facebook.com/theutdmercury | @utdmercury
November 17, 2014
INSIDE
CRASH THE PARTY
LIFE&ARTS
New Art Barn exhibit explores glitches in 10 digital systems
Photos from this year's Homecoming week
SPORTS Men's and women's basketball teams charge into new season
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THE MERCURY | UTDMERCURY.COM
Men's soccer falls in NCAA second round ESTEBAN BUSTILLOS Managing Editor
For the first time in program history, the men’s soccer team hosted the NCAA tournament from Nov. 15-16. Even though it hosted, the team wouldn’t have entered into the tournament if it were not for some very beneficial circumstances. After losing in the ASC tournament final to Hardin-Simmons on Nov. 9, it looked like the season was done for the Comets. Senior forward and captain Omar Jaroun said he thought he had played his final game. “We definitely did not expect to get the bid,” he said. The day after the result, however, the NCAA released its men’s tournament field, which not only had UTD seeded in the tournament but also listed it as a host for the first two rounds. Pomona-Pitzer, Trinity University and Hardin-Simmons were all guests for the two-day event. Head coach Jason Hirsch said there were a number of factors that contributed to this fortunate outcome. The fact that Trinity’s women’s team was already hosting the first two rounds of the women’s tournament on its turf and that UTD had put in a bid to host played heavily into the decision to hold the tournament here, he said. Along with that, the Comets had beaten Trinity earlier in the season and
→ SEE SOCCER, PAGE 7
ANDREW GALLEGOS | CONTRIBUTOR
Senior forward Omar Jaroun fights for possession of the ball against two Trinity defenders. Trinity beat UTD 1-0 to advance to the Sweet Sixteen.
CULTIVATING CREATIVITY:
Student, crowdfunding tech projects span from innovative gaming to animated short films
GALACTIC GAMING DUNCAN GALLAGHER Contributor
INNER SPACE
STICKY
A plane flies by overhead, ducking and twisting through mysterious alien ruins on an unknown mission of exploration. The horizon is infinite, as are the mysteries to uncover in the strange, inside-out world of “InnerSpace.” A group of arts and technology students first conceived the video game when they formed an indie game company, PolyKnight Games, in spring 2014 through the LaunchPad UTD program, a nonprofit educational system that provides assistance and resources to entrepreneurial-minded students. PolyKnight Games has eight members, all UTD alumni or students except for one member. The friends spent the spring semester in preproduction for what would become
“Innerspace” and PolyKnight Games. The game takes place inside of a 3-D inverted planet, which players have complete freedom to explore in their aircraft. “‘InnerSpace’ started as an experiment of what would it be like to fly in a physically different space from our own,” said ATEC junior Nick Adams. The team members said they have a strong dedication to unique, original games using ideas they’ve never seen before. The inverted planet idea for “InnerSpace” originally came out of software engineering senior Tyler Tomaseski’s vision of a flying game without boundaries, in which the sky and the ground would be similar in gameplay. “Almost all of my game ideas come from
→ SEE INNERSPACE, PAGE 4
STICKY SITUATIONS MANJUNATH RAVI Contributor
ATEC students have produced “Sticky,” a 107-second animated short film that expresses the circle of life through a young chameleon, a fly and a flower. “Sticky” is the second animated short film from the animation studio course. A team of 30 students, from the graduate and undergraduate levels, worked on the project. The original story was conceived by arts and technology senior Adam Nusrallah. “I pitched it to the university for the animation studio course back in April 2013, and throughout production, I was one among the project coordinators,” Nusrallah said. “We started going into actual production in Au-
gust 2013, and it lasted two semesters from fall semester 2013 to spring semester 2014.” The challenge of creating a professional project is what made people want to work on “Sticky,” he said, and the story was short and simple enough for the project to seem feasible. “I think what attracted (us to) this one was the idea of taking that sort of fun stylization of the toony look of like Pixar and pushing the realistic style,” Nusrallah said. There was no budget for the film, as students only had to pay for the course. The university provided most of the software through its labs on campus for students to apply their
→ SEE STICKY, PAGE 12
CREATIVE COLLECTIVE JAMIE PARK Contributor
ArtSciLab, an interdisciplinary research lab, is running a crowdfunding campaign to raise efforts for its latest project, Creative Disturbance. The project aims to connect people from different fields through podcasts and social media platforms. ArtSciLab, a product of the arts and technology and emerging media and communication programs, aims to connect artists with scientists to facilitate projects that meet at the intersections of their fields. “What we’re trying to do in the lab is help artists and scientists collaborate together, and (Creative Disturbance) is going to be one of the ways that we do that,” said professor and Associate Director of ATEC Roger Malina, who founded the lab in 2013. POLYKNIGHT GAMES, ADAM NUSRALLAH, CREATIVE DISTURBANCE | COURTESY
In the highly specialized world of academia, making connections across fields of study is valuable, but opportunities to do so are few and far between, Malina said. Creative Disturbance will allow students from around the world to interview high-profile scholars from their areas of interest. The program started a Kickstarter campaign to raise money for Creative Disturbance and will continue until Dec. 5. The group hopes to raise $20,000, which will channel directly into producing new content for the platform. “We want to use the money raised to fund international projects,” said Yvan Tina, a doctoral student working on Creative Disturbance. The crowdfunding campaign will allow ArtSciLab to expand its reach globally and attract a high-profile audience, Tina said, while
→ SEE CREATIVE, PAGE 12
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NEWS
THE MERCURY | NOV. 17, 2014
Source: Human RIghts Campaign
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OPINION
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NOV. 17, 2014 | THE MERCURY | UTDMERCURY.COM
Net neutrality needs to be mandated by law TEJ GIDVANI COMMENTARY
The equality and balance of the Internet is imperil, and it needs to be stopped. Future contributions that can only be brought by the Internet are being threatened by those who want to put an end to all traces of net neutrality. Net neutrality is the principle that governments and Internet service providers, known as ISPs, should treat all information on the Internet equally. This principle could be used to deter ISPs such as AT&T, Comcast and Verizon from censoring websites they do not like or opinions they may not agree with. Net neutrality ultimately levels the playing field and allows a website such as Facebook to go from a small startup developed by college students to the world’s largest social network. It also allows people of all backgrounds and opinions to be able to share their thoughts without being censored. Net neutrality is the reason that people can access any legal site they want. Net neutrality has allowed the Internet to truly further the human experience and enrich lives, as well as allow the freedom that most people who use the Web experience, including the dissemination of popular culture, memes, instant messages and education. There have been many cases of ISPs partaking in practices that shy away from the
principles of net neutrality, and this has negative effects on the customers and users of the Internet. This is why the talks of creating legislation to make neutrality a legitimate regulatory policy have been arising. There have been allegations of ISPs throttling the bandwidth of Netflix. In 2013, the video streaming service accounted for more than 30 percent of Internet traffic in the United States, so the ISPs would profit substantially from charging Netflix in order to have better service. After further investigation by M-Lab in New York, it was found that all the ISPs started throttling bandwidth to Netflix services around the same time and then stopped throttling around the time that Netflix made a deal with them for better service. This shows corruption of ISPs that crippled a company’s Internet service, so they could push a company into paying more money in order to get service that should have been delivered anyway. Another far-reaching violation of net neutrality is one carried out by AT&T. According to the Federal Trade Commission, AT&T throttled Internet to users who had unlimited data plans when they had high usage. This is the equivalent of users getting normal speeds up until a certain cap and getting service at a degraded quality past that cap. Recently, there have been talks between the Federal Communications Commission and telecom companies about adopting formal policies that would move away from net neutrality. The FCC has proposed creating fast lanes that it claims would provide better,
faster service to companies for a premium in order to get their service to customers at a better quality. This claim is masking the fact that creating these fast lanes would break the neutral balance that currently makes the Internet as great as it is. A common conclusion that most people on the Internet and companies have is that these fast lanes will actually give the telecom companies the ability to shake down small businesses and producers of Internet content for more money in order to let them do business as usual — kind of like the mafia would. It doesn’t help that Thomas Wheeler, a former telecom lobbyist, is currently heading the FCC. It is very concerning that a person who has been on the telecom payroll for a long time was appointed to be the head of the FCC during the time that net neutrality is under attack. It also is not good that our politicians are not as well informed about this issue as they need to be. Recently, Senator Ted Cruz from Texas said that having net neutrality is a regulation and is not “bold, innovative or fair.” This is completely wrong because having a free Internet allows for it to be more bold, innovative and fair than an Internet run by people with deep pockets, who can afford to pay to get their content to customers. All these violations of net neutrality harm the Internet that we know and love, and we need to take the steps to put an end to this. The actions of throttling and site blocking by ISPs don’t just create inconvenience to Internet users, but it also threatens the innovation and competition that has given
the world services, including Facebook and YouTube. If net neutrality disappeared, ISPs could start charging small companies more money to have a good enough connection to get their content out effectively. This barrier can stop innovation by inhibiting the ability of smaller companies and websites to compete and grow. If net neutrality had not existed a decade ago, we may not have Facebook, YouTube, reddit or any other website that probably wouldn’t have had enough money to pay off an ISP during the time it was growing. Although the fight to keep net neutrality has felt like an uphill battle, the Obama administration made some reassuring statements on the topic of net neutrality and showed support for keeping it in place, and users across the Internet have shown support for such a thing. Even big tech companies, including Microsoft, Google and Amazon, have made statements about how net neutrality is necessary for the Internet to continue to be a breeding ground for creativity, innovation and social interaction. In the White House’s statement, requests were made that the FCC would strengthen net neutrality and adopt four policies that include no blocking, no throttling, increased transparency and no paid prioritization. The guidelines that the White House has requested the FCC to follow help to mitigate and solve the problems that we have seen with the blocking of websites and throttling of services. This also would protect freedom of speech by preventing the blocking
of websites that have an opinion or serve an agenda. The next step is to take these guidelines and make them into formal legislation or regulatory policies. This needs to happen so that telecom companies will not be able to play by their own rules. Even though users, tech companies and now even the White House have shown support for net neutrality, its fate ultimately falls onto the shoulders of the FCC. It is unfortunate that it seems the FCC is being driven by money, greed and influence of deep-pocketed telecom companies, but it is doubtful the FCC will be able to kill net neutrality with all the support to keep it in place. The Internet is one of the most important inventions of the past century, and it affects the way people entertain themselves, do business and interact with other people. It allows any person from any background to be able to have a voice and reach out to an audience that was not reachable before its advent in an almost instantaneous manner. This wide reach and quick pace of information flow has changed the way that society interacts, from getting breaking news about a natural disaster moments after it happens to being able to send invites to friends rather than having to call all of them individually. Net neutrality needs be mandated in formal legislation so that Internet users — current and future — will have the ability to compete and be heard. Without this legislation, the Internet is vulnerable to the corruption of the telecom giants that provide the backbone of the Web. An Internet without net neutrality is a scary thought that cannot be allowed to become a reality.
HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY? Students interested in writing opinions for The Mercury can email the editor-in-chief at editor@utdmercury.com.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Letters must be 250 words or less. Students should include their full name, major and year. Faculty, staff and administrators should include their full name and title. Email letters to editor@utdmercury.com. Although electronic copies are preferred, a hard copy can be dropped off at the reception desk of the Student Media suite (SU 1.601). Please include a headshot. Authors may only have one letter printed per edition of The Mercury. Apart from your name and photo, personal info will not be published. We reserve the right to reject submissions, and we cannot be responsible for their return. We reserve the right to edit for clarity, brevity, good taste, accuracy and to prevent libel. The next issue of The Mercury will be published on Dec. 1. Contact us by Nov. 21, and submit your opinion by Nov. 24. MIGUEL PEREZ | EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
COMET COMMENTS
“Do you think Internet service providers should be able to sell faster service to websites that can afford it?”
Tell us what you think about net neutrality and answer our poll at www. utdmercury.com.
RESULTS FROM LAST ISSUE “The net should definitely be kept neutral, because in our capitalist way of doing that, we would limit a lot of things.”
“I think if the companies can afford it, are willing to pay for it and want the service, then they should get it.”
“I think it’s stupid that bills have been introduced to let the government regulate the net.”
Justin Hill Biomedical engineering freshman
Aditya Prabhu Computer science graduate student
Tiffany Tran Neuroscience freshman
How closely do you guard your information online? I restrict my posts to friends only.
79%
I maintain public social media profiles.
13%
I am paranoid about my digital public image.
4%
I don’t have social media profiles.
4%
The online poll was open from Nov. 4 to Nov. 16 and had 24 participants
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THE MERCURY | NOV. 17, 2014
NEWS
UTDMERCURY.COM
Mayor: Sharing info key to handling Ebola outbreak ANWESHA BHATTACHARJEE Web Editor
Transparency in communication was crucial to confronting the public fear after the first Ebola case in Dallas caught the city’s health officials and providers by surprise, said several renowned panelists at The Dallas Morning News forum on Nov. 5 at UTD. The panel discussion titled “Vital Lessons: How Dallas Confronted the Ebola Challenge” brought together important public figures, including Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins, Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital’s Chief Clinical Officer Dan Varga and Richardson Mayor Laura Maczka, to discuss the lessons learned from the Ebola outbreak both for Texas Health and the city. Since the detection of the disease in the ’80s, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, has instituted guidelines for hospitals on the treatment of Ebola, which are reviewed by Ebola experts several times a decade, said Robert Haley, a UT Southwestern Medical Center professor. These guidelines are implemented by more than 5,000 hospitals across the country. The problem was not Texas Health, Haley said, but the guidelines themselves, which everyone thought would work. “So when it happened, I would like to think it was just a blind spot for all of the experts and the whole country,” he said. When Thomas Eric Duncan, the first Ebola patient in the United States, came to Texas Health on Sept. 26, he was sent back home. Two days later, he had to be brought back in by the Emergency Services, and on Sept. 30 he was confirmed to have Ebola. Duncan died on Oct. 8, but three days later, Nina Pham, a nurse who had cared for him in the later stages of the illness, was diagnosed with Ebola. Amber Vinson, another nurse who had treated Duncan, showed Ebola symptoms around the same time. Both Pham and Vinson have recovered since and no one else in contact with these three patients was reported to have contracted the disease in the 21-day gestation period. While Texas Health has been unable to identify the exact point of breach in protocol that caused the nurses to contract Ebola, all nurses were aware of how to use protective equipment, Varga said. Like every other hospital in the country, nurses and staff at Texas Health had gone through drills and knew what to do if an Ebola patient came for treatment, he said. However, they hadn’t gone through any simulations that would help emergency room nurses to diagnose Ebola symptoms, Varga said. “If we were to step back and ask of Presbyterian’s preparedness, we would say that we were completely prepared to take care of a patient who walked in with a diagnosis
→ INNERSPACE
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
an interesting gameplay loop or an interesting change to the way you play a game,” Tomaseski said. “But this is the first idea I’ve had that’s started with a setting. The world of “InnerSpace” exists inside several planet-sized hollow spheres, or bubbles, each with its own unique aspect or twist. The central sphere is conceptually the uninhabited capital city of an ancient civilization, with additional spheres extending farther out into the civilization’s empire. “InnerSpace” is strongly focused on exploration and discovery with an untraditional style of storytelling, said ATEC graduate student Eric Brodie. The narrative is mostly told through the discovery of relics, which, along with providing upgrades for the player’s ship, give the player a glimpse into the civilization’s past. However, the game can be played without ever discovering all there is to know about the world or the story it can tell.
of Ebola but less than completely well prepared to have a patient walk in off the streets with nonspecific symptoms and make a diagnosis of Ebola,” he said. Duncan’s family has settled a lawsuit out of court with Texas Health. However, the hospital is expected to have an external review of how well it handled the Ebola cases by the end of the first quarter next year, Varga said. The procedures and protocols followed, as well as how well the information technology system was used for diagnosis are also going to be examined. Defending Texas Health’s actions during Duncan’s initial misdiagnosis, Varga said the hospital was as prepared as it could have been at the time. “I think what Presbyterian went through is likely what would have happened at almost any hospital in the country,” he said. While Duncan was kept at Texas Health for the entire duration of his illness, Pham and Vinson were moved to a National Institutes of Health facility in Baltimore and Emory Hospital in Atlanta, respectively, due to a staff shortage at Texas Health at the time, Varga said. The hospital was already monitoring more than 70 healthcare providers who had come into contact with Duncan and didn’t have the resources needed to care for two more patients. CDC experts and Dallas County officials had toured several tier one and tier two hospitals after the Ebola outbreak to assess which hospitals would be able to care for several Ebola patients in isolation, should the situation arise, said David Lakey, Texas Department of State Health Services commissioner. After reviewing different options, the Richardson Methodist Hospital was picked to be the Ebola treatment center, so that large hospitals could continue providing care to patients with other diseases such as the flu, Jenkins said. Methodist had just moved to a newer facility by the President George Bush Turnpike, and the old facility was being repurposed. It had a direct entry where other patients wouldn’t have to come in contact with an Ebola patient, so it was a perfect choice for treatment that would require severe isolation, Maczka said. The City of Richardson immediately sent out information to residents that live close to the hospital, allaying fears about the possible spread of the disease. The community went from being afraid and concerned about the location to being educated about the spread of Ebola and then proud that they would be able to support the care of those in need, Maczka said. “The lesson we learned is ‘share the information,’” she said. Communication was also the strategy adopted by the Dallas Independent School District, said DISD Superintendent Mike Miles. The school district released Ebola factsheets and com-
“The thought was to create a space that presents an alien culture or a foreign culture that the player isn’t familiar with and let the player have free reign without context and without purpose,” said ATEC senior Steve Zapata. “The hypothesis is that the player will go into that space with preconceptions.” Themes of the narrative include actions and reactions that have certain effects on cultures such as the effect Christopher Columbus’ landing had on Native American life. Players exploring this vast world will encounter massive, artificial intelligence creatures revered as godlike beings by the alien race that once inhabited the spheres. These encounters should be less thought of as boss fights and more thought of as simply a part of the world, though the ship the player controls is mounted with guns to use at the player’s discretion. “It’s kind of the question of if you give a player a plane with guns and then you put something in front of them, what are they going to do with it?” Brodie said. “And it’s not necessarily to say that there are multiple
endings or to say that you’re not supposed to do it — maybe you totally are. In reality, it’s just the player’s unique experience of making that realization.” The game is currently being financed through the developers’ personal investments as they work out of Tomaseski’s bedroom. They have created a crowdfunding page for “InnerSpace” on Kickstarter with the hopes of raising $25,000 to fund the development of the game and pay assistant developers helping with the project. Incentives for pledging include items such as custom in-game content, 3-D models of the plane and signed canvas prints of the game’s art. If the team reaches its funding goal on Kickstarter, the members plan to dedicate the next year to finishing the game for release, Tomaseski said. “We know that what we release speaks for us as developers but also speaks for what we’ll be doing in the future,” he said. “So it’s very, very important to us, not only as professionals but also as developers with standards and morals, that we develop the game that people were promised.”
LINDA NGUYEN | CONTRIBUTOR
UTD hosted The Dallas Morning News panel discussion, “Vital Lessons: How Dallas Confronted the Ebola Challenge” on Nov. 5. Dallas leaders, including Richardson Mayor Laura Maczka and Dallas County Health and Human Services Director Zachary Thompson, spoke about how Ebola cases were handled in North Texas and what they learned from the events.
municated regularly with parents and students. “We erred on the side of transparency right away, knowing that if the rumors got out it would be hard to combat that,” Miles said. Although unnecessary, schools were decontaminated when students came into contact with people who had been around an Ebola patient, he said. The challenge is to not go overboard with the panic and abide by the guidelines while keeping the community safe and happy, Miles said. At the same time, a fine balance had to be struck between being transparent and disclosing confidential patient information, Varga said. Outbreaks are difficult to forecast, and just like with other diseases like HIV and West Nile virus, this one was a way to understand what happened and plan best for the next surprise, said Cedric Spak, infectious disease specialist at the Baylor University Medical Center. With high rates of international travel and diseases with similar symptoms such as Ebola and flu, monitoring international travel will be key to prevention and diagnosis of diseases, said William Sutker, chief of infectious diseases at the Baylor Scott & White Hospital, North Texas Division. The Texas Task Force, instated after the first Ebola di-
agnosis in Dallas, reviewed and added more guidelines for Texas hospitals in order to prepare for any future outbreaks of the disease, Lakey said. The task force comprised infectious disease and bioterrorism experts. As part of the new guidelines, it was also important to state new quarantine rules for healthcare providers traveling internationally to treat patients, Jenkins said. While they should be monitored after their return as they are high-risk individuals, they cannot be expected to put 21 days of their lives on hold, and these guidelines ensured that healthcare providers were not being disincentivized to provide care, he said. Meanwhile, Ebola vaccines are still limited in supply, and there are currently only six specialized labs that research Ebola vaccines in the country, said Anthony Griffiths, an associate scientist at the Texas Biomedical Research Institute. While more federal funding will definitely help the cause, the real issue is developing such labs, he said. The hope is that this incident will translate into more federal dollars toward research in Texas and as a whole, said Dallas County Health and Human Services Director Zachary Thompson. “This was a wake-up call for the nation that funding cannot be cut in public healthcare,” he said.
CULTURAL DAYS
UTDMERCURY.COM
THE MERCURY | NOV. 17, 2014
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HUMZA KHAN | CONTRIBUTOR
Radio UTD and SUAAB hosted Rapper’s Delight on Nov. 4 in the Visitor Center Atrium. The concert featured performances by Dallas hip-hop artists A.Dd+ (top right and bottom right); Blue, The Misfit (directly below) and -topic (directly above). JONATHAN CHANG | CONTRIBUTOR
JONATHAN CHANG | CONTRIBUTOR
CHRIS LIN | CONTRIBUTOR
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Bangledesh was center stage on Nov. 8 in the Clark Center as the Bangledeshi Student Organization, or BSO, put on its largest show of the year. After dining on Bangladeshi food, a large audience was treated to a bevy of dancers, singers and artists. PHOTO SERIES BY ANDREW GALLEGOS | CONTRIBUTOR
SPORTS BALLERS Back in Action
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NOV. 17, 2014 | THE MERCURY | UTDMERCURY.COM
Women look to build on teamwork to take on tough ASC; men work to bring inexperienced players up to speed
SERIES BY ARUN PRASATH | CONTRIBUTOR
SERIES BY PARTHASARATHY S.K | CONTRIBUTOR
The women’s team is returning several key players from last year’s squad, including senior guards Madi Hess (top) and Amber Brown (bottom). The team beat Texas Lutheran 58-55 on Nov. 15.
Senior guards Nolan Harvey (top) and Matt Medell (bottom) are returning as the teams most experienced players. The Comets took down Texas Lutheran 92-77 in their season opener on Nov. 15.
ESTEBAN BUSTILLOS Managing Editor
The women’s basketball team is looking to rebound it it’s quest to claim the ASC title after it’s season ended abruptly in last year’s conference semifinals. The team, which went 21-6 last year, is returning nine players including three starters from last years squad. The ASC preseason poll picked the Comets to finish second in the conference this year. Although the team has garnered much preseason acclaim, it will be missing a crucial piece from last year’s squad. Forward Morgan Kilgore, who graduated in the spring, made almost a quarter of the team’s points. She was an honorable mention AllAmerican and the ASC women’s basketball player of the year. “I think if you go into a season asking your new people or returners to replace her, you’re in trouble,” head coach Polly Thomason said. “You don’t want them to have that pressure going into the year.” She said she wants the players on the current roster to play toward their strengths rather than emulate what Kilgore did. Out of the members of the returning senior class, two have been singled out as players to watch by the conference. Point guard Madi Hess, who transferred last year from Concordia, averaged 6.7 points, 4.8 rebounds and 3.5 assists per game. Hess said one of her biggest roles this year will be getting the ball to players who can score and under-
standing the offense better. “My focus is really studying the offense and understanding when (Thomason) is calling this play, this is who she’s wanting to score,” Hess said. Guard Amber Brown, who also was listed on the conference’s preseason watch list, averaged 8.4 points, 5.1 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game. She had 1.3 steals per game and was named to the conference’s All-Defensive Team. She said the team has to work on their communication and teamwork in order for it to be successful. “We have three new starters, so it’s not like a completely new team, but it’s pretty new,” Brown said. “We still have chemistry to build …Right now, we’re just trying to build a family, because that’s what we saw lacking last year.” There’s a special emphasis on playing a team style of basketball rather than relying on the talent of certain individuals, Brown said. Any one of the seniors on the team could go off for 20 points at any given time, she said. Both Hess and Brown have been named as captains for the upcoming season. Brown said even though Thomason chose them to be leaders for the team, she doesn’t feel pressure from that responsibility. “The pressure comes from reaching our goals together,” she said. “There’s pressure to beat the big teams. There’s pressure to know that there’s always
→ SEE WOMEN, PAGE 7
ESTEBAN BUSTILLOS Managing Editor
After a season that saw the team go 27-4, win the conference championship and advance to the NCAA tournament, a shroud of inexperience surrounds the 2014-15 men’s basketball team. The team lost several of last year’s key contributors, including Kyle Schleigh, Dmitriy Chernikov, Carter Nash and Chris McOmber. Combined, those four contributed to 1,323 of the team’s 2,486 points last year. Adding onto this is the team’s lack of seniority. Only three seniors with substantial playing time are returning to the squad. With no juniors, the rest of the roster is filled by sophomores, freshmen and seniors with almost no minutes on the floor. There is no comparison between the team from last year and this year, said head coach Terry Butterfield. “We got to the top of the mountain in our league last year, and that was a great time, but the way I look at it, we’re right back down at the bottom of the mountain, and all I can see are big ole boulders in front of us,” Butterfield said. Despite the lack of veterans on the squad, the team has still garnered a slew of preseason accolades. It’s currently ranked no. 22 in the nation, according to D3hoops.com, and UTD has been predicted to finish second in the ASC. Senior guards and captains Nolan Harvey and Matt Medell have been tabbed on the conference
preseason watch list. Medell was a second team AllASC pick last year with 15.2 points, 4.1 rebounds and 2.2 assists per game. Harvey earned third team All-ASC honors with 13.9 points, 3.5 rebounds and 3.3 assists per game. Getting the new members of the team up to speed will be a test for the team, Harvey said. “We’ve got a lot of new guys, so it’s going to be hard,” he said. “It’s going to be a challenge to get all those new guys where they need to be and where we need to be as a team.” Butterfield said that in order for the team to be successful, the new players will have to buy into his system. This can be difficult, Harvey said, since the offense is filled with subtle nuances and reads that take time for players to get adjusted. While they didn’t have a hard time communicating and getting the ball moving last year, the players have had a bit of a harder time with this so far, he said. “If you watched any of the games last year, you could tell that we were just seamlessly transitioning from one thing to another,” he said. “If you were going to come and watch a practice right now, it probably wouldn’t be like that.” The obstacles the new players have to go through is comparable to going to calculus and being asked to take a test without having proper time to absorb the material, Butterfield said. “I don’t know that we’ve ever, ever been younger
→ SEE MEN, PAGE 7
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a target on our back because we’re having successful seasons … we don’t have time to think about pressure.” Part of that pressure will come from UT Tyler, who has been picked to win the conference by the preseason poll. Last year, the Patriots were crowned as conference champs and advanced to the Sweet 16 in the NCAA tournament. Other opponents who may pose a challenge for the Comets include Mary Hardin-Baylor, who ended UTD’s season last year in the conference semifinals, and Howard-Payne, who is predicted to
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went 1-1-1 against Hardin-Simmons, something which Hirsch said might have played into UTD’s favor. “I’m happy and excited we got it, I don’t really care how,” he said. After taking down Pomona-Pitzer 2-0 in the round of 64 and earning the program’s first ever win in the NCAA tournament, the stage was set for the Comets to take on the second ranked Trinity Tigers, who overcame Hardin-Simmons 2-1 in their first match. The Comets came off to a slow start against the Tigers, who looked crisp in the first half. Trinity dominated offensively, taking 13 out of 17 shots before halftime. UTD couldn’t keep up with the pace defensively, giving up a goal in 22nd minute. On the offensive side, the Comets struggled to get the ball to the net, taking only 3 shots in the period. At the half, Hirsch made adjustments to help the
SPORTS
finish fourth in the conference. “I think this will be the toughest year in our conference,” Thomason said. “I think, from top to bottom, there’s nobody that we’re going to be able to overlook.” The one thing that will make UTD different from the other members of the conference will be the reliance of teammates on one another, Hess said. “All these teams have the same goal that we’re having; what’s going to separate us is us sticking together as a team and not doing everything individually,” she said. “There’s not one person on our team that can go out and just win the game. It takes all five of us.” team combat this issue. “We changed the formation,” he said. “We went from a 4-2-3-1 to a diamond in the midfield — four in the midfield, two up front. It worked against them earlier on in the year. Once we made the switch, it got much better.” In the second half, the Comets looked like a completely different team on offense. They more than doubled the shots they put up in the first period, taking seven after the half. Still, UTD could not seem to catch a break against Trinity’s defense. In one instance, what looked to have been a goal in the 65th minute was called back due to a ruling of offsides. Several other shots the Comets took came close but failed to find the back of the net. The conditions on the field didn’t help the team’s chances. The pitch was soggy from the rain it had received over the course of several days, causing players to visibly struggle with their footing. Adding onto this was the bitter cold and the evening’s strong breeze. “The weather came into play big time,” said ju-
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and more untested than we are this year,” he said. Another issue that will face the team is the competition and athleticism within the conference, Butterfield said. Teams in the ASC have a tendency to attract extremely talented athletes, something that UTD has to compensate for with the way the team plays, he said. The teams foundation this year has to be defense and rebounding, he said. “There’s going to be nights when we’re cold as ice, and we can’t shoot it in,” Butterfield said.
nior forward Roman Rodriguez. “Especially when you’re on the bench and you’re freezing. You’ve been sitting there for 30 minutes and you come in and you’re cold, you’re not warm enough … it catches you off guard, honestly.” As the clock winded down, the Comets could only look on as the Tigers celebrated on their home field, advancing to the Sweet Sixteen with a 1-0 victory. It was the third time that UTD had lost to Trinity in the NCAA tournament. The team was only one or two plays away from changing the outcome, Jaroun said. “It’s just one of those things, the ball didn’t really bounce our way tonight,” he said. Even though he was disappointed over the loss, Hirsch said he thought the season was still a good one. “I’m upset right now because of the what could have beens,” he said. “We had some chances to score and didn’t put them away and gave up a soft goal in my opinion, not something that (Trinity) really created but a mistake in the back — a slip. So it’s disappointing, but it was a great year.”
SPORTS UPDATES By Esteban Bustillos
TEAMS FALL IN CONFERENCE PLAYOFFS The women’s soccer team and volleyball season came to a close in the ASC tournament on Nov. 8. The women’s soccer team was taken out 2-0 against the eventual conference champion Hardin-Simmons in the semifinals. The volleyball team, on the other hand, made it to the championship match against Mary Hardin-Baylor. After holding off a sweep in the third set, the Comets were overcome by the Cru in the last set. It was UTD’s fifth championship game in program history.
CROSS COUNTRY TEAMS RUN IN NCAA REGIONAL MEET After finishing strong in the ASC championships, the men’s and women’s cross country teams were able to advance to the NCAA South/Southeast regional meet in Mount Barry, Ga., on Nov. 15. The women’s team finished second in the conference championships — its best ever finish. It sent eight runners to run in the 6K races while the men’s team, who finished fourth in the conference meet, sent nine to run in the 8K race. The men finished in 27th place, while the women took home a 19th place finish. Freshman Lindsey Rayborn finished 23rd overall in her event with a time of 23:18.
COMETS RECEIVE POSTSEASON HONORS Taylour Toso, a senior middle blocker on the women’s volleyball team, and Omar Jaroun, a senior forward on the men’s soccer team, earned two of the most prestigious awards in the ASC. Toso was named Player of the Year for the conference after becoming the program’s all-time leader in kills this season and nabbing Player of the Week honors twice. She is the all-time leader in points, kills, hitting percentage and solo blocks. Jaroun was named the Offensive Player of the Year. He had five goals over the course of the season and led the league with six assists.
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“Can we still stay in a ball game? Can we still find a way to win a ball game when we’re not shooting well? … If you can defend and you can rebound, you can still have a chance to stay in a ball game.” With few players left on the team who have time on the floor, the seniors have become the source of leadership for the group, Medell said. “Coach Butterfield looks us square in the eye and is like ‘It’s on y’all,’” he said. “‘I can go out there and I can yell at people, but they’re not going to respond to me like they’re going to respond to you.’ And that’s true, because we’re out there with them everyday … Whenever practice is going bad, he’s looking at us for leadership.”
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Art gallery finds beauty in defects NIDHI GOTGI Contributor
UTD’s newest art show explores glitch, a modern art form that creates patterns and designs through errors in the algorithmic flow of digital instruments. Glitch art, the aesthetic arrangement of bugs in the coding of a digital file, has gained popularity since software manipulation became possible. Glitch by meaning is a defect, but this art style has given a new character to error and encouraged people to embrace imperfection. A gallery in the Visual Arts Building named “Message (Not) Received” features the work of renowned, international glitch artists and UTD professors. Among them is Sabado Visconti, a Brazilian-born artist who is a documentary and film producer. Inspired by artists such as Edward Hopper and Sally Mann, his work in “Message (Not) Received” consists of digitally manipulated media files. The files Visconti altered were screenshots from Alfred Hitchcock’s film “Vertigo,” and he aptly named his collection “Vertigo by Alfred Glitchcock.” “When I made these glitches, I was very much into the concept of corrupted memories,” Visconti said. “‘Vertigo’ directly touches upon this theme of human memory’s inability to recreate experience.” Glitch artist Raluca Sturzu has work at the show under the name, “Pixels on Old Master.” Sturzu, originally from Bucharest, Romania, shared printed versions of her work for the first time at the show, and her hometown informed her work heavily.
“Bucharest is an aesthetically challenging city, full of contrasts and, at times, quite difficult to be dealt with,” Sturzu said. “The culture and the people here are to some extent the result of this fragmented, dynamic and unpredictable environment.” Sturzu said she finds beauty in these imperfections and translates them into her work, which exhibits a technique called pixel sorting where the pixels are categorized by certain values of white, black or brightness. As the pixel sorting is left incomplete, the image’s clarity is lost in distorted lines and numerous breaks, but the color palette of dark, neutral tones is maintained from the original image. These perversions are a result of code altering on images of oil paintings by Piero della Francesca and Georges de La Tour. “The exercise is a play on perception,” Sturzu said. “Iconic images of balance and mastery are digitally altered in an attempt of investing their content with new visual semantics.” Patrick Dowling, a professor of video production and design principles, also has featured work: a series of unintentional photographs that are byproducts of an experiment with time lapse to explore the bloom and death of flowers. Dowling explores repetition, space and time within his work to create striking images with balanced positive and negative spaces and bold colors. “There are normal available sensory capabilities between the eye and the brain,” he said. “I like to alter that and try and allow human beings to look at time differently and value it for themselves.”
A GLITCH IN THE SYSTEM MEGAN JENKINS | CONTRIBUTOR
Dowling’s experience in mass media, from being a radio show host to working in news production, has made him realize that much of what people see on television has been altered and reality has been compromised. Glitch art highlights the imperfections that mass media hides, and he said he believes this is the principal reason why people gravitate toward this art form. “When people see something that is a mistake, it seems real,” he said. “There’s a
sense of security and safety in it.” Dowling’s time at UTD as a graduate student exposed him to the university’s influential personalities, including Nobel Prize nominee Frederick Turner, Thomas Riccio and John Pomara, who helped Dowling become comfortable with making mistakes and optimizing their appeal. “There is a difference between striving for and achieving craftsmanship, and that is a noble endeavor,” Dowling said. “But at the same time, understanding that part
of the process is making mistakes is important, and sometimes those are better than the perfect achievement you hoped for.” Rosa Menkman, Jon Satrom, Phillip Stearns, Melissa Barron, Alessandro Canova, Max Capacity and Kyle Kondas are other artists whose works are displayed at “Message (Not) Received.” Their styles and techniques have coalesced to bring the UTD audience an appreciation of glitch art.
Bronies become ‘Dumb’ doesn’t live up to official student org original lowbrow classic
MEGAN JENKINS | CONTRIBUTOR
Computer science sophomore Hunter Gage (left) and software engineering graduate student Darren Haffner attending the first meeting of The Bronies of UTD. JACK GAMBLE Contributor
The Bronies of UTD is a new student organization that aims to provide an enjoyable and supportive social environment for fans on campus. The club held its first meeting on Nov. 7, and 14 students attended. Bronies, or fans of the My Little Pony franchise, first came into the spotlight in 2011 and 2012, according to historical studies sophomore and club president Michael Nakhiengchanh. “We wanted to get the organization started in 2013, maybe even earlier, but a lot of the fan’s and faculty’s schedules didn’t connect right,” he said. “My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic” is a television series that debuted in late 2010 and is based around the My Little Pony franchise, most known for its toys. The two-hour session opened with discussion on the series and fandom, followed by a showing of several fan-created animations based on the show. The organization’s goal is to create an opportunity for students to socialize, focusing on more than just the television series, said historical studies senior and vice president Tyler Gray. “Sure, the show is what attracts people, but there’s more to the fandom than that,”
he said, adding, “The fandom is known for being caring and inviting, promoting the messages that the series is based around.” Introversion is common among fans of the show, and it can sometimes be difficult for Bronies to socialize, said neuroscience sophomore and club treasurer Hayden Volker. “I’m an introvert, and I know a lot of the fandom is too,” said Michael Huang, an economics sophomore and club member, “but if you find someone else who is also a fan of the show, you’re instantly friends.” As part of an initial advertisement for the club, Gray organized a public music session at the Plinth featuring songs and subtle references to My Little Pony. “I wanted to feature a wide variety of music that fans of the show would recognize, but that would also attract non-fans and people just interested in the high-quality music the fandom produces,” Gray said. Bringing together the fandom socially is a challenge derived from the negative stigma attached to Bronies, he said. The existing introversion of its members combined with the show’s perceived younger target audience leads to the bullying of Bronies.
→ SEE BRONIES, PAGE 12
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Jim Carrey reprises his role as Lloyd Christmas in the sequel to the 1994 cult classic “Dumb and Dumber” with costar Jeff Daniels.
SHYAM VEDANTAM COMMENTARY
The sequel to the Farrelly brothers’ classic comedy “Dumb and Dumber” is an almost carbon copy of the original film. However, “Dumb and Dumber To” isn’t as iconic, and the jokes haven’t aged as well as Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels have. In this movie, Harry (Jeff Daniels) and Lloyd (Jim Carrey) must travel across the country to get a kidney from Harry’s long-lost daughter, Penny (Rachel Melvin). There’s a convoluted plot involving a world-saving invention, backstabbing wives, assassins and hearing aids. Explaining the plot would probably take more time than was spent constructing it during the film’s development, even though six men share writing credits on the film. It doesn’t make much sense. But that’s all right. In a comedy, what matters is not the situation or plot, but the ensuing laughter. To address this, “Dumb and Dumber To” uses a quantity over quality approach. The film’s run time is 110 minutes, and there’s at least that many jokes. Among the
fart and lame-pun humor, only about half of the jokes successfully yield a laugh. Other times, there’s an awkward silence as the entire theater watches a joke feebly die out. The half that do work are sometimes great. The biggest laughs probably come from the Farrelly brothers playing around with the traveling montage trope. Lloyd and Harry ride on a bike to get to Harry’s house after Harry’s parents kicked him out. Instead of showing the beginning and ending of the bike ride, the Farrelly brothers use a scene without edits to reveal that Harry has moved out of his house a total of three blocks. To find the long-lost daughter, they take a road trip to the address on an envelope, only to realize they’ve driven in a circle to the home address instead of Penny’s. Carrey is still one of a kind in terms of his physical comedy. Daniels plays an excellent comedic and emotional foil to this. Sometimes, this works too well, and the tone is off. He’s “acting” in scenes in which Carrey is playing for the laugh. Daniels brings some of his Emmy-winning acting chops to a raunchy comedy that asks him to show his butt crack more often than not. The supporting cast has a smaller role, but each actor gets a turn for some laughs. Laurie Holden, of “The Walking Dead”
fame, hilariously overplays a femme fatale role. Kathleen Turner, as the birth mother to Harry’s daughter, holds her own in scenes against Daniels and Carrey. Rachel Melvin gets some solid laughs through making audiences believe that stupidity might actually be a gene that gets passed down the generations. Rob Riggle as an assassin isn’t used to his potential in terms of dialogue or writing, but his camouflage gags work twice. “Dumb and Dumber To” is like a high school reunion. Everyone has grown noticeably older and their jokes are a little too dated. Bill Murray in a “Breaking Bad” riff is funny, but is Mama June from “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo” as a trailer wife funny anymore? High school reunions seem fun in theory but don’t leave anyone satisfied at the end. “Dumb and Dumber To” will probably make fans of the original overly nostalgic. Those fans should stick around for the after credits sequence: another cameo, but this one successfully reprieves a character from the original film. Audiences new to the series might be intrigued enough to seek out the original, but on its own, the sequel likely won’t become a cult classic.
HOMECOMING 2014
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HOMECOMING 5K — Participants braved the cold on Wednesday, Nov. 12 to run the nighttime 5K, decked out in glow-in-the-dark adornments. PHI GAM CAR SLAM — Students smashed and bashed an old van on Thursday, Nov. 13. The event raised funds for American troops and their families. HOMECOMING PARADE — Organizations and departments from around campus came together in a parade of custom-designed floats down Rutford Ave. on Friday, Nov. 14. Flag bearers showcased flags of various countries represented at UTD. D HOMECOMING DANCE AND CASINO — UTD goes ‘Back To Classics’ with a homecoming on Saturday, Nov. 15 that brought several classic movies to life. The night ended with the announcement of Homecoming Royalty.
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creativity. The main concentration of this year’s project was focusing on the details of every frame, Nusrallah said. This forced the team to put in a great amount of time for “Sticky.” “Even though it’s a minute and 30 seconds long, it still took a whole year to create it,” he said. Students filled various roles, including project coordinators, concept, layout, modeling, texturing, rigging, animation, lighting, compositing, visual effects and sound design. Condensing a big idea into a short film was the main challenge, said ATEC junior Gabrielle Polanco. The film starts by showing an animated chameleon walking on a branch. Suddenly, a fly grabs the attention of the creature.
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also serving as an outlet for student interest. At the completion of the crowdfunding campaign, at least 10 students will be given grants to serve as ambassadors within their intellectual communities. These students will use the funds raised to interview and connect with professionals in their fields of interest. “People that are interested in what’s going on in (ATEC) today — whether they are artists, scientists or innovators — are invited to submit podcasts,” Tina said.
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The club officers praised the fandom for the constant support it provides for its members and are attempting to recreate that support on campus. “We want to get the message across that it’s okay to be a part of this group, that you aren’t going to get picked on for being in this fandom or this club,” Gray said. J. Michael Farmer, historical studies professor and club sponsor, said that despite not being a Brony himself, he sympathized with the club due to the similarities it has with other interest groups on campus. “The Bronies of UTD are, essentially, just like the College Republicans or any other
The chameleon then attempts to capture the fly with its tongue. The story ends when the fly rests on a carnivorous flower, and the fly subsequently gets devoured by the plant. “We had named it the circle of life when we originally pitched it, which was funny because it was kind of a last minute name for us before we pitched it,” Polanco said. “It’s supposed to relate to the chameleon trying to eat the fly, and the fly gets eaten by the flower, so the circle of life.” Along with learning the skills he needed to make an animated film, Nusrallah said believing and implementing ideas with confidence was an important takeaway from the course. “I cannot express how much I’ve learned,” he said. “Not just from the class or the professors, but from meeting all the students. It was a great way to network, but I learned more than I have anywhere else just by working with them.”
ArtSciLab would like to expand its reach on social media to further spread its message, said Stephanie Brisendine, an EMAC senior working as creative director for the project. Members also are working on a way to collaborate with Radio UTD on a talk radio program to increase their reach on campus and incorporate student ideas. “Right now, we’re focused on all these really interesting people around the world, but there’s no student voice, so we plan on incorporating student voices,” Brisendine said. “We should embrace the environment we’re created in, which is the university.”
academic or social student organization,” Farmer said. Farmer supported the club’s mission of providing a space to converse about and beyond the series, and plans to help at future events. “I want other students and faculty to see my face at the (club) events just for support,” Farmer said. “There’s nothing wrong with expressing and sharing interest in a culture.” Marlina Torres, an ATEC junior and club member, said she didn’t feel like she was intruding on anyone during the meeting or feel embarrassed to express herself, something she had struggled with when trying to join other student organizations. “I felt as though I belonged, like I already fit in with everyone,” she said.
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