Photo via MIT Civic Media Blog

As we mentioned in this week's paper, this year's ROFLCon isn't just an advice animal petting zoo. It's also attracting some of the world's smartest thinkers about internet culture. At the top of the pile is JONATHAN ZITTRAIN, founder and leader of Harvard Law School's Berkman Center for Internet and Society, author of The Future of the Internet And How To Stop It, who is not only extraordinarily smart but also exceptionally funny.

Edmund McMillen was always the kid who liked to sit alone and draw instead of playing with others. He drew monsters so disturbing his third-grade teacher told his parents the pictures were "a cry for help." But he channeled his imagination rather than trying to stifle it, and began making Flash games as he grew older -- simple browser-based adventures featuring gigantic, battling genitalia or aliens with existential crises.

Edmund McMillen is just about to get famous - if he isn't already. He's one of the few independent game developers profiled in Indie Game: The Movie (check out our review here), which just had its Boston premiere at the Brattle on April 21. He's best known for his 2010 game Super Meat Boy and celebrated for his unique and unforgettable visual style.

If you think spending hours playing a computer game is nerdy, try going to a convention like PAX East 2012. And if you think that's nerdy, try showing up dressed as one of the video game characters you play. I couldn't think of a better way to spend the weekend. A variety of virtual warriors came to life and competed for the top prize in the League of Legends booth's cosplay contest, including Caitlin, Ezreal, Jax, Malzahar and Singed.

PAX East has come and gone. With panels, PC and Console freeplay stations, tabletop tournaments and over 100 show floor exhibits all happening simultaneously, the biggest challenge of my one day at PAX (Sunday) was figuring out what darned thing to do. I chose to stick to the main exhibition hall and get as many game demos under my belt as possible.

Above, watch the illustrious JoCo play his best-known song, "Code Monkey". It's an anthem for the nerd proletariats stuck in dead-end IT jobs with managers who lack web savviness. Especially those of us who are too shy to talk to people we have crushes on. Also known as, almost everyone who attends PAX East.

Aw, were Paul and Storm bitter about having to play right before that great bastion of nerd-rock, Jonathan Coulton? Probably not, because they got quite the crowd on their own, rendering this tongue-in-cheek song about openings acts a bit out of place. The Main Stage was at capacity for the Saturday night concert on the PAX East mainstage, so there were 4,000 nerds rocking out to Paul and Storm, happy to throw pieces of their Portal 2 cosplays at the pair, if not pairs of panties.

PAX East's Friday night concerts featured Supercommuter, Minibosses, Metroid Metal and the Protomen, in that order. I went to see the middle two bands.

The show floor with video game demos closes at 6 PM, and even the jamspace closes around 7 PM, so there's not much to do at PAX during the night-time besides get drunk with your gaming group at City Bar or rock the fuck out to nerdcore rock music.

This weekend, what is perhaps the nation's most rabidly anticipated gamercon invades the South Boston waterfront -- once again, PAX East returns for another three-day stretch of overstim goodness, as thousands of vidjagame fans pack the BCEC to demo new titles in the jam-packed expo hall, blister their thumbs in all-night LAN parties, watch industry luminaries drop science on everything from gamer gender politics to the Future of Dungeons & Dragons, and maybe see Gabe and Tycho draw random dongs on a giant screen.

Nothing like the sound of chiptunes in the morning. PAX East 2012's jam space kicked the concerts off early this year, with chiptune artists performing from 11 AM to 2 PM.

As Danimal Cannon bragged in his chiptune panel later in the day (5:30 PM at the Wyvern), he "plays a mean guitar" - and chips a mean tune, as well (that's what the kids say, right?).

R.L. Stine: "I started off killing teenagers"

If you were a child in the 90s, it's a pretty safe bet you were reading R.L. Stine's Goosebumps series and, later, Fear Street. I personally consumed those paperbacks like they were crack cocaine, toting a teetering pile of ‘em home with me from school on the days the Scholastic book order (oh man, remember those?) was delivered.

Damn straight, video games should get casually referred to in popular love songs. How long have we had songs about going to the movies? I'm sure that topic used to seem like a strange and modern pastime to write a song about, but now it's normal. And it's about time that gaming - one of my favorite romantic pastimes - should get taken completely seriously in a love song.

You know, James Gunn, for a man who writes for the horror genre, you sure don't seem to know much about your target demographic. Did you know that more women buy tickets to horror movies than men? So, when you say, "who doesn't want to have a beautiful, young, 18-year-old cheerleader with lots of up-skirt shots in the middle of zombie carnage?", I feel compelled to answer you.