Are you someone who actually listens to music legally? Good for you, citizen! In that case, this post is for you!

Grooveshark, erstewhile internet radio and online jukebox, is doing something very cool: it’s reaching out to visual artists and asking them to design wallpapers for their online players. I was honored to be one of the artists they asked. Above are the two I made for ‘em, both a bit reappropriated from previous work, but still stand-up in their own right. You can only access them by being a member, but I recommend it; it’s really cool, and has less lawsuits against than other new services. Wheeeee!

I’m really pleased to officially release the final art for the EFF teeshirt I’ve been working on for their DEFCON offering this year. Check out the glow in the dark action here. From their press release:

Say hello to EFF’s second, limited-edition, DEF CON membership t-shirt! Only 340 premium-level donors who attend this year’s DEF CON 19 in Las Vegas will be able to get these new “ENCRYPTION SAVES” shirts, specially designed by Joe Alterio of the creative charity Robots & Monsters.

The folks down at EFF are not only templars for the righteous in my opinion, but they’re really, really nice folks, to boot. I’m so happy I got to do this for them. If you’re at DEFCON, pick up the teeshirt; and if you’re not, watch this space, I’ll be auctioning a few teeshirts from this site, get ‘em while they’re very hot!

UPDATE! Boinged! And Laughing Squid called me a ‘charity demigod’. Oh, you!

I’m pleased to announce that I have two iPhone wallpapers available on Poolga. Poolga is a site that offers some of the best illustrators work, for free, as downloadable wallpapers. I’m not exactly sure how they make money, but they definitely have some neat stuff. It looks like a lot of European illustrators, which I always love to get more exposure to. Check it out!

I’m very very proud to finally announce the launch of the secret project I was being coy about for so long: the official launch of the social Facebook game Crazyboat that I was the art and narrative director of.

From the press release:

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It is the near future and the Pacific Trash Vortex has reached critical mass.  A new age of sea entrepreneurship has arisen. Take your rusty rig and explore a changed Pacific Ocean…

ECHO TEAM is proud to present the official launch of the new social game, CRAZYBOAT. CRAZYBOAT aims to use the Facebook platform for its true strengths: the representation and hosting of existing social dynamics and groups in the rich game world. CRAZYBOAT uses Facebook profile data to give players in-game bonuses for their real-world skills and strengths. In addition, in a first for Facebook games, players share their adventures with groups of up to four – and what happens to one affects all four.

ECHO TEAM has also called upon some of the greatest mid-century American action serials to make a game that both harkens back to the adventures of yore and puts a new face on the idea of exploration, with an emphasis on the environmental impact of what reckless exploration means to the planet at large.

ECHO TEAM has drawn on years of game and narrative experience to make a story that feels more socially immersive than most Facebook games. By breaking down the barriers between the real world and users’ social gaming experience, CRAZYBOAT is in line with the ultimate direction of current game design – the integration of the real world and the virtual world. With real people and their data as playable avatars, CRAZYBOAT is a step in that heady new direction. ECHO TEAM views what they present to you today as a proposal of sort. A demo of what is possible.

Download a PDF of what CRAZYBOAT is all about here.

Then, take a quick tour and check the game out.

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On a more personal level, I think I did some great artwork for the promo side of it. Check out the posters and videos we made!

Tell your friends!

I had the great fortune of being interviewed by Benjamen Walker for his WFMU show, “Too Much Information”, about my Cablegate Comix project at HiLoBrow. Benjamen is an incredible interviewer and mind, and I was really honored to be invited on. I’m mostly on point, though I do say “Chechnya” when I mean “Dagestan”. Drat.

My part starts at 13:40, but the whole show is terrific: I share the sir with the likes of Daniel Ellsburg, Evgeny Morozov, and others. Wow!

Listen here!

Above is a photo of the papercrafted card (click here for larger version) I made for Molly on our anniversary last week. Goopy sentiments aside (that are none of your business, anyway), I’m really pleased how the forced perspective turned out. I was afraid that the multiple layers and manufactured vanishing point would make it look fun-housey, but it really came together. It reminds me of all those amazing dioramas in some of more antique (and ramshackled-ly brilliant) museums around the globe. And of course, there’s some of this stuff, too. Ain’t the world grand?