finding finger positions intuitively.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Here's all the notes. Play the right ones at the right times.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;The Virtual Console of musical instruments.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Jim's favorite note in the mixolydian mode.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Where the Wild Things Are for Xbox 360.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;A poem with hardly any punctuation.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Going on a journey of many weeks in just a few pages.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Max in a wolf suit fighting bees with a stick.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Maurice Sendak Kart Racer.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Dinosaur Time.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Clapping for names you know.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;A building with dinosaur bones in it.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Rumpusing things.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Games where you whack shadow spiders with a stick.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;GB Studio.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Putting a wifi adapter in an NES cartridge.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;The Mario modding tool set.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;An IDE for making NES games.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Pi-Boy D.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Doing homebrew development on a system that is still in active use.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Castlevania: Passacaglia of Disrepair.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;GBA of Theseus.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Making a Lynx game that supports 8-player multiplayer, when there aren't 8 people who own the system.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Porting a game about matching colors to a monochrome display.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Giving your kids a computer running Linux to teach them sysadmin skills, but they just play games on their phone instead.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Branded Scratch Wrappers.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Composing new music for the extended What the Golf? cinematic universe.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;How to unlock your school laptop to play the Chrome Dinosaur Game. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
</description>
  <content:encoded>
    <![CDATA[<p>Lords:</p>

<ul>
<li>Cort</li>
<li>Stephan

<ul>
<li><a href="https://lonelystarsoftware.itch.io/playdapon" rel="nofollow">https://lonelystarsoftware.itch.io/playdapon</a></li>
</ul></li>
</ul>

<p>Topics:</p>

<ul>
<li>USB-C cables that only work in one orientation

<ul>
<li><a href="http://blog.zarfhome.com/2023/04/usb-c-and-plague-of-grackles.html" rel="nofollow">http://blog.zarfhome.com/2023/04/usb-c-and-plague-of-grackles.html</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li>Playgrounds seem to have gotten really good again in the last ten years</li>
<li>Bedtime guitar update</li>
<li>Where the Wild Things Are

<ul>
<li><a href="https://genius.com/Maurice-sendak-where-the-wild-things-are-annotated" rel="nofollow">https://genius.com/Maurice-sendak-where-the-wild-things-are-annotated</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li>Classic hardware has become a kind of fantasy console

<ul>
<li><a href="https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023/04/wi-fi-in-an-nes-cartridge-super-tilt-bro-takes-the-1985-console-online/" rel="nofollow">https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023/04/wi-fi-in-an-nes-cartridge-super-tilt-bro-takes-the-1985-console-online/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.thenew8bitheroes.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.thenew8bitheroes.com/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.gbstudio.dev/" rel="nofollow">https://www.gbstudio.dev/</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li>Constructing a computing environment as a nested series of cages for a child to escape</li>
</ul>

<p>Microtopics:</p>

<ul>
<li>Extra plugs.</li>
<li>Mr. Saitou</li>
<li>How to sideload software onto the Playdate.</li>
<li>Trying to make Sifteo happen.</li>
<li>Where to find all the fancy MacIntosh dithering algorithms.</li>
<li>Ableton for the Sega Megadrive.</li>
<li>Who Zarf is.</li>
<li>EU legislation saying that phones must charge via USB-C, which is unsustainable, when the text of the law ought to have been &quot;Apple, knock that shit off.&quot;</li>
<li>Getting rid of your bucket of cables.</li>
<li>Never throwing away wood because you might need one that shape some day </li>
<li>Never throwing away oddly shaped pieces of wood because you might become a carpenter some day.</li>
<li>Playgrounds getting bad and then good again.</li>
<li>Getting breakfast at the Emeryville Public Market.</li>
<li>Whether swings or seesaws still exist.</li>
<li>Giant wooden castles with bridges going between them.</li>
<li>How to make the spinny playground things safe.</li>
<li>A regionally variable playground.</li>
<li>What countries have and don&#39;t have playgrounds.</li>
<li>The San Lorenzo Community Park.</li>
<li>A big stone bear you can climb on.</li>
<li>Whether any of those playground speaking tubes have ever worked.</li>
<li>Wanting the world to have magic in it so you lie to your kid about science.</li>
<li>The Dennis the Menace playground in Monterey.</li>
<li>Periodically removing the poison oak.</li>
<li>Growing up and being on the other side of the memory.</li>
<li>The Dead Dad playground turning into a fenced-off deathtrap.</li>
<li>Procedural memory for nice melodies.</li>
<li>Mountain dulcimers vs. hammered dulcimers.</li>
<li>Walking around with a bandolier of mountain dulcimers, one for every key.</li>
<li>What happens when you&#39;re living in the Appalachians and you want to make a violin but you can&#39;t.</li>
<li>What to do with your ability to play an instrument when you have no free time.</li>
<li>Maintaining a consistent strumming pattern while singing.</li>
<li>Strumming and finding finger positions intuitively.</li>
<li>Here&#39;s all the notes. Play the right ones at the right times.</li>
<li>The Virtual Console of musical instruments.</li>
<li>Jim&#39;s favorite note in the mixolydian mode.</li>
<li>Where the Wild Things Are for Xbox 360.</li>
<li>A poem with hardly any punctuation.</li>
<li>Going on a journey of many weeks in just a few pages.</li>
<li>Max in a wolf suit fighting bees with a stick.</li>
<li>Maurice Sendak Kart Racer.</li>
<li>Dinosaur Time.</li>
<li>Clapping for names you know.</li>
<li>A building with dinosaur bones in it.</li>
<li>Rumpusing things.</li>
<li>Games where you whack shadow spiders with a stick.</li>
<li>GB Studio.</li>
<li>Putting a wifi adapter in an NES cartridge.</li>
<li>The Mario modding tool set.</li>
<li>An IDE for making NES games.</li>
<li>Pi-Boy D.</li>
<li>Doing homebrew development on a system that is still in active use.</li>
<li>Castlevania: Passacaglia of Disrepair.</li>
<li>GBA of Theseus.</li>
<li>Making a Lynx game that supports 8-player multiplayer, when there aren&#39;t 8 people who own the system.</li>
<li>Porting a game about matching colors to a monochrome display.</li>
<li>Giving your kids a computer running Linux to teach them sysadmin skills, but they just play games on their phone instead.</li>
<li>Branded Scratch Wrappers.</li>
<li>Composing new music for the extended What the Golf? cinematic universe.</li>
<li>How to unlock your school laptop to play the Chrome Dinosaur Game.</li>
</ul><p><a rel="payment" href="http://patreon.com/topiclords">Support Topic Lords</a></p>]]>
  </content:encoded>
  <itunes:summary>
    <![CDATA[<p>Lords:</p>

<ul>
<li>Cort</li>
<li>Stephan

<ul>
<li><a href="https://lonelystarsoftware.itch.io/playdapon" rel="nofollow">https://lonelystarsoftware.itch.io/playdapon</a></li>
</ul></li>
</ul>

<p>Topics:</p>

<ul>
<li>USB-C cables that only work in one orientation

<ul>
<li><a href="http://blog.zarfhome.com/2023/04/usb-c-and-plague-of-grackles.html" rel="nofollow">http://blog.zarfhome.com/2023/04/usb-c-and-plague-of-grackles.html</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li>Playgrounds seem to have gotten really good again in the last ten years</li>
<li>Bedtime guitar update</li>
<li>Where the Wild Things Are

<ul>
<li><a href="https://genius.com/Maurice-sendak-where-the-wild-things-are-annotated" rel="nofollow">https://genius.com/Maurice-sendak-where-the-wild-things-are-annotated</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li>Classic hardware has become a kind of fantasy console

<ul>
<li><a href="https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023/04/wi-fi-in-an-nes-cartridge-super-tilt-bro-takes-the-1985-console-online/" rel="nofollow">https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023/04/wi-fi-in-an-nes-cartridge-super-tilt-bro-takes-the-1985-console-online/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.thenew8bitheroes.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.thenew8bitheroes.com/</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.gbstudio.dev/" rel="nofollow">https://www.gbstudio.dev/</a></li>
</ul></li>
<li>Constructing a computing environment as a nested series of cages for a child to escape</li>
</ul>

<p>Microtopics:</p>

<ul>
<li>Extra plugs.</li>
<li>Mr. Saitou</li>
<li>How to sideload software onto the Playdate.</li>
<li>Trying to make Sifteo happen.</li>
<li>Where to find all the fancy MacIntosh dithering algorithms.</li>
<li>Ableton for the Sega Megadrive.</li>
<li>Who Zarf is.</li>
<li>EU legislation saying that phones must charge via USB-C, which is unsustainable, when the text of the law ought to have been &quot;Apple, knock that shit off.&quot;</li>
<li>Getting rid of your bucket of cables.</li>
<li>Never throwing away wood because you might need one that shape some day </li>
<li>Never throwing away oddly shaped pieces of wood because you might become a carpenter some day.</li>
<li>Playgrounds getting bad and then good again.</li>
<li>Getting breakfast at the Emeryville Public Market.</li>
<li>Whether swings or seesaws still exist.</li>
<li>Giant wooden castles with bridges going between them.</li>
<li>How to make the spinny playground things safe.</li>
<li>A regionally variable playground.</li>
<li>What countries have and don&#39;t have playgrounds.</li>
<li>The San Lorenzo Community Park.</li>
<li>A big stone bear you can climb on.</li>
<li>Whether any of those playground speaking tubes have ever worked.</li>
<li>Wanting the world to have magic in it so you lie to your kid about science.</li>
<li>The Dennis the Menace playground in Monterey.</li>
<li>Periodically removing the poison oak.</li>
<li>Growing up and being on the other side of the memory.</li>
<li>The Dead Dad playground turning into a fenced-off deathtrap.</li>
<li>Procedural memory for nice melodies.</li>
<li>Mountain dulcimers vs. hammered dulcimers.</li>
<li>Walking around with a bandolier of mountain dulcimers, one for every key.</li>
<li>What happens when you&#39;re living in the Appalachians and you want to make a violin but you can&#39;t.</li>
<li>What to do with your ability to play an instrument when you have no free time.</li>
<li>Maintaining a consistent strumming pattern while singing.</li>
<li>Strumming and finding finger positions intuitively.</li>
<li>Here&#39;s all the notes. Play the right ones at the right times.</li>
<li>The Virtual Console of musical instruments.</li>
<li>Jim&#39;s favorite note in the mixolydian mode.</li>
<li>Where the Wild Things Are for Xbox 360.</li>
<li>A poem with hardly any punctuation.</li>
<li>Going on a journey of many weeks in just a few pages.</li>
<li>Max in a wolf suit fighting bees with a stick.</li>
<li>Maurice Sendak Kart Racer.</li>
<li>Dinosaur Time.</li>
<li>Clapping for names you know.</li>
<li>A building with dinosaur bones in it.</li>
<li>Rumpusing things.</li>
<li>Games where you whack shadow spiders with a stick.</li>
<li>GB Studio.</li>
<li>Putting a wifi adapter in an NES cartridge.</li>
<li>The Mario modding tool set.</li>
<li>An IDE for making NES games.</li>
<li>Pi-Boy D.</li>
<li>Doing homebrew development on a system that is still in active use.</li>
<li>Castlevania: Passacaglia of Disrepair.</li>
<li>GBA of Theseus.</li>
<li>Making a Lynx game that supports 8-player multiplayer, when there aren&#39;t 8 people who own the system.</li>
<li>Porting a game about matching colors to a monochrome display.</li>
<li>Giving your kids a computer running Linux to teach them sysadmin skills, but they just play games on their phone instead.</li>
<li>Branded Scratch Wrappers.</li>
<li>Composing new music for the extended What the Golf? cinematic universe.</li>
<li>How to unlock your school laptop to play the Chrome Dinosaur Game.</li>
</ul><p><a rel="payment" href="http://patreon.com/topiclords">Support Topic Lords</a></p>]]>
  </itunes:summary>
</item>
  </channel>
</rss>
