I'm with you on these. Fahrenheit 451 was a remarkably compelling read for me as a kid. Real page-burner -- uh, turner. What caught my eye about your post, however, is Ursula K. Le Guin. Though I'm only recently familiar with LeGuin's work, and haven't yet read the Earthsea books, I'd definitely recommend the works I've read, Left Hand of Darkness or the short story I read last week, The Matter of Seggri. Both are gender and genre-bending stories that are both representative of traditional sci-fi and yet defy convention. As an alternative, LeGuin's essays on the topic of sci-fi -- since she challenged the existing notions about the genre -- would be excellent additions to the curriculum.

Paul Auster's The Music of Chance immediately springs to mind. You really should consider books that aren't full of the usual genre material -- not only to provide a wider survey of these genre but also to help youth in understanding that science fiction/fantasy isn't all Battlestar Galactica and Lord of the Rings. The Music of Chance is that Twilight Zone-ish strange tale that is at once terrifying and impossible. It's an easy, relatively short read (perfect for high schoolers). Great introduction to "the strange tale" for those who might be turned off by all the space aliens and/or orcs and elves. Anyone up for a game of cards?

MMO player *and* getting married: How is that possible?

I guess I jumped all over that one, but I'm not totally opposed to contests. (Unfortunately, most contests are simply dressed-up advertisements for the service/website, and hardly dressed-up at that.) Scavenger hunts can be fun, but it sure wastes our time when there's no actual possibility of reaching the goal. Perhaps in this case there is; I would hope Wired wouldn't resort to phony ad/spam scams, but -- except the Wired editors themselves -- who knows?

I'm going to follow you on Twitter just because of this post. I'm not kidding, either -- I'm also one of "those people".

Yes, that's pretty much how it's worked out for me, too. I even have difficulty signing my name sometimes, but that's mostly because cursive is my most unpracticed form. (I really admire some of the cursive scripts some folks are able to produce. My parents have wonderful cursive handwriting, so it boggles my mind that mine is so illegible!) One reasons I've maintained proper punctuation (and grammar and capitalization) -- or attempted to, anyway -- is because I fancy myself a writer, even if the vast majority of my writing is actually done through forum posts. Someday I'll get it together and write a novel, and when that day comes I want to be well-practice in my typing skills (so as not to detract from the narrative). I don't want to get into the habit of "sloppy" writing.

I can't figure out if this is an ad, spam, or something else altogether. Someone want to help me out? Does Slashdot post links to contests?

That's why I've always maintained correct/proper capitalization and grammar and compete sentences, even in IMs and IRC chats. In fact, it actually slows me down when I have to purposely corrupt a text message in order to reduce its size (such as on Twitter or SMS).

I have never been the first to post.

You've obviously never been in a real circle jerk.

Wow, I must be getting tired. I really botched my grammar in that last message I posted. Apologies! The general idea probably got through, but I'll add this: thank goodness for online used (and new) vendors. They've allowed me to be able to afford continuing my education; I could not do it if I had to spend $150 on a book or a bundle for every course I wanted to take. The only headache is differentiating between domestic and International editions -- there's some kind of scam going on there, and as a result the transaction can be just as detrimental to the financial well-being of the less wary student. (As far as I know, I've never purchased an illegal text -- that is, an International edition of a U.S. text -- but it's kind of a pain sorting through used book listings trying to determine between U.S. and International editions of textbooks.)