About Cranial Insertion

A Long Time Ago...

Cranial Insertion is the longest-running rules column for Magic: The Gathering, published every Monday since late March 2005. It's featured a team of rotating writers over the many years and a variety of translations into ten foreign languages and counting.

The column's goal has been to educate the readers on Magic - primarily in the game rules that apply to everyone, from the most casual kitchen-table players to the pros on the Pro Tour circuit, but also in tournament rules and policy. In an attempt to make this education more memorable, its style has been to use humor where reasonable (and sometimes where not).

In March of 2012, Cranial Insertion moved to its own site, and here you are now!

The Writers:

Carsten Haese is a former Level 2 judge from Toledo, Ohio. He is retired from active judging, but he still writes for Cranial Insertion and helps organize an annual charity Magic tournament that benefits the National MS Society.

Callum Milne is a Level 2 judge from Canada who hasn't given me a blurb for him here yet.

Nathan Long is a Level 2 judge currently residing in Durango, Colorado, just to the south of the middle of nowhere. He harkens back to a time when Humility said "Creatures lose all abilities. Humility gains 'All creatures are 1/1s.'"

Charlotte Sable is a Level 3 judge from Canada currently residing in Finland. She spends far too much doing this sort of thing, as can be gleaned from her blog at magicjudge.tumblr.com.

Former (Regular) Writers:

Eli Shiffrin is the founder and webmaster, now retired after ten years of articles.

Thijs van Ommen, Eli's original partner in crime in creating Cranial Insertion - a brilliant rules-master from the Netherlands who proves that you don't need to be a judge to understand the game better than most. He's moved on to bigger and better things since.

James Bennett is a former Level 3 judge from Kansas who does a whole lot of programming stuff and travels more than most would think sensible.

* Brian Paskoff

* Aaron Stevenson

* Diane Colley

* Ted Dickinson

* Tom Fowler