May 2011 Archives
May 31
"The girls who were detained were not like your daughter or mine."
Amnesty International first reported in March that Egyptian authorities were conducting "virginity tests" on female protestors. Today, military authorities admitted that these tests took place and tried to defend the practice.
Doom in your browser
Doom was a classic game, revolutionary in its time. And it took a high-end machine to run it, like a 486 running 25 MHz (ooh! aah!). Times have changed: it's been ported to Javascript, and it will run in your browser.
The Wikipedia of symbology.
There are symbols from Asia. Wiccan symbols. Symbols from Freemasonry, Christianity, and Native Americans. Explore the Symbol Dictionary.
The Dirty Talk Of The Town
The Awl compiles a history of profanity at The New Yorker. Padgett Powell once said that the usage rules used to be so restrictive, he was forced to change "big-butt sheriff" to "big-bubba sheriff" in "The Winnowing of Mrs. Schuping" (1991; great story).
Milo Goes To The Movies
FILMAGE: The Story of DESCENDENTS / ALL is an upcoming feature-length documentary about pop-punk pioneers Descendents. The makers are looking for photos, video, and film of the band. The band's first album, 1982's Milo Goes To College, was an instant classic with songs like I'm Not A Loser. Various splits, reformations, and line-up changes followed. Their most reformation in 2010 included sets at Australia's No Sleep Till festival (full Sydney set at Moshcam). Classic Desendents: I'm The One. Merican. Hope.
Magic Headphones
Magic Headphones
"DJ Fresh - Louder (Doctor P & Flux Pavilion Remix)" DUBSTEP, The dancers are ( in order) Marquese "nonstop" Scott/ Julius "iglide" Chisolm / Cyrus "glitch" Spencer . Videography by Jason Locklear
Time is Money
The Shredder Clock will start shredding anything you put in it, from homework to $100 dollar bills, unless it is manually shut off immediately. No snooze button, either.
Syed Saleem Shazad
The Most Dangerous Place In The World On May 29, fearless Pakistani journalist and author Syed Saleem Shazad disappeared on the way to a TV interview concerning his story about al Qaeda infiltration into the Pakistani military. On May 30, his badly beaten body was found in a canal 150 km from his home in Islamabad. Shazad, Pakistan Bureau Chief for Asia Times Online, had written many provocative stories that brought him threats from Pakistan's ISI. Shazad's murder shows again why Pakistan is the most dangerous place in the world for journalists.
Finite Crisis on Single Earth
DC to reboot entire universe. Will debut same-day digital distribution of 52 new #1 comics in September. [more inside]
Anatomy of a Mashup
Anatomy of a Mashup - an amazing visualization of "Definitive Daft Punk."
Crime Fighting Armored Gloves
A robber is cornered in a dead-end alley: He turns to face the police officer pursuing him, ready to fight. He pauses. The officer’s left forearm is encased in ballistic nylon, and half a million volts arc menacingly between electrodes on his wrist. A green laser target lands on the robber’s chest. He puts his hands up; it’s a fight he can’t win. [more inside]
"My father was a squirrel — so I've got my father's hands."
Somehow, this makes the Mushroom Kingdom even more trippy
Depixelating Pixel Art: "Naïve upsampling of pixel art images leads to unsatisfactory results. Our algorithm extracts a smooth, resolution-independent vector representation from the image which is suitable for high-resolution display devices." [more inside]
Now I don't go back to Lidl
Hard Luck Guy
Say, you wanna hear a sad song? Eddie Hinton was a guitar player, vocalist, and songwriter from Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Co-writer of one of the tenderest, sexiest hits of the late 60s, Dusty Springfield's Breakfast in Bed, Hinton was a key member of the world-famous Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section from 1967 to 1971 (turning down an invitation from Duane Allman to be a member of the Allman Brothers Band) who worked as a studio musician on albums by Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett, Percy Sledge, the Staples Singers, and Toots Hibbert, but his early success was sidetracked by mental problems, booze, and drugs. [more inside]
Iranian Internet 2.0: The First Halal Internet
Iran has a conflicting relationship with the internet. On one side, a large portion of the population are online, and even President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had a well-publicized blog in 2006 (though it now seems to be offline). Then there was Iran's internet revolution in 2009, when there were country-wide internet censorship that was countered by use of web proxies. Later that same year, a company affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps purchased a majority share in the nation's telecommunications monopoly. The fact that IRGC was involved with a for-profit company was not news, as IRGC has long been involved in Iran's economy, but their role in communications was more troubling. The latest news causing a stir is a "halal" internet for Iran, "an internet that conforms to Islamic principles, to improve its communication and trade links with the world," according to a quote from head of economic affairs with the Iranian presidency, Ali Aqamohammadi. [more inside]
The Third Eagle of the Apocalypse
Phallic Symbols at Denver International Airport. Many of the paintings and sculptures at DIA contain hidden images of paganism... On previous videos I have pointed out that this is actually the figure of a naked woman, and the crotch is formed by a bird form. But right opposite the woman is a penguin...
Tastes like Summer's Eve
You've probably heard of Ed Hardy clothing, but did you know that there is also a full range of Ed Hardy beverages? [more inside]
Browbeaten, weary-eyed, terribly optimistic units of the boobilariat.
Ben Hecht, arguably one of the greatest screenwriters in Hollywood history, started his career in the (sometimes literally) cutthroat world of Jazz Age journalism at the Chicago Daily News. Throughout 1921 he wrote a series of remarkable vignettes collectively titled the Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago: stories of drifters, fops, and artists from Michigan Avenue to Chinatown, but most of all a fond portrait of the city itself. Collected in book form and gorgeously illustrated, the Thousand and One Afternoons are in the public domain and readily available online. Each story is four or five short pages in length, and goes great with coffee.
Medicine in the Americas
Medicine in the Americas is a digital library project that makes freely available original works demonstrating the evolution of American medicine from colonial frontier outposts of the 17th century to research hospitals of the 20th century. [more inside]
Kreayshawn
Gucci Gucci, Louis Louis, Fendi Fendi, Prada
Basic bitches wear that shit so I don't even bother [more inside]
Basic bitches wear that shit so I don't even bother [more inside]
More WHO information on cellphones and cancer
In a shift from its earlier position, the World Health Organization has stated that cellphones "possibly carcinogenic." Full report (PDF).
"/b/ has given rise to more fluid practices to signal identity and status in spite of, or perhaps because of, the lack of technological support."
4chan and /b/: An Analysis of Anonymity and Ephemerality in a Large Online Community is a paper by researchers from MIT and the University of Southampton. The paper itself [PDF].
Did your cactus die?
“I’d gladly put my balls on the chopping block for the benefit of mankind.”
The Rise of Chinese anti-semitism and contemporary support for Hitler as a display of Chinese nationalism.
Here is an article from the Asia Times. that discusses the fact that "a rumor is spreading virally throughout the Middle Kingdom that asserts that Austrian-born Hitler was raised by a family of Chinese expats living in Vienna."
Apparently "as the rumor spreads throughout the Chinese social web, admiration for Hitler is growing stronger and stronger. Blog posts with titles like 'Why I like Hitler' are popping up every day, and an increasingly greater share of young Chinese are choosing to express their nationalism by voicing support for Hitler."
Viral link to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome questioned
Editors of the journal Science have asked the co-authors of a 2009 paper that linked chronic fatigue syndrome to a retrovirus called XMRV to voluntarily retract the paper. Science editor-in-chief Bruce Alberts and executive editor Monica Bradford cited concerns about the validity of the findings, saying other scientists hadn't been able to replicate them, among other reasons. [more inside]
Pentagon: computer virus an "act of war", can respond with military force
'The Pentagon has concluded that computer sabotage coming from another country can constitute an act of war, a finding that for the first time opens the door for the U.S. to respond using traditional military force.'
J-E-T-S!
In 1995, the NHL's Winnipeg Jets were officially sold to an investment group in Pheonix, Arizona, despite community outrage and a last minute fan rally. [more inside]
Supersupercut
Choose one.
With a coalition government and the recent turmoil over the voting system, sometimes British democracy feels like it's in a bit of a crisis. Thank goodness you can now vote on issues that really matter.
Huffduffer
Huffduffer is like Instapaper, but for audio. You can create your a personalized podcast from audioclips you find on the Internet, but don't want to listen to right that second. [more inside]
The Borneo Blog
The Borneo Blog - fascinating photographic journey from the late 1960s of life and culture in Kapit, Sarawak, Malaysia* via Mefi Projects. [slightly NSFW - some topless locals]
The edible is the political
Encountering Urdu poetry's modern heavyweight
Faiz for Dummies. Worth a read even if you don't know Urdu.
You managed not to get eaten then?
"From Papua New Guinea to Stoke-on-Trent, Prince Philip has left his mark around the world. As his 90th birthday looms, Hannah Ewan recalls the soundbites that could only have come from one man"
May 30
Typography and the Kindle platform
Learn to swim.
Energy-related carbon-dioxide (CO2) emissions in 2010 were the highest in history, according to the latest estimates by the International Energy Agency (IEA). After a dip in 2009 caused by the global financial crisis, emissions are estimated to have climbed to a record 30.6 Gigatonnes (Gt), a 5% jump from the previous record year in 2008, when levels reached 29.3 Gt. The likelihood of exceeeding 450 ppm CO2 and associated two degrees of warming has now receded greatly.
"You can't fake a tape! Pictures don't lie! At least not until you've assembled them creatively. "
Newstweek: fixing the facts. Newstweek is a device that injects fake news into unsecured wireless connections. More info at hackaday.
Fat Mike of punk band NoFX creates punk rock rental property in Las Vegas
Welcome to Vegas Punk House. Don’t break shit! Frontman, Fat Mike, of the punk band NoFX recently opened a "Punk House" available for renting while staying in Vegas. Complete with a mini golf course, 3 bedrooms (one with six bunk beds), punk flyers all over the walls, beer vending machine, and a "paltry" museum, for $400 dollars per 3 day stay, you can maintain you're punk lifestyle, albeit in luxury. (VIDEO)
Drunken Angel vs. Drunken Angel
I have seen the future of rock n roll + cinema and it is 4-minute mashups that span eras and genres and continents and cultures. Although it's hard to imagine any others can reach this level of awesome: Akira Kurosawa vs. Lucinda Williams. Drunken Angel vs. Drunken Angel. SLYT
Tupac the Kiwi
Over the weekend, PBS' website was hacked by a group calling itself "The Lulz Boat", or "LulzSec". The PBS site displayed a story claiming that rapper Tupac Shakur was alive and well in New Zealand. (He's not). The hack was apparently over the Frontline program that aired last week, 'Wikisecrets', which Julian Assange called "hostile". This follows a separate, unrelated breach at Lockheed Martin, also publicized over the weekend. (Previously)
Dog Day Afternoons
“I have to admit, I admired her style,” . . . “the most awesome robbery ever.” . . . “twisted, intellectually bright, dysfunctional individuals who outsmarted themselves” . . . "from threats to farce to violence" . . . "He smelled really good." . . . Slate and Longform.org team up to being you the tales of five remarkable bank heists.
KKK vs. WBC
"Protesting members of the controversial Westboro Baptist Church were met with an unlikely group of counter-protesters Monday at Arlington Cemetery...a branch of the Ku Klux Klan from Virginia called the Knights of the Southern Cross" [more inside]
A girl is never too young to marry, really.
Because the wedding was illegal and a secret . . it was well into the afternoon before the three girl brides . . . began to prepare themselves for their sacred vows. "Two of the brides, the sisters Radha and Gora, were 15 and 13, old enough to understand what was happening. The third, their niece Rajani, was 5. . . " Previously on MetaFilter. If you can read a pdf document, here is more from the International Center for Research on Women.
In the grim, dark future of the 41st millennium, there is ONLY (gears of) WAR
Start with the over-sized armor and bodybuilder physiques of the marines. When you aim a gun in Space Marine, the target reticle is huge, just like the target reticle in Gears of War. The guns are huge and they feature a chainsaw blade that can be used to slice enemies in half, execution style, similar to the “chainsaw bayonet” of the Gears soldiers... The blood spatters are also quite similar. The guns shoot in a similar fashion and the Space Marines wield a big giant hammer that resembles the blasting hammers not from Gears of War but from Microsoft’s other sci-fi franchise, Halo... The bad guys are the green Ork enemies from the Warhammer world, and they bear no resemblance to the enemies in Gears of War, except that they make loud grunts. Of course, their very name does bear resemblance to the “orcs” in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, but we’ll ignore that for now. Dean Takahashi, lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat, on how Warhammer 40K: Space Marine is a big rip off of Gears of War. That would be Warhammer 40k, the first rulebook for which was released in 1987, and Gears of War, the relentlessly brown X-Box game released in 2006 to an emo-tastic advertising campaign. Oops. Dean has since backed down and said that he was only talking about gameplay aspects (he wasn't) that are similar (not particularly). Previously he was forced to retract a bad review of Mass Effect when it emerged that he had no idea how to play it. Should videogame journalists be expected to vaguely know what they are talking about, or are we just petty and vindictive for expecting that? (via)
Bletchley Park WWII Code-breaking Machines Rebuilt from Memories
Early 1940: British police listening for radio transmissions from German spies within the UK pick up weird signals, and pass them to Bletchley Park, the United Kingdom's main decryption establishment in WWII. The source of these German messages is an unknown machine, which the Brits dub Tunny (10 minute video with Tony Sale describing the Tunny). August 30, 1941: German operators send two very similar messages with the same key, providing insight into the encryption scheme. By January 1942, British cryptographers deduced the workings of the German code machines, sight unseen. The British were able to create their own Tunny emulators to decrypt messages sent by German High Command. After the war, these and other British code-breaking and emulating machines were demolished and/or recycled for parts and their blueprints destroyed, leaving a hole in the history of the British WWII code breaking. Efforts to rebuild the British Tunny emulator started in the 1990s, and quite recently a Tunny emulator replica was completed. [more inside]
Courage under fire
A kindergarten teacher in La Estanzuela, a neighborhood in Monterrey Mexico, sings with her students as gunfire can be heard outside. [more inside]
An Experiment in Pixelated Alchemy
Artist Shawn Smith uses hand-cut wooden blocks and acrylic paint to transform images of nature into three-dimensional pixelated sculptures. [more inside]
William Nolde (1929-1973)
Colonel William B. Nolde, 43, Bronze Star and Legion of Merit medal recipient, was killed by an artillery shell near An Lộc on January 27, 1973 - 11 hours before the truce that ended the Vietnam War.
The uncanny valley just got uncannier
"There's nuts on both sides," he says. "I guess I'm one of 'em."
The life and times of Harvey Updyke: [espn.com] Harvey Updyke talks about life, death and the trees at Toomer's Corner. "Harvey Updyke walks into the famous catfish place down in the swamp, takes off his crimson houndstooth baseball cap and asks, right off the bat, if I know where he could get some cheap tickets to next year's Alabama-Ole Miss game. Provided, he makes sure to point out later, he's not in prison."
paradigm drift
Commodity Prices and Paradigm Shifts - "The real paradigm shift, or more like a paradigm drift, because it is slowly enveloping us, is that we are moving toward preferences and lifestyle where we will simply consume less. A lot less... [more inside]
Rocking Chair
Leslie Slape has been a professional storyteller for more than 20 years. This column will feature some of her favorite short folktales from around the world. Come on, snuggle up in the rocking chair, and get ready for a story. [more inside]
Toronto's own little war on an abstract noun.
Mayor Rob Ford of Toronto (previously, previouslier, and previousliest) is cracking down on graffiti in Hogtown with a Graffiti Abatement Program. However, with small business owners facing steep fines for failing to remove graffiti, independent removal services charging handsomely to remove it (with power washers which can damage building facings and which also sweep aerosol paint residue into the sewers and Lake Ontario) and taggers being regularly presented with fresh canvasses to work on, which starts the cycle once again, the system seems insupportable. [more inside]
A boy and his otter
The Empire of the Nickel
"For five cents Coney Island will feed you, frighten you, cool you, toast you, flatter you, or destroy your inhibitions. And in this nickel empire boy meets girl." [more inside]
There will, of course, be some 9-1-1 worthy mistakes in the beginning, such of those who think keeping a harem of hens is no more difficult than ranching gold fish.
"If a hen that appreciates Wagner and Rachmaninov can make me breakfast, she sounds like a pretty good companion to have around" - Toronto Standard reports on the pros and cons of a recent vote to determine if hens can be kept as pets.
Tressel Resigns
Jim Tressel, one of the most successful college football coaches in history, has resigned as coach of the Ohio State Buckeyes. After several players were discovered to have traded Ohio State football memorabilia for tattoos (actions which represent NCAA violations), it was revealed that Tressel knew of the player's actions and attempted to conceal the information from investigators. Though Tressel often projected a squeaky clean, conservative image, detractors have often accused him of hypocrisy.
She is right here with me nowwwww
Katy & I
Katy & I. [Video] Jack Moore has an obsession with Katy Perry.
"Liking Is for Cowards, Go for What Hurts"
Jonathan Franzen's essay, excerpted from his commencement speech at Kenyon College says, among other things "To speak more generally, the ultimate goal of technology... is to replace a natural world that’s indifferent to our wishes ... with a world so responsive to our wishes as to be, effectively, a mere extension of the self." [more inside]
May 29
I. NEVER. Would.
Odlyzko on electronic publishing, 1996
"As recently as a year ago, there were many publishers, librarians, and scholars who thought that electronic publishing was just a passing fad." In 1996, the number theorist Andrew Odlyzko, a pioneer in the development of "experimental mathematics" via large-scale computation, wrote a article, prescient in many respects, about the effect the Internet would have on the economics of scholarly publication, and on commerce more generally.
Bloody Kids!
IS TROPICAL - THE GREEKS: Official music video (Vimeo, 3.25); live action combined with animation for real comic-book violence. NSFW owing to boys being shot, blown up, shot, electrocuted, shot, slashed and then shot some more.
An alternative anthem
Tomorrow is Memorial Day, we're all tired, things have been hard here in the States, hard for years and years and years. Perhaps we could use a new (but not really) anthem to bring some spirit back.
RATM Killing Remix
Not worried at all anymore.
Sell everything, immediately.
Carleton E. Watkins
Carleton Watkins (1829-1916) was an early western photographer, notable for his views of San Francisco and Yosemite. Watkins made his images with a custom built "Mammoth" 18x22" glass plate camera. [more inside]
"Because I mean, come on. It's the 21st century. Who doesn't know how to have sex?"
"When you're partners in an unconsummated marriage, there's a lot of anger. You find yourself saying things you would never say under normal circumstances. You see yourself becoming bitter and horrible to your husband. You tell him this is all his fault and that any normal man would be able to have penetrated you. You compare him to your ex-boyfriend and laugh at him." [more inside]
Hellfire and Damnation!
After over seven years, Stephen R. Donaldson, has stopped taking questions for his monumental and amazing Gradual Interview.
"After May 21, 2011, the Gradual Interview will no longer accept new questions or messages. I will continue to work my way through the questions which have already been accepted, but I can't do more. I'm too far behind on too many things, and the strain is affecting my concentration. Discontinuing the Gradual Interview is one of several things that I'm doing to simplify my life."The Gradual Interview is a fully-searchable question and answer session with his readers that currently contains over 2600 exchanges on topics including minutiae about his novels, his writing process, and many other interesting subjects. [more inside]
More enthusiasm! More!
Our infernal devices
The most curious was on a chariot that carried the most singular music that can be imagined. It held a bear that played the organ; instead of pipes, there were sixteen cat heads each with its body confined; the tails were sticking out and were held to be played as the strings on a piano, if a key was pressed on the keyboard, the corresponding tail would be pulled hard, and it would produce each time a lamentable meow... the cats were arranged properly to produce a succession of notes from the octave… Sixteenth-century Europe, Jingle Cats, and the 2008 Housing Bubble: The Birth of Sampling [more inside]
I've Got Every Right To Get Loud
Canada's own Godspeed You! Black Emperor recently reunited and played five nights in three NYC venues. Thanks to GY!BE's kindness toward set recording and NYCTaper you can listen to the two sets at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple.
Parking Garage
Learners are doers, McLuhan as teacher
Wikipedia And The Death Of The Expert - "McLuhan prefigured the Internet era in a number of surprising ways. As he said in a March 1969 Playboy interview: 'The computer thus holds out the promise of a technologically engendered state of universal understanding and unity, a state of absorption in the Logos that could knit mankind into one family and create a perpetuity of harmony and peace' ... Wikipedia, along with other crowd-sourced resources, is wreaking a certain amount of McLuhanesque havoc on conventional notions of 'authority', 'authorship', and even 'knowledge' ... Knowledge is growing more broadly and immediately participatory and collaborative by the moment."
Art Jackson's Atrocity
Brutal Economics of Cable TV
The success of The Walking Dead, paradoxically, has left the network with an unusual dilemma. Like the executives of Mad Men’s Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, AMC is facing an existential question: How do I grow my business without sacrificing who I am? The Zombies at AMC’s Doorstep. TL;DR version: How AMC Explains the Brutal Economics of Cable Television
I just made you read that confusing thing.
Eugene Mirman has unleashed his absurdist wrath upon an unsuspecting telecom (Time Warner Cable) for their lack of customer service, taking out a paid advertisement in the New York Press to do so. This is not the first time (referenced here previously, the mp3s can be found here) this high school commencement speaker has used his bizarre powers to fight the (strange but) good fight against a telecom.
"Now come and get your Ritalin."
May 28
"Guys, just stop." "Stop what?" "Dancing."
Adam Kokesh served in Fallujah as a Marine, then got in hot water for appearing at an anti-war protest in uniform. This weekend, he was brutalized by US Park police for silently dancing at the Jefferson Memorial as part of a small flash mob. The event was captured on video, which is fascinating and surreal.
Dinosaur Battle Town
My Little Brony
The best word to describe it is probably “relentless,” in that it’s relentlessly cute, relentlessly happy, and relentlessly entertaining. In its own way, it reminds me of a movie like Singin’ In The Rain, in that both properties aim to overwhelm any cynicism directed at them via sheer and utter joyfulness. It seems like it should be easy to watch either property with an ironic sneer of detachment, but both utterly wear down all defenses. - The A.V. Club. My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic (previously) is the curiously addictive cartoon accompaniment to the famous girl's toy line. It just finished it's first season, and all of the episodes can be seen on YouTube (start here) and this all encompassing torrent. While intended for girls 6 through 8, the show has spawned a surprising additional fan base of young-adult men. Calling themselves bronies, they have created a staggering amount of fan material (check the blog Equestra Daily, chan Ponychan, and image dump Ponibooru) and turned the ponies into a widely pervasive meme, all with the apparent blessing of Hasbro. [more inside]
Your Commute Is Killing You
One of the best things you can do to increase your happiness is to move closer to where you work. [Previously]
"The songs were virtually the last things to go on there."
How Roxy Music built Avalon, the album. Producer Rhett Davies: “Bryan would lay down four or five scat vocals. We would spend quite a lot of time doing that, and we would actually comp the scat vocals as if they were final vocals with lyrics,” says Davies. “It might seem stupid that we were comping mumblings, but that is basically what we were doing. I think it gave Bryan a clue to the actual shape of the sound of the lyrics, be it an ‘e’ or an ‘o’ sound or whatever, so that they sounded right with the mood of the music. If you put the scat vocal tracks up and really listen to them next to the finished vocal, it wouldn't sound that much different than the finished vocal. He was using identical shapes! Over the months, he would work on the verses and choruses and slowly get ideas on what the song was about,” Davies continues. “He would come in and say, ‘I think I've got a first verse’ and he would try it. Then he might come in later and say, ‘I think I have a second verse,’ or ‘I think I've got a chorus.’ It was pieced together, along with the rest of the music, over the period.”
The Global Food Outlook
Psychological Costs of War
New working paper by three economists estimates the psychological costs of war at between $1.5 and $2.7 billion. [more inside]
WWJQD, or What Would John Quiñones Do?
At Norma's cafe in Farmers Branch Texas the results of the Primetime show "What would you do?" brings tears to the eyes of its actors [more inside]
Research Blogging
Research Blogging is an aggregator for blog posts on peer-reviewed research. The posts are on various subjects, such as culinary trends in an extinct hominid , the distance and mass of Saggitarius A* and when chemists go to war
What the Eye Doesn't See, the Heart Doesn't Mind.
Step Across the Border (previously, link now broken) "as long as I was playing in a band I didn't have to actually go out there and talk to girls and dance, I could just be on stage and watch everybody else doing it".
The critically acclaimed music documentary on Fred Frith, written and directed by Nicolas Humbert and Werner Penzel (amazon link). It is also available in 8 parts, on youtube. [more inside]
My God, it's full of galaxies
"The 2MASS Redshift Survey (2MRS) has catalogued more than 43,000 galaxies within 380 million light-years from Earth. In this projection, the plane of the Milky Way runs horizontally across the center of the image. 2MRS is notable for extending closer to the Galactic plane than previous surveys - a region that's generally obscured by dust." Hires image.
Relax, it's Saturday
Noxolo's name means peace.
'In South Africa's black townships, being gay can be fatal.' 'South Africa has a liberal constitution promising equal rights for all.' 'In a society that is deeply religious, traditional and highly patriarchal, lesbians and gay men contradict the dominant view of African manhood.' 'Across Africa, gay people are threatened, humiliated, raped, beaten, killed, jailed, outed in front-page newspaper stories, condemned by preachers as un-Christian and by politicians and traditional leaders as un-African.' 'In South African townships there's a crime dubbed "corrective rape," rape to "cure" lesbians, and sometimes gay men and transsexuals. They are told they are being taught a lesson: how to be a real woman or man, survivors say.' [more inside]
Triple Back Flip - I score it 10.0 10.0 10.0
World First BMX Triple Backflip [SLYT] World First BMX Triple Backflip - Jed Mildon May 28, 2011.
Cojones? Just looking down that slope gives me vertigo.
That's a Paddlin'
Marc Ornstein - Freestyle Canoe . American Freestyle canoeing is the art of paddling a canoe on flat water with perfect control of its movements.
Jazz funk, soul, disco, bollocks.
SLEBP: My ex Brother-in-Law's shit record collection. "You are bidding on a collection of 50 (approx) 12" singles and LPs of crap music. My sister found these in her attic last weekend, where they has been sat gathering dust for the last couple of decades. They used to belong to her ex-husband, who is one of the biggest arseholes ever to draw breath." A Saturday afternoon amusement.
Snickt!
Simulated Language
In the recent MIT symposium "Brains, Minds and Machines," Chomsky criticized the use of purely statistical methods to understand linguistic behavior. Google's Director of Research, Peter Norvig responds. (via) [more inside]
Risking it all in Pakistan
Risking it all in Pakistan – Pakistani truck drivers face death at every turn.
RIP Blythe Spirit
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has announced: NASA has ended operational planning activities for the Mars rover Spirit and transitioned the Mars Exploration Rover Project to a single-rover operation focused on Spirit's still-active twin, Opportunity. New Scientist has a quality obituary for the little Mars Rover that could.
"so you can imagine, here I was, an analyst at a hedge fund; it was very strange for me do to something of social value"
Salman Khan: The Messiah of Math - "His free website, dubbed the Khan Academy, may well be the most popular educational site in the world. Last month about 2 million students visited. MIT's OpenCourseWare site, by comparison, has been around since 2001 and averages 1 million visits each month... [more inside]
Eh, someone had to do it... [Champions League]
The 2010-11 Champions League Finals. In two and a half hours, the biggest game in club football will commence (bbc text stream). The Champions League final is likely to be watched by 300 million viewers and features Manchester United (England's best team this year) against FC Barcelona, now sometimes claimed to be the best team of all time (although the Barca coach plays that down). Lineker thinks that Barca just have to 'turn up to win'. [more inside]
100 Bottles of Beer
Street interviews with Buffalo's freelance bottle collectors – the people who wander through the city to recycle our empties. [more inside]
The Daily Rind
"The Daily Rind” scheduling system: I have an inkling that it will work best for those with a particular creative disposition, while those whose thought-patterns are more regimented and linear may prefer more conventional scheduling methods. But if you’ve got a more fluid workstyle and struggle with finding rhythm and balance with the scheduling of your days, give the system a try
The World Record is awarded for Cleanest Floor, not Longest Bird Ball Balance
I'd be like 'swag!'
The dude abides, Captain
Spock in retirement, aka Bruno Mars - The Lazy Song (SLYT)
Lady Gaga takes tea with Mr Fry
A ghost in a real setting
Running seems to allow me, ideally, an expanded consciousness in which I can envision what I'm writing as a film or a dream. I rarely invent at the typewriter but recall what I've experienced. --Celebrated author Joyce Carol Oates on the connection between writing and running.
You must be a robot too.
Psalty and COLBY, two singin' dancin' spiritual guides for kids. Presented by Everything is Terrible.
I swear it happened
Quentin Tarantino, Tilda Swinton and Marilyn Manson? Carl Sagan and the Dalai Lama? Awesome People Hanging out Together does what it says on the tin.
May 27
"Save The World" by Swedish House Mafia
SLYT: Either "Save The World" by Swedish House Mafia is one of the most incredibly moving music videos ever or I just have insanely weepy-with-joy PMS hormones right now. I link, you decide!
Vicious Cycles, and HTML text adventure
Vicious Cycles is a text adventure converted into HTML, and the results are pretty great. [more inside]
Cold Steel
Cold Steel is a company that produces and sells weapons to the mass market. This is a revealing promotional video focusing on its founder, Lynn Thompson, who describes the philosophy behind his business..
"You will not be able to stay home, brother..."
War Pigs. Live. Heavy.
But Not All the Live-Long Day
Grand Rapids to Newsweek: We A'int Dying!
This past January Newsweek magazine deemed Grand Rapids, Michigan as one of the top 10 'dying cities' in the United States. Mayor George Heartwell refuted the 'dying city' label in letter [PDF] to Newsweek editor Tina Brown. The designation inspired the citizens of the city to raise $40,000 and pull together to create a lip-dub to Don McLean's 'American Pie.'
The curious case of the Amazonian Chernobyl
High-Stakes Seismology
In a chilling development, six Italian scientists (and one government official) are facing manslaughter charges for failing to predict the April 6, 2009 earthquake that killed 309 people.
I have some extremely distressing news.
A long time ago (1987) in a slightly parallel galaxy not so far away, an aspiring filmmaker named George Lucas teamed up with thespian Richard E. Grant to create the epic tale of a frustrated thespidroid trying to find fame on the desolate planet of Tatooine. Withnail and O is the result.
Sarah Palin for Primetime Host
No Blood, No Foul
Inside the Detainee Abuse Task Force
On 28 Jul 2004, the Detainee Abuse Task Force, was formed by USACIDC to investigate all allegations of Iraqi Detainee abuse involving Coalition Forces.
One of the special agents in charge describes the task force as under-resourced and hampered by a bureaucracy unable or unwilling to facilitate its investigations.
PBS and The Nation investigating journalist states “One thing that shocked me was that the ID/DATF agents that I interviewed said there could be hundreds, if not thousands, of allegations of detainee abuse and torture that likely didn’t reach them.”
In 2009 President Obama stated “Individuals who violated standards of behavior in these photos have been investigated and held accountable.” and concluded
"I ran for President because I believe that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together."
On 28 Jul 2004, the Detainee Abuse Task Force, was formed by USACIDC to investigate all allegations of Iraqi Detainee abuse involving Coalition Forces.
One of the special agents in charge describes the task force as under-resourced and hampered by a bureaucracy unable or unwilling to facilitate its investigations.
PBS and The Nation investigating journalist states “One thing that shocked me was that the ID/DATF agents that I interviewed said there could be hundreds, if not thousands, of allegations of detainee abuse and torture that likely didn’t reach them.”
In 2009 President Obama stated “Individuals who violated standards of behavior in these photos have been investigated and held accountable.” and concluded
"I ran for President because I believe that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together."
Here's a picture of me when I was younger
The website of the late comedian Mitch Hedberg has been revamped and relaunched by his widow Lynn Shawcroft, with photos, videos, and selections from Mitch's notebooks. (via) (previously) (sadly)
cat I have no idea how you got into these places cat or why
The end of the end of polio?
With the help of Bill Gates, the World's efforts to eradicate polio (PDF) have over the last few years gained a great deal of new hope (TED) [more inside]
What's a few hundred million between 24 friends?
The most powerful presidential position in the world is having its election soon, and the incumbent has just been brought up before an ethics committee for investigation. The USA's best attempt at a candidate was shut out and couldn't even be nominated. The person who is supposed to be representing the US region has been found guilty of corruption several times. Could this result in a historic revote for the 2022 World Cup location? [more inside]
What Proof Does a Woman Have to Have?
"The woman, 29, testified, she woke up naked except for a bra, in a puddle of vomit, and believing that she had been raped the night before by a police officer." An East Village video system "recorded two police officers as they arrived at the apartment building above the bar four times in four hours — once on official business, then sneaking back three more times in secret..." What Proof Does a Woman Have to Have? (NYT) [more inside]
Canuck court claims consciousness-less consent clearly crap.
The Supreme Court of Canada ruled today, in a 6-3 decision, that a person cannot give advance consent to sexual activity while unconscious. [more inside]
Tyranny is helpful, especially when voting against tyranny
On May 23, 1861, Spotsylvania County, Virginia voted 1323 - 0 in favor of succession from the Union. Historian John Hennessy provides an explanation of how that vote came to be a perfect 100% in favor of succession. So people rebelling against "Northern tyranny" themselves used tyranny to rig a vote that was undoubtedly going to go overwhelmingly in their favor anyway?
Out Of This World
Out Of This World: Science Fiction But Not As You Know It is an exhibition at the British Library exploring the origins of Science Fiction, running until September. China Mieville takes a look at the exhibition for the BBC. (Out Of This World postcards - images from the exhibition) [more inside]
Captured
Elizabeth Eckford. Paul Cole. Lt. Colonel Robert L. Stirm. Juan Romero. The unfamiliar names have one thing in common: because of a split second in time with a camera pointing towards them, they will always be remembered as “the person in that photograph.” This list includes 10 such individuals, and how a single picture can change some people’s lives. [NSFW for one photo]
The Happy Warrior
Vice President and Minnesota Senator Hubert Humphrey is remembered by "Nixonland" author Rick Perlstein in today's New York Times as "America's Forgotten Liberal" on this, the 100th anniversary of Humphrey's birth. A significant political figure in his own right as a champion of civil rights, a front-runner in the 1960 Democratic primaries and the Democratic nominee for president in 1968, Humphrey's political and personal humiliations at the hands of Lyndon Johnson hindered him at what should have been the very pinnacle of his career and the success of the 30-year liberal majority in Washington. A four-part series at MinnPost.com by writer Iric Nathanson (pt.1, pt.2, pt.3, pt.4) looks at his career. Humphrey died of cancer in 1978 while still serving in the Senate.
Insider trading laws do not apply to members of US Congress
Insider trading laws do not apply to members of US Congress. And it shows, an academic study found members of House beat the market by 6% annually from 1985 to 2001, outperforming hedge funds, not to mention Raj Rajaratnam and Martha Stewart. [more inside]
Paper Cuts
Paper Cuts. Paper-cut silhouettes of famous characters. Can you name them all? (Warning: Single page with a lot of inline images. One slightly NSFW.)
Chicken Vanishes, Heartbreak Ensues
Chicken Vanishes, Heartbreak Ensues: A front-yard chicken in Brooklyn is stolen, and a neighborhood rallies. (SLNYT)
"The only horses in the arena were in this bucket."
You're a (sleepy) kitty!
sweet dreams, small kitty (slytp).
Not only can't you get an abortion, but no one knows how to perform one, anyway.
On Wednesday, the House approved an amendment from Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) that would prevent a federal healthcare education fund from being used for abortion or to provide for training for abortion procedures. [more inside]
Celebrity Lecture Series at MSU
Web artifact made of solid gold CELEBRITY LECTURES SERIES from Michigan State University. Ten years worth of lectures were posted in 1998. They are all still there-- awaiting your return.
Edward Albee ,Isabel Allende, Maya Angelou, Margaret Atwood, Pat Conroy, Jacques d'Amboise, E.L. Doctorow, Richard Ford, Carlos Fuentes, David Halberstam, Joseph Heller,
John Irving, Judith Jamison, William Kennedy, Norman Mailer, David McCullough, Terry McMillan, Arthur Miller, Joyce Carol Oates, Philip Roth, Jane Smiley, Susan Sontag, Amy Tan,
Paul Theroux, John Updike,Kurt Vonnegut Jr., Derek Walcott, Garry Wills, August Wilson and
Tom Wolfe.
I listened to the Vonnegut lecture. Imagine-- a whole hour and a half (Well, I skipped the first 9 minutes of introductions.) with my favorite author wheezing and sputtering. How refreshing to hear him declaim in his own voice and reveal the happiest day of his life and his own favorite from among his works -"The Sirens of Titan".
Sean Young's Polaroids
FEMA Gets its Groove Back
FEMA Administrator W. Craig Fugate has what he describes as a "Waffle House" theory of emergency management to assess how bad a situation is after a disaster. "If the Waffle House is open and serving food and has got a full menu, then it's green," he said during an interview inside a FEMA mobile home parked outside a fire station in Joplin. "If the Waffle House is open but has a limited menu, it's yellow, and if the Waffle House isn't open, that's red." - FEMA Gets its Groove Back
The Fiction Liberation Front
The Fiction Liberation Front: cyberpunk/slipstream/transreal author Lewis Shiner has released his collected writings under a Creative Commons license, including his award novels Frontera, Deserted Cities of the Heart, and Glimpses. Shiner may be best known for his inclusion in the seminal 1986 cyberpunk anthology Mirrorshades, alongside the likes of William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, and Rudy Rucker. A few years later he was pronouncing the movement dead.
Early to Ripe, Early to Rot
Why did William James Sidis - the reclusive boy genius fluent in Latin at 2, accepted to MIT at 8, conceptual physicist at 11 - spend so much time thinking about public transit transfers? [more inside]
And you thought me slain? Lionheart is immortal! He can never be destroyed, never!
Ah, "Diorama-Rama", my favorite school event next to "Hearing-test Thurday!"
The Greatest LEGO Diorama in the Galaxy! Imperial Employee of the Month Jay Hoff has been hard at work building the greatest LEGO Diorama in this or any other Galaxy. An impressive, most impressive 37,000 pieces of LEGO (as well as, presumably, a scary amount of time and money), including 388 mini-figurines, went into this custom commemoration of the Emperor's arrival on the second Death Star. This great moment in Imperial history was made in 2011 for Science Discovery Day at Berkeley Preparatory School in Tampa. It uses an Imperial Shuttle Kit with custom designed Death Star hangar. [Via Death Star PR]
Click "continue"
The EU has just rolled out a new law requiring websites to request permission before installing any cookies in a user's web browser. In the UK, businesses have been given a one year deferral on implementation by the Information Commissioner's Office. The ICO have brought their own website into compliance with the law though, showing other websites the way forward. There's a notice at the top of the page requesting permission to set a cookie, as legally required. Click "continue" without agreeing
Kaydara
Kaydara is a French-made Matrix fan film, released on the 21st of May 2011, which has been noted for the high quality of its special effects. The entire 55-minute film is now available to stream for free from its site. [more inside]
Ppl just litarally kill me!
Literally Unbelievable is a blog dedicated to Facebook users who don't understand that The Onion is a satire news site.
May 26
The Last Surrealist
Leonora Carrington, one of the few living links to the movement that counted Dali, Ernst, Tanguy, and Man Ray as its members, passed away Wednesday at the age of 94. Born in Britain, she earned her surrealist credentials primarily as a painter, but also as a novelist.
Forced to flee Europe during WWII, she ended up in Mexico, where she championed another expat European female artist, Remedios Varo. Though both were overshadowed by the more flamboyant Frida Kahlo, all three were strongly influenced by the culture of Mexico, and took surrealism in a new, and decidedly feminine direction.
"...the way of nature, and the way of grace."
For Roger Ebert, it's a prayer that made him "more alert to the awe of existence." For Rober Koehler, it's a kitschy New Age con. For Richard Brody, it perfectly captures the essence of a generation by depicting a character thinking "back to the musings and fantasies of childhood, which are the product of a wondrous and fantastic view of science formed by popular-science books for children and by the commercial artists whose illustrations adorned them." For Stephanie Zacharek, it's "a gargantuan work of pretension." For Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, it's "a creation myth in the guise of a crypto-autobiography" that invents a universe of its own only to destroy it. For J. Hoberman, it's lifeless and dull, "essentially a religious work and, as such, may please the director's devotees, cultists, and apologists." It spent thirty years in development, three in editing and, yes, it contains dinosaurs. The Tree of Life, written and directed by famously reclusive Zoolander fan and "JD Salinger of American movies" Terrence Malick , won the Palme d'Or at this year's Cannes Film Festival. Tomorrow, it comes out in the United States. [more inside]
“There’s a lot of trig”
Reuben Heyday Margolin is an artist who designs kinetic sculptures. His most ambitious work to date is The Nebula, 11,000 pounds of moving sculpture suspended 140’ in the air. Wired has a short, navigable movie on its design, construction and installation. (30 secs of advertising beforehand). Margolin’s art has also been powered by the human body in modern dance. [more inside]
And Seven wins by a nose!
Japan World Cup. It's in Japanese, but if you don't understand a word of what's going on here, but just click on random stuff until the race starts.
Dogs and cats drinking together... mass hysteria!
Dogs do drink like cats. Proved by Science!
Oregon Noir
She Died In Terrebonne is a hard-boiled noir webcomic by Kevin Church. The Rack, The Loneliest Astronauts and his other comics can be found at Agreeable Comics.
A comedy of the social mores of late entrepreneurial capitalism
Public Schools Charge Kids for Basics, Frills
In the wake of ever deeper budget cuts, public schools have begun charging students for basics, such as registering for honors or elective classes.
French scientists reportable habitable planet orbiting another star
French scientists have just published a paper entitled "Gliese 581d is the 1st discovered terrestrial-mass exoplanet in the habitable zone", claiming that their computer model suggests the exoplanet "will have a stable atmosphere and surface liquid water for a wide range of plausible cases."
We've discovered a lot of exoplanets. And there are a lot of sites to help you keep track. Previously.
The secret lives of roaming cats
What do feral and free-roaming house cats do when they're out of sight? A two-year study offers a first look at the daily lives of these feline paupers and princes, whose territories overlap on the urban, suburban, rural and agricultural edges of many towns. [more inside]
i can has gopro?
Ever wonder what it'd be like to be carried around in a lion's mouth? Now through the wonders of technology (and a camera stealing big cat) you can experience it for yourself!
Living With Breasts That Can Be Seen From Orbit
I was the first girl I knew to get breasts. I remember being in sixth grade and this horrible girl named Erica coming up to me before social studies and saying, “You don't have to stick out your chest like that,” and I almost cried. (I cried very easily as a child, and by “as a child” I mean “up until this morning.”) Because I wasn't actually sticking my chest out at all, it was just like that.
This is not a "hipster chick with ukulele" YouTube post
What do you do if you're the lead singer of one of the biggest rock bands in the world releasing your second solo album? If you're Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder, you record 16 songs, originals and covers, spanning a short 35 minutes... accompanying yourself with your ukulele. The entire album, Ukulele Songs, is available for a free First Listen now, thanks to NPR. [more inside]
Poking at Cow Clicker
Let's have a moment of silence ... but not before we pray first
Student Protests Prayer at Graduation, Gets Divine Retribution Instead A high school atheist in Bastrop, Louisiana tried to stop prayer at his graduation by writing to his superintendent and threatening to bring in the ACLU. The superintendent complied, but the student's name was leaked, and soon he was harassed by fellow students and a former Teacher of the Year, and was kicked out of his house. [more inside]
Just because you put on a fucking safari helmet and looked at some poop doesn't give you the right to insult what we do.
Page One: Inside The New York Times is a brilliant new documentary from Andrew Rossi, director of Eat This New York and Le Cirque: A Table In Heaven. Starting in November 2009, Rossi spent a year filming the NYT Media desk: "I’d just arrive daily, go up to the third floor and ask what they’re working on today and can I follow you. At first many were shy, but over time I remained patient and waited for things to happen." [more inside]
On Snuggies and Business Models
"Now is a better time to be a musician, or a fan of music, than any other time in all of human history." Last Friday, the NPR Planet Money podcast featured musician Jonathan Coulton, whose online success prompted one host to compare the man (or his brand) to the blanket-with-arms Snuggie, i.e. "we didn't know we wanted it, and then all of a sudden we did." Coulton responds with his own thoughts on new business models for musicians in the Internet/file-sharing age.
Hey You!
Breaking ankles since (at least) 1986.
The Crossover on Display, a fascinating short New York Times video, featuring interviews with Pearl Washington, Dwayne Wade, and Allen Iverson describing one of the most electric moves in basketball.
We're trapped in the belly of this horrible machine, and the machine is bleeding to death
All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace is the name of a new documentary series by Adam Curtis. The first episode, Love and Power [BBC iPlayer], draws connections between Ayn Rand, Alan Greenspan, an experiment by Pixar co-founder Loren Carpenter, the Californian Ideology of Silicon Valley in the 90s, Bill Clinton's presidency, and the persistence of the global capitalist hegemony in the face of continuing economic crisis. Curtis discusses his ideas in the Guardian.
Hiro Protagonist Would Approve
Back in 2005, the market for retail storage space in Hawaii was evaluated as "underserved [pdf]" and what the market wants, the market gets. The roll out of self storage facilities exploded; storage space in Hawaii doubled from 1.56 million square feet to 3.16 million square feet in 2010. The blocky, often featureless facilities sprang up quickly and would dominate entire city blocks, replacing dozens of retail locations at a time, to the extent that one might wonder: "Do people really have that much junk to store?" Apparently, not anymore[1]. But as the economy struggled and demand fell, the price for storage space hit a point that made sense to some unlikely clients. Instead of just outsourcing the junk drawer, why not use a storage locker for band practice, or a toy store, or even a legal practice? The Secret Life of Storage Units. [more inside]
Entrepreneurship vs Education: Thiel Foundation and 20 Under 20
Peter Thiel, co-founded PayPal and an early investor in Facebook, is granting $100,000 fellowships to not go to college, at least for a while. "We decided about 5 or 6 months ago to start up a program to try to identify 20 talented entrepreneurs, and give them a two year stipend to drop out of school, and to pursue their life's passions and see where that would go." The 20 Under 20 became 24 young people, the first group that the Thiel Foundation might save from the higher education bubble.
metafilter = cvcvcvccvc
The "convowel" tag on Wordnik tracks consonant-vowel patterns in words. "bleeding", "pheasant", "shoeless", "trousers" — ccvvcvcc; "quiet", "naiad", "Sioux", "feuar" — cvvvc; "anglophile", "attractive", "impressure", "ingressive" — vcccvccvcv
Inside Movies Since 1920
Boxoffice, an industry magazine for the movie theater business, has been posting back issues dating to 1925. Via Trailers From Hell.
That's where all the love is!
When you come up behind a group photograph being taken, where do your thoughts turn: to pure evil [some nsfw], or to the ties that bind us all together?
Tarnishing the world's largest and most liquid exchange.
Back on November 23rd, TPMMuckraker ran an article titled “‘Eager Beaver’ FBI Agent’s Attempt To Flip Witness Exposed Feds’ Big Insider Trading Case.” That article (about a prematurely blown, ongoing investigation of allegations of insider trading centered on Goldman Sachs) was illustrated with a photograph of the New York Stock Exchange. Yesterday, TPM Media LLC (dba TPMMuckraker) received a cease and desist letter regarding that photo. [more inside]
Super Soccer Mario
Last night, my brother, the real football fan, regailed me with stories of a bizarre double life that an English player seemed to be leading. Looks like someone beat me to collecting them all.
Motion Poems!
She's an animator who loves poetry.
He's a poet who loves animation.
Their collaboration, along with the help of many other animators and poets,
has resulted in a storm of Motionpoems.
(More on vimeo & youtube.)
He's a poet who loves animation.
Their collaboration, along with the help of many other animators and poets,
has resulted in a storm of Motionpoems.
(More on vimeo & youtube.)
Make MetaFilter Happy Day 2011
On the same morning that Dane County Circuit Judge Maryann Sumi struck down Wisconsin's infamous union-busting bill on the grounds that it violated the state's Open Meetings Law (PDF of decision, previously), Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin signed America's first state-level single-payer legislation into law. [more inside]
Krista and Tatiana Hogan turning 4.5
Krista Hogan and Tatiana Hogan are craniopagus conjoined twins joined at the top, backs, and sides of their heads who are astonishing researchers single page (NYT) with their apparent extraordinary cognitive connection to each other. Since their parents decision not to separate them due to the extreme risks involved, researchers have hoped that they could teach us more about how the brain works, and now they are old enough to tell us about it.
Loom
A cheap boulevardier.
One day last year, while working on a biography of the publisher Scofield Thayer, I opened a folder of papers related to his magazine The Dial. The folder contained undated letters from the poet E.E. Cummings to Thayer, early versions of a couple Cummings’ poems and one poem by Cummings I couldn’t remember ever seeing before. It was called "(tonite" and, until I came across it, it was unknown.James Dempsey discusses Scofield Thayer, E.E. Cummings, their relationship, and a heretofore unknown, unpublished poem.
Collision at the Plate
Last night, in a 7-6 loss to the Florida Marlins, the San Francisco Giants suffered what could potentially be a devastating loss when their prized catcher, 24-year old Buster Posey, in an attempt to block the plate and prevent a run from scoring, injured his leg in a gruesome collision (somewhat graphic mlb.com video). Following the game, his agent is questioning MLB rules surrounding home plate collisions. Analysts across the game are (ESPN Insider, subscription required) also wondering...is it time for a change? Some historical context on collisions at home plate. It's also just recently been reported that Posey has broken his leg and torn ligaments, which is a shame for such a promising and exciting player.
Extended Mind
The Root of Knowledge - "Wikipedia trivia: if you take any article, click on the first link in the article text not in parentheses or italics, and then repeat, you will eventually end up at 'Philosophy.' " (via) [more inside]
It's full of stars!
The Jolly Boys
The most serious crisis facing the world today is the lack of Jamaican Reggae/Mento covers - The Jolly Boys try to redress the balance. [more inside]
And Then Came The Knock
Internet of Things: how it will change the world
"Over the next five years more and more things will act on our behalf and encourage us to do things based on our actions. " How the Internet of Things will change the world.
"There is no separation between her art and her life."
Think you love to crochet? I can guarantee you’re not a patch on Polish-born New York artist Agata Oleksiak, now known as Olek. Olek has covered everything in her apartment with its own custom-made crocheted sweater, and a installation of those items is on display at the Christopher Henry Gallery in Nolita until May 28. She’s also done people, bicycles, cars, windows in abandoned buildings, the bull on Wall Street, and pretty much anything else that would stay still long enough. She keeps track of her crocheting time by counting the number of movies she watches while making an item. I notice she uses variegated acrylic, which is the cheapest yarn on the market. I always wondered who was still buying that "ugly afghan" yarn.
Man uses Google Books to build a 1906 Oldsmobile
Bob Ferry used Google Books to find old magazines that described mechanics, showed pictures and gave descriptions of a 1906 Oldsmobile Model B Runabout so he could build it 100 years later.
Lots of pics and "how to" info at the article.
Book bindings, artistic and historical
Publisher's Bindings Online, 1850-1930. A browesable searchable database of artistic book bindings. There are sections on artistic styles: Arts & Crafts, Japonisme, Poster Style. There are sections on specific authors and designers: Sarah Orne Jewett & Sarah Wyman Whitman, Lousia May Alcott, Lafcadio Hearn. There are historical galleries: Booker T. Washington, Women on Books, The Civil War in Fact and Fiction. There is much more. Previously.
Ratko Mladić Arrested!
VOA reports arrest of Ratko Mladić Boris Tadić has confirmed the arrest of Ratko Mladić the commander who was the military commander of the massacre of Srebenica, the Siege of Sarajevo.
What is the economic value of the internet?
The McKinsey Global Institute has published "Internet Matters: The Net's sweeping impact on growth, jobs, and prosperity" [70 Page PDF or just the Summary]. "On average, the Internet contributes 3.4 percent to GDP in the 13 countries covered by the research an amount the size of Spain or Canada in terms of GDP, and growing at a faster rate than that of Brazil... For governments, investments in infrastructure, human capital, financial capital and business environment conditions will help strengthen their Internet supply domestic ecosystems." Found on Marginal Revolution where Tyler Cowen has a few interesting comments.
All Visual Perception is Illusory to Some Extent
"He is survived by his wife of over eight years, Vanessa, and their two children, ages 4 and 5."
Jose Guerena, 26, was a Marine veteran and father of two. He served two tours in Iraq in 2003 and 2005. On May 5th, he was killed in his home by a SWAT team looking for narcotics [more inside]
It is in the DNA of our great country to reach for the stars and explore
On May 16, 2011, after one scrubbed attempt, the space shuttle Endeavour set off on her final mission, STS-134. Shuttle commander Mark Kelly had this to say after receiving a "go" from the launch poll:
On this final flight of space shuttle Endeavour, we want to thank all the tens of thousands of dedicated employees that have put their hands on this incredible ship and dedicated their lives to the space shuttle program. As Americans, we Endeavour to build a better life than the generation before, and we Endeavour to be a united nation. In these efforts, we are often tested. This mission represents the power of teamwork, commitment, and exploration. It is in the DNA of our great country to reach for the stars and explore; we must not stop. To all the millions watching today, including our spouses, children, family, and friends, we thank you for your support.You've seen launches before, but NASA has uploaded a whole slew of angles that will truly amaze: Witness 4.4 million pounds of shuttle, fuel, and rocket boosters "twang" a full 18 inches as the main engines ignite. 1.2 million pounds of thrust push against a locked down stack, waiting for the solid rocket boosters to ignite. (The SRBs bring the total to 7 million lbs of thrust, enough to break all that binds her to the pad.) OTV Camera 71, a fantastic, short close-up. UCS-15 (TV-21A) provides a dead-on, close up shot of the launch. The South Beach Tracker shot offers a fantastic view as well. From 3.1 miles away at the Press Site, note the ~11 second delay before the piercing sound of the SRBs hits. And just released today, fantastic footage from the solid rocket boosters, including their trip to splashdown in the Atlantic ocean from 30 miles up. And finally, the classic NASA view, with some great data overlays by Spacevidcast. [more inside]
Supernova Sonata
Supernova Sonata by Alex Parker From April, 2003 until August, 2006, the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope watched four parts of the sky as often as possible. Armed with the largest digital camera in the known universe, CFHT monitored these four fields for a special type of supernova (called Type Ia) which are created by the thermonuclear detonation of one or more white-dwarf stars. Each supernova is assigned a note to be played:
The volume of the note is determined by the distance to the supernova, with more distant supernova being quieter and fainter.
The pitch of the note was determined by the supernova’s “stretch,” a property of how the supernova brightens and fades. Higher stretch values played higher notes. The pitches were drawn from a Phrygian dominant scale.
The instrument the note was played on was determined by the properties of the galaxy which hosted each supernova. Supernovae hosted by massive galaxies are played with a stand-up bass, while supernovae hosted by less massive galaxies are played with a grand piano.
May 25
Now look under your seat...
Instructable: How to be Hard to Pigeonhole
We all know Instructables, the crowd-sourced how-to site that brought us great tutorials like "Garbage Bag + Rice Cooker = Alcohol Still," and "Quick Sauerkraut with Caraway Seeds and a Baseball bat" - wait, what? Oh, you must be reading some of Tim Anderson's 200-plus Instructables. Tim's a curious fellow best known for co-founding 3-D printer manufacturer Z Corp (previous-Z) um, no, wait, maybe for writing the Heirloom Technology column in Make Magazine? No? Hmm, then what is he "best known for?" Well, there's a bunch of other stuff in here. . . . [more inside]
Deller on the Threshold
The unearthly countertenor of Alfred Deller, and the Deller Consort. "The most visible icon of the countertenor revival in the twentieth century was Alfred Deller, an English singer and champion of authentic early music performance. Deller initially called himself an "alto", but his collaborator Michael Tippett recommended the archaic term "countertenor" to describe his voice. In the 1950s and 60s, his group, the Deller Consort, was important in increasing audiences' awareness (and appreciation) of Renaissance and Baroque music. Deller was the first modern countertenor to achieve fame, and has had many prominent successors." And here in a 4 part interview "on the countertenor voice!"
1 :: 2 :: 3 :: 4
Seth Godin Discusses the Future of Publishing, and How He Got Started in the Industry
Ed Schultz is sorry. Very sorry.
Ed Schultz, host of MSNBC's The Ed Show, has been suspended for one week without pay after calling right-wing radio host and Fox News staple Laura Ingraham a "talk slut" on his radio show yesterday.
On tonight's episode, he apologized.
@Poldy: Yes
This is not an attempt to tweet mindlessly the entire contents of Ulysses, word-for-word, 140 characters at a time. That would be dull and impossible. What is proposed here is a recasting or a reimagining of the reading experience of this novel, start to finish, within the confines of a day-long series of tweets from a global volunteer army of Joyce-sodden tweeps. (previously!)
Time In A Bottle
Before his death, Mickey Mantle spoke to Sports Illustrated about the effect that alcoholism had on his life and career. [more inside]
"Smells like Russians."
British food-writer and Sichuan cuisine expert Fuchsia Dunlop introduces cheese to a group of chefs from Shaoxing, China,"the Chinese headquarters of 'stinking and fermented' delicacies" for the first time. How does the Stilton fare against stinky tofu?
One Hundred Years of the Indy 500
The men of the early 20th-century motor press sometimes referred to the 13th circuit of an automobile racecourse as “the hoodoo lap,” not because more bad stuff happened then, but because they fervently wished it would. Coming at that point, a wreck would play nicely into the tabloid trope that superstitions are not to be flouted, and it would give a long car race some much-needed narrative cord. And so it was on May 30, 1911, as several dozen reporters leaned forward anxiously to watch the 40-car field for the first-ever Indianapolis 500-mile race power past the starting line for the 12th time and roar yet again into turn one.
We kept playing until we could barely see things
Prison administrators in China have found a new use for forced prison labour: gold-farming operations, in which prisoners play multiplayer games for hours on end, handing over the gold they acquire to the guards, who sell it online for real money.
Can't touch this
Last week the Texas House of Representatives unanimously passed a bill (House Bill 1937) prohibiting public servants from intrusively touching anyone seeking access to a public building or form of transportation. (TIME, Dallas News, Washington Times) The blogosphere touted the legislation as a move to criminalize TSA groping. Today, the bill was withdrawn from consideration by the state senate after a threat from the TSA and Department of Justice to "close down all the airports in Texas". Protesters are currently marching on the state capitol. [more inside]
Seriously. What *is* up with sneakers?
An exhaustive guide to the sneakers worn by Jerry Seinfeld over the course of Seinfeld's 9-year run. [more inside]
A deliberate, knowing lie.
Acting Solicitor Gen. Neal Katyal, in an extraordinary admission of misconduct, took to task one of his predecessors for hiding evidence and deceiving the Supreme Court. The misconduct took place 'in two of the major cases in its history: the World War II rulings that upheld the detention of more than 110,000 Japanese Americans.' 'Scholars and judges have denounced the World War II rulings as among the worst in the court's history, but neither the high court nor the Justice Department had formally admitted they were mistaken — until now. "It seemed obvious to me we had made a mistake. The duty of candor wasn't met," Katyal said.' [more inside]
Online Ear Training Games
Theta Music Trainer — Train your ear with fun music games. Sharpen your sense of pitch and tone. Unlock the hidden patterns in music. Strengthen your music theory skills.
Indy Meets Han
Once upon a time, Indiana Jones met Han Solo. Sort of. Wookieepedia article. Vanity Fair story. io9 story.
D.I.Y. Cooking Handbook
What follows is a D.I.Y. cooking starter kit: small kitchen projects that any cook can tackle. What they all have in common is that they are simple, season-less and a clear improvement on the store-bought version. Includes: Chinese Chili-Scallion Oil, Chocolate-Hazelnut Paste, Corn Muffin Mix, Crème Fraîche, Cultured Butter, Fresh Cheese, Horseradish Beer, Mustard, Kimchi ,Maple Vinegar, Preserved Lemons, Tesa (Cold-Cured Pork Belly), Tomato Chili Jam, Vin d'Orange
On President Kennedy, the Space Race, legacies and politics
50 years ago today, on May 25 1961, US President John F. Kennedy decided "...this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth." Eight years later the Apollo program fulfilled the task, leaving the world with a legacy that includes advances in computers and communciation, lessons in managing complex projects, technological innovations and new views of the Earth. [more inside]
Atari Teenage Riot: Two Decades of Riot Sounds to Cause Riots
Atari Teenage Riot is the sound of punk, breakbeat and glitchy electronics, with a message behind the noise, something of the modern version of a riot set to music. The German group was briefly associated with the Phonogram record label back in 1993, but only long enough get a record deal with an unrecoupable advance, piss off the label, cut those ties and form their own new label: Digital Hardcore Recordings. From there, the group made three albums and about a dozen singles and EPs, toured the world, then went quiet in 2000. That is, until last year when the group reformed to tour, and the revised cast of characters recorded a new album, which is streaming online. Step inside for more history and noise. [more inside]
Disparity
"I just came from Deep River, Ontario, and now I'm in this... DREAM place."
David Lynch's 2001 film Mulholland Drive is the subject of dozens of interpretive theories. Roger Ebert decided it was impossible to figure out. Part of the mystery of the movie comes from how it was initially planned as a television pilot for ABC; Lynch combined pilot footage with a newly-devised ending to make the film. That pilot's script. The entire 90-minute pilot. If you can't be bothered to watch the whole thing, individual scenes after the jump. [more inside]
'He's never kind, he's never affectionate'
We promise no articles about buzzy bees.
Have you always longed for a comprehensive list of the shit Kiwis are really into? No, neither have we. Here it is anyway. Kiwianarama
@Eshackleton: You can't just turn around and go right back, you know.
"Shackleton": The story Ernest Shackleton's Endurance voyage, told as a Twitter novel. Says author Peggy Nelson, "The fearless leader of the greatest anticlimax known to narrative, polar explorer Ernest Shackleton (1874-1922) is today’s go-to superhero." You can follow the narrative on Twitter here. [more inside]
U.S. Measles Cases Hit 15-Year High
April 12, 2011 Joplin editorial: Storm Shelters Needed
On April 12th, prior to the Alabama outbreak and about 6 weeks before a tornado tore through the middle of mostly basement-less Joplin, MO, Colleen Bogener wrote a short editorial on the need for public storm shelters in Joplin. There was a short bit of discussion in response.
Falling Comet
"In 1955 "Rock Around the Clock" went to the top of the charts and turned Bill Haley into the king of rock and roll. Twenty-five years later, he was holed up in a pool house in Harlingen, TX, drunk, lonely, paranoid, and dying. After three decades of silence, his widow and his children tell the story of his years in Texas and his sad final days." (Via)
Archivist Asseblage Art
"Collections wrap bare objects with cultural identity." Smithsonian archivist turned assemblage artist Tracy Hicks finds the seam between two things I didn't think were related -- dispassionate taxonomy and artistic whims. You can catch Hicks' installation at the American Association of Museums conference showing his interpretation of the future of museums (if by "future" you mean a Lovecraftian dystopia.) [more inside]
Turf Grass Capital of the World
Happier meals
So Your Friends Don't Make Fun of You
The AV Club feature Gateways to Geekery is all about the best places to start on some of pop culture's most complex and nuanced artists and genres, including Randy Newman, The Who, Monty Python, steampunk, Sherlock Holmes and 90 others. [more inside]
People begin to get better when they fail.
Milton Glaser on fear of failure "This is the way to professional accomplishment: You have to demonstrate that you know something unique that you can repeat over and over and over, until ultimately you lose interest in it. The consequence of specialization and success is that it hurts you. It hurts you because it doesn't aid in your development. The truth of the matter is that understanding development comes from failure." [more inside]
The Glorious 25th of May: Do you know where your lilac towel is?
All the little angels rise up high. The 25 of May is a day to celebrate two giants of British sci fi/fantasy and humor--Sir Terry Pratchett and the late Douglas Adams. Long may their work endure. [more inside]
"It's not in the textbooks"
A World of Struggle and Hope
Walking from the desert to the Great Lakes.
Walking Home: stories from the desert to the Great Lakes. Laura Milkins is walking home. Home is Grand Rapids, Michigan. Laura lives in Tucson, Arizona. That's 2,000 miles (3,219 km), or about 4,473,976 steps. Right now she's in the shoulder of the road somewhere around Holbrook, Arizona. She has a pack on her back, a webcam streaming 24 hours strapped to a sun visor on her head, and hopefully, a place to stay tonight. You can follow her every step of the way, by watching live video broadcast from her hat.
Or walk with her. [more inside]
Goodbye to Salon's Table Talk
Scott Rosenberg on the end of Salon's Table Talk. They're deleting 16 years of messages on June 10, with nothing indexed by Archive.org or anywhere else.
May 24
NY-26 special congressional election won by Kathy Hochul
Media outlets are declaring a winner in NY-26 as Democratic candidate Kathy Hochul has a 6% lead (with 91% reporting) over Republican Jane Corwin (previously) in Tuesday's special election. [more inside]
David Foster Wallace: Portrait Of An Infinitely Limited Mind
Don't you treat them like no low down dogs
They began as a folk duo on the lower east side, doing irreverent versions of songs from the Harry Smith anthology. They became the backing band for The Fugs, had a brush with fame on the soundtrack to Easy Rider, briefly featured playwright Sam Shepard on drums, moved to Oregon and became the uber bar band. After carrying on for more than 40 years, they are still the most underrated band in history, The Holy Modal Rounders. [more inside]
A place on earth
Safe Ground is an organization of Sacramento's homeless population to claim a secure location in order to live decently. While resistance to tent cities (previously, 2, 3) has largely been due to political expediency (criminalizing homelessness is easier than ending it), a spot on Oprah brought media attention to the plight of the homeless and made it more difficult for police to bully them from place to place with the threat of jail. In response to this, Costa Mantis(of He Knows You're Alone fame [uncredited on the wiki]) started filming the personal stories of the homeless along the American River in Sacramento. This led to Searching for Safe Ground, a miniseries concerning the struggle of Sacramento's homeless for a place to exist.
Incidentally, a federal jury ruled tonight that the city of Sacramento has been violating homeless people's constitutional rights by moving them from public property and confiscating their property. Stay tuned.
"Mommy tracked" and loving it?
In-sourcing the legal business: America's biggest law firms are "creating a second tier of workers, stripping pay and prestige from one of the most coveted jobs in the business world." [more inside]
Flashlight worthy - Really good books
FlashlightWorthy: handpicked book recommendations on hundreds of topics. Lists of books are easy to come by. Thoughtful lists of good books are harder to find. FlashlightWorthy does a fine job of mixing classic greats along with more obscure treasures. Plain vanilla lists (e.g. Best Cooking Books, 33 Best Books on Writing Fiction, Best Graphic Novels of 2009 and 2010) are well-represented but there's also quirkier and specialized fare like... [more inside]
Henriette Coulouvrat
There's really not much to find out on early '80s pop chanteuse, Henriette Coulouvrat. Not even a wiki. Just a long neglected web site. She's French, and she's dance and she's synth-pop, and seems to be remembered for these two songs, Rockin' On The Red Book and Paddy Field, along with several appearances on French tv.
Rustic Hinge
It wasn't like we were playing any kind of conventional music, it was outrageous, nasty, bad trip music... If ever there was a missing link in the history and development of British psychedelic music it is Rustic Hinge. [more inside]
The Boston Globe's Newspaper Row storefront
Long before the Web, The Boston Globe had a “homepage” of sorts – its old storefront downtown. Taking advantage of its location in a heavily trafficked block of Newspaper Row, the young daily brought the news to Bostonians in a whole new way: handwritten signs.
The Most Sensible Site You Will Ever See
The lemon is evil.
"Remember, you’re the first little girl who’s ever made a game at TOJam. And everyone’s worried you’re going to run around screaming and making noise and wrecking things. […] If you’re very well behaved, then next year if another little girl wants to come and make a game, the TOJam people will say 'the little girl who made a game last year was SO wonderful, we’d LOVE to see more little girls making games.'" Ryan Creighton takes his five-year-old daughter Cassie to an indie game jam in Toronto, and together they make Sissy's Magical Ponycorn Adventure.
I had a dream last night, that I built a universe.
Selling doctors on patient gag orders
"It's completely unethical for doctors to force their patients to sign away their rights in order to get medical care." Ars Technica dissects doctor "privacy" agreements that seek to limit patients' ability to post online reviews by making them sign the copyright of any future reviews over to the doctor, in exchange for vague (and possibly illusory) extra privacy protection. Doctored Reviews offers info and tools for fighting "anti-review contracts," whose language comes primarily from an "anti-defamation protection program" sold by a company called Medical Justice. Sources quoted in the article express doubts that this kind of "privacy blackmail" would hold up in court, with some wondering if Medical Justice is actively deceiving doctors by selling them a product that won't work as advertised. [more inside]
An Exploration of the Typeface Everyone Loves to Hate
He's Got Everything He Needs, He's An Artist He Don't Look back
Bob Dylan is 70 today.
Bradley Manning's Facebook Page
Last year U.S. Army Private Bradley Manning allegedly provided thousands of secret U.S. documents to Julian Assange and WikiLeaks. He allegedly leaked the secret cables — "along with a controversial video — in the hope of inciting 'worldwide discussion, debates and reforms.' In preparing for its new investigative report, WikiSecrets (airing tonight), PBS Frontline "obtained access" to his Facebook account. "Manning's Facebook postings are a vivid, if partial, portrait of his life in the military and of the political and social issues that he followed closely. They reflect his commitment to gay rights and defiance of the military's ban on openly gay or lesbian soldiers. They track the anguish in his personal life. And they conclude with an entry, put up in Manning’s name by his aunt, explaining his arrest with a link to a WikiLeaks website."
WHO NEEDS CRITICAL THEORY
How to make an Art-- a tutorial [with Addendum] by HennesyYoungman...via the amazing Victory Light blog [more inside]
Camp Cranky is all about periods.
Camp Cranky is a virtual sleepaway camp intended by its creators, actors Liane Balaban and Vanessa Matsui, to be a safe space for young girls to hear personal stories about first periods, learn about the biology of menstruation, read poems about periods (musician Leslie Feist and actress Emma Thompson each contribute), and learn about various menstrual products. Readers can also donate to Huru International, which sends menstrual supplies to girls in need in Kenya. Camp Cranky is the first phase in what will eventually be Crankytown [the name comes from a Feist poem], a site where women of all ages can discuss menstruation and menopause. The project is a part of the National Film Board and Studio XX's First Person Digital Program. [more inside]
Buck The Trend
Make your Franklin is a site which accepts submissions of recreated 100 USD banknotes.
"Faster! Faster, Bambi! Don't look back! Keep running! Keep running!"
Bambi Rescued By the Jaws of Life! [SLYT] What do you do when you find a baby deer trapped underneath a pile of rocks? Call your local firefighters, who extract the poor creature using the largest power tool they could find—the Jaws of Life. Via Gizmodo
Save the Beach, Drink the Ice
Sonar
Sonar is a cool music visualization. (SLYT)
Cooking should be fun
There is Much More to Say
It might be instructive to ask ourselves how we would be reacting if Iraqi commandos landed at George W. Bush's compound, assassinated him, and dumped his body in the Atlantic (after proper burial rites, of course). Uncontroversially, he is not a “suspect” but the “decider” who gave the orders to invade Iraq -- that is, to commit the “supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole” (quoting the Nuremberg Tribunal) for which Nazi criminals were hanged: in Iraq, the hundreds of thousands of deaths, millions of refugees, destruction of much of the country and the national heritage, and the murderous sectarian conflict that has now spread to the rest of the region. Equally uncontroversially, these crimes vastly exceed anything attributed to bin Laden.There is Much More to Say by Noam Chomsky.
Huguette Clark dies, many questions remain
The reclusive 104-year-old heiress has died, but the recent public fascination with her has led to an investigation into the handling of her money. You may remember last year's MeFi post dedicated to Huguette Clark. The hospital in which she lived for the past 22 years confirmed that she died Tuesday morning, just shy of her 105th birthday. The investigation of the people handling her fortune continues.
The End of the World Is (still) At Hand!
Harold Camping refines his end of the world prediction. When the world didn't end this past Saturday at 6 pm Harold Camping went into seclusion for a bit to think about that. [more inside]
Color films can simply be illuminated. Black and white films have to be lighted.
For the past year, director Stephen Soderbergh has been recording and sharing a list of the books that he has read, and films that he has watched. The writers at Flavorwire noted Soderbergh's decision to watch Raiders of the Lost Ark in black & white three times, and have compiled a list of color films that work better in monochrome. [more inside]
Kickstarting a City
Cities as Software is an article by Marcus Westbury about Renew Newcastle's low-budget, DIY model for renewing urban spaces. "...You need to start by rewriting – or hacking – the software to change not what the city is but how it behaves." [more inside]
The Girls Next Door
I’d always dismissed the idea of human trafficking in the United States. I’m Indian, and when I went to Mumbai and saw children sold openly, I wondered, Why isn’t anything being done about it? But now I know—it’s no different here. I never would have believed it, but I’ve seen it.
Study finds many white people view racism as a zero-sum game
Whites believe they are victims of racism more often than blacks. Researchers at Harvard Business School and Tufts University have published a study (PDF) that concludes that "many Whites believe ... the pendulum has now swung beyond
equality in the direction of anti-White discrimination."
I'm Not Worth A Damn
An oldie but a goodie: Don Reese, then of the San Diego Chargers, talks about his own problems with cocaine and the widespread drug use in the NFL at the time. [more inside]
"This is the last song I'll write about you"
I Feel Better: A brief rotoscoped video for the song by the Scottish band Frightened Rabbit, in which a real-life HUD and an infinite number of parallel universes conspire to help our hero get motivated. [SLYT]
Short Films Against Global and Social Injustice
In 2009, Ctrl.Alt.Shift, the "youth initiative of Christian Aid," held a national competition in the UK for aspiring filmmakers aged 18 to 25. Their mission: create a short film treatment based around three key issues: "War + Peace," "Gender + Power" and "HIV + Stigma." The results were then screened to an audience at the 2009 Raindance Film Festival. The films: 1000 Voices, HIV: The Musical, Man Made, No Way Through and War School. (All YouTube links. Vimeo links and descriptions of each film are inside this post.) These films deal with adult subject matter and may be disturbing for some viewers. Some may also be nsfw. [more inside]
Let's play spot the game
Here's an awesome music video recently released by the band Goldfish, which includes a staggering number of video game references. [more inside]
From Live Journal to Life
Starting from a proposal by vito_excalibur, the Back Up Project tries to intervene in sexual harassment at fan conferences. [more inside]
Pimp my Ride
The world's slowest Porsche. Johannes L. built a Porsche GT3 RS out of a recumbent bicycle, wood stripping, pvc, and tape. The Flickr set covering construction.
Nitto of Japan
May 23
The official blog of notorious former African dictator Mobutu Sese Seko
Et tu, Mr. Destructo? is a funny, insightful blog that covers everything from politics to film to sports and mystery novels.
Some of the men think they freak this like we do, but no they don't.
Hey Beyonce, Guess What? You're a Liar. (SLYT) Angry young video blogger (vlogger?) Nineteen Percent calls out Beyonce's Run the World (Girls) for shallow girl-power lyrics.
(via Feministing.)
Heading East
"Excuse me while I rock out to the Pochonbo Electronic Ensemble and The Wangjaesan Light Music Band." The human face of communism. It's a Pyongyang thang.
The New Hotness
Only downsides I see are that the peppers are so small and the grueling stomach pain. The Trinidad Scorpion Butch T measures a record 1,463,700 Scoville Heat Units - about 7 times hotter than a habanero. (related)
"Americans maximize their... [happiness] by working, and Europeans maximize their [happiness] through leisure,"
Why America is the 'no vacation nation'. (CNN) -- Let's be blunt: If you like to take lots of vacation, the United States is not the place to work.
Bubbles and Public Facts
The Destruction of Economic Facts - "Renowned Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto argues that the financial crisis wasn't just about finance—it was about a staggering lack of knowledge" (via) [more inside]
Wondeful Dog
A load of sys
Apple says app developers are covered under license, Lodsys' patent infringement claims are invalid Macworld has more.
I can't believe we had that in the budget
Microsoft Mathematics CAS
Microsoft Mathematics is a free Computer Algebra System (CAS) available from Microsoft. A CAS is a program that can solve purely symbolic mathematical equations. For example, the program can tell you that the derivative of 6x^2 + 12x is 12x + 12. The program has functions for calculus, statistics, linear algebra, and graphing. One interesting feature of the program is that in some cases it can show and describe the intermediate steps involved in solving an equation. Here’s a 16 page tutorial (in MS Word docx format) showing how to use the program. The program can be downloaded from the Microsoft download page. Thirty-two and sixty-four bit versions are available. The program only works on XP/Vista/Windows 7.
"Meticulous and ambitious"--Horace Rumpole.
Film on Paper documents in detail a personal collection of some 1500 movie posters from the UK, US, and Japan.
Grand Prix - the Killer Years.
Grand Prix - the Killer Years A BBC documentary on how rapidly evolving technology and an indifference to driver safety on the part of car designers and track owners caused ever-escalating casualties among the top-tier drivers of the '60s and '70s, and the efforts of the drivers to introduce modern safety standards and rules. The footage is in places exhilarating, capturing the beauty and the excitement of the sport at its best, and in others horrifying and tragic, the sport at its worst.
Brown v. Plata
Conditions in California’s overcrowded prisons are so bad that they violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday, ordering the state to reduce its prison population by more than 30,000 inmates. [more inside]
They Never Managed To Get Jean Giraud, Moebius, and Gir Together To Do One
Du Tac au Tac was a 1970s French television programme which brought cartoonists together to create improvised jam drawings based on specific themes, building upon one another's illustrations. Some highlights:
Neal Adams (Batman), Joe Kubert (Sgt. Rock), and Jean Giraud (Blueberry) open Pandora's Box and in another segment, create a bestiary and draw their favorite comic-book heroes.
Jean Giraud and Hugo Pratt (Corto Maltese) create a 3-panel strip using four onomatopoeia provided by Jean Claude Forest (Barbarella) and Jije (Spirou and Fantasio).
Goscinny and Uderzo (Asterix) play a game of equisite corpse with Greg (Achille Talon) and Davy (Olivier Rameau). [more inside]
Dude. MOVE ALREADY.
"Challenge: Create a game. The game can be of any theme or genre you desire, but there is one restriction: You're creating a 'new classic,' like Chess, Tag or card games. So, create a game to be enjoyed by generations of players for a thousand years. Prize: $1,000 to the winning entrant, to be announced and awarded January 1, 2012." Daniel Solis' Thousand-Year Game Design Challenge. [more inside]
Joseph Brooks
Joseph Brooks was a writer of commercial jingles in the 60's. He went on to write and direct the film You Light Up My Life in 1977; the film was a critical flop but a commercial success, and the title song went on to win an Oscar and become an adult contemporary standard. He later wrote the book and music for, and direct the stage musical In My Life (nyt), which flopped famously in 2005 amidst reactions of bewilderment. In 2009, he was indicted on charges(nyt) of luring at least 11 actresses across the country to his Manhattan apartment and raping them. He was found dead yesterday of a suicide while awaiting trial.
Obama's Car gets stuck pulling out of Dublin Embassy
While pulling out of the American Embassy in Dublin this morning, Barack Obama's bullet-proof, missile-proof, nuclear launch-code enabled limo got stuck on an overly steep concrete incline.
Iran and the West
While not being an outright example of a clash of civilizations in the Huntingtonian sense, elements of cultural misunderstanding and fears about the system-challenging tendencies of Iran do affect Western perceptions and influence Western behavior toward Iran. Furthermore, these kinds of reciprocal identity-based fears and projections of the other side’s presumed malevolent intentions tend to be mutually reinforcing. The risk is that they eventually become self-fulfilling prophecies.Iran and the West - Regional Interests and Global Controversies [PDF]. [more inside]
Themselves + Notwist = 13 & God
The details are hazy, but somewhere outside of Toronto in the winter of 2004, on a stretch of highway near the U.S. border, a computer onboard a large bus spontaneously combusted. Some point the finger at the driver, others blame a faulty battery. Whatever the cause, Themselves and the Notwist were stranded. Gigs were cancelled. Meals were skipped. Shady motels were booked in below-freezing weather. It was the fifth breakdown of the tour, and despite those frustrations, a minor language barrier and the unfamiliar terrain, a cross-continental brotherhood was forged. Seven years later, the megagroup 13 & God have two albums, a live CD and and an EP as proof of that fateful tour. Join Doseone for a track-by-track commentary of their new album, and listen to the album, streaming on Soundcloud.
“Cambridge is a city, not a highway!”
There is an inspiring mural on the back of the Micro Center building in Cambridge, MA. It commemorates the freeway revolt against the proposed I-695 Inner Belt. There are usually cars parked in front of it, but some have managed to get good photos.
Intelligence and imagination vs a light show for cattle
Deadly tornado hits Missouri
Joplin, Missouri was hit by a tornado on Sunday evening, leaving at least 89 people dead and an estimated 2,000 buildings destroyed, as much as 30 percent of the town.
Teeny tiny womb
A rare black lion tamarin at the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust gave birth by c-section last month (via). The c-section was necessary because, though tamarins usually give birth to twins, this mother had only a single baby that was too big to deliver naturally (adult tamarins weigh about 600 grams). [more inside]
Wolgamot
"It's harder than you think to write a sentence that doesn't say anything." The quest to find and understand the author of In Sara, Mencken, Christ and Beethoven There Were Men and Women. "Includes full-length album (by Robert Ashley) and PDF of Wolgamot's magnum opus." (Via)
"Or don't you like to write letters. I do because it's such a swell way to keep from working and yet feel you've done something." ~Ernest Hemingway
An Open Letter to Writers of Open Letters: To those who feel compelled to address the world from Facebook, Twitter, and email chains, TEDDY WAYNE has a message: No one is listening, least of all Luther Vandross. [TheMorningNews.org]
Doctor Who, Cali style...
The Doctor Who theme, Adam Savage of Mythbusters, and tesla coils! (SLYT) ... just a part of this weekend's S.F. Bay Area Maker Faire.
Money for Nothing
In 2009, Jon Gosselin was offered $365,000 for interviews: how reality stars, celebrity parents and rehab workers make money selling gossip to celebrity websites and TV shows.
May 22
The Elephant In The Green Room
How Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes Failed At Setting Up A Strong Republican Candidate for 2012: The circus Roger Ailes created at Fox News made his network $900 million last year. But it may have lost him something more important: the next election. A lengthy (7 page) New York Magazine article. Single page link.
RIP Bob Gould
The Sydney bookseller and Labor left-wing activist Bob Gould has died at the age of 74. His massive bookstore, Gould's Books, is a Sydney landmark. A massive archive of his political writings can be found online.
Songs to Ignite the Spirit
Perverse Incentives
Obstetricians and gynecologists are meeting the increased demand for cosmetic vaginal surgery (NSFW)
Jesus came back, sort of.
Dance is beautiful.
Ethan Law Roue Cyr performs a solo dance with a hula hoop. This is beautiful, a little astonishing, and more than a little moving. I didn't look away once. [more inside]
High School Ranking Never Ends
Today the Washington Post released its annual High School Challenge Index, which ranks DC-area public high schools. But in a twist this year, they have also expanded their rankings nationally to more than 1900 public high schools. [more inside]
The latest in medical sperm collection
Further proof that China is indeed the up and coming (sorry, I couldn't resist the childish pun) new global economic force.
Why do I have a sneaking suspicion that this may turn up at one of my local adult toy stores?
“If you really want to get to know someone, you don’t ask what’s between their legs,” says Stocker.
Parents Kathy Witterick and David Stocker welcomed their third baby into the world this year, but they won't tell anyone whether Storm is a boy or a girl. “We thought that if we delayed sharing that information, in this case hopefully, we might knock off a couple million of those messages by the time that Storm decides Storm would like to share,” says Witterick Storm's brothers, Jazz and Kio are also encouraged to wear their hair however they wish, and pick out clothing they like. [more inside]
Beat the Devil
"Beat the Devil" went straight from box office flop to cult classic and has been called the first camp movie, although Bogart, who sank his own money into it, said, "Only phonies like it." It's a movie that was made up on the spot; Huston tore up the original screenplay on the first day of filming, flew the young Truman Capote to Ravallo, Italy, to crank out new scenes against a daily deadline and allowed his supporting stars, especially Robert Morley and Peter Lorre, to create dialogue for their own characters. (Capote spoke daily by telephone with his pet raven, and one day when the raven refused to answer he flew to Rome to console it, further delaying the production.) - Roger Ebert's Great Movies
the benefits of work sharing
Work Sharing - "Work-sharing schemes, in many different forms, are becoming the norm in Holland and Denmark, and have made inroads in France and Germany. The key element in any such approach is to separate work from income. [more inside]
Preservation of a Dream
The last hand-written newspaper in the world - A brief film about The Musalman, which has been penned in Urdu calligraphy every day since 1927. via CreativeRoots [more inside]
Vegeta answers back with stack after stack!!
wow, high level play from both players here, really close. the cookie chains were knit tight, like yarn in a yoshi sweater. on the sweater, yoshi is eating a cookie. absent-mindedness or perhaps careful alteration of the "Yoshi Eats Cookie Sweater" pattern makes yoshi take on a more pensive expression, looking at the viewer with a pensiveness that reflects the lives of the men lost in gycl06, like a puddle of water in a battlefield, opaque with blood and mud, its glory hours long passed. A video, with commentary, of the Yoshi Cookie Eastern Conference Finals. SLYT.
She was a woman, so we asked her if she could handle it, because it was big, Mrs. Donovan said
They might not teach you how to be an alligator trapper who works barefoot in Florida, but The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's Becoming an Outdoors Woman program is patterned after a similar one that began in Wisconsin, and Becoming an Outdoors Woman programs are available across the U.S. and Canada. [more inside]
Successful Alcoholics
After making the rounds on the film festival circuit, the short comedy "Successful Alcoholics," starring T.J. Miller ("Cloverfield," "Yogi Bear") and Lizzy Caplan ("Party Down," "True Blood") is available to watch in full on Funny or Die.
Literary Blurb Translation Guide
"Trenchant satire" = poop jokes. J. Robert Lennon at Ward Six presents the Literary Blurb Translation Guide.
Dimming soon to a theater near you.
While theaters with weak and incorrect bulbs have long been the bane of movie fans, the rise of 3D projectors have added a new wrinkle. Many chain theaters (at least in the Boston area) are leaving on the 3D lenses for 2D movies, which can make it "as much as 85 percent darker than a properly projected film".
You are under arrest for breaching the Hot Gossip Act
Twitter and unnamed Twitterers sued by anonymous man. These are the six tweets referred to.
Some are fighting for the right to gossip as Judges and MPs clash on gagging orders and a showdown between the law and common sense is brewing.
Its not all about sports personalities with way too much cash.
As Imogen Thomas says: Yet again my name and reputation have been trashed while the man I had a relationship with is able to hide.
List of known gagging orders. ( google spreadsheet and Previously 1; 2 ).
Some are fighting for the right to gossip as Judges and MPs clash on gagging orders and a showdown between the law and common sense is brewing.
Its not all about sports personalities with way too much cash.
As Imogen Thomas says: Yet again my name and reputation have been trashed while the man I had a relationship with is able to hide.
List of known gagging orders. ( google spreadsheet and Previously 1; 2 ).
May 21
You've Worked Hard! Yay!
Jonathan Winters
Improv has never been as good as this.
Jonathan Winters on the Jack Parr Show.
and, on Johnny Carson.
and, with Dean Martin
and, with David Letterman and Robin Williams
and, roasting Ronald Reagan
and, with Steve Allen
False May 21, 2011 Doomsday prophet Harold Camping "deserts" devastated followers, church offers solace (PHOTOS)
False May 21, 2011 Doomsday prophet Harold Camping "deserts" devastated followers, church offers solace (PHOTOS) Doomsday prophet Harold Camping, who predicted that the End of the World would come on May 21, 2011, has gone missing ever since it became increasingly clear that his prediction is going to fail, even as local churches willingly stepped in to provide counseling and help to Camping's devastated followers.
Indie Pop
Overlooked '90s Indie Pop: The Cat's Miaow, whose single sentence wiki describes them as... "an indie pop band formed in Melbourne, Australia, in 1992." And Madison Electric, a band from Ann Arbor that played one show in a church basement before going their separate ways.
Fast Food Fights Back
Hambuster: when your lunch goes berserk. Vimeo; Warning, funny, violent, and gory as Hell, so maybe NSFW. Also available in 3D. [more inside]
Land of 10,000 Hates?
Earlier this week, the Republicans in the Minnesota House of Representatives asked Bradlee Dean to give the morning prayer. [more inside]
The Amoral Maze
Of spies, special forces and drone strikes
Warfare: An advancing front - "The US is engaged in increasingly sophisticated warfare, fusing intelligence services and military specialists" [more inside]
Is Mike Tyson's Face Open Source?
S. Victor Whitmill is suing Warner Brothers Entertainment for copyright infringement for using the design of a tattoo he created for Mike Tyson on a characters face in Hangover II. There is precedent for this action.
XyWrite
A famously fast, robust, command-driven text processor/file manager that publishers... relied on throughout the '80s and some do even now, [XyWrite] is an unrivaled writer's tool.
How Modern Spam Works
Through purchasing Viagra, herbal remedies, and replica watches, computer scientists explain how modern spam works. The spam business model consists of three components: advertising, click support (i.e., delivering the customer to an actual website), and realization (i.e., receiving payment and delivering the product to the customer). Different firms located across the globe carry out the various tasks. For example, the website domains are registered in Russia, the credit card payments are handled by banks in Azerbaijan, and the pills are sent from manufacturers in India. The spam business infrastructure appears to be organized around a small number of affiliate programs that coordinate the activities among the different firms. Click Trajectories: End-to-End Analysis of the Spam Value Chain (A 16 page PDF). [via]
"The answer was to photograph the surface itself."
The postman who delivered a palace
The story begins in 1879. Cheval, then 43 years old, had been working as a rural mail carrier in the southeast of France for 12 years. Because his daily routine involved walking about 20 miles (32km), mostly in solitude, he did a lot of daydreaming. One day (perhaps while his mind was elsewhere), he tripped over a small limestone rock. He picked up that stone and over the next 33 years went on to build his dream, Le Palais Idéal, an amazing fantasy palace. [more inside]
More statistical hijinks on climate change
“certain styles of research were suggested to be prone to ‘groupthink, reduced creativity and the possibility of less-rigorous reviewing processes.’ Edward Wegman is a professor at George Mason and a distinguished statistician with a long career, a former winner of the ASA's Founders Award. In 2006 he testified before Congress on climate science, sharply criticizing the statistical methodology of Michael Mann's "hockey stick graph," which showed a sharp increase in global temperature in the last part of the 20th century. One section of Wegman's testimony concerned "social network analysis," and suggested that Mann's tightly-knit network of co-authors might have led to insufficiently aggressive peer review. USA Today reports that Wegman's testimony contained a substantial quantity of plagiarized material, and the peer-reviewed article derived from the testimony has been retracted by the journal that published it. John Mashey has compiled an obsessively thorough catalogue of the plagiarized text. (large .pdf.) [more inside]
Passing the sexual Turing test
Filtering out porn algorithmically takes audio into consideration. "Comedy shows with laughter were also sometimes mistaken for pornography, as the loud audience cheers and cries share similar spectral characteristics to sexual sounds."
'I'm a human being, God damn it! My life has value!'
Notes of a Screenwriter, Mad as Hell - The New York times on Paddy Chayefsky's notes for his screenplay of Network. I don't have to tell you things are bad...
May 20
Learn about a fantastic rock weathering pattern
The man in the middle, Or, The Truth About the Muslim Plot Against Pea Soup
A bridge builder, a student of how societies hold together; an advocate of dialogue. Standing against polarized and simplistic styles of thought. Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor is Canada's best known and most widely read contemporary thinker. In books like Sources of the Self and A Secular Age, he has attempted to define the unique character of the modern age. He maps the fault-lines in our modern identity, and points to both the pitfalls and the promise of our condition. Learn about his life, history, upbringing, and... ideas.
Now available, CBC IDEAS in five one-hour parts: the malaise of modernity (this special program has the same title as the 1991 Massey Lecture of the same name, but is not the same [MP3's, get them now, they will go away, and then you can only stream them]).
One, Two, Three, Four, Five. [more inside]
Scientific Illustration
Scientific Illustration is a Tumblr blog devoted to... well... scientific illustration.
Final Films
Second Life for Studio 60
The cast and writers and crew of Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip recently all joined twitter and began tweeting about their lives and the live comedy sketch show they all create each week. The catch is, Studio 60 is the fictional creation of Aaron Sorkin and was the subject of a failed weekly drama from five years ago, and nobody knows who is performing this remarkable charade.
OPD2011
It's that time of year again... The 2011 One-Page Dungeon Contest has announced winners[15mb pdf] in 15 categories ranging from the more traditional "Best Investigation"[pdf] to "Best Use of Teleporters."[pdf] (previously.) [more inside]
Animated fun from Fearnet.com
Mari-Kari Fun and somewhat gorey 8 (short) part animated tale of twins, one living, the other.... not so much. Starring the voice of Shannen Doherty [more inside]
Hey Mick, who was that duck you were talking to?
An unfinished Donald Duck comic story, designed and roughed out with story complete, by Don Rosa! Written to promote the grand opening of Disney's MGM theme park, for one reason or another they dropped it before it could be completed. It's interesting because, in the comic book universe, Donald Duck isn't a movie star, but Mickey Mouse is -- so the duck seeks out his autograph. It even makes an explicit reference to a certain other duck....
Mike Runnels
Time for some Texas twang and honky tonk blues from Austin's own, Mike Runnels: Dream Girl :: Last Date
Rock This Way
Rock and Rap has had a sometimes fun, sometimes interesting, sometimes possibly regrettable relationship over the years. Artists like Kid Cudi and Lupe Fiasco continue to blur the line by releasing post-punk/electroclash/whatever style music (complete with fake British accent), learning to play the guitar, and announcing that rap is boring. [more inside]
tennis greatest entertainer
Mansour Bahrami - Tennis Greatest Entertainer
Repeat ad infinitum.
Infinity Blade is an iOS game available for iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch. It is typically seen as a send-up of the classic game Punch-Out!! mashed up with roleplaying game conventions such as experience points and character-modifying equipment. Its defining trait is that it relies upon new game+ to advance your character (actually your character's family/bloodline) and the story.
J. Nicholas Geist over at Kill Screen has written a review to match the game.
This recipe is rated 'Easy'
Make it so...
Following on from an epic Star Trek: The Original Series rewatch (previously) and their Star Trek movie marathon, tor.com are now watching each episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation in turn. So far they have reached The Last Outpost, in which a terrifying new adversary was introduced as a replacement for Klingons as Star Trek universe bad guys: The Ferengi.
smaller companies are using robots
Made in America: small businesses buck the offshoring trend - "For US manufacturing to make sense, factories must make extensive use of automation. That's getting easier, given that the cost of robots with comparable capabilities has decreased precipitously in the past two decades." [more inside]
Recquisat in pace, noble warrior.
"Macho Man" Randy Savage passed away today at the age of 58, when he was struck with a heart attack while driving. [more inside]
Circling the wagons
No central organization; social media networking; multi-city protests against the status quo. Protests now banned.
Not North Africa or the Middle East but Spain which has banned Protests ahead of Sunday's local elections.
For the first time, Spain's civil society bypassed the established channels to mount its own public protest against the country's political class.
El Pais calls it Spain's Icelandic Revolt. Blogger South of Watford was in Puerta del Sol.
Not North Africa or the Middle East but Spain which has banned Protests ahead of Sunday's local elections.
For the first time, Spain's civil society bypassed the established channels to mount its own public protest against the country's political class.
El Pais calls it Spain's Icelandic Revolt. Blogger South of Watford was in Puerta del Sol.
Hotcakes, no. Hotkeys, yes!
Hotkeys! Hotkeys! Get yer hotkeys! Steaming hot and ready for your Windows, Macs and Linuxeses! Even more for Macs! We've got some for your Microsofts and Open Offices! For yer Adobes and Gimps! Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari, and Opera! And for the baker's dozen, DOS Shortcuts and a lot more shortcuts that also work for modern Windows systems.
The Comic Book Greats... And Some Other Dudes!
In 1992, comic book titan Stan Lee produced and hosted an interview/chalk talk-type video series featuring some of the biggest names of the day and all-time greats: Todd McFarlane! Rob Liefeld! Sergio Aragones! Harvey Kurtzman and Jack Davis! John Romita and John Romita! Will Eisner! Bob Kane! Whilce Portacio! Jim Lee! Be amazed as Todd, Rob, Whilce, and Jim create a comic book! Be astounded as Rob and Todd, ably assisted by Smilin' Stan, create a comic book character right before your eyes!
Tubecrush
A-month-behind-the-times-filter: Tubecrush is a website that lets people upload pictures of attractive men they've seen on the Tube (i.e., the London Underground, for the benefit of nonUKians), along with varying degrees of lechery. It came to wider attention the middle of last month when the Evening Standard ran a fairly lighthearted fluff piece on it, but there are some who believe that this is at least slightly unkosher not only for its instrusiveness, but also because they suggest its reception has been somewhat smoother than would be the case if it encouraged taking similar pictures of women on the tube. Others offer the thought that ogling different genders is given different contexts by societal attitudes to gender, and that, therefore, its all a bit more OK than it seems. Others still prefer to examine it through the lens of art history.
Pensioners volunteer to help clean up Fukushima
As the Japanese government and TEPCO struggle to bring the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant under control, a group of pensioners has decided to put their lives at risk to save younger people from radiation.
Look and learn?
Political shifts mustn’t threaten Canada’s unity, vision. An opinion piece by (the much loved and/or hated)Preston Manning about the recent Canadian election, and how it will affect Quebec's relationship with the rest of Canada.
Will There Be Actual Seals in the Movie?
Walt Disney Co. has filed an application to trademark the name "Seal Team 6", the Navy Seal team that killed OBL in Pakistan earlier in May. [more inside]
It's ok to be Takei.
George Takei's response to Tennessee's "Don't say gay" bill George Takei gives gay folk an out in Tennessee. Don't say gay, say Takei. A humorous look at a crazy piece of legislation to make it illegal to talk about homosexuality in school.
America reCycled: The best web content I have seen in a while
On one level America reCycled is simply the journal of two brothers riding recycled bicycles across the United States and meeting people. Lots of them. On another level it is a Homeric tale of an American adventure. It has been a long time since I have seen web content of this quality. The writing is superb, the videos so compelling you can't look away and the perspective gained is invaluable. I am positive this has been posted here before, but it certainly deserves a bump.
"My gender was my very first 'This I Know For Sure' moment"
Janet Mock is an editor at People.com, a blogger, and co-hosts the The Missing Piece podcast.
She is also a transgender woman. [more inside]
She is also a transgender woman. [more inside]
Blogmanship
According to recent studies, arguing on the internet is now the second most popular leisure activity in the world, just below shopping and just above sex. But how many of those who spend half their lives debating God versus Atheism or Climate Change on a message board or blog really know how to win those arguments? Now, for the first time, anonymous internet guru Noseybonk reveals the ploys, tactics and strategems of Blogmanship: the art of winning arguments on the internet without really knowing what you are talking about. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5.
Step one: find a bulldozer
Pictures of homemade flood levees , built to protect homes in areas flooding from the swelling Mississippi.
The axeman cometh for recording studios
"You want how to make a million in the studio business? Start with two million." Abbey Road is safe, but with Olympic, Townhouse, The Hit Factory and Eden all overtaken in recent years by the developments in digital recording, what's to be done with all that history?"A museum? A doctor's surgery? A Wedding venue? Flats? Or chop them into little pieces and sell them to your fans? (video in Spanish, scroll down for English text)
You Are Sleeping... You Do Not Want To Believe
The Unexplained (subtitled Mysteries of Mind, Space, & Time) was a popular partwork magazine that came out in the UK in the early 80s. It explored various Fortean phenomenal like UFOs, ghosts and spontaneous human combustion but also scientific 'mysteries' such as black holes. [more inside]
Scottish artist Robert Montgomery and his billboards and neon signs
"Robert Montgomery works in a poetic and melancholic post-situationist tradition. He makes billboard pieces, recycled sunlight pieces and drawings." This one's my favorite but I like others too. Here are a few more examples: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.
Visitation at Wisconsin Hospitals.
Gov. Scott Walker wants to stop defending hospital visitation rights for same sex couples. His rationale is a 2006 law passed banning same sex marriage or similar arrangements. The visitation law was passed in 2009.
cool paintings of birds
Cool paintings of birds by Maurizio Bongiovanni [embedded good music], an Italian-Chinese artist included in the sumptuous art blog ArtOdyssey, which is really worth exploring. [more inside]
"I just hugged the man that murdered my son."
It's all downhill from here
"I saw [EPO] in his refrigerator...I saw him inject it more than one time like we all did, like I did many, many times." Ex-professional cyclist Tyler Hamilton, a former teammate of Lance Armstrong, has accused the seven time Tour de France winner of using performance enhancing drugs such as EPO and testosterone during several of his Tour wins. Hamilton made the allegations during an interview with "60 Minutes" which will be shown this Sunday. Hamilton rode with Armstrong on the US Postal Service team from 1998 until 2001 and was himself banned for eight years in 2009 for taking testosterone. Armstrong is already the subject of a federal grand jury investigation into alleged doping conspiracies and financial irregularities. A year ago Floyd Landis, after finally coming clean about his his own drug use,
accused Armstrong of systematic drug abuse. Armstrong, who recently retired from professional cycling, has always denied these claims.
Bookstore Compulsions
Biblioklept's list of bookstore compulsions, which I am sure you understand, like suggesting books to strangers, or buying books you'll never read.
A PC building guide by an idiot
hey, beardo....
Gordan Ugarković
Croatian software developer and amateur image processor Gordan Ugarković takes images from NASA's unmanned space probes released to the Planetary Data System, splices them together and tweaks the colors, sometimes combining higher resolution black and white images with color images, sometimes recreating what the object would look like in natural color (ie, in visible wavelengths, from images taken in multiple wavelengths), sometimes heightening the contrast to bring out detail. (via) [more inside]
May 19
bwahahaha
Footage of cute laughing babies, slowed down. Hyek hyek hyuh hyuh hyuhhh!! Haw haw haw haw haaaaw.... heh... Ohhhh hah hah hah... whoooh!
Home Alone house for sale (I got nuthin').
The north Chicago house featured in the movie Home Alone is for sale. Asking price? 2.4 million dollars.
Video of the first woman in a human powered helicopter
Video of the first woman in a human powered helicopter piloting the University of Maryland Gamera Helicopter. [more inside]
Ebooks overtake print books in Amazon sales
Like the death of Mark Twain, the demise of the printed book is greatly exaggerated, although the latest news from Amazon – which announced that it is selling more ebooks in America than print books for the first time – might suggest the nails are being readied for the coffin. [more inside]
Jeff Jones RIP
Jeff Jones, comic book artist, science fiction and fantasy artist, and former member of The Studio, died today of emphysema and bronchitis. [more inside]
I was so much older then. I’m younger than that now
Bob Dylan turns 70 next Tuesday. Why not start the party early by listening to 2ser's annual Bob Dylan Birthday Marathon on Saturday? It's streaming online from 7pm, Sydney time. Dylan has recently denied that China censored his shows, an allegation levelled against him by Maureen Dowd but opposed by Sean Wilentz.
"Seeing is more in your brain than in your eyes"
Erik Weihenmayer is a gay -- excuse me, I mean blind -- climber, mountaineer and author who counts the Seven Summits and the Nose of El Capitan among his accomplishments.
Erik's recent efforts have been assisted by the Brainport, an experimental device that allows him to sense visual information via his tongue.
Friending Iceland
Halló humans on the Inter-net. My name is Iceland. I am an island, full of mountains and glaciers and hot water and sheep and many nice Icelandic people, who like to make music, and who are sometimes cold. (Maybe you have seen me on your tele-visions, or your Inter-net.) I have heard that many humans use the Inter-net to make friends, and to talk about themselves. I decided to do this, too.
Iceland wants to be your friend. [more inside]
Iceland wants to be your friend. [more inside]
Cinema Europe
You could spend $600 or more for the dvd set, or you could just watch the first half (3 hrs) of the documentary mini-series here for free. Cinema Europe: The Other Hollywood. Where It All Began :: Art's Promised Land :: The Unchained Camera
HAVE A GOOD LOOK AT YOURSELF TODAY.
Monkey Suit Story
He told me his gorilla suit had been taken by his landlady in Pensacola, Florida because he could not pay his back rent. She kept his trunk with all his possessions as well. So his movie days were over...A brief, thoughtful recollection of the last days of the elusive Emil Van Horn, who, with pioneers like Charles Gemora, Ray "Crash" Corrigan, Steve Calvert, George Barrows, Janos Prohaska, and Bob Burns, established the golden age of Hollywood gorilla men.
What... is the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow?
Hey, you should be a doctor!
Recognize Immigrant Credentials is a series of Canadian PSAs that are at once funny and heart-breaking.
A Stateless People
The CBC has launched an interactive web documentary with tonnes of videos that takes users inside Shatila refugee camp (pop. 12,000) in Beirut, where Palestinians have now lived for more than 60 years.
Stay classy, corporados.
Just your classic corporation-meets-social-good, corporation-funds-social-good, corporation-dumps-social-good story. Cable giant Comcast meets ReelGrrls, a Seattle-based nonprofit dedicated to supporting young women in becoming filmmakers. Comcast funds ReelGrrls. Comcast buys NBC, giving their cable network (presumably cheaper) access to NBC's vast back catalog of content. FCC approves the union. FCC head Meredith Attwell Baker leaves and becomes head of Comcast. ReelGrrls tweets about her career move. Comcast yanks funding for ReelGrrls. ReelGrrls says, "OMG, you broke up with me over a tweet?" (SLYT) [more inside]
"In the Game of Food, you win, or you wash the dishes."
"Welcome! We are two big fans of George R.R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire series. We are also fans of food. What, then, would be more natural than to combine them into one fabulous blog?" The authors of The Inn At The Crossroads cook their way through the book series that starts with A Game of Thrones [previously on Metafilter: the HBO adaptation] and post the sometimes intricate and often tasty-looking results. Recipes are included. [Via Anger Burger] [more inside]
Only TWO DAYS left!!!
"Harold Camping, 89-year-old leader of the ministry Family Radio Worldwide, has predicted that a five-month destruction of humanity will commence Saturday with a Rapture, in which believers will ascend to heaven. 'Whereas this five-month period will be an enormous horror story for those who have not been raptured, it will be a time of great joy and wonder for those who are raptured,' according to the Family Radio website. Camping uses a mathematical formula linked to prophecies in the Bible. He once predicted Sept. 6, 1994 as Judgment Day, but that math didn't quite work out. This time around, Camping's organization took out an ad in Reader's Digest, stating: 'The Bible guarantees the end of the world will begin with Judgment Day May 21, 2011.'"* [more inside]
Leafsnap
Leafsnap is a free field guide for iPhone (Android coming soon) that uses the phone's camera and some biometric processing to identify trees by the shape of their leaves. Development was financed by the National Science Foundation (NYT article), and includes research by Columbia University, University of Maryland, and the Smithsonian Institution.
Anno Dracula
Kim Newman discusses the novels that inspired Anno Dracula, his epic pop-culture mashup of all things vampire, set in a Victorian London ruled by Dracula. Newman's long fascination with Dracula led to two more novels in the setting and several short stories, several of which can be found online.
A Damn Fine Cup of §∞╪╪▲▲
"Do you think that if you were falling in space ... that you'd slow down after a while, or go faster and faster?" ... "Faster and faster... until after a while you wouldn't feel anything ... and then your body would just burst into fire. And the angels wouldn't help you, cause they've all gone away ..." - A WITCH HOUSE AND OKKVLT GUIDE TO TWIN▲▲PEAKS (Vol. II) (Witch House previously; Mater Suspiria Vision recently) [more inside]
Glorified Streetball
From 1967 to 1976, the American Basketball Association delivered wild, raw, above-the-rim hoops that few ever saw (lacking TV broadcasts). They introduced the 3-point shot and slam-dunk contests (along with a red, white and blue ball, short shorts and big afros), brought pro ball to the American South, and launched the careers of Connie (the Hawk) Hawkins, Bob Costas, George Gervin, Fly Williams, David Thompson and a guy named Julius Erving. You know, Doctor J. [more inside]
The crack is out of whack
Unusually for a spring season, gasoline prices have been steadily climbing in the US since the beginning of 2011, and have surpassed $4/gallon in many US states, largely due to political instability in many oil-producing African and Middle-Eastern nations. "Not so fast," says the Department of Energy. Although the price of crude oil has climbed steadily throughout the year, the price of gasoline has climbed much faster -- a disparity known as the crack spread, which has remained at its highest level in 32 months, even in light of a sharp decline in the price of crude oil at the beginning of the month. The DoE speculates that although crude oil is cheap and plentiful enough, the 2011 Misssissippi River Floods are currently more to blame for $4 gas than the uprisings in the Middle East.
What Fabric Would You Be?
The Influencing Machine
Slate magazine has posted an excerpt from Brooke Gladstone's "The Influencing Machine." It's a reflection on the media done in quasi-comic book form and illustrated by Josh Neufeld. The fairly beefy excerpt is an interesting discussion on the concept, and the history of the concept, of Objectivity.
One Nation Under a Groove
The Smithsonian's forthcoming National Museum of African American History and Culture won't open until 2015, but it has already made a number of important acquisitions, including most recently, the Parliament-Funkadelic Mothership.
Juju Apple, Voodoo Apple
Looks like FOX News called it -- UK neuroscientists now suggest that the brains of Apple devotees are stimulated by Apple imagery in the same way that the brains of religious people are stimulated by religious imagery.
you may say I'm a dreamer
-Only an 'energy internet' can ward off disaster
-We must electrify the transport sector [more inside]
-We must electrify the transport sector [more inside]
John J. Pershing: Born into War
Born into War. In 1863, a 3 yr old John J. Pershing was pinned to the floor by his mother to protect him from confederate raiders. In 1886, he left West Point for the western frontier, having been elected class president four years in a row. In 1890 he was present at the Wounded Knee Massacre. In 1898 he fought with Buffalo Soldiers in Cuba, commanding a black cavalry regiment at San Juan Hill. From 1898 to 1901 he was fighting Philippine insurgents. In 1905 he served as an observer in the Russo-Japanese War, arguably the first "modern" war. In 1906 Teddy Roosevelt promoted him to Brigadier General, skipping over 862 senior officers. In 1916 he was hunting Poncho Villa in Mexico. In 1917, Pershing was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Entire American Expeditionary Force of WW1, in which he built an army almost from scratch, organizing, training, and supplying an inexperienced force that eventually numbered two million. 1919 saw Pershing promoted to the highest U.S. Army rank in history, "General of the Armies", a position held previously by George Washington. Pershing lived to see Allied Victory before his death in 1948.
I think I'll call him Rusty.
The red-crested tree rat (Santamartamys rufodorsalis), not seen in over a hundred years, made an unexpected, nonchalant appearance at the El Dorado Bird Reserve in Colombia a couple of weeks ago. Witnesses are unavailable for comment, being too busy with squeals of "Awwwwwww" to respond to questions. Press release here; high-res photos heEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
Rain Delay Antics
Clemson Baseball vs. Davidson Rain Delay Antics Moose hunting? Curling? Bowling? How this university's baseball team entertained during a rain delay. (SLYTHilarity)
$181,000,000 in Warhols.
Andy Warhol always plays a prominent role in the twice-yearly contemporary sales in New York, but this season his work saw a phenomenal turnover of $181m, almost a third of the week's total proceeds at Christie's, Sotheby's and Phillips de Pury. The Economist on The wizards of the Warhol market. Watch for yourself: In the Saleroom: Andy Warhol's Self-Portrait, 1963-1964.
21st century Tin Pan Alley
"Sometimes less," he says cheerfully. "Sometimes I get two hours. Someone comes over at three, we have a cup of tea, chew the cud for a bit, go: 'All right, shall we write a song?' And by six, they've gone home and we've done it. Chasing Pavements, that took two or three hours." The life of today's pro songwriter.
TermKit
May 18
Cart-pimpers and cat counselors
What is a library? What do librarians do? Librarians from the 2011 ALIA conference in Sydney respond - and their answers can be surprising.
Let's settle this with science (and a side of fries)
In-N-Out vs. Five Guys vs. Shake Shack: a careful comparison of three hamburger heavyweights. (Previously.)
photographs of Africa by Carol Beckwith and Angela Fisher
Stunning photographs of the cattle farmers of Sudan | African ceremonies | Faces of Africa | video: African Ceremonies | Thirty years ago American-born Carol Beckwith and Australian Angela Fisher met in Kenya and began a relationship with the African continent that would profoundly alter and shape their lives. Their journeys would take them over 270,000 miles, through remote corners of 40 countries, and to more than 150 African cultures. | About the photographers (opens with sound to the video) [all links slightly nsfw in a NatGeo kind of way] [more inside]
The Angry, Outspoken, Activist Larry Kramer
It begins: “Thank you for coming to see our play. Please know that everything in ‘The Normal Heart’ happened. There were and are real people who lived and spoke and died, and are presented here as best I could.” The letter goes on to name some of the people on whom he based his characters (the central figure, Ned Weeks, is based on himself) and describe what became of them. [more inside]
The Stockholm Syndrome Theory of Long Novels
"Reading a novel of punishing difficulty and length is a version of climbing Everest for people who prefer not to leave the house. And people who climb Everest don’t howl with exhilaration at the summit because the mountain was a good or a well made or an interesting mountain per se, but because they’re overawed at themselves for having done such a fantastically difficult thing." Mark O'Connell writes about how he overcame his fear of reading very long novels.
...Charlie Murphy?
DID I MENTION I LIKE TO DANCE. LEMME SMANG IT. SEX SYRUP. (some language nsfw; Voice Q&A with Flynt Flossy)
"the oompa loompas did not have their blueberry driver's licenses... they were shorter than I was wide"
The Making of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Most quotes are from the "making of" documentary from 2001, now on YouTube in four pieces: 1, 2, 3, 4 (also see featurette). The cast reunited on Today show earlier this week. [via]
O Canada Shatnerized
Montreal-born actor William Shatner, 80, sings the National Anthem of Canada to show his appreciation for getting a Lifetime Achievement Award from Canada's Governor General, the greatest honour given to artists in the country (and yeah, in fact it comes with some cash).
Wrap yourself in silken stones
Richard Weston is not only a professor of architecture at Cardiff University. He is now a fashion designer. Being interviewed by Vogue. Beautiful Weston silk scarves printed with scans of minerals, fossils and stones are now on sale at London's historic department store Liberty. [more inside]
An Ankh and A morepork
We all know beloved fantasy author Terry Pratchett has a sword, but did you know he has his own Coat of Arms?
Robert Aldrich's "Kiss Me Deadly"
I'm a Nazi! - Just kidding
Outspoken Danish Film Director Lars Von Trier, famous for making films in which women have a really hard time, plugged his new film Melancholia at Cannes in somewhat controversial fashion. [more inside]
Now, witness the power of this fully-armed and operational battle station
The discovery indicates there are many more free-floating Jupiter-mass planets that can't be seen. The team estimates there are about twice as many of them as stars. In addition, these worlds are thought to be at least as common as planets that orbit stars. This would add up to hundreds of billions of lone planets in our Milky Way galaxy alone.
RC Superhero
Hodgmino
"Powers that come and go in the night, banish these snail-things from my sight!"
Enter the Dragon: [SLVimeo] A short documentary that explores the Dungeons and Dragons subculture.
Lie, world; truth, shoes.
“Does anyone have confirmation that Osama was watching The IT Crowd in these home movies? Amazing if true. Don't know how to feel.” —@Glinner [more inside]
Starbucks better than Hospital.
Men who drink the most coffee have a 60% lower risk of developing lethal prostate cancer. 'Even drinking one to three cups of coffee per day was associated with a 30% lower risk of lethal prostate cancer.' But is that down to perhaps coffee drinkers having healthier habits? No: 'Coffee drinkers were more likely to smoke and less likely to exercise, behaviors that may increase advanced prostate cancer risk. These and other lifestyle factors were controlled for in the study and coffee still was associated with a lower risk.' [more inside]
Glowing Lines of Night-time Airline Flights
Long exposure photos of airline traffic - like the mapping of flights with GPS, except more glowing. [more inside]
CDC's Advice on Living With the Living Dead
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Public Health Matters Blog issues advice on Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse. Preppers, unite! (Single-link zombie preparedness awareness campaign. That is all.)
Money doesn't grow on trees.
Bitcoin is a peer-to-peer digital currency. Trading at eight dollars this week—and being used to pay for everything from freelance programming jobs to magic mushrooms—it has been described as “the most dangerous open-source project ever created” and “an unambiguous challenge to the government monopoly on the power to print money.” Estimated at over 20 petaFLOPS the Bitcoin network is currently the fastest virtual supercomputer in the world. [more inside]
the old man of the lake
It's just a dead old tree trunk ...that's been floating around Crater Lake for at least a hundred years.
MINECRAFT GHIBLI WORLD
Oz Workshop recreates the worlds of Hayao Miyazaki in MINECRAFT GHIBLI WORLD. Download the map free.
Ghost Cities Of Light
Like most game companies, Square Enix records every significant activity that occurs in their online environments. Jim Blackhurst took a database of "terminal impact events" in Just Cause 2 and mapped each of the 11 million player deaths to to the geography of the game to create a haunting visualization.
What It's Like To Get A Breast Reduction
A young woman writes about her breast reduction.
The Crying Game
After 14 years, a movie and 17 seasons Stargate has left our screens forever- falling ratings dooming it's latest incarnation, Stargate: Universe, just as the series was finding it's feet. But what would have happned had the series continued? (contains spoilers for show you probably didn't watch)
Not your average, everyday locust swarm...
That time has come again, the magical time of the century when the, somewhat creepy, bugs we know as the cicada appear. [more inside]
Google translation ... 1 2 3 Go!
A song/video made using Google Translate has become one of the most popular YouTube clips in Taiwan this month. (previously) (via)
Callil's complaint
"[H]e goes on and on and on about the same subject in almost every single book. It's as though he's sitting on your face and you can't breathe." As expected, Philip Roth (bibliography) won the Man Booker International Prize today. Perhaps not unexpectedly, one of the judges quit rather than award it to him. Was she so wrong? Should they give Roth the Nobel Prize already?
"It didn't bother me"
Charles Barkley on homophobia in sports It bothers me when I hear these reporters and jocks get on TV and say: ‘Oh, no guy can come out in a team sport. These guys would go crazy.’ First of all, quit telling me what I think. I’d rather have a gay guy who can play than a straight guy who can’t play.”
Atmosphere above Japan heated up before earthquake says NASA
The atmosphere above Japan was observed by NASA to heat up rapidly several days before the Great Earthquake, probably caused by stresses in the fault releasing massive amounts of radon. [more inside]
End of an Era
On Thursday, the final judgement in the Microsoft antitrust case expires. The case was filed in 1998 and was so far reaching that the DOJ set up a website to coordinate efforts.
Microsoft is still appealing the judgement in the European Union antitrust case.
Anger and anxiety
Anger, Politics and the Wisdom of Uncertainty - "If there's somebody or even some institution to blame, it turns out people are much more likely to get angry... anger tends to inspire individuals to engage in more political activities than they would otherwise... Without someone to blame, respondents mostly just grow fearful and anxious... A particular danger of anger seems to be closed-mindedness. Research finds that when citizens get angry, they close themselves off to alternative views and redouble their sense of conviction in their existing views. Fear and anxiety, on the other hand, seem to promote openness to alternative viewpoints and a willingness to compromise." (via) [more inside]
"It was kind of shitty at first, but I thought it got a lot better. You know what show I like? Cheers. That was a good show."
"You didn’t put a bullet through Bin Laden but I’m proud of you. You’re a bust-ass kid." Justin Halpern's dad reacts to the cancellation of $#*! My Dad Says.
Christophe Huet CGI/photomanipulations
Christophe Huet and other talented artists at the Asile studio in Paris produce amazingly lifelike and realistic CGI and photomanipulated creations. (Flash and audio, but the music, also created by Huet, is lovely.) Some images NSFW.
Harvard Natural Sciences Lecture Demonstrations
Harvard Natural Sciences Lecture Demonstrations presents videos, at times stunning and informative, of in-class science. [more inside]
The Fresh Maker
The costs of Honor
"It was your words, Jim, that were a call to arms for the rest of us." The story behind an iconic photo of the civil rights movement.
The Cosby Sweater Project
The Cosby Sweater Project is a blog by Kelly Tucker where she draws/paints a single piece of clothing (usually the eponymous sweater) from every episode of The Cosby Show in chronological order. Some favorites: s1e4, s1e5, s1e16, s1e18, s2e1, s2e6. Finally, a short interview with Bill Cosby about sweaters.
I'd ask my friends to come and see
Abbey Road has a webcam, you normally don't have to wait long to see someone taking a version of that photo. (previous)
May 17
Davy we hardly knew ye
David Mamet, playwright and screenwriter has completed his migration to the right of the political spectrum. The Weekly Standard's Andrew Ferguson writes about it in "Converting Mamet."
"A wise son maketh a glad father." -- Proverbs 10:1
The Legacy of Malcolm X
The Legacy of Malcolm X: Why his vision lives on in Barack Obama is an affecting essay by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
Love Endures Even Cancer
"In 2006, Mr. Snow had Stage 3 melanoma, a disease usually found in people three decades older." A short New York Times piece on a young couple going through the end of a cancer diagnosis. Make sure you watch the video in the multimedia column.
Snarf! Snarf!
The Information Sage
“If you display information the right way, anybody can be an analyst,” Tufte once told me. “Anybody can be an investigator.” - The Washington Monthly interviews informaticist Edward Tufte [via]
Video Games Now Eligible for NEA Grants
The National Endowment for the Arts' new Arts in Media Guidelines now include video games as an art form eligible for federal grants. [more inside]
Making The Movies Jealous
Yet another movie theater trailer marriage proposal. This time with live reaction shot so you can watch her watch as you watch!
Counselling commission of mischief, not committed
Just before the Toronto G20, Byron Sonne was arrested on a wide range of charges (previously). Nearly eleven months later, he has been granted bail. [more inside]
The personal effects of Ted Kaczynski, aka the Unabomber, will be sold via an online auction.
Exploring the Solar System, on Earth and Beyond
From Earth to the Solar System (FETTSS) is a collection of images curated by NASA that portray an attempt to understand the origin and evolution of the solar system, by looking to the skies and investigating extreme situations on earth, like high-altitude lakes and an acidic river. [more inside]
Past Predictions on the Future of Sports and Technology
In 1995, experts predicted what watching sports would be like in the future. One prediction: "...a Seattle Times reporter imagined a day in the not-too-distant future when a fan who got home late during a Seattle SuperSonic game could digitally fast-forward through the recorded action until he caught up with the real-time telecast."
Is it art? Music? Who can say?
I don't know what you're referring to, but maybe if certain older, wiser people hadn't acted like such little babies, and gotten so mushy, then everything would be ok..
Alexander Payne's 1999's movie Election originally had a much more awkward and true to source material ending that was shot and then discarded after testing poorly. It remained a rumor until someone found a VHS copy at a Farmer's Market in Wilmington, DE for $5
KENTUCKY v. KING
How “secure” do our homes remain if police, armed with no warrant, can pound on doors at will and, on hearing sounds indicative of things moving, forcibly enter and search for evidence of unlawful activity?Supreme Court OKs More Warrantless Searches [more inside]
Long Live The Killer
"The Killer," Harmon Killebrew, a slugger for the Minnesota Twins (formerly Washington Senators) has died today at 74. [more inside]
John Cazale
I Knew It Was You: Before his tragically early death from lung cancer at the age of 42, John Cazale acted in only five films -- The Godfather, The Conversation, The Godfather Part Two, Dog Day Afternoon, and The Deer Hunter -- and each was nominated for Best Picture. Yet today most people don't even know his name. I KNEW IT WAS YOU is a fresh tour through his movies which helped define a generation. With Al Pacino, Meryl Streep, Robert De Niro, Gene Hackman, Francis Ford Coppola, Sydney Lumet and Steve Buscemi. (documentary, 39mins)
Presidential candidates 2012
2012 Presidential Candidates - Comparing the 2012 Presidential Candidates on the issues with profile, issue and trivia comparisons. [more inside]
Pay What You Want Type
The Lost Type Co-op is a collaboration between Tyler Galpin and Riley Cran. It was founded with the intention of providing unique and quality fonts based on a pay-what-you-want model. All designers get 100% of the donations their font receives.
So, you know, be on the look out for that. And, you know, be careful when anyone loves you.
The entirety of Brad Neely's unauthorized redubbing of the first Harry Potter movie, Wizard People, Dear Reader, is available in its entirety on Youtube (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 & 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35). Surreal, excessive, goofy, and at times oddly poetic, it tells the story of "Harry, the near-perfect new god", and his sidekicks Ronny the Bear and the Wretched Harmony (who has "complex on top of complex"), as they explore the world of wizardry while avoiding the cruel she-professor Snake and the dreaded vampire tattoo-maker Valmart. If you'd like to read along, a full script is available here. "Well, bless my nippers! Bless them all day long." (Previously, but the last post required you to burn WPDR to CD and play it along with the movie; now the entire thing is streaming online)
The Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon
After 45 years, $2.5 billion, and one legendary reunion, Jerry Lewis has announced that this year's Labor Day Telethon to benefit the Muscular Dystrophy Association will be his last. (previously) [more inside]
Bad Education
The Higher Education (Debt) Bubble - "[H]igh and increasing college costs mean students need to take out more loans, more loans mean more securities lenders can package and sell, more selling means lenders can offer more loans with the capital they raise, which means colleges can continue to raise costs. The result is over $800 billion in outstanding student debt, over 30 percent of it securitized, and the federal government directly or indirectly on the hook for almost all of it. If this sounds familiar, it probably should... [more inside]
Greetings, True Believers!
Marvel.com now has many animated series (all episodes, in their entirety) available to view online at their website including The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Superheroes, X-Men, The Animated Series, X-Men Evolution, Fantastic Four: World's Greatest Heroes, and Spider-Man (1967) (Full list inside) [more inside]
Yay Carolyn! Yay GameSpot!
This week, Rockstar Games released L. A. Noire, a video game that's--perhaps not unusual for a Rockstar game--getting stellar reviews. One review, and one reviewer in particular, though stands out. Carolyn Petit, a new member of the staff at GameSpot, made her video game review debut yesterday. Carolyn is transgender. Note: if you're not a GameSpot member, you'll have to do an age check on the video [more inside]
24in60
24in60 The last 24 hours in 60-second, unbiased news bites.
"It was a good thing to have a couple of thousand people all rigid and frozen together, in the palm of one's hand." - Charles Dickens
So how much does an F-35 actually cost?
Fresh on the heels of Lockheed Martin's delivery of the first production F-35 to the USAF, you might be wondering how much it actually costs. It depends on who you ask.
Blackfive takes a crack at it, prompting a rather snippy response from Bill Sweetman over at Ares. Throw in additional commentary and a rebuttal, and head down the rabbit hole into the wonderful world of defense acquisition.
"Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing." — Harper Lee
Breathing Books — A collection of beautiful photos on all things bookish.
"People generally think you're mad... That's sort of the point."
Planking (lie flat, face down, in an unusual location, get someone to take your photo) is a meme that started in Australia (or possibly England). It has just claimed its first death.
Now what if we could get X11 running in this thing?
May 16
"No, no, you can just talk to the comedian anytime!"
[NSFW: swear words galore] Hecklers, the bane of many a performance. Here you can watch a documentary about Hecklers [ part 1 - part 2 - part 3 - part 4 ] and other critics. Someone at the beginning of that "Heckler" movie says something like, "A show was never made better because of a heckler." If only all of the banter was as funny as when Matt Walsh was heckled at SXSW. More often, it's like how Kyle Kinane states right off the bat during his act: "Every trainwreck needs a fuckin’ caboose; let’s get it over with," before he launches into a semi-drunken 9-minute conversation/shoutfest. But every once in a while, you get the perfect "point, counterpoint" moment. Let's see how different stand-up comedians react when the social contract of audience/performer is broken. [more inside]
"What I wanted was to create a prophet"
"I wanted to do a movie that would give the people that took LSD at that time the hallucinations that you get with that drug, but without hallucinating. I did not want LSD to be taken, I wanted to fabricate the drug's effect." - Alejandro Jodorowsky's Dune (previously) is to be the subject of a new documentary.
No tights. No flights.
The popular WB/CW superhero soap Smallville has chronicled the life of Clark Kent for 10 years. Comic bloggers Chris Sims and David Uzumeri have celebrated by recapping the last season in a storm of magnificent snark.
Women Now Empowered By Everything A Woman Does, including getting sick in dresses
Will Bridesmaids save the chick flick? Director Paul Fieg fretted about the opening, but Bridesmaids came in second place opening weekend. It has buzz and critical praise. But is it feminist? Does it matter? Is it total crap anyway? Does Roger Ebert like it? [more inside]
Open access for the win.
As a part of their new open access policy, Yale is releasing their vast digital images collection for free. Although it will take years to upload everything, the online collection is starting with 250,000 images. A sampling includes original Mozart manuscripts, maps from the Lewis and Clark Expedition, and John Trumbull's iconic Declaration of Independence. [more inside]
Unsightly money cluttering up your house?
The town on the wrong side of America's drug war
The town on the wrong side of America's drug war. An article on the Brownsville, Texas neighborhood cut off by the border fence. Via Crooked Timber
dance film, wim vandekeybus
excerpt from blush, a dance film that came out a few years ago but I've never seen posted here, by wim vandekeybus/ultima vez
Interactive map of US foreign aid
Interactive map of US foreign aid by the Center for American Progress: "explore where U.S. foreign aid dollars are spent and how these countries rank in terms of basic indicators such as political rights and civil liberties, corruption, and overall development." [more inside]
And the entire marvelous panorama of the war passed before my eyes
Christopher Hitchens reviews the letters of Rosa Luxemburg, the Polish-born German political radical, intellectual, and author.
Hit me up!
A Call for Change. In an eloquent and thoughtful letter on the Tegan and Sara website, Sara Quin asks "When will misogynistic and homophobic ranting and raving result in meaningful repercussions in the entertainment industry?" Tyler the Creator, the object of her ire, responds on his twitter feed in characteristic fashion.
Ain't No Party Like a Leninist Party
"The handover to a new president and premier has generated plenty of speculation in the press, about who the leaders are and what is will all mean, but sometimes it’s useful to go back and fill in the very basics, since China has a unique and in some ways quite confusing political system." A Primer on China's Leadership Transition. [via]
This movie is 100% realistic
Building on the popularity of their previous "Harry S Plinkett" movie reviews, Red Letter Media's Mike Stoklasa and Jay Bauman have been working on a second line of film mockery: Half In The Bag [more inside]
Heaven's Not on His Mind
Famous physicist Stephen Hawking calls the notion of heaven a "fairy story" in an interview with The Guardian newspaper published today. He made the comment in response to a question about his fears of death.
"'I have lived with the prospect of an early death for the last 49 years. I'm not afraid of death, but I'm in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first,' he told the newspaper. 'I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people who are afraid of the dark.'"*[more inside]
One-Man Show
Louis C.K. has what most artists dream of: total creative control over his show.
I want my edition with the subtraction!
In such a world maximalism and encyclopedism, erudite puzzle solving, simply feel like more of the same, and the last thing we need is more of the same. We need less, much less: we don't need fiction that cultivates the general noise in a slightly more erudite way but still plays by the same rules; we need fiction that strips its way down to our nerves and fibers, simulations that are willing to cut enough of our context away to let us step outside of our own increasingly simulated experience and to see it afresh, from without.
—Brian Evenson, "Doing Without," an essay in The Collagist
(could also be titled "How a mistake in the digital conversion of a Cory Doctorow novel [see difference between print and electronic version] made me think about the meaning of innovative literature") [more inside]
—Brian Evenson, "Doing Without," an essay in The Collagist
(could also be titled "How a mistake in the digital conversion of a Cory Doctorow novel [see difference between print and electronic version] made me think about the meaning of innovative literature") [more inside]
My Rapist Friended Me On Facebook [And All I Got Was This Lousy Article]
"I felt comforted by the fact that like everyone I've reconnected with on Facebook, he'd gotten fat, and by the banality of his listed interests like "Bob Marley" and "Scrubs." He was a monster in my memory, but on Facebook, he was just a man. I called him."
Details given for friendly audience about tactics, mistakes, funding and even entrepreneurial opportuneship.
Fabulousness is the right of all sentient beings.
Now THAT'S winning!
"I will win this battle if I have to kill every last white bitch in high heels around here.” Roseanne Barr discusses, among other things, Charlie Sheen, working on TV, addiction and fame.
Stealth social marketing
Stealth social marketing: CBC’s Spark radio show and podcast interviews a social marketer who describes the lengths to which advertisers will go to make you believe the “friends” who mention a product really are your friends. Includes everything from use of regional slang to hiring a stripper. (Bonus points for the segment’s Deep Throat–style concealment of the identity of the source.) Spark blog with Flash audio player; direct MP3 download. [more inside]
You are here, and there, and over there, and also in Ohio
Where The Streets Have Your Name: find streets, places, and things that have your name, as mapped by the folks at OpenStreetMap. While the view starts out in the US, it covers anything mapped with OSM, so pan around the world to find more results. [more inside]
The Translations and Rareties of Elfinspell
Elfinspell is a garishly painted trunk stuffed with rare old books. You can browse the collection by timeline or by Muse.
Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom, on YouTube
Over 100 full episodes of the Marlin Perkins-hosted television show Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom (previously) are now available on YouTube. That is all.
A Tale as Old as 1862
Is it really that deep, though?
Kyle Munkittrick, a program director at the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies and a grad student at NYU, writes an interesting essay on understanding Pixar's movies through relationships between the human and non-human characters -- and perhaps shaping how an entire generation sees life and reality.
Universal Horror
Universal Horror: history of the early horror films made by Universal Studios such as Dracula, Frankenstein, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, King Kong, The Mummy and many more. Directed by Kevin Brownlow. Narrated by Kenneth Branagh. 1 :: 2 :: 3 :: 4 :: 5 :: 6 :: 7
Chester Brown Pays For It
Chester Brown's autobiographical works such as I Never Liked You (1.3 MB PDF) placed #38 on The Comics Journal's list of the 100 Best Comics of the 20th Century. In his new graphic novel, Paying For It, he "calmly lays out the facts of how he became not only a willing participant in but also a vocal proponent of one of the world's most hot-button topics--prostitution".
Vermont, Single-Payer in the USA?
With the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act being argued in lower courts, it's probably also worth looking at Vermont's adoption of single-payer health care: "On May 26, Gov. Peter Shumlin of Vermont is expected to sign legislation that will create universal coverage in the state—eventually. Vermont will use subsidies from the Affordable Care Act to help create a Canada-style system. And its system, or so the theory goes, will become so popular and cheap that the rest of America will want to copy it." [more inside]
Why should I have to wait for a damn robot to get me my book?
"Librarians that are arguing and lobbying for clever ebook lending solutions are completely missing the point. They are defending library as warehouse as opposed to fighting for the future, which is librarian as producer, concierge, connector, teacher and impresario." Though not everything a library collects is a scannable book or document. [more inside]
Flottille - amazing water-powered origami
Flottille by Etienne Cliquet. Exquisite moving origami powered by the capillary action of the paper.
Norms and Peeves
Language Log lists all their previous articles about prescriptivism vs. descriptivism (or at least a lot of them), plus a link to Geoffrey Pullum's Ideology, Power, and Linguistic Theory [pdf].
Sammy Wanjiru (1986-2011)
24 year old Olympic marathon champion Sammy Wanjiru died yesterday in Nyahururu, Kenya after "falling" from a balcony.
Sammy set a world record for the half marathon of 58:53 in the United Arab Emirates in 2007, only to best it again two months later in the Netherlands, with a 58:35. He won five marathons, setting an Olympic record of 2:06:32 in 2008, and a personal best of 2:05:10 in London in 2009. He might be best remembered for his dramatic win in Chicago in 2010. [more inside]
"I Will Never Plea-Bargain With The Truth."
“The worst is over without a doubt.”
Artist Debbie Grossman starts with Russell Lee's Depression-era photographs of Pie Town, New Mexico, and then Photoshops the men into women. (via) [more inside]
Warren Buffett 4 Kidz
It's not uncommon for celebrities to get a cartoon. Billionaire Warren Buffett now joins their ranks with Secret Millionaire's Club, a cartoon about Warren Buffet giving a group of kids advice on investing, business and life. [more inside]
Slinking through the 70s: Marlene Clark
If you watched TV in the 1970s, you might know Marlene Clark as Janet Lawson on Sanford and Son. If Bruce Lee is more your bag, she might look familiar due to her role as John Saxon's secretary in Enter the Dragon, while Hammer Horror fans would recognize her from her appearance in The Beast Must Die. However, her portrayal of Ganja Meda in the Bunuel-meets-blaxploitation classic Ganja & Hess made her an enigmatic figure in 1970s cinema. Temple of Schlock recently tracked her down to find out what became of her.
Meanwhile, The San Francisco Public Library
Wendy MacNaughton's Meanwhile Illustrated Documentary Series has so far covered San Francisco dog walkers, Farmers' Market Farmers, Mission Bar Tenders etc. This week she captures the essence of libraries in Meanwhile, The San Francisco Library
"I have a bad feeling about this."
The five stages of Star Wars fandom grief. [Slate.com]
May 15
The Best Toy Maker
Kids know that the best toys are the ones you make from stuff that's lying around. Arvind Gupta's been doing this for three decades. Take a look at his Turbine bottle cap,
Helicopter foam cup,
Drinking straw flute,
The CD hovercraft,
Magic Paper Fan,
Funny Fountain, Drinking Straw Centrifuge Pump, Climbing Butterfly.
Or check out the rest of his 1000 videos(!). Go to his website and discover an armload of books and pamphlets describing more toys (some of them classic) along with science experiments, math activities and stories. A sample:
The amazing Touching Slate, a drawing toy for blind children.
Hands On - Science Sense,
Hands On - Ideas and activities,
Toy Joy,
Little Science,
The Toy Bag,
Toy Treasures.
Little Toys
,
Finally you can hear Arvind in person at TED.com giving career advice, showing off a dozen toy examples, demonstrating the structure of methane; telling a Large Hadron Collider joke and finishing with the wonderful "Captain's hat" story. [more inside]
Phillippe Faraut
Philippe Faraut , realist sculptor, has a couple of interesting videos on Youtube ... one shows the effects of the aging process, another shows the effects of meth, and a third shows the effects of insanity. [more inside]
* 162m others not shown
100 years of world cuisine is a statistical exploration of military conflict that is both artistic and disturbing.
Every one a little lawyer.
“Watching the video I thought that it was wise of Major League Baseball to combine this sort of sentimental moment with mass speculative litigation. It kept brand values strong. I felt strangely grateful that I could have a moment to remember that afternoon. Surprised by the evidence of both copyright violation and father-daughter affection.” —Paul Ford, “Nanolaw with Daughter” [more inside]
They say the sun don't rise in Vegas.
Chris Worth did a tour of the real-life locations that that appeared in Fallout: New Vegas and compared them with their videogame counterparts. He explains more about the project in a newspaper interview.
Interviews with writers, producers, and directors...
On Story is a new series which takes a look at the creative process of filmmaking through the eyes of some of the entertainment industry's most prolific writers, directors and producers. Each episode will also showcase short films from the region's most promising filmmakers.
Why Would Heavenly Father Do That?
Why Would Heavenly Father Do That? After 20 years as a married Mormon living the plan of happiness, a gay man comes out to his family and his church, and blogs about it, with special attention to the question of "Mormon beards": "Why do gay Mormon men keep marrying Mormon women?" Holly Welker, a straight Mormon woman formerly engaged to a gay Mormon man, calls for an end to beards.
The last two stores of smallpox under review
Health ministers from the World Health Organization's (WHO's) 193 member states will meet this week to debate when to destroy the two last known remaining stocks of the virus that causes smallpox. [more inside]
Does internet use trigger sex crime?
Broadband Internet: An Information Superhighway to Sex Crime? [.pdf] (Leuven et al. 2011) is a German/Norwegian study that attempts to answer the question Does internet use trigger sex crime? [more inside]
A Boy and His Battle Kingdom
"Anyone who's not ready for this needs to catch up"
After being involved with the N.B.A for 40 years, Phoenix Suns President and CEO reveals that he is gay. [more inside]
Hellzapoppin'
Produced by a pair of Vaudeville comedians just as the Vaudville era was era was coming to a close, the musical revue Hellzapoppin' became a runaway smash hit, and for a time, was the longest running show on Broadway.
It was a crazy quilt of frequently updated comedy and musical bits stitched together, featuring risque humor, fourth-wall breaking audience participation, skits abandoned halfway through, dwarfs, pigeons, clowns and Adolph Hitler with a Yiddish accent. [more inside]
Everyone Knows You're A Hack
Flawed Typefaces
Flawed Typefaces. Paul Shaw, author of Helvetica and the New York City Subway System and a writer with a sharp eye even by typography standards, dissects the one or two characters in each of nearly two dozen fonts that stick out like a sore serif. (Yes, the Gill Sans numeral 1 is in there.)
Goblin Camp
Zhang Xiao
History that you can hold, smell and you can touch
Lisa Eldridge, make-up artist and blogger met up with the historian Madeleine Marsh to discuss the history of cosmetics, which is also a history of women, society, and culture. The resulting videos are just fascinating, Part 1: Victorian Era to 1930s & Part 1: 1940s to 1970s.
(via Beauty is a sleeping cat)
(via Beauty is a sleeping cat)
TEDxCaltech
GAME OVER
The last gasp of the arcade. Several months ago, two of the last major arcades on the west coast and east coast, Chinatown Fair in New York and Arcade Infinity in Los Angeles, shut down. [more inside]
DEMF - A Decade On
DetroitTechno.org presents a documentary (1 2 3) about the history and politics of techno with a focus on the Detroit Electronic Music Festival, now called Movement, from its inception in 2000 until the most recent one in 2010. [more inside]
The Shaman of the Lower East Side is no more
Ira Cohen passed away a couple of weeks ago aged 76 (NYT obit )
He was a friend and collaborator with William Burroughs and Brion Gysin and authored the Hashish Cookbook. He made several short films including The Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda.
In Kathmandu in 1979 Ira Cohen photographed the Tibetan Buddhist cremation of his friend Angus MacLise, poet and original drummer with The Velvet Underground.
He has been described as an "electronic multimedia shaman" .
His photographs range from a psycadelically distorted Hendix to Joujouka musicians; whom he described in his book Gnaoua
Ira was also a poet who had several volumes published.
An interview.
He was a friend and collaborator with William Burroughs and Brion Gysin and authored the Hashish Cookbook. He made several short films including The Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda.
In Kathmandu in 1979 Ira Cohen photographed the Tibetan Buddhist cremation of his friend Angus MacLise, poet and original drummer with The Velvet Underground.
He has been described as an "electronic multimedia shaman" .
His photographs range from a psycadelically distorted Hendix to Joujouka musicians; whom he described in his book Gnaoua
Ira was also a poet who had several volumes published.
An interview.
Subtext
The Guardian has a new series of webchats with various people in the publishing industry starting with literary agent Karolina Sutton. Also various writers are asked: Can you teach creative writing?
taH pagh taHbe
David Warner, on being Hamlet at the age of 23 in 1966, has played at least three different species in the Star Trek universe. Notably, as Chancellor Gorkon in Strek Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. But another Shakespearean actor, playing General Chang, was more apparent in that movie. Of course there is far more Shakespeare in the Star Trek Universe.
Doug's Word Clocks
May 14
Saving Louisiana by Temporarily Drowning Some of It
The opening of the Morganza spillway on May 14 by the U.S. Corps of Engineers is not only a tacit admission of the severity of the river control problems the spring 2011 flood of the Mississippi River is creating, but also one of the last remaining measures the Corps has for protecting the Old River Control Structure, which has prevented the Mississippi from naturally diverting its main channel through the shorter, steeper Atchafalaya River channel, since construction of the control structure in the late 1960's. If the Old River Control Structure fails (as it nearly did in the 1973 floods), or the river overwhelms other nearby levees north or south of the Morganza spillway/ORCS, the main channel of the Mississippi could suddenly shift westward by about 100 miles, bypassing New Orleans and the current lower delta, with severe long term effects for the U.S. economy. [more inside]
In the future, you get love by video.
"I Am Your Grandma." (Time-capsule SLYT)
corpsing, giggle fits
Uncontrolled laughter: 20 best 'corpsing' videos | Corpsing is a British theatrical slang term used to describe when an actor breaks character during a scene by laughing or by causing another cast member to laugh. | The Art Of Corpsing 1 and 2. [more inside]
Reflex: to act without thinking
Who is Reflex Responses Management Consultancy LLC? Only "the Premier Security Consultant and Training supplier for the United Arab Emirates," of course. Frequently referred to as R2, the company specializes in nuclear facility security, special-forces operations, revolt quelling, cybersecurity, and (somehow) protecting the U.A.E from Iran with one battalion of foreign mercenaries. Oh, and it's led by Erik Prince, formerly of Blackwater (now Xe). [more inside]
Why you in my ear rhymin? It's not American Idol, I'm not Simon
Music artists have long talked about trying to get into the game, getting pestered by those trying to get into the game, and unceremoniously falling out of the game. Want to get your music heard by the industry? Violator's Chris Lighty has an answer. Pleaselistentomydemo.com.
Led Zeppelin North American Tour 1977
I’m sitting aboard Caesar’s Chariot, Led Zeppelin’s customized Boeing 707 jet. Appropriately named after the conquering emperor who was ultimately doomed by an addiction to his own glory, this flying fortress now carries onboard an invading modern-day musical force. Steven Rosen's account of the 1977 North American tour.
Strauss-Kahn arrested for sexual assault
Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Managing Director of the IMF and likely French Presidential Candidate, was arrested in New York for sexual assualt today. The Port Authority of New York removed Strauss-Kahn from the first class cabin of an Air France flight ten minutes before it departed for Paris and handed him over to the NYPD, whose Special Victims Unit is handling the case, for questioning. He is expected to be arraigned later tonight. [more inside]
Audionatomy of Melancholy
A discussion on BBC Radio 4 of Robert Burton's 17th-century compendium The Anatomy Of Melancholy. Examining the medical, literary, political, and religious influences of this enormous work, as well as how it contributed to those same fields over its many years of revisions and continuing popularity. Not exactly thorough (how could it be?) but an interesting listen.
Indiana wants you
As reported by Dan Carden - Court: No right to resist illegal cop entry into home In a 3-2 decision, Justice Steven David writing for the court said if a police officer wants to enter a home for any reason or no reason at all, a homeowner cannot do anything to block the officer's entry.
David said a person arrested following an unlawful entry by police still can be released on bail and has plenty of opportunities to protest the illegal entry through the court system. [more inside]
The Surprisingly Undetestable Birth of TGI Friday's
The Surprisingly Undetestable Birth of TGI Friday's In 1965, a young Manhattanite just “looking to meet girls” added some sawdust, fake Tiffany lamps and a coat of blue blue paint to the $5000 bar that became, nearly immediately, NY's first and most popular singles bar, and eventually, the progenitor of one of the US's most popular restaurants.
The Lazarus File
The Lazarus File. "In 1986, a young nurse named Sherri Rasmussen was murdered in Los Angeles. Police pinned down no suspects, and the case gradually went cold. It took 23 years—and revolutionary breakthroughs in forensic science—before LAPD detectives could finally assemble the pieces of the puzzle. When they did, they found themselves facing one of the unlikeliest murder suspects in the city’s history." [more inside]
Canadian Indie Music
Canadian Independent Radio. CBC Radio 3 has over 25,000 uploaded artists, broadcasting on satellite and streaming on the web. The programming mix is "100 per cent Canadian music on both platforms" with exceptions for collaborations. Previously here and here.
US High School student challenges Rep. Michele Bachmann
"I, Amy Myers, do hereby challenge Representative Michele Bachmann to a Public Forum Debate and/or Fact Test on The Constitution of the United States, United States History and United States Civics."
Maybe History Ended After All
Reconsidering Fukuyama - "In 2004 he became the first of the card-carrying neocons to break ranks and oppose the Iraq War; in 2006 he published a comprehensive history and critique of the neoconservative movement; in 2009 he skewered the economics profession at length in his journal The American Interest; earlier this year, he dedicated an issue to a series of essays exploring the emerging American plutocracy... that through their greed they somehow benefit society... He was not being glib: Much of his new book, The Origins of Political Order, is devoted to documenting the struggles of premodern states to draw up sustainable tax codes. Long before modernity and the spread of democracy, societies that failed to effectively tax their citizenry were the first to shrivel... [more inside]
Together we shall conquer the cupboard
Cat and Owl are Friends ( SLYT )
"ITS THE FUCKING CATS!!!"
Cats in Tanks. [SLVimeo] Watch what happens when cats commandeer tanks.
Bob Marley Week
Jimmy Fallon commemorates Bob Marley Week on his show by welcoming six artists to perform their favorite Marley song. Performances include Lauryn Hill singing the lovely, lesser-known "Chances Are" and a slightly manic "Could You Be Loved". Via
Burning Down The House
You can learn a fair bit about a person by asking them what they'd attempt to save if their house was on fire. [more inside]
skiffy
Tragic Hero?
As governor, Palin demonstrated many of the qualities we expect in our best leaders. She set aside private concerns for the greater good, forgoing a focus on social issues to confront the great problem plaguing Alaska, its corrupt oil-and-gas politics. She did this in a way that seems wildly out of character today—by cooperating with Democrats and moderate Republicans to raise taxes on Big Business. And she succeeded to a remarkable extent in settling, at least for a time, what had seemed insoluble problems, in the process putting Alaska on a trajectory to financial well-being. Since 2008, Sarah Palin has influenced her party, and the tenor of its politics, perhaps more than any other Republican, but in a way that is almost the antithesis of what she did in Alaska. Had she stayed true to her record, she might have pointed her party in a very different direction.
happy saturday
Northern Fur Seal release (slyt thatisall)
May 13
I drank your milkshake
PBS's excellent weekly news magazine, Need to Know, explains why European broadband speeds are racing ahead of the USA. Britain now has 400 broadband suppliers with service available for as little as $6/month. Bonus: Harvard's Berkman Center reports on broadband supply trends around the world.
Do What Thou Wilt With These...
Original designs for the Thoth Tarot deck, painted by Lady Frieda Harris for Aleister Crowley, are are now for sale. [more inside]
Mapping the 2011 Canadian Federal Election
12 maps of the recent federal election in Canada. See also this large PDF map posted by Elections Canada.
Steinberger instruments
The most famous Steinberger design is the L-series instrument... made entirely of the Steinberger Blend, a proprietary graphite and carbon fiber mix in two pieces: the main body and a faceplate. It had no headstock for tuning, tuning instead at a redesigned tailpiece using micrometer-style tuners and special strings with a ball at both ends.
Kiss Me
Florida's Bestiality Law May Have Accidentally Outlawed Sex Entirely
If you have had sex in Florida in the last week, technically, you broke the law. Due to some unfortunate wording, Florida's new bestiality law technically outlawed sex between two animals.
"An act relating to sexual activities involving animals; creating s. 828.126, F.S.; providing definitions; prohibiting knowing sexual conduct or sexual contact with an animal; prohibiting specified related activities; providing penalties; providing that the act does not apply to certain husbandry, conformation judging, and veterinary practices; providing an effective date."
"An act relating to sexual activities involving animals; creating s. 828.126, F.S.; providing definitions; prohibiting knowing sexual conduct or sexual contact with an animal; prohibiting specified related activities; providing penalties; providing that the act does not apply to certain husbandry, conformation judging, and veterinary practices; providing an effective date."
An email love story, from Storycorps and NPR
It is 2007, and R.P. Salazar is living in Waco, Texas. His email username is rpsalazar. One day an email arrives addressed to another rpsalazar, meant for someone with the same initials and surname but a slightly different email address. He sends it along to the right person, an R.P. Salazar living in Bangkok. Before clicking Send he adds a p.s.: "How's the weather in Bangkok?"
Before the end of 2007, Ruben Salazar and Rachel Salazar are married. Storycorps and NPR report the whole story. (The text is good, but the audio is even better. Click "Listen to the Story.")
Brutal!
Reality 86'd. A documentary by David Markey of the last Black Flag tour in 1986. Besides the Flag (Greg Ginn, Henry Rollins, Cel Revulta, and Anthony Martinez), the tour lineup also included Painted Willie and Gone, which featured two future members of the Rollins Band. Rollins mentioned the documentary on Twitter--actually, his second-ever tweet.
As a group, they are the chief proponents of public nudism in this country.
Happy machine, inductance style
“Happy” was the theme we were given by the organizers for this year's F5 Re:Play Fest, held in April in NYC, to create this edition's pieces, probably the hardest thing to convey in any artistic expression. After a good deal of introspection, and teaming up with awesome motion graphics artist Gerardo del Hierro, we decided that happy wasn't happy for Physalia unless pliers, microchips and a bit of soldering were involved, and with this idea we resolved to create the happiest machine Physalia has built to date. [more inside]
Meet Preet
That Syncing Feeling
Christopher Soghoian, who exposed the latest Facebook PR move, is now filing an FTC complaint (pdf) against Dropbox on the grounds that they gained unfair competitive advantage by lying about how files are encrypted and who has access to them. Dropbox explains how safe your files are.
Short films by Osamu Tezuka
10 short, experimental, animated films by Osamu Tezuka, godfather of anime: Jumping, Memory, Push, Broken Down Film, Mermaid, Drop, Story of a Street Corner, Genesis, Muramasa, Self Portrait. Tezuka is best known in the West for creating Astro Boy, Kimba the White Lion and the mangas Buddha, Phoenix and Black Jack. Here is an interview where Tezuka talks about his shorter, experimental films.
Exile Nation: Drugs, Prisons, Politics, and Spirituality
"I realized that I was one of those extremely rare individuals who was a former POW of the drug war, and who got out and had the opportunity to share his story with the world." "It kind of makes an activist out of you when 3 helicopters land in your backyard and guys jump out with guns and destroy your place before your very eyes."
Exile Nation is a documentary [complete film] [trailer] and an ongoing memoir, a work of “spiritual journalism”, and eventually "a documentary archive of interviews and testimonies […] revealing the far-ranging consequences of the War on Drugs to the American Criminal Justice System." [more inside]
I like girls. But now, it's about justice.
Top 50 Worst Video Game Voices brought to life by some guy's face. Collected by Audio Atrocities. Previously 1 2.
Progress in the understanding of AIDS immunology
In a recent paper published in Nature Hansen et al. show the efficacy of their unusual vaccine strategy against SIVMAC239 in rhesus macaques. While the goal is not necessarily to produce a human vaccine against HIV using this exact strategy, this paper is now reigniting the debate over the progression of HIV infections and the mechanism(s) by which the virus skirts the human immune system.
Why walk when you can ride?
Charles Hugh Smith on The Housing Bubble
Exquisitely Corrupt Charles Hugh Smith's predictions on the housing bubble, from almost five years ago, are proving accurate.
Previously.
Big Becky has broken through
Haute Ecole
For 4 hours, the sand blocks out the sun
"It's...it's across the entire horizon." Inside a sandstorm in the Sahara. "It seems like they've been transported to Mars."
"There are some people, who don’t wait."
On May 7th, Robert Krulwich (of WNYC's RadioLab and accompanying NPR blog Krulwich Wonders) gave the commencement speech to Berkeley Journalism School’s Class of 2011 on the future of journalism. (Via) [more inside]
A million little pieces of construction paper
Construction paper artist Jen Stark and composer/party starter Dan Deacon have combined their disciplines to make a video for you. They call it Surprise Believer. [more inside]
Canada Cures Cancer
"Dr. Evangelos Michelakis, a professor at the U of A Department of Medicine, has shown that dichloroacetate (DCA) causes regression in several cancers, including lung, breast, and brain tumors. "
Between rumors that pharmaceutical companies have no interest in this discovery because it can't be patented and quacks jumping on the bandwagon to sell home made DCA to hopeful cancer patients for self medication, things are not exactly going the way Dr. Michelakis would have probably hoped.
A distant ship's smoke on the horizon
For only the second time since their breakup in 1985, the three surviving members of Pink Floyd shared a stage last night in London. Video, with the amazing reveal around 0:52. [more inside]
Sean Power’s Laptop and the Girl in the Purple Sarong
Sean Power had his laptop stolen five days ago. Last night, while in Canada, preyproject tracking software alerted him to his laptop's location and he put out a call on Twitter for help in getting it back. Twitter user @neilreese and a Girl in a Purple Sarong jumped into action. Here's the chronological summary of Tweets and events, as well as Nick Reese's account of a wild night in which justice was served.
The suspect isn't responding to our questions...
An Essay by Michael Moore
Some Final Thoughts on the Death of Osama bin Laden Although not typically a fan of a lot of Michael Moore's work, I think he has some cogent thoughts concerning recent world events and the U.S. in particular. [more inside]
Ask me about my gun collection. No wait... don't.
Do doctors violate the 2nd Amendment when they ask their patients if they own guns? May the government force doctors to stop asking that without violating the 1st Amendment?
Sex and the Single Bat Leveyha
"God is totally down with sexpionage, at least according to the Zomet Institute, an organization dedicated to interpreting Jewish law for modern living" -- on the Mossad's precursor to Russia’s femme fatale spy Anna Chapman.
The Misfits, The Rebels, The Troublemakers...
Here's to the crazy ones - a decade of Mac OS X reviews.
Limerence
Is Sappho's so called "Ode to Anactoria" the first literary reference to limerence? Coined in a book by psychology professor Dorothy Tennov in 1979 and soon covered by Time Magazine, limerence involves "intrusive thinking about the object of your passionate desire". Is it just a fancy term for callow infatuation or the unrequited love behind many great novels and young suicides? Whatever its reality, or corrosive effect, Tennov believed that central to limerence is "the desire for limerence itself".
United in Apathy
Britain's Got The Next Terri Schiavo
British "super-injunctions" goes one step further: "A High Court judge has issued an injunction which bans publication of information on Twitter and Facebook." [more inside]
Jumping the pond
Dozens of concerned citizens will march on London this weekend to protest high taxation and government debt. Sound familiar? The rally is the first sign of what The Guardian terms "a radical Tea Party-style mass movement" in the UK. Organisers The Taxpayers' Alliance have previously been linked to the US-based Freedom Works.
new branch in tree of life
Now Back to the good part...
This is the tale of Captain Jack Sparrow (SLYT)
Featuring Michael Bolton and The Lonely Island
Revenge Attack
"This is the retaliation for the killing of Osama bin Laden" - At least 70 Killed at military training centre in North-West Pakistan. Pakistan Taliban claim responsibility.
REMEMBER THE AMBER LIGHT
This recording (mp3 excerpt) is an "unauthorized experiment" that was made in the year 2058 C.D.S. (Carbon Dating System), a "blue verbal data feed" sent backwards in time to "retro A.D." by Decker, T. L. (pdf transcript) (via @GreatDismal) [more inside]
WoW... Done Mario Style... For Flash Friday...
WoW... For the rest of us... WTF?!
A flash side scroller featuring Freud, Marx and more, done beautifully in the style of World of Warcraft. [more inside]
May 12
Freakin' Dragons
Friday Flash Fun-frustration! In the form of "Checkpoint", a fast paced platform game similar to N, featuring wall-jumping, spikey things, and a narrator who doesn't appear to like you very much. [more inside]
Go the F**k to Sleep
For tired parents everywhere, the not-even-released yet Go the F**k to Sleep, is a already a best seller on Amazon.com, probably due to its viral release on the Internet. You can find the pdf if you use your Google-Fu and definitely worth the search. I've ordered my copy.
The digital humanities...plural...
How to define digital humanities? "the humanities done digitallys"? Should we expand the definition of the field to include, as I've heard it said several times, "every medievalist with a Web site"? Undoubtedly not. Yeah, not. Rather, The particular contribution of the digital humanities, however, lies in its exploration of the difference that the digital can make to the kinds of work that we do, as well as to the ways that we communicate with one another. [more inside]
A Typical Jordan Game
Compiling the Absurd Box Scores from Space Jam. Courtesy of The Harvard College Sports Analysis Collective.
The Monstars, behind a vicious defense and a quick-strike transition offense featuring the unprecedented 3-point-line dunk, seize early control and take a 66-18 lead going into the half. Pound (Barkley) and Bupkus (Ewing) are dominant. Things look grim for Jordan, Bugs Bunny and crew.
The Monstars, behind a vicious defense and a quick-strike transition offense featuring the unprecedented 3-point-line dunk, seize early control and take a 66-18 lead going into the half. Pound (Barkley) and Bupkus (Ewing) are dominant. Things look grim for Jordan, Bugs Bunny and crew.
What in the blue blazes is that?
Spine Shattering - Bone Blasting! She'll put you in traction! She's A One Mama Massacre Squad!
Machete Maidens Unleashed! is a documentary about Filipino exploitation films of the 70s and 80s. It features interviews with Roger Corman, Joe Dante, John Landis, Sid Haig, Eddie Romero and is directed by Mark Hartley, who also directed the Ozploitation documentary Not Quite Hollywood. The film was started by Andrew Leavold and grew out of his as-yet-unfinished 'Search For Weng Weng', about the midget James Bond of the Philippines who starred in For Your Height Only and Impossible Kid (and inspired the Weng Weng Rap). You can follow Andrew's adventures through the world of Filipino filmmaking on his blog, Bamboo Gods and Bionic Boys. Several Filipino genre films are available online, including TNT Jackson (NSFW).
The World's Largest Model Airport
Frederik and Gerrit Braun, energetic twin brothers with no shortage of dreams, have just finished construction of the world’s largest model airport. With 40,000 lights, 15,000 figurines, 500 cars, 10,000 trees, 50 trains, 1000 wagons, 100 signals, 200 switches, 300 buildings and 40 planes, Knuffingen Airport is both a wonder to behold as well as a technological tour de force. The best part of Knuffingen is that it’s alive. Forty planes and 90 vehicles move about autonomously.
Torturing Republicans with the facts.
ro.me if you want to
ro.me A new Google Chrome experiment showcasing WebGL.
Ben Greenman’s Museum of Silly Charts
Fukushima 'Full Meltdown' Made Official
TEPCO officials confirmed that the Reactor No. 1 at Fukushima suffered a full meltdown What has been alluded to for weeks has been confirmed today. High levels of cesium has been found in the water and soil of japan and reports that from 60 to 70 percent of the radiation the Chernobyl disaster have been released. The Australian Broadcasting Company news service is reporting that reactor number three continues to leak dangerous levels of radioactivity in to surrounding seawater.
“No one is more important to the future of our state than our teachers.”
New, From Mike Huckabee! Give Your Kids An Exciting Way To Learn The Facts About American History! This fascinating, original series of animated videos features the Time Travel Academy kids, a group of friends who create an incredible time machine that whisks them back in time to experience history in the making!
Many of our schools and teachers today haven't found ways to make history for kids fun. Instead, they’re teaching with political bias that distorts facts for the sake of political correctness. As a result, our national pride and patriotism are in jeopardy. - Mike Huckabee, Co-founder Sample video: Learn Our History: the Reagan Revolution [more inside]
Cricket on the halo deck?
"This Imperial dOvewalker COOs his way into a Big Surprise.
Parveen says let him have it with the dOveton Launcher 3000! He won't know what hit him after attacking my planet."
Just another tale from the The Pakistani Starfleet Explorers. Via boingboing.
And the big kids want what the little kids get
"If you have basically heard no music, and then you're told to create music, what will it sound like?" Jon Ronson talks to The Shaggs - the girl group from the 1960s who were home schooled and practised for hours every day in their basement.
And the band played on, for there was good news to share.
An NIH clinical trial has shown that early treatment of HIV with antiretroviral drugs reduces the odds of the virus being transmitted to an uninfected sexual partner by 96%, with only one new HIV case recorded out of the 1,763 couples participating in the trial.
Dr. Doom
Doomsday reloaded. In 1986 the BBC launched an ambitious project to record a snapshot of everyday life across the UK for future generations. A million volunteers took part, and now you can search and view the million photos and written entries.
Paging Dr. Kinte...
"With regard to the idea of whether or not you have a right to health care, you have to realize what that implies... It means you believe in slavery." Senator Rand Paul weighs in on the notion of human rights at a Senate subcommittee hearing yesterday, equating the right to health care, as well as the right to water and food, as tantamount to a belief in slavery.
AHHH! Wookie rug!!!
Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you!
"God gave me the talent to pose for pictures and it seems to make people happy. That can't be a bad thing, can it?"
Many of the photos of classic pin-up Bettie Page were taken by the photographer Paula Klaw, who helped to run the photo shop and men's magazine business owned by her brother Irving. Chuck Keefe (blog), an artist, had several photographs of Klaw's autographed by her, and eventually by Bettie herself. An interesting look at part of the story of two of pin-up's most notorious women....
Dun-dun-dun!
Drama on the top floor. A pair of redtailed hawks nested on the window of the NYU’s Bobst Library, outside the office of President John Sexton. (Previously.) The New York Times set up a hawk cam to observe the hatching process. Instead they’ve got a soap opera on their hands, with miraculous births, life and death drama, bungling bureaucracies, and a comments section on the warpath, with some New Yorkers demanding the Governor get involved to mount a rescue mission of the injured mother hawk. As of 12:49 EST, hawk catchers were standing by on the 12th floor to determine whether to attempt to remove and rehabilitate the hawk at the Bronx Zoo (previously), a course which could mean the death of her chick. (Consolidated post with most updates is here, if you want to catch up.) [more inside]
Fashion's Double-Standard
Why Does the FTC Mandate that Bloggers Disclose Freebies & Samples When Print Writers/Editors Don't Have To? Racked.com Asks an FTC Lawyer. Last year, Ann Taylor was investigated for offering giftcards to bloggers they failed to disclosed (the investigation was closed without enforcement).
Will the greatest Dungeon Master ever make his save vs. Hipster or lose his group?
There’s a new indie film in the works about nerd culture and coming to terms with the hipster cooption of the sacred cow of Dungeons & Dragons : Zero Charisma. This is brought to you by two folks Katie Graham and Andrew Matthews who’s prior work includes the cinematography and film editing of Best Worst Movie (previously)
Egg on their Facebooks
Last Friday, USA Today reported that two people from PR firm Burson-Marsteller had been contacting various news outlets and bloggers, pushing a story about how Google's "Social Circle" gmail feature violates users' privacy. The pitch was made on behalf of an unnamed client that The Daily Beast now confirms was Facebook. [more inside]
Pitcher’s Treatment Draws Scrutiny
Bartolo Colon, now of the New York Yankees, underwent a controversial stem-cell treatment in the Dominican Republic to regain his old form.
In Europe, tea-parties of a euroskeptic stripe threaten EU
In Europe, bail-out and immigration
fears have led to the rise
of nationalism and xenophobia, a crisis that now
threatens the EU itself. Right-wing euroskeptic
parties and politicians
have gained in power, such as the True Finns, they can roughly be seen as
"Europe's
Tea Parties". Greece is talking about dropping the Euro currency (due to Finnish demands),
other PIGS could be next. Denmark has introduced custom checks at its
borders again, seeking to stop the flow of intra euro traffic, while
France and Italy have raised the possibility of reintroducing their own
border controls.
Myrmecomorphy
Ants are one of the most abundant groups on earth, but, curiously, not a lot of things eat them. Yes, there are anteaters (who also eat a lot of termites), and some lizards specialize on ants, but the little critters are full of noxious chemicals and pheromones that put them way down on the list of predators’ preferred foodstuffs. Because of this, many other insects and arthropods have evolved to mimic ants, taking advantage of the aversion of predators to anything antlike. These mimics are called myrmecomorphs, and they’re the subject of a really nice eponymous feature in this week’s Current Biology.[via]
The little girl from Jurrasic Park is 31
Twhistory
"Genevieve has told us what happened. A group of White supremacists attacked John, then Al stepped into to protect John." Live history on Twitter, via Twhistory.org. Currently broadcasting, The Freedom Riders. [more inside]
Wisconistan, UK
Osborne to target workers' rights with review of employment law "Workers are set to receive less protection against redundancy, dismissal and workplace discrimination as the Chancellor George Osborne tears up sections of employment law so businesses can dispose of their staff more easily."
More Here (Times.co. uk - no sub required (at least, not in the uk), and Here.
Why a mobile phone ring may make bees buzz off: Insects infuriated by handset signals
Why a mobile phone ring may make bees buzz off: Insects infuriated by handset signals Signals from mobile phones could be partly to blame for the mysterious deaths of honeybees, new research shows. In the first experiment of its kind, a bee expert placed a mobile phone underneath a hive and then carefully monitored the reaction of the workers. Download the full report here: Mobile phone-induced honeybee worker piping.
renewable is doable if governments are think-it-throughable?
As you may know, Japan's prime minister Naoto Kan announced two days ago that plans for new nuclear power plants in Japan are to be scrapped (NYT). Meanwhile, a landmark study from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) says renewable energy can power the world (Guardian - article includes many related links). Here's a summary of the IPCC Special Report.
"An institution full of intelligence but devoid of wisdom"
Oops, my bad, I totally missed that!
Alabama's Browns Ferry Plant nuclear plant has received red finding from the NRC for an emergency coolant valve failure that wasn't detected for over a year. [more inside]
One Glance Back
Horace Freeland Judson died last Friday at the age of 80. Though his greatest achievement was The Eighth Day of Creation, a detailed account of modern breakthroughs in molecular biology, he was more famously the haplass TIME reporter harranged at length by Bob Dylan in Don't Look Back.
how to organize society
Cut up just like regular chickens
Puny Earthlings, you will be reduced to a smoldering sphere
The International Academy of Astronautics is holding the Planetary Defense Conference: Protecting Earth from Asteroids May 9-12, 2011. in Bucharest, Romania [more inside]
May 11
scarcity is no longer an option
Instant Cinema is a comprehensive platform for experimental film, video and computer art, making the best audio-visual work of artists of all generations available to a worldwide audience. Not a tonne in the archive just yet--it's still in rough beta--but still some nice viewing. For instance: Balance Study, or Trying.
Psygnosis, dev Playstations, SCEA of Europe, logos, Wipeout and LSD
Dream Sequence
Ghar Aaya Mera Pardesi + Tere Bina Aag Yeh Chandni: Dream sequence from the 1951 Hindi film, Awara. "The film, generally considered one of Kapoor's finest, is notable for its darkly surreal sets... and for its remarkable dream sequence, which echoes this architecture in an evocation of heaven and hell. Despite its ultimate vindication of patriarchy and capitalism, the film became an enormous hit in the U.S.S.R. and, thanks to Chairman Mao’s reputed fondness for it, in China (to this day, millions of middle-aged Chinese can hum its title song)." You can view the other musical numbers from the film here.
But that's another show
After 249 episodes on a wide variety of ingredients and other cooking related topics, Alton Brown ended Good Eats last week (save for 3 unaired one hour specials). The show leaves behind many unaddressed recipes that were to be in "another show." [more inside]
Return to Sender
So it turns out that the United States Postal Service has lost $2.2 billion in the first quarter of 2011 with estimated losses of $7 billon by September. Despite shedding over 130,000 jobs in the past three years and promises from the Postal Worker's Union to not demand any raises in the near future, some doubt that the USPS has a future in America. Does the future have a P.O. Box? Google sure thinks so.
Liquid Sky
It’s about time people started rendering unto Liquid Sky. Its long lipstick trace is smudged through much of indie cinema. [more inside]
Who cares?
Coal cares! "Puff-Puff™ inhalers are available free to any family living within 200 miles of a coal plant, and each inhaler comes with a $10 coupon towards the cost of the asthma medication itself." [more inside]
Allan Blakeney
Rhodes' Scholar, Canadian Constitutional lawyer, eminent statesman, former Saskatchewan Premier and gentleman Allan Blakeney has died. [more inside]
Better to be the head of a dog than the tail of a lion
Samoa has seized headlines by moving the International Date Line--leaping forward a day and confusing readers in the process. [more inside]
New U.N. FAO Report Indicates 30% of Food Lost or Wasted
A new report by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization indicates that 1.3 billion tons, or nearly one-third of all food produced in the world is lost or wasted. The full report is available here (Warning: PDF).
Let's find as many suckers as we can as fast as we can, because we'll only make more money as more and more shit hits the fan.
The People vs. Goldman Sachs. Matt Taibbi's latest magnum opus (previous coverage) lays out the full case for federal prosecutions against the Vampire Squid according to Sen. Carl Levin's Senate Subcommittee on Investigations. [Wall Street and the Financial Crisis: Anatomy of a Financial Collapse 650 page pdf].
I have superpowers? Snap.
"Even beyond the philosophical wonder of passively sampling our outside environment in a shared, meaningful fashion is the ridiculous sensitivity of our senses." [more inside]
Anonymous Satire of Koch Industries Prevails
In December 2010, a Koch Industries press release spoof (Scribd; alt: screencap) was posted on a website that mimicked the appearance of the official site for Koch Industries. The press release stated that Koch would no longer support research and advocacy initiatives that denied or questioned the human role in climate change. The press release was quickly identified as a hoax, and both the fake press release and site disappeared quickly, yet the Koch company pursued the identities of those behind the stunt, going as far as to file a lawsuit to expose the anonymous pranksters as part of a larger lawsuit. This past Monday, the lawsuit was thrown out of court in Utah, with the judge citing that parody is not commercial speech, and thus a First Amendment issue. [more inside]
If you have work to do today, please consider doing that work before installing Angry Birds.
HUD Interactive Map Tool
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has launched a new interactive mapping tool for Community Planning and Development agencies, interested agency partners, and the public. [more inside]
English Language and Usage
Linguists, etymologists, and serious English language enthusiasts, check out free Q&A site English Language and Usage. [more inside]
Nobody calls me monogamous with malice.
Monogamous Privilege Checklist. Cory Davis, who is polyamorous, wrote a checklist in the style of Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack. Davis interviews with Cunning Minx of Polyamory Weekly podcast (3:00-28:00ish Site header NSFW) and discusses the nature of privileged relationships and her pushback from monogamous and polyamorous alike.
Bill Gallo joins General Von Steingrabber in the bleachers
Bill Gallo, longtime NY Daily News Sports Cartoonist, is dead at age 88. If you grew up in the NYC area anytime from the the 50s until this April, you've probably seen one of Gallo's cartoons in the Daily News. Although he covered all sports and their fans, blue collar sports like boxing and baseball were his real love. Gallo was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in Canastota, NY as part of the Class of 2001 and some of his work hangs in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. [more inside]
Shooting cats with a chronophotographic gun
Do cats always land on their feet? No. Unless...
In an earlier statement issued to the press, Kenobi boasted that striking him down could make him "more powerful than you could possibly imagine."
HIDs
Over the past 30 years, designer, writer and Principal Researcher for Microsoft Research Bill Buxton has collected input and interactive devices whose designs he found "interesting, useful or important. In the process, he has assembled a good collection of the history of pen computing, pointing devices, touch technologies, as well as an illustration of the nature of how new technologies emerge." This week, he unveiled his collection at the Computer-Human Interaction conference in Vancouver, British Columbia. An extensive gallery has been posted online with images and notes at The Buxton Collection. [more inside]
"-No tension contact!"
Claude Shannon and
Marvin Minsky collaborated to create the concept of The Ultimate Machine, a device capable of shutting itself off after activation. Out of the numerous and often transparent homages to the invention, a new variant has emerged, with more rigorous defenses. [via]
Enumerate me
The 40 Literary Terms You Should (maybe, depending on your predilection for books and availability of interstitial moments in which to read) Know
Midnight movie show
A Cult Influence. A short film on cult films. SLYT NSFW
It's Full of Surprise
Christian Schallert transformed his tiny 258 square feet apartment into a much more usable space by creating a vast wall of clickable furniture, and a spring-loaded door swings.
This is more precious than it has any right to be.
A toddler finds a dead squirrel. Cuteness ensues. [SLYT]
42?
'"Is there an answer?": Searching for the meaning of life in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' by Julia Galef.
I'm a Samantha... err, you know what I mean
What Are the Advantages of Horizontal Fly Men’s Underwear?
Age of the Algorithm. In the age of the algorithm, you can get just about anything you think you want, learn everything you think you need to know, by clicking on a link or typing a few words into a search bar. On SEO, content farms, old media, and 'online sweatshops.' (From Maisonneuve.)
Tell Someone
Glamor magazine is encouraging women to talk about relationship violence—both to ask for help and to offer it without judgment. The most important step - Tell Somebody. [more inside]
Cowabunga d00dz
Michelangelo’s Pizza Taste Test. [Video] Converting the gross-pizza-topping jokes (ex: chocolate sprinkles and clam sauce) from the TMNT cartoon into real world comestibles. [more inside]
Why did I do it? Because I could.
How I invented games, and why not - an essay by game designer Christian Freeling. Between 1979 and 1986 I invented some fourty abstract games, most of which can be found in the ArenA and the Pit. Dameo, HanniBall, YvY and Symple(x) are exceptions. Dameo's invention in 2000, after an incubation period of fifteen years, took two minutes. The invention of HanniBall and YvY in 2009 and Symple and Lhexus in 2010 were 'live' occurences decribed in a late arrival and a final whisper respectively.
Looking back now, from a safe distance, and with the benefit of hindsight, I'd like to clarify how and why I invented these games, and more specifically why not...
Music Beta by Google
Music Beta by Google launches today, so go request an invitation to stream 20,000 songs from your collection for free (for now) .
The Thin Edge of Danger
26 year old Belgian cyclist Wouter Weylandt crashed and died on a 60mph descent on stage three of this year's Giro D'Italia. The teams paid tribute the following day. [more inside]
Climate Change by Climate Scientists: the musical
In the media landscape there are climate change deniers and believers, but rarely those speaking about climate change are actual climate scientists... From the Power Episode of The Hungry Beast a weekly, half-hour, TV show on ABC (Australia) television combining journalism, comedy and the reportage of weird. It asks questions others don’t, covers stories others won’t and brings them to your screen in ways that only this unique team of broadcasters can do.
I can't wait to grow up
Drinks are good
In the 1940s, he fought Nazis. In the 1950s, he fought the U.S. Civil Service. He's battled the Pentagon, the FBI, the medical establishment, the police, and so on. Generally, he wins. And when he's won, so has the entire gay community.... He coined the phrase ''Gay is Good'' in 1968, when the distance between homosexuality and shame was a very short trip.
He co-founded the Mattachine Society of Washington in 1961, one of the nation’s earliest gay rights groups, picketed the White House, and became the first openly gay Congressional candidate when he ran for DC’s House seat in 1971.Kameny finally got an apology from the government that fired him for being gay. But he didn't get his pension back. And now, "while his mind is sharp, he has difficulty managing his finances. To be brief, one of our greatest heroes needs help." So maybe you'd like to Buy Frank A Drink. (previously, previously)
Tyler Robinson vs. The World
When Tyler Robinson auditioned for NBC's new reality singing contest show The Voice, he sang a great rendition of Train's "Hey, Soul Sister". He also came out as gay (and Mormon) on national television. And he was chosen by Blake Shelton to be on his coaching team for the show. The problem? Blake has a bit of a problem with teh gayz. [more inside]
May 10
Pre-fractal art
Fractals may have become a cliche in modern computer graphics, but they have a long and rich history in art.
Before anybody even knew Mandelbrot, artists were seeing fractals in nature and transferred the patterns in painting, design and sculpture. Fractals, as you may know, are geometric patterns that are repeated on smaller and smaller scales to produce intricate designs, through self-similarity, described by the Mandelbrot Equation.
Before anybody even knew Mandelbrot, artists were seeing fractals in nature and transferred the patterns in painting, design and sculpture. Fractals, as you may know, are geometric patterns that are repeated on smaller and smaller scales to produce intricate designs, through self-similarity, described by the Mandelbrot Equation.
Troll Food
Roger Moore's Carnival of Animals
Sir Roger Moore (recently on MeFi) performs recitations to introduce each segment of Saint-Saëns' 1886 suite Le carnaval des animaux ("The Carnival of Animals") [more inside]
Goodbye Screen on the Green
Escher's Relativity in paper
Koch exerts deep influence with endowed positions
A conservative billionaire who opposes government meddling in business has bought a rare commodity: the right to interfere in faculty hiring at a publicly funded university. [more inside]
"You are missing one ingredient... the HEAT of SATAAAAN!!"
$100 Million Finally to Be Split Between Descendants, 92 Years later
Cantankerous curmudgeony robber baron Wellington R. Burt was among the 8 wealthiest Americans, worth around $90 million when he died in 1919. He feuded with his 7 children, and left them very little. In an act of supreme cruelty, or foxy genius, his will stipulated that 21 years after the death of his last grandchild, any remaining heirs would receive the fortune. 92 years later and the money is being distributed, to three great-grandchildren; seven great-great grandchildren; and two great-great-great grandchildren.
The Problem with Tamiflu, Relenza, Swine Flu, GSK, and the FDA.
Small Saltbox
Running Chrome? NaCL Box is a port of DosBox, running in your browser. Game demos include The Secret of Monkey Island and SimCity 2000, among others. [more inside]
MeFi Civil War, Part 2
Lady Gaga will debut songs from her new album 'Born This Way' on Farmville. The promotion will include a rebranding of Farmville to 'Gagaville', which will feature magical unicorns, sheep on motorcycles and other Gaga-inspired items. The promotion runs until May 26th.
Wait for it...
The Slow Mo Guys mix beautiful captures of life in slow motion with the sensibilities of Jackass and Beavis and Butthead. Best viewed fullscreen at high resolution. [ Intro/Interview • Smashing Disposable Cigarette Lighters • Hammer thrown through a television • the Coin Challenge • "Eggy-weggs? I wanna smash em!" • Skeet shooting at clay discuses, apples, and oranges • Air Pistol vs. Soda Can • The Front Flip, the Back Flip, and the Double Superman • Red Kites Swoop for Bacon in a Parking Lot [previously] • 0.6 seconds of colored droplets in two minutes • Shoot out the lights! ]
All things come to those who wait
From the pop of "Nursey, Nursey" to the pomp of "Epitaph: Angel", the ambitious double album White-Faced Lady by seminal British psych/prog band Fairfield Parlour (formerly Kaleidoscope) had all the makings of a 1971 hit record. By the time of its actual release, in 1991, the moment had long since passed. The cause of the twenty-year delay is explained in this interview with ex-frontman Peter Daltrey (spoiler: it was the labels). [more inside]
Osama bin Laden Death Raid Game
Kill Osama First-Person Shooter programmers at Kuma Games have been working long hours to crank out this timely, yet controversial game. "The virtual bin Laden, created over a rush of all-nighters by a team of game developers who specialize in turning current world events and military battles into playable video games, had somehow disappeared from the faithful recreation of his Pakistan compound." But the Kansas City Star asks, is this "cathartic, educational or just ghoulish?"
Off The Charts
Off The Charts: "In his wildest satirical dreams, not even Christopher Guest could top Off the Charts for sheer folk-art eccentricity. And yet, the creator of A Mighty Wind would find comedic inspiration in Jamie Meltzer's hilarious and sincerely affectionate tribute to the subcultural phenomenon known as the song poem. For over 50 years, a small, strictly amateur music industry has thrived on the fine-print ads that appear in alternative newspapers and music-industry magazines, inviting would-be songsmiths to send in their lyrics (and perhaps even "earn royalties") when their songs--and we use that term loosely--are set to music, recorded by seasoned musicians, and returned to their creators as a kind of one-shot fantasy fulfillment of dreams that will never come true. What drives Meltzer's film is a uniquely American combination of pathos, fringe-dwelling ambition, and free expression by assorted misfits and "regular folk" who seek elusive immortality by turning their lyrical musings into trash-art that's simultaneously fascinating and pathetic. But despite the end-credit claim that not a single hit has resulted from the estimated 200,000 song poems that have been recorded over the decades, Meltzer's not out to ridicule these wonderfully ungifted artists. Instead, Off the Charts gives a memorable spin to the flipside of the American dream. --Jeff Shannon" (PBS, 54mins.)
Tolkien infographics
The inmost circle is a geographically accurate map of Middle Earth according to Tolkien's design, and the journey of the Fellowship is plotted according to major destinations and places of action. - JT Fridsma [more inside]
Unspoken Truths
"For me, to remember friendship is to recall those conversations that it seemed a sin to break off: the ones that made the sacrifice of the following day a trivial one." -Christopher Hitchens tries to come to terms with the loss of his voice. [more inside]
Elmatic: Detroit State of Mind
Seventeen years ago, Queensbridge prodigy Nas put out arguably the greatest hip hop album of all time. Today, Detroit lyricist Elzhi releases a loving and skillful tribute to the album with re-recorded live beats: Elmatic. [more inside]
You May Now Continue Waiting For The Future
Hearts raced briefly today as reports circulated of a Ralf+Florian sighting. Despite what was reported, it wasn't Ralf going into the (original) King Klang studio with Florian. It was Uwe Schmidt aka Señor Coconut. Should we be waiting for a Schneider/Schmidt record?
You will not need to circumvent the Times' paywall for this.
The New York Times, World's Newspaper of Record, Closes Its Doors Forever. "In this edition of the New York Times, our usual 14 verticals (known for 141 years as 'sections') have been collapsed to 3. The reason is a marked lack of reporters and hence reportage." Former National Lampoon editor Tony Hendra launches a biting satire of the NYTimes, where the owners may have 'torched' the building for insurance money, Maureen Dowd has been on vacation since 1997, and William Shortz melts down.
Music to my ears.
New from the Library of Congress, National Jukebox, where you can listen to 10,000 rare historic sound recordings. (Streaming only, requires flash and javascript.)
Months to make, a minute and a half to watch
Where The Mountain Meets the Moon in 92 Seconds The kids of Chicken Nugget Lemon Tooty and Bookie Wookie (prev) have created a video version of Grace Lin's Where The Mountain Meets the Moon using paper puppets for the 90 Second Newbery contest. Can your kids do better? Entries are open until September.
To The Finland Station
Portugal, in the throes of an IMF / EU bailout that Finland could block, sends a video letter to convince Finland to support the rescue effort. Finland responds. Bonus: crisis the focus of Portugal's Eurovision entry this year.
Acidee!
Charanjit Singh on how he invented acid house ... by mistake. The Guardian interviews an unlikely pioneer of Acid House. With the aid of a TR-303 and a TR-808
this track was born somewhat earlier than traditionally appreciated for the genesis of the genre. "So far ahead, in fact, that it appears to pre-date the first Acid House records to come out of Chicago by about five years."
Its enough to make you smile.
Eurovision 2011
The Eurovision Song Contest 2011's first semi-final begins at 2 PM CST. Watch it online.
Give them someplace to go
'Do Not Cry'
JKTS: A Japanese medical aid worker's diary An anonymous blog written by a Japanese nurse as she cared for victims of the tsunami has given strength to survivors and fellow relief workers.
We Have Cameras
Eyes of a Generation is a "virtual museum of television cameras, and the broadcast history they captured," curated by actor and radio DJ Bobby F. Ellerbee. The site has hundreds of photos of cameras and of television sets backstage. It also includes vintage articles and a neat look at how the moon backdrop on the Conan set works. [more inside]
Old Moscow Photos Reappear
"Howe snapped more than 400 photographs in Moscow and St. Petersburg with his hand held Graflex camera, a state-of-the-art device that allowed its user to shoot without a tripod. His photographs of pedestrians, street vendors and aristocrats are rare glimpses of everyday life before the upheavals of World War I and the Bolshevik Revolution — and sparked huge interest in Russia among history buffs and local museums."
Roger Ebert writes what many of us are thinking.
One percent of Americans now "earn" 25% of the income. Many of them have grown their wealth through criminal exploitation. Roger Ebert asks the burning question: why aren't more people outraged?
You will need one bolt of lightening...
Microsoft Agrees to Purchase Skype for $8.5 billion US.
Worse things happen at sea
Here Be Monsters. "Three friends, on a drunken dare, set out in a dinghy for a nearby island. But when the gas ran out and they drifted into barren waters, their biggest threat wasn't the water or the ocean—it was each other." [more inside]
Wheels! Threads! Atoms!
War is Boring's Steve Weintz has a two-part article up on mobile nuclear reactors, called Atoms In Motion: Portable Reactors (part two here). The links referenced cover planes, trains, and automobiles (though calling the last one an "automobile" might be stretching the definition a little.)
May 9
In The Playroom
Canadian photographer Jonathan Hobin's In the Playroom series depicts children reenacting infamous tragedies, such as 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, Princess Diana's death, and the Jonestown massacre. [more inside]
We Are Legion
Dallas Wiens
Man Receives 1st US face transplant. - Dallas Wiens, whose face was burnt off after his head hit a power line in 2008, appeared in public for the first time since the surgery on Monday.
This is the worst tennis match I've ever watched
The dreaded SLYT: Kitten vs an Extremely Horrible Thing
I just need one more 4x2 brick.
"Day by day we pass by vacant lots downtown ... Neighbourhoods that, although having a huge potential, have more and more unused spaces ... Sometimes, the tourists are the ones who open our eyes by mentioning or questioning whether this situation is normal. On other occasions, we pay attention to it for a moment only because the secondary problems that those spaces imply affect us directly. But in most of the cases, they are only a part of our way."Habit Makes Us Blind is a series of colorful images by Spanish studio Espai MGR that seeks to draw attention to the problem of wasted space in urban environments (specifically, in the city of Valencia) -- by building conceptual LEGO structures in them. [via]
Broadcast your cosmicity
365 Days of Astronomy is a 5-minute podcast where each episode is written and recorded by volunteers. Monthly night sky surveys; the early universe; seeing far– these podcasts are made by volunteers, and more are needed.
Paper Tigers
Wesley Yang writes a really angry article about being Asian-American, with the tagline, "What happens to all the Asian-American overachievers when the test-taking ends?"
The Cat That Time Forgot
Behold the Manul! Otherwise known as Pallas's cat, it was one of the first two modern cats to evolve. (Via The Ark In Space, an amazing compendium of creatures.)
Oh oh, what a night.
At a Toronto show on May 7, Paul Simon offered his guitar to a fan, inviting her onstage to sing. [more inside]
Now You See It, Now You Don't
Homeowners are using a little known loophole in the bankruptcy laws to shed their second mortgages.
The nonexistent epidemic
The Guardian speaks to suffers of Morgellons, a disorder that, depending on whom you ask,is a delusional psychosis, an epidemic that's whitewashed out of medical research, or for conspiracists, alien nanotechnology. (Previously.)
Over 2.7 million nations served.
NationStates is a free political simulation game founded by author Max Barry back in 2002 (previously). Loosely based on his dystopian corporate thriller Jennifer Government, the game starts by asking players to provide some national trappings and answer a few civics questions, then generates a virtual country with a matching political outlook. Periodic policy decisions like mining rights and compulsory voting allow players to further modify their country along axes of social, political, and economic freedom, arriving at one of twenty-seven colorful government types like Tyranny By Majority or Scandinavian Liberal Paradise. There's also a healthy roleplaying community -- players can discuss current events in the General forum, practice wargaming in International Incidents, form cooperative Regions to debate internal affairs (many of which form their own communities), and elect Delegates to send to the World Assembly (so renamed after an amusing cease-and-desist from the real-world U.N.). Their collective history is thoroughly recorded in the 35,000-article NSWiki, which provides a detailed legislative record, gameplay guide, and profiles on many of the 90,000 active nations, 8,000 player regions, and countless characters that currently make up the game world.
Miami Vice
Miami Vice and early '80s musical montages. Did any show ever do it better? Devo - Going Under :: Afrika Bambaataa - Renegades of Funk with Shaba Doo from "Electric Boogaloo" poppin' and lockin' all up in Crockett's face :: Kate Bush - Hello Earth :: Godley and Creme - Cry with Ted Nugent :: The Damned - In Dulce Decorum with Laurence Fishburne :: Iggy Pop - Real Wild Child :: Steve Jones - Mercy :: Red 7 - Heartbeat :: Pete Townshend - Face The Face :: The Who - Baba O'Riley :: David Johansen - King of Babylon :: Public Image Ltd - Order Of Death :: Etta James - You Want More :: and of course Phil Collins - In The Air Tonight :: Phil went on guest star in an episode, as did Leonard Cohen and Frank Zappa.
Indian Street Graphics
50 Cent Origin of Me
Ride the wave
Leningrad - Dr. House
Leningrad - Dr. House (slyt)
GPS Tracking
Battle Brews Over FBI’s Warrantless GPS Tracking. How to Check Your Car for a GPS Tracker. FBI Vehicle-Tracking Device: The Teardown. Video: The Dissection of an FBI Bumper-Beeper. Previously.
Like, I want some bread up front.
Once upon a time, Van Morrison had a record contract with Bing Records which he wanted to escape. Since the contract required him to produce thirty-six original songs, Van Morrison sat in the studio for a single session and recorded a series of nonsensical non-tunes that are still in his distinctive style. Three of them are available here.
Greatest Movie Sandwiches
"I've thrown up many times working out, but it's all worth it." Arnold Schwarzenegger
Why is the Planet Fitness chain of health clubs trying to alienate people who love to work out? [Via Slate.com] "Maybe you've seen the one where a greased up Schwarzenegger-type swaggers through the gym repeating the mantra, "I pick things up and put them down." Or the one where another "lunk"—that's what Planet Fitness calls these sorts of people—struggles to tie his shoes. A third shows a screaming gym buffoon as he fills out a membership application, flexing and making sound effects as if he's maxing out on the squat rack. "Not his planet, yours," reads the tag line."
♪ "So kiss me and smile for me. Tell me that you'll wait for me. Hold me like you'll never let me go..." ♫
Inspired by Andrew Sullivan's recent post on views outside airplane windows, BuzzFeed compiled a collection of "100 incredible airplane window views" from Flickr. (bandwidth-heavy single page version.) Click through slideshow at Business Insider.
What is the most neglected and underrated *accessible* pop music album?
Econblogger Tyler Cowen asked his readers What is the most neglected and underrated *accessible* pop music album? 154 and counting answers range from Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion to the 1960s band Honeybus and everything in between. One comment points to an interesting possible answer [Previously on mefi] to why a good album never catches on. "Short answer might be that we are social animals and don’t make these decisions independently and as a result, even tiny, random fluctuations can blow up, generating potentially enormous long-run differences among even indistinguishable competitors" [more inside]
"The Book of Mormon" on Broadway
From Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators of South Park, and Robert Lopez, of Avenue Q, comes the new Broadway show "The Book of Mormon." The show "tells the story of two young Mormon missionaries sent off to spread the word in a dangerous part of Uganda" while gently (and no so gently) lampooning organized religion and traditional musical theatre. The entire show is now streaming on NPR. Songs are extremely Not Safe For Work.
New Reliquaries
Artist Al Farrow uses ammunition, parts from firearms, and selected other materials to build miniature churches, synagogues, and mosques.
“meaningful adjacencies”
“It was a computer-science problem, but it was also a big, crazy typography problem,” An algorithm for the names at the 9/11 memorial.
tonalist's videos: contemporary music in Moscow
tonalist (aka composer Pavel Karmanov) is a YouTube user who has uploaded numerous videos featuring performances of contemporary/classical music from the former Soviet Union... [more inside]
Don't you let that deal go down.
Contrary to the liberalism many read in a highly-publicized DOJ memo in 2009, federal authorities are cracking down on medical marijuana establishments that exist in the gray area between state and national statutes.
Obama On OBL: The Full "60 Minutes" Interview
Also, crazy people can’t do it without going crazy midway through.
May 8
Brown And Also Blue
John Joseph Maus (1943 - 2011)
John Maus, a.ka. John Walker, vocalist, guitarist and one-third of The Walker Brothers (with Gary and, of course, Scott) has passed away at age 67 following a battle with liver cancer. [more inside]
Farmville is getting a little frothy
Recent venture capital fund raising rounds have placed very high valuations on social media sites such as Facebook, Zynga and Groupon. The valuations continue to soar at an exponential pace, some placing Facebook at 75 billion and Zynga at 10 billion. Many experts have gone on record claiming this is a bubble including Eric Schmidt, Alisher Usmanov, the Russian magnate behind much of the venture capital in soical media and the Economist from last year. [more inside]
Cat Scratch Fever
Death Grips: Zombie holocaust in seconds
It started two months ago to the day, when a stuttering/strobing video of angry man obscenely rapping over a spasmodic drumbeat was posted on YouTube from an unknown group who called themselves Death Grips, with the promise of an album and a mixtape within the year. The next day, a new track went up, not furious like the day before, but the rapper sounded a bit hoarse now. More tracks were uploaded every few days, and on April 26th the mixtape was on YouTube, soundcloud, and available to download from their website and other places. Still, little is known about the group, beyond that it's probably a trio and Zach Hill is involved. [more inside]
I can't tell you what this post is about or even that it exists
In the UK, "super-injunctions" can prohibit the press from reporting a story on privacy grounds and from reporting that any such injunction has been issued. Newspapers are occasionally quite playful in getting around these increasingly unpopular injunctions. The Telegraph famously pointed its readers to the then-trending twitter campaign against Trafgura and, today, the Daily Mail appears to be playing a similar game. More prosaically, The Independent has simply reported a Tory MP's comments in Parliament that a currently sitting MP has taken out a super-injunction. [more inside]
Lara Logan's tale
Tweeting Bin Ladens Death
How the news spread via twitter Interesting visualisation of tweets of Bin Ladens demise.
"...the Tweet by Rumsfeld chief of staff Keith Urbahn that got the ball rolling was retweeted more than 80 times within one minute after it was sent, and that by the 3-minute mark, it had led to more than 300 reactions"
Oh, the Shark has Pretty Teeth, Dear
Rosa Klebb of shoe stiletto fame in From Russia with Love was played by Lotte Lenya twice wife of Kurt Weill , composer of The Three Penny Opera, with lyrics by Bertolt Brecht.
This was the beginning of the quintessential Mack the Knife
Lenya was present at the Louis Armstong recording - here live where he gives her a shout out (2.36)
The song was covered by many : Ella Fitzgerald; Bobby Darin; Kevin Spacey as Bobby Darin; Frank Sinatra with Jimmy Buffet; Sting
Brecht rewrote the lyrics in 1930 to give them more edge
There are some who are in darkness
And the others are in light
And you see the ones in brightness
Those in darkness drop from sight
Nick Cave re wrote them again in 1994. (wiki)
This was the beginning of the quintessential Mack the Knife
Lenya was present at the Louis Armstong recording - here live where he gives her a shout out (2.36)
The song was covered by many : Ella Fitzgerald; Bobby Darin; Kevin Spacey as Bobby Darin; Frank Sinatra with Jimmy Buffet; Sting
Brecht rewrote the lyrics in 1930 to give them more edge
There are some who are in darkness
And the others are in light
And you see the ones in brightness
Those in darkness drop from sight
Nick Cave re wrote them again in 1994. (wiki)
Bombs Away
Take a drive with Google Earth
Enter start and destination and watch your route payed out.
the academic upper middle class needs to rethink its alliances
What we have in academia, in other words, is a microcosm of the American economy as a whole: a self-enriching aristocracy, a swelling and increasingly immiserated proletariat, and a shrinking middle class. The same devil’s bargain stabilizes the system: the middle, or at least the upper middle, the tenured professoriate, is allowed to retain its prerogatives—its comfortable compensation packages, its workplace autonomy and its job security—in return for acquiescing to the exploitation of the bottom by the top, and indirectly, the betrayal of the future of the entire enterprise. Graduate school as suicide mission, in the Nation.
"I have to go deeper."
"Discrimination generates hatred"
Brazil's supreme court recognises same sex unions. The Brazilian Supreme Court voted 10-0 (one abstention) yesterday to recognise same-sex civil unions as of equal legal validity to marriage/ with "stable" same-sex couples now able to gain certificates that allow access to equal legal rights. "Discrimination generates hatred," said Justice Carlos Ayres Britto, who wrote the ruling. [more inside]
It's gonna get so much better / Everybody's gonna get their turn / Count the matches that's left in the matchbook / One of these is gonna burn
""The GAA player who performs in front of 70,000 at the weekend will be teaching your kids on Monday..."
"It was a picture of the dissidents' worst nightmares. The GAA was defining the police in Northern Ireland as "us" and Ronan Kerr's killers as "them"." Fintan O'Toole muses on the role of the Gaelic Athletic Association in defining and redefining what it is to be Irish.
A Real Motherspammer
What better way to show your mom you love her on Mother's Day than to send her as many spammy email forwards as she sent you all year? Momspam.net This is why the Internet was invented.
Happy Mother's Day, from the songwriters of the world
Happy Mother's Day from Buck Owens, Randy Newman, John Lennon, Merle Haggard, Elvis Presley and LL Cool J
May 7
The Miscreants of Taliwood
The Miscreants of Taliwood is probably one of the best documentaries I have ever seen. And it defies all types of film making (in a good way). The subject? The Talibanization of a certain part of Pakistan and the assault on art, entertainment, and humanity. But it’s not quite a documentary. It is a surreal trip through the fiction and the nonfiction of Peshawar, NWFP and FATA. It is fake, it is real, it is unbelievable. Basically, it is Pakistan. [more inside]
A typical cafe; gems were everywhere.
L'Brondelle's Universe—I'd describe it as Tim and Eric with the Dada-meter cranked way up. SLYT
I see only the overwhelming indifference of nature.
EXT. STREET -- TWILIGHT. A dreary day in 1971. Wearing a trilby hat and a hideous overcoat, a LONE CROCODILE stands on the rain-slicked sidewalk. Singing in tune with the plangent sounds of the concertina he clutches in his claws, he tells the viewers that today, of all days, is his birthday. This scene presages the appearance of one of the most emblematic characters in Soviet animation. [more inside]
MATER SUSPIRA VISION
Filter Bubbles
Filter Bubbles: As web companies strive to tailor their services (including news and search results) to our personal tastes, there's a dangerous unintended consequence: We get trapped in a "filter bubble" and don't get exposed to information that could challenge or broaden our worldview. Eli Pariser argues powerfully that this will ultimately prove to be bad for us and bad for democracy
Git!
Git is the version control system that inspired social coding, music videos, and now a party
game (pdf).
Caturday Kitten Crash
Kitten crash test, in slow motion, with a suitable soundtrack. Don't worry, no kittens were actually harmed.
Spiritual Atheists, Humanist Chaplains, and FFRF Weddings
Currently making the rounds. A qualitative study in Sociology of Religion looks at "spiritual atheists" in science. A call for Humanist Chaplains in the U.S. armed forces. And The Freedom From Religion Foundation becomes certified to perform weddings in Tulsa.
The runners’ bibs say something different each year: SUFFERING WITHOUT A POINT; NOT ALL PAIN IS GAIN
The Immortal Horizon: Thirty-Five Runners Face Hollers and Hells, a Flooded Prison, Rats the Size of Possums, and Flesh-Flaying Briars to Test the Limits of Self-Sufficiency in a race only eight men have ever finished.
It's just a word, right?
Dishtip: aggregating restaurant reviews down to the entree level
Dishtip is a service that combs through restaurant reviews on other sites and attempts to figure out the best dishes of a particular type in a city of your choice (e.g. waffles in New York or tacos in San Francisco) or a particular restaurant's best dishes (say at Alinea).
Loving Free Comics Can Never Be Wrong
Free Comic Book Day is a single day - the first Saturday in May each year - when participating comic book shops across North America and around the world give away comic books absolutely free to anyone who comes into their stores. Here's the store locator.
notorious sites of anti-intellectualism, alcohol abuse, and sexual assault
Should Colleges Ban Fraternities? A New York Times roundtable that takes the Yale Title IX complaint and related cases as its starting point. Via Historiann, whose anti-frat attitudes are much more pointed than any of the New York Times commenters.
Girls! Girls! Girls!
Vintage Sleaze: Exploitation and enticement in the form of drawings, comics, and pinups.
I miss, I miss, I miss, I make
Severiano Ballesteros, golf legend, has passed away at 54. If you could say anything about his game, was that he could win a British Open from the car park.
I Scheme with Genie
Ahmadinejad allies charged with sorcery. Several people said to be close to the president and his chief of staff, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, have been arrested in recent days and charged with being "magicians" and invoking djinns (spirits). Increasingly, there is a rift between the President and his Supreme Leader.
May 6
Shannon's Law
Shannon's Law: a story about bridging Faerie and the mundane world with TCP-over-magic. From the forthcoming Welcome to Bordertown anthology. [Via]
Sisyphusian Snowmobile
It Even Blocks the Endless Moaning
The First Zombie-Proof House: "The Safe House" was designed by KWK Promes, and completely folds in on itself to become an impenetrable concrete bunker, keeping you safe from the undead.
"You should become a giraffe."
How To Make Guys Like You - romantic advice from the Vlogbrothers, who are also nerdfighters. [more inside]
Stonybridge!
LaserDisc...Logically.
We're different from classic feminists.
Kiev's topless prostestors (NSFW) Facebook used to block their pages and Ukraine's secret service has threatened them with violence:
"With a mix of political protest and eye-catching eroticism, the women's rights group Femen (wiki) has inspired fear in Ukrainian authorities with its fight against prostitution and sex tourism."
Non-Violent Civic Resistance in Ukraine has a history with Maidan.
The nude radicals: feminism Ukrainian style.
"With a mix of political protest and eye-catching eroticism, the women's rights group Femen (wiki) has inspired fear in Ukrainian authorities with its fight against prostitution and sex tourism."
Non-Violent Civic Resistance in Ukraine has a history with Maidan.
The nude radicals: feminism Ukrainian style.
Let's get the chicks and kick it. Tony?
Arthur Laurents (wiki), writer of the libretti for West Side Story and Gypsy, among many other things, has died at the age of 93. [more inside]
'Til Death Tries To Do Us Part And Beyond
The Honeymoon From Hell. Stefan and Erika Svanstrom had planned a long trip that would start in Singapore in early December and end in China four months later.
But things didn't go exactly as planned. They encountered floods, fires, tsunamis and earthquakes along the way.
Guys who like fat chicks.
The current issue of the Village Voice profiled Fat Admirers, or Dudes who like fat chicks. One of the main guys interviewed was Dan Weiss who runs a blog called ask a guy who likes fat chicks. He has also written a couple of articles for The Hairpin: I Like Fat Chicks, Questions? 1 & 2.
In Space No One Can Hear You Disco
The life and times of Tom Eisner, father of chemical ecology, photographer, musician and champion of environmental and human rights
Thomas Eisner, a Cornell biologist best known for his extensive work (PDF) with chemical ecology, passed away on Friday, March 25th, 2011. Eisner was more than a "bug guy," he was one of the "original guiding lights" in the study of chemical interactions of organisms, most often focusing on insects. He also was a photographer, pianist and occasional conductor (PDF), and conservation activist. More on his fascinating life inside. [more inside]
Hemp History Week
This week is Hemp History Week. Hemp has been considered to be one of the most versatile plants known to man, and is a rapidly growing source of biomass, which produces strong fibers. [more inside]
Killer levels of cute
Animals with Stuffed Animals. Today's anti-grar.
Jerry Seinfeld Launches JerrySeinfeld.com
The Ballad of the Space Babies
Sword & Sworcery EP is "a brave experiment in I/O cinema with an archetypical video game aesthetic." To put it more simply, it's an arthouse adventure game with unique pixel graphics, available for iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch. Featuring music by Jim Guthrie, S&S is inspired by the Legend of Zelda, Carl Jung, Tim Schafer, and David Lynch. Trailer. [more inside]
U-853
"ALL U-BOATS. ATTENTION ALL U-BOATS. CEASE-FIRE AT ONCE. STOP ALL HOSTILE ACTION AGAINST ALLIED SHIPPING. DÖNITZ." [more inside]
The most trusted man in America
Why I Love Mr Rogers. Scott Jordan Harris discusses discovering Fred Rogers's show as an adult.
Anything above 110th St can't be said to actually exist
Alien Loves Predator makes an (abridged) map of NYC movies. Can you name all 91? (via) [more inside]
Neil Gaiman and the Invisible Hand
Neil Gaiman: "A pencil-necked weasel who stole $45,000 from the State of Minnesota". Minnesota House majority leader Matt Dean was moved to fury at the discovery that writer, comic book celebrity and Minnesota transplant Neil Gaiman received this sum for a speaking engagement at a Stillwater, MN high school. [more inside]
Phil Campbells support Phil Campbell
The town of Phil Campbell, Alabama is named for a 19th-century train engineer and is one of a handful of US towns with the full name of an individual. It is also the site of an occasional meeting of people named Phil Campbell (or Phyllis Campbell, Philippe Campbell, etc.) A piece about the convention was collected in Shiny Adidas Tracksuits and the Death of Camp and was previously mentioned on the blue.
It was devastated by the recent tornadoes which left some 25 county residents dead; in response, the organizer of the irregular convention (named Phil Campbell, of course) has shifted his efforts to harnessing his network of Phil Campbells in a relief effort for their namesake. Here is organizer Phil Campbell talking to the CBC about the relief efforts.
What's it like to have autism?
You don't understand the nuances of social interaction. Casual encounters can become an ordeal. Sincere attempts to get needed information can create problems. Even the ability to react "correctly" to an emergency situation may be impossibly difficult. [more inside]
Listen to the whole song, dummy!
I always loved the Quincy Jones-composed theme song to 70s sitcom Sanford and Son, but up until a few minutes ago I'd never heard the entire piece: three minutes and six seconds of delightfully infectious, playfully bright instrumental pop-funk. It's called The Streetbeater, and its creative and ever-changing arrangement includes snippets of the rarely heard bass harmonica. The piece is just a hella lotta fun. [more inside]
The 15 Quid USB PC
David Braben, developer of games such as Rollercoaster Tycoon and Kinectimals has turned his sights to hardware, to develop a £10-£15 PC in a USB stick form factor, to make computers universally accessible to children wanting to learn computing and programming.
Then...
The I of It. Flash for a Friday.
How to disappear completely
How to disappear completely: Almost everyone has a digital footprint these days. Think you could remove your tracks? Frank Ahearn worked as a skip tracer for years, but now he helps folks drop off the face of the Earth, those who want to disappear and erase evidence of their existence. "So, what we do in a nutshell, is make you a virtual entity where you work for this corporation. You lease your apartment through this corporation, your electricity, your phone. Everything about you exists under the corporation. The address doesn't have to be in the same city you're in. The goal is to make you virtual and have you communicate virtually through this corporation. "
In Soviet Russia, MosFilm posts YOU(tube)
"Legendary" Russian movie studio Mosfilm is posting some it's most famous films on its youtube channel. They will be posting 5 new legendary Soviet films per week. They expect to have 200 uploaded by end of year. Most have English subtitles. [more inside]
The da Vinci Robot Plays "Operation" Board Game
May 5
What is the meaning of the assassination of OBL?
Guy Rundle teases out the meanings of the bin Laden assassination, in contrast to the Eichmann trial.
Just in time for Mother's Day
The Long Con
"I didn't realize I was playing a chess game for my life with the FBI. They were playing chess, and I was off finger-painting in the corner." Rick Wilson, an occasional activist who liked to throw after-hours parties in his Capitol Hill apartment, was the target of an intricate and costly 2-year long undercover sting operation led by the Seattle Police Department and the FBI. Their goal; to get Rick to reveal his ties to eco-terrorism groups and two of the more progressive city council members. (Members who have encourage increased oversight of the SPD) The only problem, there were no such ties. [more inside]
Classical Music: a history according to YouTube
The Australian ABC's Limelight magazine has put together a potted history of music, with video examples (40LYTP). [more inside]
The Lion Wakes.
There's something in the air this election season. For the first time in almost 40 years, almost every electoral ward in Singapore is up for grabs, as the opposition parties stage their biggest contest against the incumbent People's Action Party (PAP). [more inside]
A gift from God
'80s Alternative Music Live on Spanish TV
Youtube channel of early/mid 1980s alternative rock music recorded in Estudios Roma, Madrid [more inside]
Multitasking at a new level
Farewell, Chuckles
Last World War I combat vet dies in Australia. Claude Stanley Choules was 110. RIP, Chuckles.
The smell of popcorn and Coppertone
The House Next Door has kicked off this year's installment of the "Summer of..." series, where they look back at the summer movies from 25 years ago. For the next few months they'll be revisiting the summer movies from 1986, and you can check out the previous installments to relive the glories of 1985 (Weird Science, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, St. Elmo's Fire), and 1984 (including the magical day Gremlins, Ghostbusters, and Top Secret! opened simultaneously).
Can We Influence Outcomes Together?
Can We Influence Outcomes Together? How can people and computers be connected so that—collectively—they act more intelligently than any individuals, groups or computers have ever done before? Can collective intelligence save the planet? An MIT Sloan Management Review studies The Collective Intelligence Genome [pdf].
Everybody loves bacon!
Red kites; slow motion; bacon. What's not to love?
Detroit 3.0: It's Aerotropolis
Safari Disco Club / Que veux-tu
Safari Disco Club / Que veux-tu double-feature music video for two tracks from Yelle's second album
a micro-site for micro-frameworks
Ogilvy on Advertising -- the original Mad Man
"How to Create Advertising that Sells" by David Ogilvy From the late 60's to early 70's, ad agency Ogilvy & Mather ran a series of full-page ads designed to promote the then-new innovative marketing discipline called Direct Response. This ad (#4 in the series) was 1900 words long and featured advice for creating "advertising that sells." [more inside]
The question was whether anyone really wanted to know.
We're protecting you from the Internet, Citizen.
Mozilla recently received a request from the US Department of Homeland Security to disable and block at the root level the MAFIAAfire plug-in for Firefox. Mozilla declined to roll over.
The Stolen Scream
The Stolen Scream. In 2006, photographer Noam Galai posted a handful of dramatic self-portraits to Flickr. Unbeknownst to him, his screaming face slowly took on a life of its own (often as a symbol of unrest or protest), appearing in countless permutations the world over. In this mini-documentary, Noam is surprisingly pragmatic about his accidental fame, and the fact that he only got paid once for the legal use of the picture.
Grouponomics
Murdochileaks
Documents and databases: They're key to modern journalism. But they're almost always hidden behind locked doors, especially when they detail wrongdoing such as fraud, abuse, pollution, insider trading, and other harms. That's why we need your help. The Wall Street Journal launches a "safe house" for whistleblowers. There's instant criticism, plus the question: will anybody use the site? (P.S. don't forget to read the Terms of Use).
Is this x defined? Is F continuous?
Calculus Rhapsody Like it says on the tin.
Interstellar Overdrive
The Wonder of God in Nature
Die Wunder Gottes in der Natur (1744) illustrates astronomical, meteorological, geological, spiritual, and psychological visions, based on the work of 16th century Alsatian encyclopedist Conrad Lycosthenes.
The cover and title page.
The cover and title page.
So how do we stand now?
Following recent events; Frontline has rushed out a special report (53 mins). which takes the viewer inside two fronts of the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. They also find new evidence of covert support for elements of the Taliban by the Pakistani military and its intelligence service, the ISI [more inside]
The conspiracy theories that Osama bin Laden isn't really dead continue.
The Osama Bin Laden conspiracies (CBC The Current radio segment) Jonathan Kay has been giving a lot of thought to the conspiracy theories that have emerged since the attacks of September 11th. He's the Comments Page Editor at The National Post and the author of Among the Truthers: A Journey into the Growing Conspiracist Underground of 9/11 Truthers, Birthers, Armageddonites, Vaccine Hysterics, Hollywood Know-Nothings and Internet Addicts (released next week) [more inside]
Here Be Dragons
HBO's Game of Thrones, "Narnia populated by super-hard bastards", has been a ratings and critical success and has already been picked up for a second season. HBO have a secret weapon in bringing George R. R. Martin's fantasy epic to screen: An awesome title sequence that doubles as a painless infodump.
Green Army Men with PTSD
Holiday snaps
Jane Corwin: Standing Next to Fire Trucks
Why it is important to register your domain name. New York State Assemblywoman Jane Corwin apparently neglected to register her name as a dot org. So somebody else did.
"I've got this thing..."
In the basement rolling dice / I'm a wizard / When we play we do it right / Candles flicker / Fighting dragons in my mind / Just for kicks / DM says you're gonna die / Roll a D6
His reaction is adorable
That first kiss... (SLYT)
Mama Shaq!
Let's
Today, the UK is voting on a series of national and local elections along with a referendum on whether to adopt the Alternative Vote system. The referendum has caused fierce rows within the Coalition, with accusations of lies flying around, including the supposed high cost of an AV system. Most polls indicate that AV will not be adopted, spelling yet another potential disaster for the Liberal Democrats.
They Paved Paradise and Put Up a Parking Lot
War Dog of War
...it should be no surprise that among the 79 commandos involved in Operation Neptune Spear, one was a dog ...it should come as no surprise that among the 79 commandos involved in Operation Neptune Spear that resulted in Osama bin Laden's killing, there was one dog -- the elite of the four-legged variety. And though the dog in question remains an enigma -- another mysterious detail of the still-unfolding narrative of that historic mission -- there should be little reason to speculate about why there was a dog involved...
A lot more photos, links, and history here and here and more adoption info here
NYC is now More Diverse Than LA
Extra Credits
Extra Credits is a weekly video series on the design, status quo and potential of video games. [more inside]
Team Werewolf
The Social Security Administration has released the top ten baby names for both genders in 2010.
Topping this year's list: Jacob and Isabella. Were Twi-Moms out in full force last year? Maybe. It should be noted, however, that Edward came in a distance 136.
The Discrete Charm of the 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, ...
Do you like integer sequences? Do you like poking around in the The On-Line Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences? Do you think, whoa, wait, okay, actually I like integer sequences but the OEIS is a goddam intractable maze of numbers? Do you think, man, what I wish is that someone would make an accessible blog that discusses some of the interesting entries in the OEIS for the casual fan of integer sequences? Well, that's an amazing coincidence; you should take a look at The On-Line Blog of Integer Sequences, by our very own Plutor.
"Good grief!"
Peanutweeter: pairing off-color tweets with panels from Peanuts.
"We noticed an issue yesterday...:
In last week's post about the PSN security breach, several MeFites recommended LastPass for storing passwords. Well, yesterday they found some anomolous network traffic, and they're asking all users to update their master password. (Some notes from James Fallows of The Atlantic. One guy explaining why you shouldn't freak out. Ask MeFi: "What simple, secure, portable password and secure data management systems do you use?")
A History of the Library as Seen Through Notable Researchers
"The New York Public Library’s Beaux-Arts Stephen A. Schwarzman Building celebrates its 100th anniversary this month on May 23. The Centennial offers a wonderful opportunity to reflect on Library use from the past 100 and uncover stories that can serve as inspiration for another century. One unique way to trace the history of the Library is through call slips. In order to use books in the research collection, patrons request specific titles by filling out a call slip, which includes the following information: author, title, and call number. Not all call slips have been saved over the years, but some have been preserved for posterity." Featured are slips from Max Eastman, Lewis Mumford, Dorothy Parker, John Dos Passos and R. G. Wasson...
The Argumentative Theory of Reasoning
Reasoning was not designed to pursue the truth. Reasoning was designed to help us win arguments. [more inside]
FLicKeR
FLicKeR [1h9m] is a documentary about Brion Gysin and his Dreammachine, a motorized sculpture made to be viewed with one's eyes closed. It features interviews from Marianne Faithful, DJ Spooky, Iggy Pop, and Genesis P-Orridge, among others. [more inside]
My God is doin' a *pant* brand nu *wheeze* thang!
Rap disaster! Earnest boy attempts dc Talk's "Nu Thang." The band Capital Cities offers a redemptive remix. (Download.)
A hundred things you should read
(About) 100 fantastic pieces of journalism from the editor of the Atlantic. Some stuff has been posted here before, but there is much that is new. So read about: The man who broke the Price is Right, horrifying Argentine ant invasions (warning: features description of ants in a California home that will creep you out for a long time to come), the ethics of cloning Neanderthals, the rise of the order of Assassins, why Holder can't close Gitmo, Hooter's opening in Japan, how a jailhouse lawyer sued himself out of prison, and the reflections of one of the best writers of nonfiction alive. And about 90 other articles, all available online.
"We have no idea what to do next."
"All of us in the environment movement, in other words – whether we propose accomodation, radical downsizing or collapse – are lost." Is human civilization hitting the sustainability wall? If so, the environmental movement seems blocked about what to do about it, broods George Monbiot. Nobody likes a "steady state economy", and the worse things get, the harder that option is to achieve. Plus green contradictions might vitiate effective action: "the same worldview tells us that we must reduce emissions, defend our landscapes and resist both the state and big business. The four objectives are at odds." [more inside]
Bill James Applies His Science to Serial Killers
Bill James, a pioneer in the field of baseball statistics, has now turned his attention to serial killers and their methods.
He's tryin' to build somethin' here!
We're gonna have a real good time together
In 1993, The Velvet Underground reformed and played their first gig in Edinburgh. A Documentary on the tour.
Montblanc Watches Chinese Ad:
Montblanc Watches Chinese Ad is the everyday story a son of a billionaire that splits with his arty girlfriend and wins her back with ride to Switzerland in a private jet. I won't spoil the rest other than to say don't give up on the boring factory visit, the finale is worth waiting for.
PRETTYGOODACTUALLY
Wanted: Gentleman bank robber
Crime Magazine features a rather matter-of-fact account of one of Leslie Ibsen Rogge's (wiki) bank robberies. The article is an excerpt from a new book by Dane Batty, Rogge's nephew, called Wanted: Gentleman bank robber: The True Story of Leslie Ibsen Rogge, One of the FBI’s Most Elusive Criminals. Rogge was once on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list, and is apparently the first from that list brought in due to the Internet. He is due to be released in 2047.
May 4
a speculative essay on the self-regulating limits of reality
Mindless Ones is a surreal, cerebral comics blog filled with essays about Grant Morrison and Batman villains. Still not enough? Too Busy Thinking About My Comics takes comic book overthinking to another level.
Little Holes the Worms Make
Trigger warning! What do speaker grills, wasp's nests, worm-eaten wood, swiss cheese, surinam toads and lotus seed pods all have in common? Visceral disgust and fear, if you have trypophobia!
Bryan Ferry
First Masters
Troy Tate and The Smiths: The Not Poor Recordings . The Smiths were first produced by Troy Tate and the bootlegs have been rather bootleggy as it were. These are one step removed from the master recordings and don't sound quite so hollow... Includes an apparently unheard version of Accept Yourself as a bonus.
This isn't Tech-Mex, it's Nortec!
Born in the border city of Tijuana, Nortec is an audio and visual style that digitally alters the local music and images to make something unique. The sound of Nortec takes the acoustic sounds of norteño (sample) and banda (sample), cut up and re-arranged into something new, with influences from electronic music broadcast by San Diego radio stations. Before too long, the Nortec sound would leak back north, and create divergent paths. More sounds and stories below the break. [more inside]
Bronze Age Sword Making
Project Neon
Alphaland, a game
Alphaland: your friend has sent you a game in the alpha stage of development, but it soon becomes clear that there is more there than just the test level.
Introducing Scanimate
Introducing Scanimate. It was an analogue computer that was programmed by turning knobs, directing beams of light and using animation cells as input. It was one of the first computers ever used to make visual graphics on TV. Scanimate excelled at making flying logos.
The logos that they created freaked out a generation of kids. So many people developed a phobia of these logos, there's a short movie out that documents the the fear these kids experienced, and relates to the scariest logo of them all: the dreaded Screen Gems bumper.
The movie is called The S From Hell.
The best dong in the world
When the clouds look like the ocean
It's me, I'm Molly Bloom, I've come home!
After twenty years, the James Joyce estate finally grants Kate Bush permission to use Molly Bloom's soliloquy. Now called Flower of the Mountain, the original lyrics have been replaced by a passage from James Joyce's 1922 novel. "Originally when I wrote the song The Sensual World I had used text from the end of Ulysses," Bush said. "When I asked for permission to use the text I was refused, which was disappointing ... When I came to work on this project I thought I would ask for permission again and this time they said yes ... I am delighted that I have had the chance to fulfill the original concept." Emma Forrest, of the Paris Review, on the destructive influence of Kate Bush, "Bush emerged at the same time as Debbie Harry, but your punk-rock Grace Kelly was nothing like our prog-rock Ophelia. Never had one felt so worried for a pop star." A clip from the new song, Flower of the Mountain and her new single, Deeper Understanding. Wolfmother's cover of Wuthering Heights, The Sweptaway's cover of Wuthering Heights, Noel Fielding's cover of Wuthering Heights.
The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means; and my people love to have it so: and what will ye do in the end thereof?
In this paper, we report on the first-ever test of the accuracy of figures who made political predictions. We sampled the predictions of 26 individuals.... We discovered that a few factors impacted a prediction's accuracy. The first is whether or not the prediction is a conditional; conditional predictions were more likely to not come true. The second was partisanship; liberals were more likely than conservatives to predict correctly. The final significant factor in a prediction's outcome....[PDF] Are Talking Heads Blowing Hot Air? [more inside]
Where do you fit?
Where do you fit? Main Street Republican? New Coalition Democrat? Post Modern? Disaffected? It's the Pew Research Center's 2011 Political Typology Quiz.
With the light's out, it's less dangerous.
Smells Like Teen Spirit is probably the most influential song of the early 1990s. It was performed by Nirvana, and was released in September 1991. Nearly twenty years later, 18-year-old Miley Cyrus cites it as one of the songs that inspired her to perform. Here is a video of Miley Cirus performing Smells Like Teen Spirit in Ecuador last weekend.
For the Love of Music
"A ballet dancer needs a mirror to perfect her style, her technique. A singer needs the same -- an aural mirror."In 1950 and '51, Japan’s first reel-to-reel tape recorders, the "G-Type" (for gov't use) and the "H-1" (for home use) were released by a company named Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo. Music student Norio Ohga was unimpressed by the wobbly sound of "Talking Paper," so he wrote a note complaining to the firm's founders, who hired him. Mr. Ohga never achieved his original dream of becoming a baritone opera singer, but the future President of TTK, (later renamed Sony,) would still make an indelible, global impact on the world of music -- including the development and introduction of the compact disc. Mr. Ohga died on April 24, 2011. [more inside]
The means of production
‘Everyone is a worker.’ That is a powerful statement, if you think about it. Richard Scarry wasn’t afraid to paint contemporary American society in such bold strokes. Nor was he afraid to explain commerce and capitalism to children. - What Do People Do All Day.
Einstein was right
"There is a space-time vortex around Earth, and its shape precisely matches the predictions of Einstein's theory of gravity." NASA announces result of elaborate experiment to prove Einstein's inferences about space time. The engineering involved in this blows me away. More links within the article...
"He set the word 'free' to a note so high nobody can reach it."
Tony Kushner, Pulitzer Prize winning author of "Angels in America," has been denied an honorary degree because of his views on Israel. City University of New York trustee Jeffrey S. Wiesenfeld raised objections to the nomination in what may the first honorary degree candidate to be denied by the board. [more inside]
Messi and Beautiful
Barcelona may or may not be the greatest soccer team of all time, as some now claim, but watching them is one of the prime viewing pleasures of our sports era. Can it get any better?. SLYT.
Food Desert
Derek Miller -- The Last Post
"I'm dead, and this is my last post to my blog." Writer, editor, musician and marine biologist Derek Miller, author of Penmachine, wrote this blog post to be published after his death from colorectal cancer. He died on May 3rd.
Just Keep Screwing That Chicken
Well, just take n=1...right?
In the afternoon of May 4, 1971, in the Stouffer's Somerset Inn in Shaker Heights, Ohio, Steve Cook presented his STOC paper proving that Satisfiability is NP-complete and Tautology is NP-hard. [more inside]
Americhrome
Americhrome: The color that has come to signify America in today’s combat theaters isn’t the red, the white, or the blue picked by Betsy Ross, but an ignoble sandy hue commonly referred to as desert tan and officially identified as Federal Standard 595 Color No. 33446. The official swatch of desert tan is housed in Franconia, Va., just outside Washington’s beltway, in a warehouse filled with the rest of the federal government’s certified color chips. From there, for $625, you can purchase a complete set of the 650 three-by-five-inch cards that define the colors covering the vast majority of items purchased by the Federal Acquisition Service, a $50 billion subsection of the General Services Administration, which acts as a kind of equipment manager for federal agencies around the country...
the Situation Room
"No public elementary or middle school shall provide any instruction or material that discusses sexual orientation other than heterosexuality."
Ultra Local Geography
Ultra Local Geography documents the everyday architecture of Chicago with detailed drawings and neighborhood historical research. [more inside]
Loose Lips Sink Starships
Question? RTFAQ (Read the F*cking Al Qaeda)!
Mining the Mother of all Data Dumps We now have a relatively massive haul of digital data from the OBL strike. There are several forensic toolkits in use by the private (commercially available) and public sector as well as open-source. Best practices include inventorying all the sources, cloning the sources so as to not damage pristine data, recovering any partial or damaged content, making the cloned sources read-only, adhering to legally-admissible tools standards, and documenting everything. There is an excellent source titled Digital Forensics and Born-Digital Content from the Council on Library and Information Resources [pdf, Resource Shelf]. But what to do next*? [more inside]
The Fast and the Furryous
"If you've never heard of this game, it is simply the best bear-driving simulator ever made. It's also the most accurate." Let's Play Enviro-Bear 2000: Operation: Hibernation [more inside]
Welcome to the world of Playboy!
"The Bunny has become what the Zeigfield girl was to another generation: synonymous with the most glamorous women in the world. The Playboy Club Bunny Manual (1968)
The Art of the Fugue
So you want to write a fugue? Some examples of modern songs in fugue format: ♫ The Lady Gaga Fugue ♫ The Final Countdown Fugue ♫ The Legend of Zelda Underworld Fugue ♫ The Nokia Ringtone Fugue ♫ The Dragnet Fugue ♫ The Oops, I did it again Fugue ♫ [more inside]
May 3
Vice in Libya, on Libya.
From Vice Magazine (NSFW photos in sidebar): The New Libyans: Knee-deep in the Shit with Benghazi's New Rebels, by Trevor Snapp. (warning: gory photo) More photos of the New Libyans from Trevor Snapp. Also from Vice, on Libya: Big Muammar's House. Also on Vice, on Libya: Notes from a Libyan Lurker, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, part 10, part 11.
piss off pussy peepee
Art by Paul Octavious
Same Hill, Different Day
Experiment with the Color Indigo
Book Collection
JFK → SFO | JFK → ORD
Lines
& lots more by Paul Octavious via
Experiment with the Color Indigo
Book Collection
JFK → SFO | JFK → ORD
Lines
& lots more by Paul Octavious via
Don We Now Our Gay Apparel
The Don Cherry Jacket Watch. Amazing, mind-blowing garishness.
pet the sounds
Behind the Sounds is a sampling of images and recordings from the studio sessions of Pet Sounds, the 1966 Beach Boys album masterminded by Brian Wilson. [more inside]
Secrets of the Sage of Baltimore
H.L. Mencken's Stein Collection is for sale on eBay. "A prohibitionist is the sort of man one couldn't care to drink with, even if he drank." -- H. L. Mencken
Into the woods...
Whitestone Motion Pictures presents Blood On My Name, a short musical film in the style of Americana folklore. [more inside]
Windows music, whoda'thunk-it
Awesome music using only sounds from Windows XP and 98, just what it says on the tin
US DoD and alternative energy
Despite continuing inaction and perverse subsidies from the US Federal Government, one of their largest entities, the US Department of Defense, has done the analysis and considers both peak oil and climate change to be a significant threat. In partial response, they're pushing heavily into alternative fuels, with the Air Force aiming to get fully half of its domestic jet fuel from alternative sources by 2016.
All Cannabis Use Is Medical
Because It Gets Better
This week in love
This week in love: the winning submission of the NYT's now-annual college Modern Love essay contest, the 2011 US pole dance champion (probably NSFW), and a Japanese kissing machine in development.
Ubiquitous nostalgia
Instagram is a hugely successful photo app for iPhone, currently skyrocketing in popularity. Free to download, it enables users to add characteristic filters to their photos and share them online easily. But a growing uneasiness seems to be developing about the software's raison d'être: does it serve to dilute creativity? Or perhaps the effects simply become nauseating when overused. Or is the sharing just too easy, leading us to end up drowning in our photos?
w o b b l e w o b b l e w o b b l e
And here is a video of Jell-O cubes bouncing, shot at 6200 frames per second.
The Film-Lover's Check List
The Film-Lover's Check List This is a simple but neat website for marking off the movies you've watched based on "Best" movie lists. You can choose from a wide variety of lists at the site or you can create your own. [more inside]
Gaby Dunn's 100 Interviews
100interviews: NYC writer and comedienne "No Fun" Gaby Dunn made a list of 100 types of people she knew existed but had never met. A transgendered person, someone who had been to prison, someone who had saved a life, a one-hit wonder, a psychic, someone from a third world country. She wanted to find out about all the stories she was missing out on, so she is interviewing every one of them. [more inside]
Serotonin! More than a neurotransmitter.
Serotonin is back in the news. Recent research shows that it plays an impressive number of roles throughout the body, both below the neck and above it. [more inside]
By the sleepy lagoon
On the 29th January 1942 the first ever Desert Island Discs was broadcast. Surpassed only by the Grand Ole Opry it is the second longest running radio show in history. Beautiful in its simplicity - each castaway is asked to choose eight pieces of music, a book and a luxury item for their imaginary stay on the desert island. For those who have not come across it before aquaint yourself with its iconic theme tune 'By the Sleepy Lagoon' here. Then for newcomers and old hands aquaint yourself with the wonderful new BBC website with searchable archives of 2852 episodes detailing castaways choices, and now with more than 500 episodes available for free download.
If This, Then That
If This, Then That [beta] allows you to designate trigger actions in one corner of the cloud based on events in another. In addition to popular websites like Facebook, Craiglist, and Twitter, IfTTT links email, SMS, and telephone (full list of current services here) in any configuration.
Battle-field Interpretation
With the death of Osama Bin Laden having re-opened the debate over the intelligence value of "enhanced interrogation" techniques, it's worthwhile revisiting the wartime lessons of Sherwood Moran, missionary, Marine, and decorated POW interrogator (he preferred he term "interviewer"). Working on the front lines of battle - even under aerial bombing and artillery shelling - he combined "deep human sympathy" with a "ruthlessly persistent approach" to extracting information from a supposedly unbreakable captured enemy. [more inside]
"Next to the originator of a good sentence is the first quoter of it." — Emerson
"I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy." In the wake of bin Laden's killing, partially fabricated misquotations were circulated widely via Twitter and Facebook. [more inside]
Transparency and the rule of law
Could you give, please, your conclusions on questions 1 to 5 in turn?The jury has reached a verdict in the Ian Tomlinson inquest. (previously) [more inside]
“Aux enfants, je leur dis et je leur répète: ne faites pas la guerre."
FACT: Corgis are the best.
A museum shows its favorites folder
The Corning Museum of Glass (previously), not to be confused with the Museum of Glass in Tacoma, Washington (previously), has named 60 favorites of their own collection and campus. The choices range from ancient, like the glass "portrait" of the Egyptian pharaoh Amenhotep II, to the scientific, like the initial 200-inch disk intended for the Hale telescope at the Mt. Palomar observatory, to modern sculpture, like Family Matter by Jill Reynolds.
[more inside]
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As long as they're vertical, it's all right.
It's an odd thing that libraries – by tradition temples to the unfleshly – can sometimes seem such sexy places. The Secret life of libraries.
The Original Indoor Cycle Gymnastics. Since 1999
"The previous cycling was conducted by using the general cycle with two wheels, but JACKIE SPINNING ™ is the Group Exercise Program using specially designed stationary bikes." [more inside]
Germany is never so happy as when she is pregnant with war.
"In the course of researching my book The Emotional Life of Nations, I discovered that just before and during wars the nation was regularly depicted as a Dangerous Woman. I collected thousands of magazine covers and political cartoons before wars to see if there were any visual patterns that could predict the moods that led to war, and routinely found images of dangerous, bloodthirsty women."
Sociologist, political psychologist, and founder of The Institute for Psychohistory (no not that one) Lloyd deMause has written eight books and 90 articles on the link between warfare and parenting practices. With thousands of references to psychological and anthropological studies, deMause makes the case that outbursts of nationalist violence are reenactments of childhood experiences common to large groups.
His book The Origins of War In Child Abuse is available as a ten-part, free audiobook; read by Stefan Molyneux. [more inside]
Sociologist, political psychologist, and founder of The Institute for Psychohistory (no not that one) Lloyd deMause has written eight books and 90 articles on the link between warfare and parenting practices. With thousands of references to psychological and anthropological studies, deMause makes the case that outbursts of nationalist violence are reenactments of childhood experiences common to large groups.
His book The Origins of War In Child Abuse is available as a ten-part, free audiobook; read by Stefan Molyneux. [more inside]
Copying is an act of love. Please copy and share.
Mimi & Eunice is a comic by artist Nina Paley (who you may remember as the artist behind Sita Sings the Blues). The comic touches on Free Culture, artistic struggles, internet drama and of course poop.
Better Never To Have Been
Down and out in Toronto and New York
Down and out in Toronto and New York: Freelance film critic Steven Boone recounts his experiences with the soup kitchens of Toronto and New York in First rate, second rate: In and out of the soup kitchens of Toronto and New York
Remembering Emily
All Things Emily celebrates the life and work of American jazz guitarist Emily Remler. Influenced by Herb Ellis and Wes Montgomery in her early albums, her music was taking new directions before her untimely death, at just 32, while on tour in Australia in May 1990. [more inside]
A Bottomless Silo
The Rusty Technoporn Of Nuclear Russia - The Base Of Human Exterminators , The Place That Stalkers Would Love To Visit, from English Russia via Warren Ellis
May 2
We Make Our Own Movies
Craig Finn (The Hold Steady) has premiered 'One Single Saviour', a solo song at Minnesota Public Radio's Wits. The show was hosted by music writer Chuck Klosterman, who's book 'Fargo Rock City is being adapted by Craig. Klosterman was recently interviewed by the AV Club about the project. Chuck previously. THS previously.
High as a kite
This kite-aerial photography (KAP) gallery flies through Seattle, NW Washington, Peace Arch, and a Burning Man festival. [more inside]
How Green Is Your Garden?
With the 2nd round NHL series between Nashville and Vancouver turning into the sleeper goalie duel everyone expected, superfans step up to create a better storyline: A Garden Gnome vs. Two Guys In Full-Body Spandex. [more inside]
marbleo.us
You know when grown-ups tell you everything's going to be fine, but you really think they're lying to make you feel better?
How Dangerous You Make People: A Boldly Violent New Side to the Doctor discusses who, or what the Doctor (who?) is becoming. [more inside]
Northern Exposure
Alone In The Wilderness "Documentary tells the story of Dick Proenneke who, in the late 1960s, built his own cabin in the wilderness at the base of the Aleutian Peninsula, in what is now Lake Clark National Park. Using color footage he shot himself, Proenneke traces how he came to this remote area, selected a homestead site and built his log cabin completely by himself. The documentary covers his first year in-country, showing his day-to-day activities and the passing of the seasons as he sought to scratch out a living alone in the wilderness." (Color, 57mins)
A pilot's worst nightmare
Putting aircraft back into service after storage is sometimes hazardous. Witness this TU-154, where control problems occurred approximately 30 seconds after takeoff. [more inside]
I wish we could stop saying these. We should really try to, or else we get what we deserve.
World Peas and more
How It Turned Out
"While going through my archives, I found this piece and emailed it to my friends -- most of whom didn't get it at all. There's usually only one way that change ever comes to the eternal childhood immortality of a comic strip, and that's by the strip being cancelled -- and sometimes not even then." How it turned out.
Ultimate dog tease
X-ray Origami is Damn Cool.
RIP you Diamond Geezer
It was Enery's Ammer wot put a young Cassius Clay on the floor (3.02) in 1963. Sir Henry Cooper, British Boxing legend has died aged 76.
The splitting glove controvery was a a mischievous manipulation of the truth (scroll down previous link)
He is still the only boxer to have won three Londsdale belts. Cooper and Muhammed Ali remained friends throughout his life.
In later years he came to despise what he saw as tawdry dealings and gave up commentating on BBC radio dedicating his life to golf and charity.
The splitting glove controvery was a a mischievous manipulation of the truth (scroll down previous link)
He is still the only boxer to have won three Londsdale belts. Cooper and Muhammed Ali remained friends throughout his life.
In later years he came to despise what he saw as tawdry dealings and gave up commentating on BBC radio dedicating his life to golf and charity.
The Illustrated Hobbitses
Hobbitish is a site that collects the various cover and interior paintings and illustrations of The Hobbit from versions around the world. [more inside]
Canada federal election 2011
Election Day in Canada. The Globe and Mail's guide to voting and watching the federal election. [more inside]
Dogs Rule!
Sometimes this shoulder is a bit sore. Sometimes age starts to creep up on me. Sometimes I make excuses like "Naw, I'm not going walking, it's too cold/hot/steep/wet/dry/tiring." Sometimes I want people to feel sorry for me.
But then, I'm not a dog.
AV explained for cats
Engineering Gloriousness
To the aficianado, a clicky keyboard is the only keyboard. For PC users, nothing is better than an IBM Model M. For Apple lovers, it never got better than the Apple Extended Keyboard II. [more inside]
You may say I'm a dreamer...
The Last Prisoner
100 year old Pavel Galitsky, the last survivor of Kolyma, tells his story. "Kolyma was Auschwitz without the ovens. Prisoners traveled in batches of 1500; within 3 months only 450 people of our batch were left alive." [more inside]
May 1
Do The Pop!
Wallaby Beat is a blog dedicated to punk, DIY, powerpop, grillfat (pre-punk Australian hard rock) and NWOAHM from Australia 1975-1984. It follows projects like Do The Pop, Lethal Weapons, and Inner City Sound in documenting Australia's fertile underground rock and roll scene. While those blogs and books are focused on the past, I-94 Bar is documenting the scene as it stands today and interviewing the various survivors.
"Come with me into the tormented, haunted, half-lit night of the insane."
Daughter of Horror (original title: Dementia) was a 1955 avant garde film featuring a noir style, a surrealist sensibility, and virtually no dialogue. A later version of the film even included an over-the-top voice over by none other than Tonight Show sidekick Ed McMahon, but like Blade Runner the flick is better off without the narration. Daughter of Horror is probably most famous for being the film playing in the theater overrun by The Blob. And with a few more surrealistic elements and peculiar dialogue added, this could have been done by David Lynch in a later decade. The film, recently featured on Turner Classic Movies, is available for free on archive.org.
Bin Laden
f p p
Not Your Usual Bunk Buddy
Father and son, bunking in G block. "Scott Peters and his father, Bernard, eat dinner together at night, then watch bowling or classic boxing matches on television together into the evening. They have an extremely close relationship: They have seen each other for at least part of nearly every one of the last 5,455 days. Every night, they sleep together in an 8-by-12-foot room, where the alarm bell rings in the morning but also at 10:30 p.m., when the guards turn off the lights in G Block, at the Elmira Correctional Facility." via NYT
Digger's Digest
Digger's Digest offers something for the crate digger in us all, with categories including Post Punk / Synth Pop :: Cosmic / Disco :: Electronic / Experimental :: Middle East & Oriental :: French Library :: Various 7" :: Soundtracks :: French Sounds :: Jazz Funk :: Psych / Prog / Rock :: Afro Latin Caribbean :: Various Library :: Jazz :: Breaks & Drums :: Psych / Prog / Pop 7 plus Cover Art and Podcasts.
The second-most famous Libyan
Before Qaddafi, the closest thing to a national icon that Libya had was Omar Mukhtar, the Lion of the Desert. Mussolini thought of Libya as the Fourth Shore of Italy; the natives were not pleased with this idea, and under the leadership of Mukhtar, a school teacher, successfully resisted the Italians for twenty years with almost no resources. Italian rule in Libya was harsh: Libyans were rounded up into concentration camps, tanks and aerial bombardment were used against civilians, and half of the population of Cyrenaica - the eastern part of Libya - died. To stop Mukhtar from receiving supplies from Egypt, the Italians built a 168-mile long barbed-wire fence essentially dividing the country in two. Mukhtar was finally captured and hung on September of 1931; he remains a symbol of Libyan independence. [more inside]
Arduino the Documentary
Meet "Meet The Hollowheads"
The Edgewise Guide To Filmmaking. Screenwriter Lisa Morton kept a diary while making the very, very strange 1989 movie Meet The Hollowheads (trailer). The low-budget sci-fi/horror/social comment/sitcom takes place in a dystopian underground suburb whose entire infrastructure, operated by monopolist corporation United Umblicial, consists of flexible tubes which carry waste, energy, and slimy and sometimes still living comestibles. The movie, the one and only directorial effort of horror FX and make-up man Tom Burman, inspires confusion and dismay in most viewers. Hollowheads stars John Glover and features a 14-year-old Juliette Lewis, her big brother Lightfield, a musical instrument made out of a live chicken, an eyeball attached to a large intestine that lives in a glass tank, and an uncredited Bobcat Goldthwait as a lascivious cop, whose few lines include "When will children learn to just say no to butt polish?"
What is an embryo?
Art. 6(2)(c) of Directive 98/44/EC, passed by the EU Parliament and Council back in 1998, ruled that, among other things, "uses of human embryos for industrial or commercial
purposes" were to be considered unpatentable because of their being contrary to "ordre public" or morality. After German researcher Prof. Dr. Oliver Bruestle was granted a patent concerning a method for creating nerve precursor cells on the basis of embryonic stem cells, Greenpeace Germany (in German) filed a lawsuit for annulment of the patent. The German Federal Court of Justice then referred to the European Court of Justice the question of whether embryonic stem cell therapy constitutes such a use of human embryos for industrial or commercial purposes, under Directive 98/44/EC. [more inside]
Very Metal
speculative, but instructive, economics
In a pinch, upgrade the humans or redistribute the robots - "[S]uppose [as a factory owner] I replace all my workers with machines... This squeeze has many implications, one of them being that here is an important sector of the economy in which more or less all the gains accrue to the owners of capital and more or less none to the working class..." [more inside]
Cartography Geeks
Bostonography is the study of Greater Boston, Massachusetts through maps and graphics. This site is run by a pair of cartography geeks; Andy Woodruff of Axis Maps, and Tim Wallace. [more inside]
There's a vicious rumor going around that Mitt Romney passed Universal Health Care
Mahalo! What A Week: US President Barack Obama at the recent White House Correspondence Dinner (SLYTP - 19 Min)