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Desire. Metaphor. The problem of many (“As anyone who has flown out of a cloud knows, the boundaries of a cloud are a lot less sharp up close than they can appear on the ground”). Implicature ("the act of meaning or implying one thing by saying something else"). Implicit bias. Feminism and globalization. Justice and bad luck. The Human Genome Project. The pineal gland (“a tiny organ in the center of the brain that played an important role in Descartes' philosophy”). Humor (“As he approached the gallows, Thomas More asked the executioner, ‘Could you help me up? I'll be able to get down by myself’”). The “Great Cosmological Debate” of the 1930s and 40s. Voting methods. Zombies.

…Read about all this and more in the remarkable Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, which has just celebrated its 20th birthday. [more inside]
posted by nebulawindphone at 8:55 PM PST - 15 comments

The boom in mini stomachs, brains, breasts, kidneys and more
posted by StrikeTheViol at 8:23 PM PST - 7 comments

Beijing has been voted as the host of the 2022 Winter Olympics, beating Almaty, Kazakhstan. It is the first city to host both the Summer and Winter games. [more inside]
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 6:39 PM PST - 63 comments

A series of visual tests: can you see which kid is in trouble?
posted by Short Attention Sp at 5:02 PM PST - 84 comments

Wrestling legend Rowdy Roddy Piper has died of a heart attack at the age of 61. Piper was one of the great "heels" (villains) of the 1980s wrestling boom, teaming with Paul Orndorff at the first WrestleMania in 1985 to take on Hulk Hogan and Mr. T. [more inside]
posted by Etrigan at 4:14 PM PST - 107 comments

The Millennial Commune
posted by overeducated_alligator at 2:23 PM PST - 52 comments

All 74 Led Zeppelin Songs, Ranked, A definitive, uncontroversial list from the fine folks at Vulture.
posted by Cookiebastard at 2:11 PM PST - 114 comments

A History of Art in Three Colours (BBC) [Part 1] [Gold] [Part 2] [Blue] [Part 3] [White] Dr James Fox explores how, in the hands of artists, the colours gold, blue and white have stirred our emotions, changed the way we behave and even altered the course of history.
posted by Fizz at 2:04 PM PST - 5 comments

Today's Penny Arcade comic is the last in a 1 2 3 4 5 6 part story that starts here. Set in the world of Nightlight where children's fears come alive and must be dealt with, Grace has to grow up and take her mother's place as protector of the family. Mike Kahulick (aka Gabe), the artist of PA, wrote a nice piece about his father seeing behind the curtain for the first time that discusses some of where this story comes from. [more inside]
posted by macrael at 1:35 PM PST - 45 comments

One riot, one Ranger. One 2x4, one boat.
Launching the boat.
posted by OmieWise at 12:15 PM PST - 32 comments

The Timmy Brothers: Water Makers (SLVimeo)
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 11:33 AM PST - 3 comments

Depiction vs. Endorsement and Sexism in GoT: How Game of Thrones presents a sexist narrative when A Song of Ice and Fire doesn’t (spoilers through GoT 5x03 and the books). "The world in which Martin set his A Song of Ice and Fire (ASOIAF) is a terribly sexist one. But George R.R. Martin is not sexist. The books are not sexist. The show…is. And here’s why: where Martin actively forces the reader to address the problematic treatment of women in his series head-on as an overarching theme, showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss (D&D) actively incorporate sexist tropes and demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of the source material." [more inside]
posted by homunculus at 11:11 AM PST - 129 comments

You are first a wife and a mother. Go to the Doll House. Sexism was conceived in 1971 by Carolyn Houger, (interview at link) a resident of Seattle, Washington. With the creation of Sexism, Houger hoped to “bring out the humor in the Women’s Liberation movement.” The idea for the game came to Houger after her four-year-old daughter returned home after playing the card game “Old Maid” with her friends and made the statement, “wouldn’t it be terrible to be an old maid?” [more inside]
posted by emjaybee at 10:45 AM PST - 5 comments

An oral history of Wet Hot American Summer. (And, hey, First Day of Camp premieres on Netflix today.)
posted by box at 10:06 AM PST - 91 comments

Do you own one of the 14 million computers already running Windows 10? If so, it might be a good time to review your privacy settings. [more inside]
posted by selfnoise at 10:01 AM PST - 154 comments

It is still possible in Park Slope, for example, to rent a duplex with a garden for $200 a month, a half-block from the subway [...] Hundreds of people are discovering that Brooklyn has become the Sane Alternative: a part of New York where you can live a decent urban life without going broke, where you can educate your children without having the income of an Onassis, a place where it is still possible to see the sky, and all of it only 15 minutes from Wall Street.

"Brooklyn: The Sane Alternative", Pete Hamill, 1969
posted by griphus at 9:28 AM PST - 53 comments

Radioactive Trailers! Metafilter's own MST3K Club on Fanfare collects trailers for the zero budget, obscure, cult and bonkers movies you love, from Manos The Hands Of Fate to the Prince Of Space. [via mefi projects]
posted by The Whelk at 9:02 AM PST - 17 comments

Personality, and a whole lot more. August always stirs up memories of going back to school for me. This year, I've been scratching the academic itch with some fine online classwork by the University of Toronto's Jordan B. Peterson. If you like Jung, Freud, Personality you might find his youtube channel a profitable place to hang out. [more inside]
posted by mrdaneri at 8:33 AM PST - 8 comments

10 Common Crimes Against Cheese You Don't Have to Commit - Serious Eats piece by Niki Achitoff-Gray. Previously: 7 Secrets To a Beautiful Cheese Board [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 7:59 AM PST - 53 comments

"When someone like Chris Pratt lands back-to-back roles in some of the biggest movies of the year, that’s headline news. But when a charismatic, quirky actress like Judy Greer does the same, well, blink and you might miss her. The comedic actress—best known for her scene-stealing work in shows like Arrested Development and movies like The Descendants—showed up in four major 2015 films: Tomorrowland, Entourage, Jurassic World, and Ant-Man." Here’s Every Single Line Judy Greer Had in a Movie This Summer.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 7:36 AM PST - 55 comments

"Good," Mohammed said softly to his friend. "The robot is working."
posted by appleses at 7:01 AM PST - 8 comments

New Ebola vaccine shows 100% success rate in clinical trial. Today the World Health Organization has announced that the rVSV-ZEBOV vaccine had a 100% success rate in preventing onset of the disease if administered within 10 days of exposure (n=4,000). In response to the current outbreak in West Africa that has afflicted over 27,000 and killed over 11,000, this collaborative effort led by the WHO pushed the vaccine through a process that usually takes more than a decade in just 12 months. Official paper from The Lancet here (pdf).
posted by Ufez Jones at 6:59 AM PST - 23 comments

Adnyamathanha and Narungga man Adam Goodes is an Australian Rules football (AFL) player, two times winner of the highest individual award for the fairest and best player, as well as playing in two premiership winning games over his eighteen year career with the Sydney Swans. He works with indigenous youth in detention and co-chairs a foundation (with Michael O'Loughlin) working to empower the next generation of indigenous mentors. Goodes is a former Australian of the Year (2014) who recently said that "If people only remember me for my football, I've failed in life." So why are people booing Adam Goodes? [more inside]
posted by Thella at 4:39 AM PST - 75 comments

"I do like to believe that people will be inherently good if you offer friendship in the game. ... I communicate entirely through Jazz Hands." A player describes an attempt at a non-violent gameplay in Grand Theft Auto Online (via @TheQuinnspiracy).
posted by exogenous at 4:19 AM PST - 22 comments

Alberto Nisman accused Iran and Argentina of colluding to bury a terrorist attack. Did it get him killed? [more inside]
posted by ellieBOA at 4:15 AM PST - 7 comments

Warren Buffett’s Family Secretly Funded a Birth Control Revolution

Quietly, steadily, the Buffett family is funding the biggest shift in birth control in a generation. “For Warren, it’s economic. He thinks that unless women can control their fertility—and that it’s basically their right to control their fertility—that you are sort of wasting more than half of the brainpower in the United States,” DeSarno said about Buffett’s funding of reproductive health in the 2008 interview. “Well, not just the United States. Worldwide.”

posted by Room 641-A at 12:49 AM PST - 76 comments

Nudinits: Tickled Pink, an all-knit stop-motion animation. While the link itself is adorably SFW, the videos YouTube suggests in the sidebar are basically porn, so be forewarned.
posted by jacquilynne at 12:13 AM PST - 6 comments

The Last True Know-It-All reviews Andrew Smith's biography of Thomas Young - "The Last Man Who Knew Everything (including hieroglyphs). Was Young The Smartest Person Ever? [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 11:26 PM PST - 17 comments

Science Fiction grandmaster Samuel R. Delaney interviewed by SF Signal, with a very long answer in part 2, and by The New Yorker where he talks about race, recent Hugo controversies being nothing new, and the past and future of science fiction.
posted by Artw at 11:15 PM PST - 26 comments

Meek Mills has finally responded to Drake in their week long feud. Reaction has not generally been kind. Drake's Instagram speaks for itself. Chuck D was not impressed. Toronto Councilor Norm Kelly poured more salt in the wound (after fanning the flames last week). And of course brands are getting in on the action. Other Twitter highlights: 1 2 3 4 5 6
posted by kmz at 10:29 PM PST - 73 comments

Lost TV Pilot of Clerks has emerged (SLYT). In 1995, Disney (Miramax parent company) under the Touchstone Television brand tried to turn the indie hit of the previous year into a PG-Rated sitcom. The results are exactly what you'd expect. (via AV Club) [more inside]
posted by lmfsilva at 5:34 PM PST - 59 comments

“I love you so much, I want to carry you around all day in my pocket” . Emily Bernard writes about being the mother of brown-skinned daughters after Ferguson. [more inside]
posted by Deoridhe at 4:15 PM PST - 4 comments

Six people have been stabbed at Jerusalem's Pride Parade following threats from both a Haredi man just released from prison for a similar knife attack at the 2005 Jersusalem Pride parade, and from Lehava, a right-wing Jewish supremacy organization that also held a protest away from the LGBTQ parade route. These knife attacks are unfortunately not the first time LGBTQ Jews have been killed by other Jews; there was a gun attack on the Tel Aviv LGBTQ youth center in 2009 (previously). [more inside]
posted by Dreidl at 2:16 PM PST - 42 comments

A standoff between Greenpeace and Shell Oil is happening right now high above the Willamette River in Portland, Ore. Yesterday, using mountaineering equipment, thirteen protestors lowered themselves down from the magestically large St. Johns Bridge in a bid to prevent the passage of Shell's icebreaking ship MSV Fennica, which had been undergoing repairs in Portland and was scheduled to depart to assist Shell's oil drilling activities in the Arctic. The protesters have supplies to stay awhile. For now, the ship has turned around and a judge has ruled that Greenpeace will be charged $2500 for every hour the protest continues.
posted by lisa g at 1:38 PM PST - 91 comments

Double Genocide: Lithuania wants to erase its ugly history of Nazi collaboration - by accusing Jewish partisans who fought the Germans of war crimes.

"After Lithuanians got independence,” he told me, “we hoped that Lithuania would give us help.” But it was not to be. In one of its very first independent actions, before even fully breaking free of Moscow, Lithuania’s parliament formally exonerated several Lithuanian nationalists who had collaborated in the Holocaust and had been convicted by Soviet military courts after the war. The right-wing paramilitaries who had carried out the mass murder of Lithuania’s Jews were now hailed as national heroes on account of their anti-Soviet bona fides.

posted by Rustic Etruscan at 12:40 PM PST - 52 comments

Cesena is a small town up in northern Italy, that until yesterday was pretty-well unknown to the world. That changed this morning when a guy called Fabio Zaffagini presented to the Internet his year long-project of getting one thousand musicians to gather in a field and play Foo Fighter's Learn To Fly, with the sole objective of convincing the band to go and do a show in their town. You have to watch it.
posted by Cobalt at 11:48 AM PST - 134 comments

Fourteen days and 12,000 miles of storm-chasing result in one beautiful video.
posted by mudpuppie at 11:45 AM PST - 25 comments

Brooklyn Pizzeria Juliana's Named #1 In The United States
posted by poffin boffin at 11:30 AM PST - 160 comments

Who is the greatest person who has ever lived? Those ranking by deaths prevented have put forth Norman Borlaug (over 1 billion), Viktor Zhdanov (300 million), Haber and Bosch (2.7 billion, but then there's the war crimes thing), and, of course, Stanislav Petrov (everyone). Lists of the most important people are often decided by popular vote, with Gutenberg, Einstein, and Darwin generally doing well, but don't count yourself out. More recently, as Cass Sunstein entertainingly covers, there have also been quantitative attempts to measure the most important person., including, most recently, a detailed algorithm by a computer science professor and a Google engineer that tells us that the most important people are, in order: Jesus, Napoleon, Shakespeare, and Muhammed. Smithsonian magazine commissioned them to come up with a special list of the most important Americans. You can also play a historical importance version of the who's hotter game using their algorithm.
posted by blahblahblah at 11:25 AM PST - 51 comments

The Role of Writers in a STEM Obsessed Society

“As writers, it’s easy to think of how we matter to literature classrooms, but what the appointment of writers-in-residence in hospitals, history classrooms, foreign language learning spaces, and cooking schools reminds us is that we are relevant wherever there is humanity—which is to say, wherever humans are with their stories. Writing is healing. Writing is art. Writing is learning. As such, writing across the disciplines matters. Many models of artist residencies depend upon the retreat model, wherein the artist sequesters herself away with a small community of other artists. While these models have value, especially when considering how solitude relates to the creative process, it’s heartening to me to see more models catch on that value the place of the writer in society, rather than hidden away from it.”

posted by Fizz at 9:42 AM PST - 44 comments

Since it folds in three dimensions, we could store all of the world’s current data—everyone’s photos, every Facebook status update, all of Wikipedia, everything—using less than an ounce of DNA. And, with its propensity to replicate given the right conditions, millions of copies of DNA can be made in the lab in just a few hours. Such favorable traits make DNA an ideal candidate for storing lots of informations, for a long time, in a small space.

But how stable is DNA? The Reed-Solomon method, long used to error-check data transmission and duplication, is now being explored as an adjunct to the long-term archiving of information encoded in DNA. A post by Alex Riley at the PBS Science blog NOVA/NEXT.
posted by Rumple at 8:58 AM PST - 33 comments

"When we use the phrase, what we seem to be trying to say is that there should be a lot of room for intelligent disagreement around aesthetics – and that we don’t feel comfortable about asserting the superiority of any one style or approach over any other. It implies an acute sensitivity to conflict and a fear of being rude or mean to others. However, by resorting to the phrase, what we actually do is unleash a stranger and more reckless situation: what we’re in effect stating is that nothing is ever really more beautiful – or uglier – than anything else. This suggestion then has a way of implying that the whole subject is essentially trivial. After all, we’d never say that truths about the economy or justice were in the eyes of beholders only. We know that big things are at stake here – and over time, we’ve come to positions about the right and wrong way of approaching these topics, and are ready to discuss and defend our ideas. We wouldn’t ever say that ‘the treatment of the poor is just a subject best left entirely to the eyes of beholders’ or ‘the best way to raise children is in the eyes of beholders,’ or ‘the future of the environment is in the eyes of beholders.’ We accept that there are dangers to arguing in aggressive and unfruitful ways; but we are confident that there are sensible and polite ways to advance through these tricky yet vital debates. The same should feel true around beauty."
posted by beisny at 8:07 AM PST - 91 comments

Jessica Gentile has compiled a brief-but-interesting listicle for Pitchfork: “Songs about PMS and Periods”
posted by Going To Maine at 7:37 AM PST - 20 comments

Karen Gaffney (TEDxPortland) speaks on history and present state of the value of people with Down syndrome. Gaffney (previously 1, 2), is the first living person with Down syndrome to receive an honory PhD and the president of an eponymous foundation dedicated to inclusion and advocacy. [more inside]
posted by plinth at 7:33 AM PST - 13 comments

Hell, damn and bitch are especially popular in the south and southeast. Douche is relatively common in northern states. Bastard is beloved in Maine and New Hampshire, and those states – together with a band across southern Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas – are the areas of particular motherfucker favour. Crap is more popular inland, fuck along the coasts. Fuckboy – a rising star* – is also mainly a coastal thing, so far. from Strong Language via Kottke [NSFW language, natch]
posted by chavenet at 7:25 AM PST - 98 comments

A decade ago, Susan Smillie bought a classic ketch, moored it on the Thames and moved aboard. Now hipster landlubbers squeezed out of the property market are taking to the water in droves. So what are the joys and challenges of a river residence? (No, it’s not cold in winter. Yes, she can only buy ebooks.) (slGrauniad)
posted by Kitteh at 6:51 AM PST - 66 comments

This Italian giant is nestled in the sprawling metropolitan area of Naples, population 3.1 million. We’re not talking “nearby” like Rainier is to Seattle or Popocatépetl to Mexico City. We’re talking a volcano smack in the middle of the city. It is merely ~12 km (~7.5 miles) from the summit craters at Vesuvius to downtown Naples. For your average pyroclastic flow from a volcano like Vesuvius, that is a trip that would take only about two and a half minutes.

The World’s Most Dangerous Volcano May Kill Another City
posted by Spinda at 10:53 PM PST - 45 comments

CW Developing ‘Hyper-Stylized’ Reboot of ‘Little Women’ "Disparate half-sisters Jo, Meg, Beth, and Amy band together in order to survive the dystopic streets of Philadelphia and unravel a conspiracy that stretches far beyond anything they have ever imagined – all while trying not to kill each other in the process." [more inside]
posted by betweenthebars at 9:47 PM PST - 77 comments

It was an unexpected end to an extraordinary chase. For 110 days and more than 10,000 nautical miles across two seas and three oceans, the Bob Barker and a companion ship, both operated by the environmental organization Sea Shepherd, had trailed the trawler, with the three captains close enough to watch one another’s cigarette breaks and on-deck workout routines. In an epic game of cat-and-mouse, the ships maneuvered through an obstacle course of giant ice floes, endured a cyclone-like storm, faced clashes between opposing crews and nearly collided in what became the longest pursuit of an illegal fishing vessel in history. (SLNYT)
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 9:24 PM PST - 22 comments

The top 50 assholes in cinema - by Andrew Blair, Den of Geek
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 8:52 PM PST - 91 comments

The Verge's web sucks.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 8:04 PM PST - 78 comments

Bumble, founded by Tinder co-founder Whitney Wolfe, is a dating app where women call the shots. [more inside]
posted by halifix at 6:50 PM PST - 78 comments

Kaycie D. is an animator and artist who grew up on Disney films and has used that inspiration to create her own anthropomorphized illustrations of the chemical elements.
posted by Navelgazer at 3:29 PM PST - 22 comments

The nastiest habit of medieval cats seen via illuminated manuscripts.
posted by Confess, Fletch at 3:00 PM PST - 55 comments

"When women win literary awards for fiction it’s usually for writing from a male perspective and/or about men. The more prestigious the award, the more likely the subject of the narrative will be male. I analysed the last 15 years’ results for half a dozen book-length fiction awards: Pulitzer Prize, Man Booker Prize, National Book Award, National Book Critics’ Circle Award, Hugo Award, and Newbery Medal." Nicola Griffith notes the absence of stories about women from prize-winning novels--even when those novels are written by women. The Seattle Review of Books adds an interview with Griffith on the writing and aftermath of her original blog post.
posted by sciatrix at 1:33 PM PST - 92 comments

A delightful story of a 50-something couple, formerly single and living with their parents, who have found love.
posted by glaucon at 1:14 PM PST - 9 comments

Potential MH370 wreckage found Wreckage of an actuator from a Boeing 777 has washed ashore on the island of Reunion. [more inside]
posted by bobloblaw at 1:02 PM PST - 89 comments

Yesterday, the Jamestown Rediscovery and the Smithsonian Institution announced that they had identified the remains of Capt. Gabriel Archer, Rev. Robert Hunt, Sir Ferdinando Wainman and Capt. William West, four of the earliest leaders of the Jamestowne settlement. Among Archer's remnants was a small silver box that researchers have identified as a Roman Catholic reliquary. [more inside]
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 12:51 PM PST - 22 comments

Who first said Motherf$cker on TV? What was with Lesbian Kiss Episodes? Are Crossover Episodes ever a good idea? Why do Bottle Episodes make good television? What was Cousin Oliver Syndrome? [more inside]
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 12:23 PM PST - 12 comments

The Making of Leopoldo López: A closer look at the democratic bona fides of the rock star of Venezuela's opposition. [more inside]
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 12:12 PM PST - 3 comments

(Or I CAN Get Arrested in This Town!) Aspiring actor Jason Stange nailed the audition for the role of an evil doctor in the forthcoming horror film Marla Mae. The low budget production was shot in Olympia Washington, where the local paper took an interest. [more inside]
posted by Naberius at 11:14 AM PST - 18 comments

Logan Paul has conquered the internet, but he can’t figure out how to conquer the world
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 10:35 AM PST - 67 comments

"Roger roll, Discovery." The sweet, sweet sounds of NASA mission control audio snippets, edited for your sampling and ringtone pleasure as MP3 and M4R downloads.
posted by Laminda at 10:15 AM PST - 19 comments

Lawrence Schall, the President of Oglethorpe University, decided to learn more about Uber by becoming a driver in his free time. He writes: "I wanted to understand the sharing economy. Instead, I got schooled in the failures of Atlanta's public transit system. . . . I assumed the people who used Uber fell into three basic categories: young people (including lots of students at my own university) responsibly avoiding drinking and driving on nights out, business people who had switched to Uber for a faster response and lower cost, and folks like me who occasionally used Uber to avoid the hassles of traffic, parking or just because it’s the cool new thing to do. Yet in my dozen-plus Uber forays thus far, I’ve encountered no one who fits those categories." [more inside]
posted by a fiendish thingy at 9:58 AM PST - 115 comments

Pechito Alejandro Ferreiro, better known as Pechito, lived with his 2 dogs on the corner of two busy avenues in the Palermo barrio of Buenos Aires for 12 years. Well-known and well-liked in the area, he died in 2013. In this short film he tells his story.
posted by jontyjago at 9:34 AM PST - 5 comments

“My name is Donald Sutherland. My wife’s name is Francine Racette. We are Canadians....” [The Globe and Mail]

“Did you know that? If you don’t live here all the time you can’t vote. Americans who live abroad can vote. They can vote because they’re citizens! Citizens! But I can’t. Because why? Because I’m not a citizen? Because what happens to Canada doesn’t matter to me? Ask any journalist that’s ever interviewed me what nationality I proudly proclaim to have. Ask them. They’ll tell you. I am a Canadian. But I’m an expatriate and the Harper government won’t let expatriates participate in Canadian elections.”

[more inside]
posted by Fizz at 9:28 AM PST - 137 comments

There are more than 285 competitive bagpipe bands in the United States, made up of thousands of pipers and drummers. Bands are divided into grades based on skill: Grade 5 is the lowest, akin to Little League; Grade 1 is the majors. In May 2014, the Massachusetts-based Stuart Highland Pipe Band was promoted to Grade 1, and next month they'll be facing off against other top-level bands in Glasgow at the annual World Pipe Band Championships. But first, the Stewies made their North American debut at the premier level at a competition in Ontario: Blowhards: On the road, down the bottle, and across the border with Boston’s greatest competitive bagpipe band. [more inside]
posted by zarq at 7:51 AM PST - 25 comments

How Groningen invented a cycling template for cities all over the world
Motorists woke up one mid-70s morning to find new one-way streets made direct crosstown journeys impossible by car. Forty years later Groningen boasts two-thirds of all trips made by bike … and the cleanest air of any big Dutch city [more inside]
posted by moody cow at 7:25 AM PST - 92 comments

The Man Booker Prize Longlist has been announced! This year, it includes more US authors than Brits (per country breakdown), the first Jamaican nominee and three first-time authors. [more inside]
posted by Going To Maine at 7:24 AM PST - 17 comments

nupepa : Another place to talk about Hawaiian-Language Newspapers. A few selected highlights: Duke Kahanamoku Off to Hollywood, 1936 -- More bats found, 1905 -- Names of the stevedores who participated in Queen Liliuokalani’s funeral, 1917 -- The Beautiful Flag of Hawaii / Let it forever wave -- Hei, cat’s cradle, Hawaiian style, 1916 -- On eating stones, 1894 -- Did Not Forget His Mother Tongue
posted by No-sword at 6:40 AM PST - 4 comments

Two More Eggs is the new series by the Chapman brothers, creators of Homestar Runner (YouTube playlist link)
posted by DoctorFedora at 6:39 AM PST - 15 comments

Activity trackers train users to love lives that are all work.
posted by almostmanda at 6:34 AM PST - 133 comments

How the ANC sent encrypted messages to one another during the struggle against apartheid. Talking to Vula is a series of six articles by Tim Jenkins about the project from the ANC`s monthly journal Mayibuye from May 1995 to October 1995. (via Schneier) [more inside]
posted by jeffburdges at 1:31 AM PST - 13 comments

In 1983, at the height of the Cold War, the National Film Board of Canada produced War with Gwynne Dyer, a seven part series in which the historian Gwynne Dyer traced the evolution of total warfare from its origins to the present day. [more inside]
posted by MartinWisse at 12:44 AM PST - 7 comments

The Singular Mind of Terry Tao - "Imagine, he said, that someone awfully clever could construct a machine out of pure water. It would be built not of rods and gears but from a pattern of interacting currents." (via) [more inside]
posted by kliuless at 12:34 AM PST - 17 comments

Activist Deray McKesson took this photo of an armored vehicle parked at the Waller County, TX jail. JPat Brown at Muckrock asked the Waller County Police Department for "[a]ny documentation (receipts, work orders, emails ) regarding customization of armored vehicles in the office's possession, specifically the application of the 'Batman/Dark Knight' logo. They were not amused. However, it's likely that the Chief Deputy is telling the truth, since companies like The Armored Group makes vehicles that are similar to the one spotted at the Waller County jail. This same company was mentioned in a October 2014 Mother Jones article about militarization of police forces across the country.
posted by snortasprocket at 12:04 AM PST - 29 comments

Warship's Last Survivors Recall Sinking in Shark-Infested Waters
posted by Artw at 11:23 PM PST - 19 comments

About a month ago Motherboard posted about artist Jesse England looking for a lost Mac game that he played in his 7th grade social studies class. He knew it was about terrorism and an aircraft hijacking but not much else besides some images he remembered, which he drew out and shared in hopes someone would recognize it. Fortunately, he found it, and decided to share it with everyone. Let's Play: Research Paper Writer
posted by gucci mane at 8:15 PM PST - 16 comments

Peter Watts: No Brainer.

For decades now, I have been haunted by the grainy, black-and-white x-ray of a human skull. It is alive but empty, with a cavernous fluid-filled space where the brain should be. A thin layer of brain tissue lines that cavity like an amniotic sac. The image hails from a 1980 review article[PDF] in Science: Roger Lewin, the author, reports that the patient in question had “virtually no brain”. But that’s not what scared me; hydrocephalus is nothing new, and it takes more to creep out this ex-biologist than a picture of Ventricles Gone Wild. What scared me was the fact that this virtually brain-free patient had an IQ of 126.

[more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 8:02 PM PST - 48 comments

An Illustrated Guide to Iconic Fictional Weapons.
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 7:00 PM PST - 39 comments

Isobel Varley had her first tattoo when she was 49, then went to become a Guinness Record holder for the most tattooed female pensioner. She died recently. Part of a Guardian photo series of "Aged Rebels"[slightly NSFW]
posted by growabrain at 6:41 PM PST - 17 comments

If you think finding a short in a light switch or lamp is your idea of fun, imagine having the time of your life with this little repair. You probably won't find much of the stuff you need at the Home Depot.
posted by pjern at 5:53 PM PST - 32 comments

In 2010, nearly fifty years after her death, and more than a hundred years after she became the first person to sing on the radio, the remains of Eugenia Farrar were finally laid to rest. Fittingly, her porcelain memorial urn has her own recording of that first song -- "I Love You Truly" -- etched into its surface using a lathe (similar to the process used for early cylinder recordings). Laura LaPlaca's thoughtful essay -- musing on the materiality of this final remaining artifact of a historic broadcast that otherwise left little trace -- describes this final resting place as Farrar's "ashen physical remains protected by the materialized solid form of her voice." [more inside]
posted by orthicon halo at 4:47 PM PST - 2 comments

The Rocket Cat Café in Philadelphia has recently had to apologize for letting a naked guy walk around for an hour with the owner's permission. A misguided promotion for the Philly Naked Bike Ride, the naked man drew attention thanks to Sarah Grey (previously), who has written her side of the story. And if you're interested, there's also a (surprisingly not naughty) limerick.
posted by graymouser at 3:32 PM PST - 160 comments

A new London accent strikingly different from Cockney has emerged in the last few years. Linguists call it "Multicultural London English" (or MLE) and although it has obvious roots in the London black community it's now displacing Cockney to become a universal accent for working class London youth, regardless of race. Change is spreading so fast that London teens often have radically different accents from their own parents. [more inside]
posted by w0mbat at 3:05 PM PST - 70 comments

Macy Gray sings about her dear friend, Bob. He comes in all kinds of colors, but he had me at yellow. (SLYT, NSFW)
posted by Anonymous at 1:25 PM PST - 22 comments

I'm Getting Really Tired of Living In This Quaint English Village [YouTube] - Original published humor piece performed before a live audience by Mefi's own The Whelk [previously] via MetaFilter Projects. If you want to read the piece along with the performance, here it is as it appears in The Toast.
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 12:18 PM PST - 20 comments

Local chameleon overwhelms public with cuteness
posted by a lungful of dragon at 12:15 PM PST - 37 comments

Proceedings of the Natural Institute of Science is an open-access scientific journal with a mandate to publish papers from academics and non-academics alike. Boasting a strong peer review process and a high impact factor, it's only partly serious. (Previously)
posted by bismol at 10:40 AM PST - 8 comments

"Maybe the story is the difference between the writers on the panels and the writers in the audience. That story is the creation of a celebrity class. That story is the fine line between jealousy and envy: I want everything you have versus I want everything I can have. Or is the story simply vanity?" Choire Sicha of the Awl reports on (and attempts to schmooze through) the two-day New Yorker literary festival
posted by The Whelk at 10:40 AM PST - 4 comments

Sure, Her Story is great and all, but what if you want a classic cheesy FMV murder mystery game, full of scenery chewing and dodgy programming? Then you're in luck! Created by a Tim Follin, a long time video game composer, Contradiction: Spot the Liar! has spawned a bit of a cult following on the video game site Giant Bomb after Giant Bomb East did a Quick Look and was then so engrossed they recorded a supplemental Quick Look and is now continuing their playthrough as a premium feature (paywalled). The actors and producers have noticed the attention and have responded in kind, recording thank you videos and vines. They even (with the help of community members) managed to prank the GBeast podcast. [more inside]
posted by kmz at 10:39 AM PST - 10 comments

Herbalife is an MLM company that its detractors believe is nothing more than a pyramid scheme. But, John Hempton manager of Bronte Capital disagrees. In a long post he sets out why "it is the stock in the portfolio I am most proud to own. It is also the stock about whose long-term prospects I am most bullish."

20,000 words of economic analysis sounds a dry read. But think again, exploring the economics of this one peculiar company is a rabbit hole of fascinating portraits on globalisation, psychology and everyday life around the world.
posted by Another Fine Product From The Nonsense Factory at 10:30 AM PST - 54 comments

Copyright owners of the song "Happy Birthday" have built a stead yearly income of two million dollars a year by giving rights to use the song publicly for about $1500 per use. This copyright claim was fought in court recently, and a "smoking gun" was discovered in the process that places the public use of the song a number of years before the copyrighted work for hire, and as such, argue the plaintiff's lawyers, make the song conclusive in the public domain. Read more here. [more inside]
posted by SpacemanStix at 10:08 AM PST - 81 comments

The Rise of the Reducetarian (yup there's a word for that) Like tofurky? Thank a reducetarian. Part-time vegetarians are the ones driving vegan restaurants, vegetarian blogs and meat-free options at restaurants and grocery stores. [more inside]
posted by St. Peepsburg at 10:04 AM PST - 121 comments

Facebook's bias training: "There are different forms of unconscious bias that can prevent us from cultivating an inclusive and innovative workplace. In these videos, we discuss four common types of biases: Performance Bias, Performance Attribution Bias, Competence/Likeability Trade-off Bias, and Maternal Bias."
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:13 AM PST - 24 comments

Dear Design Student - In Praise of the AK-47 (NSFW language)

The AK-47 is often cited as a well-designed object. And this case is usually made by pointing out that the AK-47 is easy to use, maintain, take-apart, modify, and manufacture. It’s a model of simplicity. And the original design, introduced in 1948, is still in use, even as the AK family has continued evolving...

[more inside]
posted by SansPoint at 8:53 AM PST - 112 comments

'The Numskulls' is a comic strip that started way back in 1962 in the British comic The Beezer that is now published in The Beano. It may seem a bit familiar... what happens when the Numbskulls watch Inside Out?.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 8:36 AM PST - 8 comments

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced Monday that the White House will take advantage of a loophole in the 1994 law that banned incarcerated Americans from using Pell Grants to pay for college, "developing experimental sites that will make Pell grants available" to prisoners. [more inside]
posted by anotherpanacea at 8:35 AM PST - 16 comments

MovieBob Reviews: PIXELS [YouTube] [NSFW] [Adult Language]
posted by Fizz at 8:12 AM PST - 99 comments

Grindr: The Musical (somewhat NSFW) [more inside]
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 8:04 AM PST - 12 comments

Spirit of the Nation. The Guardian has invited readers to submit their uninspiring holiday photos. That is all.
posted by glasseyes at 7:36 AM PST - 49 comments

Feminist writer Anne Thériault of bad-date-tweeting fame posted a series of tweets about the deadly feminist animal in her natural habitat. Less than an hour later, voice actor D.C. Douglas transformed the static text into a David Attenborough-esque documentary narration.
posted by drlith at 7:29 AM PST - 10 comments

Sauna Mänual ov Finland Män – 7 Ruuls You Must Knou. Finland Män häv rispekt for thö Sauna. Thö wörld is kold, thö Sauna is worm. Tis is ofishöl Sauna Mänual ov Finland Män. [more inside]
posted by severiina at 7:05 AM PST - 30 comments

Metal band logo CAPTCHAs
posted by overeducated_alligator at 6:44 AM PST - 25 comments

Inside the world's quietest rooms
posted by slogger at 6:20 AM PST - 16 comments

"Using the Restroom: A Privilege—If You’re a Teacher" (SL Atlantic.com)
"Educators seldom have enough time to do their business. What’s that doing to the state of learning?" [more inside]
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 4:10 AM PST - 48 comments

How Berlin’s Futuristic Airport Became a $6 Billion Embarrassment. Inside Germany’s profligate (Greek-like!) fiasco called Berlin Brandenburg
On May 7, less than four weeks before the scheduled opening, Loge met with Schwarz for the first time. The airport, Schwarz conceded, would have to open using the army of human fire detectors. “Professor, let me understand this,” Loge said. “You are talking about having 800 people wearing orange vests, sitting on camping stools, holding thermoses filled with coffee, and shouting into their cell phones, ‘Open the fire door’?” Loge refused the airport an operating license. Schwarz stood up and walked out without another word. [more inside]
posted by moody cow at 2:58 AM PST - 35 comments

As Sayed and Waleed and the others describe their various demises, it strikes me that the key to making a living in Hollywood if you're Muslim is to be good at dying. If you're a Middle Eastern actor and you can die with charisma, there is no shortage of work for you. Jon Ronson in GQ on the Muslim-American actors who earn virtually their entire livings pretending to hijack planes and slaughter infidels. [Via.]
posted by chavenet at 2:07 AM PST - 11 comments

In a 2002 paper, history professor Richard Jensen claimed that Irish Americans had perpetuated a Myth of Victimization: "No Irish Need Apply" signs were "extremely rare or nonexistent" in the United States, and "Newspaper ads for men with NINA were exceedingly rare. " High school student Rebecca A. Fried recently debunked that argument in a paper of her own. Their debate continued in the comments of an Irish Central article.
posted by Knappster at 12:26 AM PST - 54 comments

"Humans as Superorganisms: How Microbes, Viruses, Imprinted Genes and Other Selfish Entities Shape Our Behavior" by Peter Kramer and Paola Bressan discusses the idea that an individual homo sapiens is only one component of the human superorganism we call a person, focusing on the psychological and psychiatric ramifications thereof. (Paola Bressan previously.)
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 8:28 PM PST - 17 comments

Sonic Seasoning

“Sound is the forgotten flavour sense,” says experimental psychologist Charles Spence. In this episode of Gastropod, we discover how manipulating sound can transform our experience of food and drink, making stale crisps taste fresh, adding the sensation of cream to black coffee, or boosting the savory, peaty notes in whiskey.

[more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 7:51 PM PST - 9 comments

Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly: "...the National Executive Board ratified a resolution that removes the national restriction on openly gay adult leaders and employees. Of those present and voting, 79 percent voted in favor of the resolution. The resolution is effective immediately."" [more inside]
posted by jquinby at 6:23 PM PST - 67 comments

"So you are in 13th century England and you’ve been accused of, or maybe have actually committed, a murder. To be taken into custody and tried would likely result in execution, so you need to go to ground, fast." What do you do? Run to a church and claim sanctuary! [more inside]
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 6:13 PM PST - 34 comments

We all need silly things in our lives, so courtesy of James Leyland Kirby (aka V/Vm), here's a classic tune reduced to its bare minimum: Workin' In A Cocktail Bar. [more inside]
posted by naju at 5:34 PM PST - 32 comments

The IBM Watson Personality Insights service uses linguistic analytics to extract a spectrum of cognitive and social characteristics from the text data that a person generates through blogs, tweets, forum posts, and more. Just enter a chunk of text with at least 100 recognized words and Watson will break down your (or Hitler's or Donald Trump's) personality compared to other participants. [more inside]
posted by Room 641-A at 5:29 PM PST - 80 comments

Inside a Dog Retirement Home [more inside]
posted by poffin boffin at 4:05 PM PST - 26 comments

"Who Killed Captain Alex: Uganda's First Action Movie was produced, written, directed, shot, and edited by Nabwana IGG from his home in Wakaliga, Uganda. Made for under $200 - using real blood and a modified car jack for a tripod - the film became a sensation in the slums of Uganda while the trailer went viral in Europe, South America, and the US." [more inside]
posted by brundlefly at 3:22 PM PST - 7 comments

"What you want to avoid is panic. What you want to teach yourself is that you deserve better than lying alone in a dark room, imagining yourself buried." || Diana Spechler for NYT's Opinionator: 10 Things I'd Tell My Former (Medicated) Self, the final installment in Going Off, a series of essays recounting the challenges Spechler has faced in gradually discontinuing her regimen of psychiatric medications.
posted by divined by radio at 2:39 PM PST - 59 comments

Earlier today, the US Olympic committee dropped the Boston 2024 bid. Local website Universal Hub provided extensive coverage of the ill-fated bid, from its beginnings to today's end. [more inside]
posted by pie ninja at 2:18 PM PST - 119 comments

The nine foot tall, 1 ton statue of Baphomet (discussed previously) has, at long last, been unveiled in Detroit! [more inside]
posted by Lemurrhea at 12:16 PM PST - 122 comments

Do you like Roguelikes? (Yes, you do.) Then you are going to enjoy this collection of over 700 free or open source Roguelikes available by torrent, the full set of which is listed here. Since its a torrent, I should mention that while everything seems legitimate here (Rock Paper Shotgun likes it, and the poster is a moderator on r/games and runs a highly regarded Steam group) from both a rights and a malware perspective, nothing is guaranteed. Suggestions among the 7 GB within... [more inside]
posted by blahblahblah at 11:49 AM PST - 38 comments

It's Not Climate Change, It's Everything Change by Margaret Atwood
posted by zabuni at 11:42 AM PST - 20 comments

Over a thousand scientists and public intellectuals, including Stephen Hawking, Daniel Dennett, Steve Wozniak, Noam Chomsky, and Elon Musk, have signed an open letter calling for a ban on the development and deployment of "offensive autonomous weapons beyond meaningful human control”, i.e., the coupling of autonomous Artificial Intelligence to weapons systems.
posted by Rumple at 11:28 AM PST - 83 comments

SLYTP. Does what it says on the tin.
posted by scrump at 11:16 AM PST - 16 comments

Nowadays, if you go to a McDonald's in San Diego, odds are you'll see the same menu as your cousin in Miami who happens to be at her local McD's. But back in the early days of franchising, companies often signed contracts letting franchisees considerable latitude in their menus. And some of those franchisees are still operating under those old, old contracts, including the Dairy Queen in Moorhead, Minnesota. [more inside]
posted by Etrigan at 11:00 AM PST - 69 comments

They are people—not cannon fodder or back patting lessons in how deep down we’re all the same. Moses is an imposing, intimidating figure but director Joe Cornish lets the camera linger on his face and Boyega fills it with the compromises and dashed dreams to which he’s already acclimated. His gang are a delightfully maddening crew of young boys. They constantly try to demonstrate their machismo but clearly adore each other.
posted by veedubya at 8:57 AM PST - 46 comments

Racist Readers Need Not Apply

Scott Vogel, editor-in-chief of Houstonia magazine, explains why he canceled the subscriptions of two readers who complained about an ad picturing an interracial family.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 8:00 AM PST - 133 comments

Man in Blue Suit Thanks Firefighters

For a second straight day, firefighting efforts at the Westside Road fire were the backdrop for political photo ops. Today, several federal politicians stood around waiting, occasionally wiping dirt from their clothing while sweaty, ash-covered, exhausted-looking firefighters surrounded them for the tightly controlled photo opportunity. Helicopters carrying empty buckets buzzed overhead and a steady stream of wildfire fighting aircraft circled prior to the event.

via: HuffPoCanada
posted by Fizz at 7:58 AM PST - 39 comments

The International Dialects of English Archive (IDEA) is a free, online archive of primary-source dialect and accent recordings of the English language. Founded in 1997 at the University of Kansas, it includes hundreds of recordings of English speakers by natives of nearly 100 different countries. To find an example of an accent or dialect, use the Global Map, or select a continent or region at the Dialects and Accents page. [more inside]
posted by zarq at 7:49 AM PST - 15 comments

The election of a new leader of the Labour Party looked like being a rather uninteresting affair with three candidates from the moderate to right wing of the party. A token leftie was added to open up the debate but he stood now chance... However against all expectation, that leftie, Jeremy Corbyn, is surging ahead in popularity and may actually win. Perhaps because unlike the other candidates Corbyn speaks like a human being and has anti-austerity policies that the public like. [more inside]
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 7:27 AM PST - 131 comments

Kate Clark is an artist who uses clay to sculpt human faces for taxidermied animals. You can easily browse the gallery by starting here and using the arrow navigation in the top right.
posted by phunniemee at 7:20 AM PST - 20 comments

Trees and trains and rain.
posted by Bee'sWing at 5:43 AM PST - 19 comments

A website for women who have been discriminated against whilst they were pregnant or after having a baby. 54,000 UK women a year are forced out of their jobs due to pregnancy. This doesn't include the women who are demoted, harassed, aren't put forward for promotion, or those that are self employed. Pregnant Then Screwed is a place for these women to tell their story anonymously. [more inside]
posted by biffa at 4:45 AM PST - 24 comments

If you feed your pet commercial pet food, there's a good chance the fish in it came from slave labor. "In the past year, Thai Union has shipped more than 28 million pounds of seafood-based cat and dog food for some of the top brands sold in America including Iams, Meow Mix and Fancy Feast, according to United States Customs documents."
posted by Yellow at 3:51 AM PST - 21 comments

Over on Tumblr, Jolly Good imagines an origin for Spider-Man more in keeping with modern times which the artist behind the all the things blog captures in a couple of key scenes.
posted by MartinWisse at 3:18 AM PST - 60 comments

Get your guit on. As chosen by the staff of Guitar Player. Rumble!
posted by Wolof at 2:54 AM PST - 51 comments

On this date in 1940 (that's exactly 75 years ago, bud), a new Merrie Melodies cartoon premiered: "A Wild Hare"; and Bugs Bunny was officially 'born'.
Warner Bros. had made previous cartoons with 'crazy rabbits' (or 'cwazy wabbits') before, but this one, directed by cartoon legend Tex Avery was the first one with the recognizable 'Bugs' character design and the first time Mel Blanc used Bugs' distinctive voice to say "What's up, doc?", as well as the first time Elmer Fudd, (voiced by Arthur Q. Bryan, NOT Blanc) said "Be vewy, vewy quiet, I'm hunting wabbits".
Happy Birthday, Bugsy, you sure don't look 75 (though you always were grey haired [hared]) [more inside]
posted by oneswellfoop at 1:38 AM PST - 19 comments

"Mossariums are simple, low maintenance and fun. They're durable and will last a long time. You can get moss from your backyard, from your favorite trips, or delivered in the mail. Here's all you need..." From Mefi's own jessamyn. [via mefi projects]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 10:12 PM PST - 30 comments

“I was very much into Freud and Jung when I was writing those books,” he says. “The whole point of Elric’s soul-eating sword, Stormbringer, was addiction: to sex, to violence, to big, black, phallic swords, to drugs, to escape. That’s why it went down so well in the rock’n’roll world.” - Michael Moorcock at 75 on his work, autobiographical fantasy, and why he thinks Tolkien was a crypto-fascist.
posted by Artw at 9:25 PM PST - 69 comments

At Home at the End of the World: The Long Defeat of Mike Mignola’s Hellboy
posted by the man of twists and turns at 7:48 PM PST - 26 comments

‘I’m No Longer Afraid’: 35 Women Tell Their Stories About Being Assaulted by Bill Cosby, and the Culture That Wouldn’t Listen (trigger warning: sexual assault) SL longform New York Magazine. [archive.org saved version here]
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 6:46 PM PST - 177 comments

Seminal post-modern choreographer Sally Gross has died at 81: "Because that's what we exist on, is the breath. It's the inhale and the exhale that guarantees us that we're living. And it's only because we're alive that we can even take on the idea of performing." [more inside]
posted by an animate objects at 6:46 PM PST - 1 comment

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law by George H.W. Bush on July 26, 1990. [more inside]
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 5:46 PM PST - 18 comments

In conjunction with tonight's season 2 premier, the creators of Rick and Morty have launched what's being called the world's first Instagram game, the Rickstaverse. The game is a click-through Easter Egg hunt through dozens of Instagram accounts full of comic strips, videos, and jokes. [more inside]
posted by elr at 4:54 PM PST - 8 comments

Sometimes I wanna take you down, sometimes I wanna get you low. 'Cause you're a human supernova. I'm looking for answers from the great beyond. You're older than you've ever been, and now you're even older. Oh, get off the air! I'm on the stereo, stereo. Now check-ch-check-check-check-ch-check it out: It's 90s Bands on TV. [more inside]
posted by divined by radio at 2:17 PM PST - 29 comments

Loop - Pool on an elliptical table. The ellipse has two significant points, called focuses, which have a remarkable geometrical property that is almost always explained using the example of an imaginary pool table. "If a pool table is the shape of an ellipse, then a ball shot from one focus will always rebound to the other focus no matter in which direction the ball is shot." That sounded interesting! Wouldn’t it be fun, I thought, if I could build one of these imaginary tables? So I did.
posted by dng at 1:54 PM PST - 21 comments

Jara – who was also a folk singer, theatre director and communist party member - was taken prisoner during the coup by General Augusto Pinochet in September 1973. Military officers tortured him, broke his wrists and hands, played Russian roulette with him and then on 16 September executed him with 44 bullets. [more inside]
posted by MrJM at 12:45 PM PST - 21 comments

To celebrate the 30th anniversary of Pee-Wee's Big Adventure, he's just posted some never-before-seen photos from the set of that classic comedy. Time to hit play on the movie, or perhaps enjoy a very rare promotional song by Pee-Wee and his friend Allee Willis! Of course, for the more literary inclined, you could always pick up an interesting book on the subject. Viva Pee-Wee!
posted by ktoad at 12:41 PM PST - 49 comments

The Cogmind roguelike has entered its alpha release. [more inside]
posted by neuromodulator at 12:33 PM PST - 9 comments

As she's laid to rest, questions remain about whether her arrest was good policing, a bail system that is especially harsh on the poor, the stigma of marijuana use, treatment of depression and, of course, the long history of American racism, as seen in Waller County, Texas, were the initial incident occurred. [more inside]
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 12:26 PM PST - 175 comments

Sometimes successful (historically) mailing one's self is not a good plan: Whether to escape slavery or merely the cost of a plane ticket, people have been trying for over a century and a half to package themselves like so many rolls of toilet paper from Amazon.
posted by sammyo at 12:06 PM PST - 14 comments

The Dog of Wisdom. [YT, WTF] [more inside]
posted by Countess Elena at 11:31 AM PST - 13 comments

“This is our final season – and it’s not because of Comedy Central, it’s us,” said Key. “It was just time for us to explore other things, together and apart. I compare it to Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor. We might make a movie and then do our own thing for three years and then come back and do another movie. [more inside]
posted by riruro at 10:14 AM PST - 23 comments

How to build an air conditioner in under 15 minutes. How to build a slightly fancier portable version.

*Okay, technically they're air coolers, but still.
posted by Room 641-A at 9:56 AM PST - 26 comments

How the Nordic far-right has stolen the left’s ground on welfare
posted by lalochezia at 9:15 AM PST - 23 comments

If you're a long time user of Steam, you might assume that the current top selling game would be a AAA blockbuster, or maybe a half-finished multiplayer survival game. But for the past few weeks, the gaming world has been completely gripped by a game about cars playing soccer. [more inside]
posted by selfnoise at 9:05 AM PST - 22 comments

"Democracy is not a game. It is not a means of getting our names on the front page or setting the world abuzz about our latest scoop."
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 8:43 AM PST - 46 comments

Jamaal Charles, star running back for the NFL's Kansas City Chiefs, offers an inspiring speech at the opening ceremony of the Special Olympics. He discusses the influence competing in the Special Olympics had on his own life as he struggled with a learning disability as a boy.
posted by Drinky Die at 8:18 AM PST - 4 comments

Jeff Wysaski, the comedian behind Obvious Plant, recently pranked a grocery store by leaving a series of funny tips for shoppers in order to make their grocery experience more memorable.
posted by hippybear at 8:17 AM PST - 12 comments

If this is a real picture of the Brontës, then I'm Heathcliff! [The Guardian] A collector is convinced that the £15 photograph he snapped up on eBay is of the Brontë sisters. It’s highly unlikely, but the story is a mark of our enduring fascination with the literary family. Plus, a Brontë Society expert gives her verdict. Could this be the only photograph of the three Brontë sisters? asked Seamus Molloy [Daily Mail], who picked the photograph up for 15 quid on eBay.
posted by Fizz at 7:46 AM PST - 8 comments

An Oral History of TT The Bear's The legendary Cambridge, MA rock club has closed after a months long blowout\wake. Opened in 1981 as a restaurant, when Central Square was still a no-man's land between Harvard and MIT, blighted by urban decay and suburban flight, the venue was soon rebooted as a rock club and soon joined the Rathskellar, the Channel and The Middle East as one of a small group of independent venues that functioned as an incubator for 90s icons such as The Magnetic Fields, Tanya Donnelly, Galaxie 500, Letters to Cleo and, of course, the Pixies. [more inside]
posted by bl1nk at 6:48 AM PST - 17 comments

Near empty trains rattle around the countryside at odd hours of the day and night... Why Britain has secret ghost trains [more inside]
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:46 AM PST - 32 comments

Veteran actor George Coe has died at the age of 86. His final role of note was as the voice of Woodhouse on "Archer" so the producers made a little tribute. Still, he did a lot before that. [more inside]
posted by oneswellfoop at 12:00 AM PST - 46 comments

Stephen "Increpare" Lavelle - creator of many strange free games, one-going-on-two strange paid ones, the sound effect generator Bfxr and the excellent tile-based puzzle game engine PuzzleScript - released three much simpler game makers a couple of months ago: Flickgame, Tinychoice and Plingpling. Flickgame and Plingpling have help pages, each with an example game; Tinychoice needs no help page and starts with an example game in the text box. More detailed info after the break. [more inside]
posted by BiggerJ at 10:16 PM PST - 6 comments

It's been over 100 years since the common cup for public water fountains was banned, reducing their health risks. But we don't trust drinking fountains anymore—and "it’s making us poorer, less healthy and less green." [more inside]
posted by MonkeyToes at 7:31 PM PST - 68 comments

Mark Volman (in orange, wielding a French horn) totally owning a performance of Happy Together. [more inside]
posted by phunniemee at 6:36 PM PST - 45 comments

Rarely does a newspaper story get the kind of response that The New York Times front-page exposé of wage-theft at nail salons prompted this spring.... But was it true? [more inside]
posted by Shmuel510 at 5:53 PM PST - 35 comments

Comic Con Man: A true crime tale of comic books, corruption, and a $9 million vanishing act
posted by Horace Rumpole at 5:23 PM PST - 6 comments

"In the early 1990s, about 50 kindergarten teachers rated the social and communication skills of 753 children in their classrooms. It was part of the Fast Track Project, a study administered in Durham, N.C., Nashville, Seattle and central Pennsylvania….Using an assessment tool called the “Social Competence Scale,” the teachers assigned each child a score based on qualities that included “cooperates with peers without prompting”; “is helpful to others”; “is very good at understanding feelings”... This month, researchers from Pennsylvania State University and Duke published a study that looked at what happened to those students in the 13 to 19 years since they left kindergarten. Their findings warrant major attention because the teachers’ rankings were extremely prescient."
posted by storybored at 5:04 PM PST - 22 comments

The last remaining Inca rope bridge is the Q'eswachaka, spanning the Apurimac River in Peru. Even though there is a modern bridge nearby, the residents of the region keep the ancient tradition and skills alive by renewing the bridge annually, in June. Several family groups have each prepared a number of grass-ropes to be formed into cables at the site, others prepare mats for decking, and the reconstruction is a communal effort. In 2009 the government recognized the bridge and its maintenance as part of the cultural heritage of Peru.
posted by growabrain at 5:02 PM PST - 17 comments

It's been a while since we took to the rails together so it's time to buy our tickets and climb aboard for another trip around the world in the drivers cab. [more inside]
posted by jontyjago at 3:47 PM PST - 8 comments

Hacking Team: A Zero-Day Market Case Study
posted by alby at 3:10 PM PST - 12 comments

Postmodern Jukebox (previously) has posted their most recent cover, which takes Fiona Apple's classic "Criminal" and creates a 1940's torch song with the assistance of some mean horns and the sultry stylings of Jazz singer Ariana Savalas .
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 2:24 PM PST - 23 comments

AlunaGeorge - You Know You Like It [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 11:32 AM PST - 10 comments

Adventure Time with Snoop & Dogg - Graweedy Falls - Stweed Smokeverse - Smokémon - Nichijoint - My Ordinary Weed
Whaddaya mean previously?! [more inside]
posted by JHarris at 10:17 AM PST - 16 comments

What were snakes doing before they lost their legs? A new fossil discovery of an early snake with four tiny, stubby legs might shed some light on that question. Assuming it really is a snake, of course. However, the status of this fossil as a specimen from a private collection raises ethical questions. This is likely to be an illegally obtained specimen, like 2012's controversial Tarbosaurus bataar (previously, previously). Is it ethical for Science to promote findings from unethically sourced fossils when these are an increasing problem for paleontology? (Previously, previously.)
posted by sciatrix at 10:13 AM PST - 22 comments

Looking for a great soundtrack for your Saturday? Yesterday, to celebrate the 26th anniversary of the release of the seminal album, Seattle radio station KEXP spent 12 hours playing every song sampled on the Paul's Boutique. The station's streaming archive of the show will be available for the next 2 weeks and is filled with history and interviews interspersed with a pretty eclectic mix of some fine music. [more inside]
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 9:27 AM PST - 26 comments

A never-before-released set of photos show the anxiety of the Bush administration as it reacted to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The documentarian Colette Neirouz Hanna, whose work with PBS has focused on the Bush administration, received the photos in response to a freedom of information request. They were taken by the vice-president’s staff photographer. The full set is on Flickr: 1, 2, 3, 4
posted by biffa at 8:44 AM PST - 75 comments

SPECTRE [YouTube] [Trailer]
posted by Fizz at 7:34 AM PST - 84 comments

Has geek culture finally embraced gender parity? [SLGuardian] [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 7:09 AM PST - 39 comments

If sheep could sing reggae, they might sing reggae like this.
posted by orange swan at 3:43 AM PST - 18 comments

"Women told Microsoft the animated paper clip was leering at them. The software company didn’t listen." -- the story of Microsoft's Clippy.
posted by MartinWisse at 2:00 AM PST - 100 comments

Do you like your jazz to be Norah Jones or Ornette Coleman, your classical music to be Bach or Stravinsky, or your rock to be Coldplay or Slayer? The answer could give an insight into the way you think, say researchers from the University of Cambridge. Forget the eyes, music is the window into the soul.
posted by moonlily at 10:13 PM PST - 50 comments

A translator's struggle to export Seinfeld to Germany. How could she possibly translate the episode where Jerry doesn't know the name of the woman he's dating, but only knows it "rhymes with a female body part"? [more inside]
posted by John Cohen at 9:15 PM PST - 67 comments

Enjoy the Artisanal Landlord Price Hike Sale! "Everything in the store was also two-and-a-half times its original price, a nod to an impending rent increase that would send the store’s monthly payments skyrocketing from $4,000 to $10,000."
posted by bswinburn at 8:15 PM PST - 19 comments

Bismuth is element 83.

I do not think I will see my 83rd birthday, but I feel there is something hopeful, something encouraging, about having “83” around. Moreover, I have a soft spot for bismuth, a modest gray metal, often unregarded, ignored, even by metal lovers. My feeling as a doctor for the mistreated or marginalized extends into the inorganic world and finds a parallel in my feeling for bismuth.

Oliver Sacks on dying. (SLNYT)
posted by gaspode at 7:43 PM PST - 20 comments

Cats vs. Ssscat
posted by phunniemee at 6:26 PM PST - 86 comments

Hulk Hogan is perhaps the most famous professional wrestler in history (though the Rock is working on that). Over the last three decades, he led the WWF to dominance, nearly destroyed it by signing with rival promotion WCW, came to an uneasy detente while working for not-even-close-to-rival promotion TNA, and finally made a triumphant return to the since-renamed WWE, culminating in hosting duties at last year's WrestleMania XXX. He was even claiming that he was training for one final match, perhaps at next year's WrestleMania 32 in AT&T Stadium in Texas. But then the National Enquirer got hold of a transcript of a sex tape wherein Hogan uses the N-word three or four times while discussing his daughter's sex life. [more inside]
posted by Etrigan at 6:20 PM PST - 112 comments

Got Rhythm? Prove it as you try to keep the beat after it fades out (minimal sound content) in this web widget from the hotel (?) site that brought you last year's Superstar Vocal Range Chart.
posted by oneswellfoop at 4:39 PM PST - 36 comments

Of all the great back catalogs in the history of rock, Bob Dylan’s is among the most covered, his acolytes ranging from The Byrds to Adele via Manfred Mann and Guns N’ Roses. But something tells us you haven’t heard anything quite like Dylan’s Gospel by The Brothers and Sisters, a choir of Los Angeles session singers brought gloriously to the fore for a very special, one-off record. [more inside]
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 4:36 PM PST - 17 comments

Chase scenes from forty-six films edited into one (slv) (via)
posted by octothorpe at 12:57 PM PST - 49 comments

One hundred years ago today, the SS Eastland, about to set out for a company picnic in Indiana, tipped over at its dock in the Chicago River with over 2,500 people aboard. Eight hundred and forty-four of them died in one of the worst non-military maritime disasters in American history. The Chicago Tribune has published some previously unseen photographs of the recovery efforts. [warning: a couple of these are potentially disturbing] [more inside]
posted by theodolite at 12:26 PM PST - 39 comments

"After surviving one of the most high-profile and long-running school sex abuse scandals in history, a group of 32 men and women banded together to seek solace and justice — only to find that public outrage, a star attorney, and overwhelming evidence are no match for a legal process stacked against even the most privileged or traumatized." - Sam Roudman
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:24 AM PST - 13 comments

Jurassic Park: High Heels Edition. You loved the endless running in high heels in Jurassic World... Now enjoy them in the entire Jurassic series!
posted by blue_beetle at 7:29 AM PST - 54 comments

@mothgenerator is a Twitter account from poet and artist Katie Rose Pipkin and game maker Loren Schmidt that shares their fantastic bot-generated digital moths. Boingboing article here. [more inside]
posted by taz at 6:09 AM PST - 8 comments

"Games offer a way to simulate and view complex systems from the outside, to pick them up and play with them as a child might play with a toy machine, to understand what they are able to do and where they are broken." Bea Malsky at The New Inquiry writes about casual time management gaming, Marxism, affective/emotional labor, worker alienation, and whether just maybe Diner Dash is doing subversive feminist work.
posted by Stacey at 6:07 AM PST - 25 comments

GSK, Gates Foundation, PATH, 30 years ,500 Million later and perhaps even affordable.
posted by rmhsinc at 5:30 AM PST - 16 comments

July 24th is the date when the Mormon settlers first arrived in the Salt Lake Valley. Commemorated as Pioneer Day, it's a day off work that is tied to a specific belief system. But non-Mormons in Utah also want to observe the holiday, and so July 24th became Pie And Beer Day. The Salt Lake Tribune article provides more background.
posted by hippybear at 3:29 AM PST - 37 comments

She's every decade, Chaka Khan! Start and end your weekend with her and you can’t go wrong. She can tell you something good in the '70s. In the '80s, she feels for you, in one of the most danceable songs ever. In the '90s Chaka was Every Woman, and tonight I found this: with a good band including Mark Stephens, Vinnie Colaiuta, Melvin Lee Davis and Andy Winer, she makes you shiver with her cover of Joni Mitchell's Man from mars.
posted by goofyfoot at 1:08 AM PST - 30 comments

Thinking of hiring a stretch limo for that graduation, prom, wedding or some other event? Top tip! If you do, perhaps don't try and drive it over a level crossing. Especially on a rail line used by trains hauling a "ten thousand ton" load. (Video features train collision with unoccupied vehicle, amateur video production effects). As in the Telegraph, Jalopnik, ABC news and Car Buzz. And a follow-up video by the county sheriff.
posted by Wordshore at 10:32 PM PST - 53 comments

In 1865, a customised tea clipper called the Mimosa delivered around 150 Welsh men, women and children to an uninhabited corner of southern Argentina. Today, in far corners of Patagonia, Welsh culture and language still survive.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:14 PM PST - 17 comments

Islam Chipsy is a virtuoso keyboard player, using a synth to extend the traditions of Arabic music. listen, listen, listen and enjoy.
posted by idiopath at 9:22 PM PST - 22 comments

‘Leaving the Faith’: Faigy Mayer’s struggle in her own words
On Monday evening, a 30-year-old Jewish woman named Faigy Mayer fell to her death from a rooftop bar just one block from Tablet’s offices in Manhattan. The event was reported as a suicide... At the very least, we hope that publishing this article under her byline enables Faigy Mayer to have something of a legacy—in her own words. [more inside]
posted by davidstandaford at 6:39 PM PST - 69 comments

A short comic about sensory deprivation by Lucy Bellwood (NSFW: drawn nudity)
posted by Elementary Penguin at 6:33 PM PST - 28 comments

Photographer Shoots Powerful (and Sexy) Nude Portraits of Amputee Veterans. More Michael Stokes photography. NSFW.
posted by Jacqueline at 3:34 PM PST - 19 comments

“Possibly, the person who ends up being gored or attacked is maybe not the one who is harassing the animal,” Bartlett said, according to CNN. The animal “may have been approached all day long … eventually the animal reaches its breaking point and charges people.”
posted by altersego at 3:08 PM PST - 119 comments

Why Is It So Hard to Get a Great Bagel in California? [New York Times] San Francisco bakeries have tried and tried again to replicate the chewy, crusty perfection of New York’s specialty. They are still trying. [more inside]
posted by Fizz at 2:30 PM PST - 132 comments

Jennifer Pan’s Revenge: the inside story of a golden child, the killers she hired, and the parents she wanted dead. - Karen K. Ho writing for Toronto Life magazine [via tabs]
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:10 PM PST - 28 comments

The Best Books of 2015 (So Far) By Christian Lorentzen at Vulture. "These ten stand out as having made an especially remarkable impression on the past half-year." [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 1:49 PM PST - 13 comments

"At my former American job, I received 10 days of paid vacation per year, and each of those days came with a sizable portion of guilt if actually used."
posted by kpraslowicz at 1:16 PM PST - 177 comments

Super fun, pre-animated, sometimes looping, customizable Fake User Interface assets.
posted by nebulawindphone at 1:06 PM PST - 19 comments

Most people are familiar with the handkerchief code, which uses different colors of bandannas[NSFW: sexual language] to signal coded messages between queer people. Mostly the province of gay men in the 1970s, today femmes of all gender identities are bringing flagging back in a new movement known as "femme flagging", a way to use style to fight heteronormativity and invisibility in the queer community. While most femmes "finger flag" with nail polish, Queer Fat Femme offers a few more suggestions as well as some conversation starters in the event you see someone else femme flagging.
posted by Juliet Banana at 12:40 PM PST - 44 comments

19 Slides that explain solar power generation for homes.
posted by storybored at 12:31 PM PST - 20 comments

Obsessively Detailed Map of American Literature's Most Epic Road Trips

"The...map is the result of a painstaking and admittedly quixotic effort to catalog the country as it has been described in the American road-tripping literature. It includes every place-name reference in 12 books about cross-country travel...and maps the authors' routes on top of one another. You can track an individual writer's descriptions of the landscape as they traveled across it, or you can zoom in to see how different authors have written about the same place at different times."

[more inside]
posted by kirkaracha at 11:26 AM PST - 20 comments

"Is This the End of Christianity in the Middle East? ISIS and other extremist movements across the region are enslaving, killing and uprooting Christians, with no aid in sight." --a comprehensive piece by Eliza Griswold (SLNYTMP.)
posted by resurrexit at 11:03 AM PST - 38 comments

Since LeBron James has made his film debut, it is now possible to link every player in NBA history to nearly every actor in film history through him in an expanded version of the Kevin Bacon Game. Sure, Kareem and Shaq, among others, might have bridged this particular media gap already, but they didn't have a web app making it easy to figure out how Russell Westbrook connects to Clint Eastwood or Dolph Schayes to Dolph Lundgren. (previously: Erdős-Bacon numbers and Erdős-Bacon-Sabbath numbers) [more inside]
posted by Copronymus at 10:31 AM PST - 34 comments

Why I Deleted Your Band's Promo Email (SLTumblr)
posted by Faint of Butt at 10:12 AM PST - 50 comments

Check it! We may have been mistranslating the first word of Beowulf for 200 years.
posted by Iridic at 9:49 AM PST - 63 comments

A Zoomorphic Performance: Joaquin Phoenix in P.T. Anderson’s The Master, Daniel Fairfax [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:32 AM PST - 11 comments

Princeton researchers have discovered a long-theorized, never-observed variety of massless (quasi)-particle called the Weyl fermion. Exciting things to come maybe! (Bat-signal: expert.) [more inside]
posted by Zerowensboring at 9:26 AM PST - 25 comments

The History (and Psychology) of Creepy Dolls [more inside]
posted by Miko at 9:12 AM PST - 17 comments

The Avery Needle Case Resource Center is your comprehensive source for information about brass needle cases created by the W. Avery & Son company between 1868 and 1890. [more inside]
posted by jedicus at 8:35 AM PST - 9 comments

The Twitter account Diana_Vreeland pays tribute to the celebrated fashion editor/social maven by coming up with colorful suggestions for how to live your life.
posted by The Whelk at 8:27 AM PST - 16 comments

For most of us, the internet is functionally a necessity, with much of our lives lived on or enabled by the Web. But for the disabled, the internet is too often an unfriendly, inaccessible place, with many sites and services not being designed to support accessibility. But Web accessibility needs to be for everyone, in our ever more connected world, not only from the standpoint of letting the disabled into an increasingly important public accommodation, but because accessibility is just good design. (SLSlate)
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:02 AM PST - 32 comments

A photo of deformed daisies taken near Fukushima has recently gone viral. As serious as the Fukushima disaster is (previously), these particular deformities were probably not caused by radiation, and similar mutations have been found in a variety of plant species all over the world. The condition is known as fasciation or cristation, it has a number of potential causes, and it can look pretty cool. In some plants it's even a desired trait: the cockscomb celosia, aka "brain flower", is deliberately cultivated for its fasciated blooms.
posted by Metroid Baby at 7:56 AM PST - 26 comments

In the wake of Donald Trump giving out his phone number, Senator Lindsay Graham decides to take action. And for those of you wondering, yes, Graham still uses a flip phone.
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 7:44 AM PST - 219 comments

TOP QUALITY PROFESSIONAL SEEKS ALL POSITIONS. By Kate Nacy at McSweeny's Internet Tendency. Previously.
posted by artsandsci at 6:26 AM PST - 11 comments

It will be Barack Obama’s first visit to the land of his father as American president and a far cry from a 1988 trip when his luggage got lost. Obama will be visiting only Kenya and Ethiopia. Yet each is the base for two Africa-wide trends. In Ethiopia, he will give a speech at the headquarters of the 54-nation African Union, the main body trying to lift the standards of governance among its members. But the White House appears more focused on Kenya, which is Africa’s center of innovation and host to a global “summit” of entrepreneurs.
posted by Sir Rinse at 5:25 AM PST - 14 comments

Next week is pride week in Sweden and even social conservatives are getting in on the fun. The catch? They intend to host an LGBT pride parade through suburbs which contain large muslim immigrant populations. Left-wing activists have called the pride parade a racist attempt to offend muslims and are planning a counter-demonstration. The protest is organised, by Jan Sjunnesson, a journalist closely associated with the the anti-immigration right-wing Swedish Democratic party. In recent opinion polls the party polled 23.3% which, if followed in elections would make them Sweden's second largest political party. The party is linked with fascism and the far right (associations they would dispute) (NB:Google Translate links) [more inside]
posted by Another Fine Product From The Nonsense Factory at 3:50 AM PST - 77 comments

If you're tired of the endlessly minor variations of TV's Police Procedural shows (seriously, "CSI: Cyber"?!?), check out "The Encyclopedia of Hypothetical Police Procedurals" for great non-existent shows including... [more inside]
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:07 AM PST - 42 comments

Ever wanted to get lost in a piece of art or feel like you're inside an anime? LA-based art duo kozyndan posted an immersive "VR" experience of their 2009 Miyazaki-esque piece "Nakano In Spring". (More info on the original piece is here) [more inside]
posted by raihan_ at 11:57 PM PST - 7 comments

Slavutich was built starting in 1986 to house misplaced inhabitants of Pripyat and the surrounding area of the Chernobyl disaster, including workers of the plant. More modern than many of Ukraine's other cities, it enjoyed a historical high birth rate and standard of living. Since the start of decommissioning of the plant, the city of over 25,000 connected by Chernobyl via railway has lost 2,000 people "and more are following. In 2015, the new sarcophagus over the infamous reactor No. 4 will be finished, further slashing jobs in the exclusion zone. Is Slavutich set to be the final victim of Chernobyl?"_{(from 1st link)} [more inside]
posted by daninnj at 10:21 PM PST - 3 comments

In 2012 the genetics company 23andme gave web app developers the ability to create app mashups with DNA information. Most apps help users add genetics to their electronic health record, or connect with relatives, or explore risk factors for diseases. Two days ago a new webapp did something different: it showed how to only let white people in. [more inside]
posted by Monochrome at 8:35 PM PST - 58 comments

Black users on Vine: celebrating blackness 6 seconds at a time. [more inside]
posted by standardasparagus at 7:02 PM PST - 9 comments

NASA will host a news teleconference at noon EDT Thursday, July 23 (livestream) to announce new discoveries made by its planet-hunting mission, the Kepler Space Telescope.

"The first exoplanet orbiting another star like our sun was discovered in 1995. Exoplanets, especially small Earth-size worlds, belonged within the realm of science fiction just 21 years ago. Today, and thousands of discoveries later, astronomers are on the cusp of finding something people have dreamed about for thousands of years -- another Earth."
posted by jayCampbell at 6:49 PM PST - 82 comments

How Bea Arthur Became a Champion for Homeless LGBT Youth, by Carl Siciliano, Executive Director of the Ali Forney Center.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 6:49 PM PST - 21 comments

What do "You Were Always On My Mind" and "The Letter" have in common? They were both written by Wayne Carson who passed away at the age of 72.
posted by HuronBob at 6:47 PM PST - 11 comments

A single-serving tumblr.
posted by kenko at 5:43 PM PST - 44 comments

Sizzler and the Search for the American Dream :: Inside the paper was another brick, bright yellow-orange and vacuum-sealed in plastic. We had never seen food that color before. We had never eaten anything that perfectly geometric. It sat in our fridge for days, like an unwelcome guest that never said anything. It just sat there without a word of explanation. We had staring contests every day. The cheese always won. I always had to blink. [more inside]
posted by anastasiav at 4:16 PM PST - 65 comments

Tweeted Love - A solo pun jam (slyt)
posted by howfar at 3:45 PM PST - 6 comments

New to anime? Looking for the highlights? Try Glass Reflection's Top 25-ish Recommended Anime. [more inside]
posted by MartinWisse at 2:54 PM PST - 153 comments

From Steinbeck to Cervantes: Confessing Our Literary Gaps by Sarah Galo, Elon Green [Hazlitt] Authors, journalists, and assorted literary stalwarts tell us why they’ve missed the famous books they’ve missed. [more inside]
posted by Fizz at 2:23 PM PST - 77 comments

On January 3rd, 1961, three men died when the US Army's SL-1 experimental nuclear reactor melted down. It was the first fatal reactor incident in the US. But was it an accident? Or murder?
posted by Chrysostom at 2:07 PM PST - 47 comments

The British Movietone archive of nearly fifty thousand newsreel films is now on YouTube. Movietone started making newsreels in 1929 and stopped fifty years later. You can find clips about nearly any subject, women's rights, space exploration, and sports. The archive has a number of playlists, including one where archivist Jenny Hammerton presents clips she finds interesting. But, I hear you say, do they have cute cat videos? Yes. Also, a parachuting dog and jokes about Hitler. Also now availabe, the Associated Press Archive of more than 170 thousand video clips. The Guardian has a list of interesting clips from both archives.
posted by Kattullus at 1:51 PM PST - 5 comments

Is this a selfie?
posted by alms at 1:51 PM PST - 76 comments

"There are many age-old questions that have plagued humanity since the dawn of time; where did the universe come from? Is there really a god? What on earth is going on with Donald Trump's hair?

"But scientists have now answered one of these great unknowns; what makes a good-looking penis?"

Scientists claim they've worked out what makes the perfect penis [NSFW] - The Independent [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 1:16 PM PST - 95 comments

Baroque Bohemian Cats’ Tarot

Via tabbycat via filthy light thief via zarq
posted by y2karl at 1:08 PM PST - 13 comments

Forbidden City: Uncle Sam’s Mystery Town Directed by “2nd Einstein” [more inside]
posted by honestcoyote at 1:08 PM PST - 6 comments

E. L. Doctorow, author of Ragtime, died Tuesday. He was 84. [more inside]
posted by tzikeh at 11:54 AM PST - 40 comments

* (Not really, but they would have if they had given it any thought) Mosey Sumney does an improvised cover of Laurie Anderson's O Superman. He doesn't attempt the verses, but it is still going to the top of my summer playlist.
posted by rtimmel at 11:53 AM PST - 16 comments

One sousaphone ruins an entire KKK march.
posted by Evilspork at 11:14 AM PST - 72 comments

PICO-8 is a fantasy console for making, sharing and playing tiny games and other computer programs. When you turn it on, the machine greets you with a shell for typing in Lua commands and provides simple built-in tools for creating your own cartridges.

What does that mean? PICO-8 is like an emulator for a lo-fi game console that never actually existed. With 16 colors, 128x128, 4 channels of sound, and tight data limits, PICO-8 "cartridges" can be played -- and created -- in a web browser, or on just about any home computer, and even inside maker Lexaloffle's other, more full-featured fantasy console, Voxatron. [more inside]
posted by grobstein at 11:08 AM PST - 61 comments

Dayna Evans writes about Taylor Swift for Gawker: [T]he part of Taylor’s persona that doesn’t get talked about enough [is that] she is a ruthless, publicly capitalist pop star. To think of her as womanhood incarnate is to trick oneself into forgetting about “Bad Blood” and “Better Than Revenge.” Swift isn’t here to help women—she’s here to make bank… Her plan—to be as famous and as rich as she can possibly be—is working, and by using other women as tools of her self-promotion, she is distilling feminism for her own benefit. [more inside]
posted by Going To Maine at 11:04 AM PST - 172 comments

Internet firebrand/comedian/awesome feminist Lindy West on being a fat bride. Late last year, West also wrote a post about being a fat bride and how people seem to think fat women don't get married: "It’s an aggressively entrenched paradigm that I’ve only recently managed to excise from my own psyche – me, the feminist killjoy shrew – so I really can’t begrudge anyone that initial reaction. But, every time, the subtext is clear: you are reaching above your station, fat lady." [more inside]
posted by Kitteh at 11:00 AM PST - 49 comments

21 Potato Chip Flavors That Have Absolutely No Right Being a Thing (SLPleatedJeans)
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 10:38 AM PST - 104 comments

4K displays may be pretty, but how can they possibly compete with an 80x80 display that generates tens of thousands of volts of static electricity while rendering images entirely out of thread? [more inside]
posted by tocts at 10:11 AM PST - 26 comments

"We're still trying to eliminate sweatshops and child labor by buying right. But that's not how the world works in 2015." - Michael Hobbes [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:24 AM PST - 44 comments

Jaya Saxena takes a look at how energy drinks through the ages have gotten humanity JACKED UP. [more inside]
posted by divined by radio at 8:52 AM PST - 50 comments

Why did Space X have a bad day and not go into space recently? Scott Manley explains it all, in a soothing tone and with MS Paint drawings.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:34 AM PST - 37 comments

Everything I Am Afraid Might Happen If I Ask New Acquaintances to Get Coffee
posted by showbiz_liz at 6:07 AM PST - 88 comments

Knock knock!
   Who's there?
Norns
   Norns who?
Nordstrom! [more inside]
posted by cortex at 5:50 AM PST - 50 comments

After a failed attempt to overthrow the president of Gambia in December 2014, the US authorities charged two middle-class Americans from Texas and Minnesota. But why did they think they could succeed?
posted by Stark at 1:47 AM PST - 31 comments

Yuri Milner gives $100 million to buoy the search for extraterrestrial life.
posted by delight at 10:49 PM PST - 71 comments

The transformation of Synanon, founded by Charles E. Dederich, from drug rehabilitation program to wealthy, violent cult. Stripped of its tax exempt status and formally disbanded in 1991 (Dederich himself died in 1997), the downward spiral began in 1978 when two members of Synanon's "Imperial Marines" were charged with the attempted murder of attorney Paul Morantz -- via a rattlesnake in his mailbox. [more inside]
posted by automatic cabinet at 9:26 PM PST - 39 comments

Theodore Bikel, multilingual troubadour, character actor and social activist who created the role of Baron von Trapp in the original Broadway production of “The Sound of Music” and toured for decades as Tevye in “Fiddler on the Roof,” died on Tuesday in Los Angeles. The prolific Tony- and Oscar-nominated actor and singer was an artist of many passions. He also was once a guest on Buckley's Firing Line to discuss student unrest.
posted by Sir Rinse at 8:49 PM PST - 29 comments

The presentation that sold ABC on a new Muppet Show.
posted by sutt at 7:19 PM PST - 98 comments

Kiwi Nigel Richards wins French Scrabble contest, doesn't even speak French. - Finale [more inside]
posted by unliteral at 6:45 PM PST - 32 comments

"Mile... Mile & a Half" is the answer that hikers give when you ask 'How far from here to there?', according to this documentary: Five artists/friends left their daily lives behind to hike California’s historic John Muir Trail, a 211-mile stretch from Yosemite to Mt. Whitney. The trip lasted 25 days and was funded by a successful kickstarter campaign a few years ago. The movie will wake the wanderlust feelings in you, and is available on the usual channels.
posted by growabrain at 6:02 PM PST - 11 comments

Blair Bogin is a Chicago based performance and visual artist who creates videos/performances about things like living in your apartment, playing Rock Paper Scissors, and monologues on putting things in your mouth. [more inside]
posted by solarion at 4:32 PM PST - 3 comments

How Not to Be Elizabeth Gilbert Thoughts on how gender informs travel writing by Jessa Crispin.
posted by frumiousb at 3:53 PM PST - 48 comments

Pyroglyphics and The Secret Language of Cattle Branding
posted by a lungful of dragon at 2:41 PM PST - 19 comments

FOR SALE: Largest ranch in the U.S. within a single fence. Texas fixer-upper with more than 1,000 oil wells; 6,800 head of cattle; 500 quarter horses; 30,000 acres of cropland; tombstones for legendary cowboys, long-dead dogs, and a horse buried standing up. Favorite of Will Rogers and Teddy Roosevelt. Colorful history of drinking and divorce. Fifteen-minute drive to rib-eyes at the Rusty Spur in Vernon. Ideal for Saudi oil sheiks, billionaire hedge funders, and dot-commers who can tell a cow from a steer. Profitable. Zero debt. Property taxes only $800,000 a year. Price: $725 million.
posted by octothorpe at 2:10 PM PST - 76 comments

The Klerksdorp Spheres found near Ottosdal, South Africa, Moqui Marbles from Utah and Arizona, and the Moeraki Boulders on Koekohe Beach on the Otago coast of New Zealand all have something in common: they aren't puzzling ancient artifacts or possibly proof of otherworldly connections, but rather concretions, naturally occurring geologic features that are created in the same fashion as pearls. Archaeology Fantasies debunks the myths of the Klerksdorp Spheres, and also details what is know of the giant stone balls of Costa Rica, which retain some mystery to their creation and purpose. [more inside]
posted by filthy light thief at 1:51 PM PST - 12 comments

Conquistadors no more: Spaniards are flocking to Latin America because they need jobs In 2012, the most recent year for which statistics are available, Spaniards made up some 85 percent of all European immigrants to Latin America and the Caribbean, according to the EU/IOM report. Unemployment in Spain has hovered around a mind-boggling 25 percent in recent years. But that may be the least of it. Youth unemployment has been double that, at around 50 percent.
posted by Michele in California at 1:11 PM PST - 15 comments

Comic book artist Joe Phillips recently presented "Silver Screen Heroes", which places stars from the golden age of Hollywood into modern superhero roles.
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 12:24 PM PST - 36 comments

When the Internet’s ‘Moderators’ Are Anything But [New York Times] The title suggests a steward of civility and decency. But online, unpaid moderators can become a force for mayhem. [more inside]
posted by Fizz at 12:21 PM PST - 57 comments

The State of Comic Book Retail - David Harper's latest comics industry survey shows bricks and mortar comic stores to be in a surprising period of opportunity and change. But are there now too many comics?
posted by Artw at 12:11 PM PST - 11 comments

Joe Gould died well over half a century ago after having been gone from his haunts in Greenwich for half a decade. He had been a fixture in the Village for decades, friend to famous writers and artists, living in penury while saying he was working on a massively long work called Oral History of Our Time (coining the term [pdf] "oral history" in the process) from which only a few short pieces were ever published. In the 40s he became famous thanks to a profile called "Professor Sea Gull" written by star New Yorker writer Joseph Mitchell. After Gould's death, Mitchell wrote another profile in 1964, "Joe Gould's Secret", where Mitchell said that the Oral History only existed in Gould's mind. After that article, Mitchell never published again in his lifetime despite being on The New Yorker's staff until his death in 1996. Since then, various further secrets have been unearthed about Gould, diaries from the 40s, the identity of Gould's mysterious patron, and now New Yorker writer Jill Lepore has written about Gould's whereabouts in the last years in his life, and much else, in a sad profile called Joe Gould's Teeth. [Joe Gould previously]
posted by Kattullus at 11:56 AM PST - 10 comments

Hello. This is David Bowie. It's a bit grey out today, but I've got some Perrier water and I've got a bunch of records. I think if I was walking outside at the moment, I'd like to be walking on this street. It's Love Street by The Doors. In May of 1979 Bowie sat down at BBC Radio One and played two hours of his favourite music. [SLYT, track list inside] [more inside]
posted by carsonb at 11:33 AM PST - 32 comments

No Wave legend Lydia Lunch talks to the Grauniad. [more inside]
posted by Kitteh at 10:34 AM PST - 41 comments

Security researchers Charlie Miller (@0xcharlie) and Christopher Valasek (@nudehaberdasher) have found an exploit for Chrysler's Uconnect infotainment system allowing for remote control of many vehicle functions including climate control, audio, braking, and under certain conditions, steering. They plan to release details during a talk at next month's DEFCON 23 hacking conference. Chrysler has already issued a patch for the vulnerability, but it requires a manual update.
posted by Small Dollar at 10:12 AM PST - 133 comments

The Banjo Bands of Malawi is a video clip featuring three different performances of a certain strain of folk music from the small African nation. Totally raw and homemade instruments are employed in the service of urgent, percussive music (some of it a bit reminiscent of bluegrass) topped off by tight harmony vocals. What's not to like?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 9:41 AM PST - 18 comments

Lavanya Ramanathan in the Washington Post on why we need to do away with the "ethnic food" label "It's not the phrase itself, really. It's the way it's applied: selectively, to cuisines that seem the most foreign, often cooked by people with the brownest skin."
posted by nightrecordings at 8:58 AM PST - 245 comments

How I Quit Spin an essay by writer and poet Joshua Clover
posted by gwint at 8:43 AM PST - 36 comments

Why can't men be Olympic synchronised swimmers? - by William Kremer (BBC News Magazine)
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 8:37 AM PST - 32 comments

Pulp! The Classics is a new(isn) British imprint producing pulped-up neon editions of various classic novels and plays. The text is untouched, but the day-glo covers are as brash and trashy as as any 1950s B-movie poster. Authors covered so far are Joyce, Shakespeare, Hardy, Kafka, Dickens, Shelley, Stevenson, Austen, Carroll, Conrad, Wilde, Bronte, Fitzgerald, Jerome, Defoe and Doyle. The blurbs aren't bad either.... [more inside]
posted by Paul Slade at 8:14 AM PST - 5 comments

"For almost 70 years, hot chicken was made and sold primarily in Nashville’s black neighborhoods. I started to suspect the story of hot chicken could tell me something powerful about race relations in Nashville, especially as the city tries to figure out what it will be in the future." Rachel L. Martin, "How Hot Chicken Really Happened," from The Bitter Southerner.
posted by MonkeyToes at 7:53 AM PST - 40 comments

A look at the current #1 Single on the billboard charts, Omi - Cheerleader (Felix Jaehn Remix) [more inside]
posted by beisny at 7:32 AM PST - 42 comments

A new study from Northwestern University examined the potential link between cell phone use and depression. "The study found a depressed person’s average daily phone usage clocked in at 68 mins, whereas non-depressed individual’s came in at 17 mins." source [more inside]
posted by schnee at 7:08 AM PST - 43 comments

BBC: George Osborne has launched his spending review with a call for £20bn cuts to Whitehall budgets. Each unprotected department has been asked to come up with savings plans of 25% and 40% of their budget. The chancellor said departments had also been asked to help meet a target of 150,000 new homes on public sector land by 2020. The NHS and per-pupil schools budgets will be protected in the review, which will be published on 25 November. Mr Osborne, who is currently giving evidence to MPs, said that "with careful management of public money, we can get more for less".
posted by marienbad at 7:05 AM PST - 44 comments

In the 1970's, Sesame Street wasn't the only educational puppet show in town. The Letter People was a literacy program and television series that taught phonics with an unusual bunch of 26 characters. Here's the entire 60 episode run. The production values improved a bit as the show went on, evolving from black backgrounds and simple sets to more elaborate ones. Every Letter Person had their own theme song, featured in their introductory episode; here's all twenty-six of those in alphabetical, and thus wildly anachronic, order. Absent from the show are the songs of Misters R, X and Q (the last three Letter People to debut in the show - they'd clearly gone through design changes by then, ESPECIALLY Mr. X). [more inside]
posted by BiggerJ at 6:50 AM PST - 31 comments

Bill Nye is patient with a Fox anchor who doesn't understand the Moon
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 6:41 AM PST - 75 comments

We will probably be judged not by the monuments we build but by those we have destroyed. So wrote Ada Louise Huxtable in a NY Times editorial condemning the destruction of Penn Station. The outrage was a major catalyst for the architectural preservation movement in the United States. In 1965, the New York Landmarks Law was passed, which helped save the iconic Grand Central Terminal and more than 30,000 other buildings from similar fates.
posted by Obscure Reference at 6:19 AM PST - 37 comments

The black president some worried about has arrived [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 6:14 AM PST - 80 comments

Horse Wife: Professional Hugger, Full Time Homemaker, Literal Horse.
posted by Drinky Die at 1:34 AM PST - 34 comments

Meet the Man Who Flies Around the World for Free.
posted by jacquilynne at 1:00 AM PST - 68 comments

Web Design: The First 100 Years
So despite appearances, despite the feeling that things are accelerating and changing faster than ever, I want to make the shocking prediction that the Internet of 2060 is going to look recognizably the same as the Internet today.
Unless we screw it up. [more inside]
posted by CrystalDave at 12:47 AM PST - 42 comments

"Don't you know what could happen?"
posted by entropicamericana at 7:55 PM PST - 88 comments

Worm fever, headmouldshot, quinsy, Derbyshire neck, and other medical terms of the 18th and 19th centuries.
posted by theodolite at 7:05 PM PST - 31 comments

...why bother? That seems to be a prevailing sentiment when the topic of any sort of big-ticket retro investment is broached online. After all, all of these games can be played through emulation for free; matters of legality aside, why not just load up MAME or RetroArch and call it a day?

The Quest for the Perfect Retro Game Experience
posted by griphus at 5:16 PM PST - 45 comments

In 1998, Vice President Al Gore had a vision for "Triana," an imaging satellite that would continuously transmit a live "big blue marble" Earthview for the nascent World Wide Web. Designed, built, and scheduled for launch in 2001, the $150 million "GoreSat" became a victim of politics during the W. Bush administration, and was relegated to a closet at the Goddard Space Flight Center. Friendlier heads revived the satellite in 2009 as the NOAA's DISCOVR - the Deep Space Climate Observatory - and launched her on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket last year. Today, NASA published her first "epic" view of Earth.
posted by Chinese Jet Pilot at 5:01 PM PST - 27 comments

Road Wars: The Imperator Strikes Back (SLYT)
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 4:30 PM PST - 18 comments

Anonymous group hacktivists are mounting a campaign to avenge a man “in a Guy Fawkes mask” shot dead by Canadian police in British Columbia on Thursday after being mistaken for a suspect. Cyber-attacks have already hit national police websites. [more inside]
posted by CCBC at 2:33 PM PST - 33 comments

Blatter splattered with fake smackers by noted blagger
posted by a lungful of dragon at 2:13 PM PST - 13 comments

"11 books, including memoir, history, detective fiction and juvenile novels; magazine articles published in everything from the socialist Jacobin to the resolutely Main Street Rotarian; a gig commenting on current events for TIME following a run as a pop culture columnist for The Huffington Post; two films about his life, including HBO’s forthcoming Kareem: A Minority of One; and appearances on shows such as Meet the Press, where he’ll pose questions such as, 'Why must peaceful Muslims like myself answer for violent perversions of that religion while their counterparts in other faiths get a pass?' After years of trying to break back into the NBA as a full-time assistant coach, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, 68, has found both comfort and a calling as a man of letters and a public intellectual."
posted by overeducated_alligator at 2:03 PM PST - 7 comments

For a time this summer, it seemed all anyone could talk about was the N.A.A.C.P. chapter president whose parents had “outed” her as white. The tornado of public attention has since moved on, but Rachel Dolezal still has to live with her choices—and still refuses to back down.
posted by Sir Rinse at 1:55 PM PST - 56 comments

The fans of Mad Max: Fury Road have discovered Amazon.com's listing for Winton Silver Color Mist. [more inside]
posted by Peregrine Pickle at 1:20 PM PST - 44 comments

From the 1920s to the 1960s, German people loved to pose with actors dressed as polar bears. Large images here, smallish images here. In German: a gallery and a book article (The Foto-Eisbär: an unusual memento of beautiful moments). Other pictures from the internet: Wehrmacht soldiers with a person in polar bear suit. Revelers in polar bear costumes (with poodle), Berlin, 1929. And many, many others. [more inside]
posted by elgilito at 12:39 PM PST - 10 comments

Cartoonist Jack Ohman of the Sacramento Bee recently completed a four part series of cartoons titled "The Care Package" based on his experiences with his father in his final years: "Getting old ain’t for sissies", "The last time I went fishing with my dad", "What I wish my dad said before he died", "In my dad’s final weeks, I was still in denial".
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 12:19 PM PST - 15 comments

Vince Staples - Norf Norf [YouTube] [Video] [Explicit Lyrics] From the debut studio double album Summertime '06 by rapper Vince Staples. [more inside]
posted by Fizz at 11:58 AM PST - 13 comments

Conchita Wurst (previously) might have made bearded drag famous with her 2014 Eurovision win, even popularizing it to an extent by inspiring mainstream outlets like RuPaul's Drag Race. But there's more to bearded drag and genderfuck drag than Conchita Wurst. Beards in drag have been around since the 1970s, notably as performed by The Cockettes and the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence (previously). Here, bearded queens Lucy Stoole, Grace Towers, and Jeff Poulin speak about why they incorporate beards into their performances. (NB: drag queens are not synonymous with trans women.)
posted by sciatrix at 11:52 AM PST - 12 comments

"This is one of the ways in which my second adolescence was absolutely faithful to the first: it was so difficult, so emotionally overwrought, so suffused with terror and confusion and embarrassment. It takes a perverse kind of bravery to start over—it's a selfish and deluded thing to do, and you need that courage to deal with what comes next. It's one thing to burn your life down and walk out of the ashes, but nobody tells you the phoenix is born as a tender, featherless baby bird."

A Midlife Crisis, By Any Other Name: an essay by Jess Zimmerman (previously, previouslier) for Hazlitt. [via]
posted by divined by radio at 11:22 AM PST - 64 comments

100 thoughts on Kafka's "Metamorphosis" to mark the 100th anniversary of its publication. (via) [more inside]
posted by Iridic at 11:17 AM PST - 4 comments

In May, the New York City Council passed the "School Diversity Accountability Act", which requires the city to "provide detailed demographic data & steps it is taking to advance diversity in NYC schools" and Resolution 453, which calls on the NYC Department of Education to establish diversity as a priority in admissions, zoning, and other decision-making processes. Education advocates are re-drawing district maps, and creating experiments which "range from developing specific diversity quotas for individual schools to redrawing school district lines to better reflect racial and economic diversity." [more inside]
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 11:07 AM PST - 19 comments

That Time the Internet Sent a SWAT Team to My Mom's House

My mom asked what I had said to make people so angry, and what I had done to upset strangers so badly.

I’ve never felt worse about myself.

Caroline Sinders, an interaction designer and researcher with IBM, describes how researching ways to prevent online abuse made her, and her family, the victim of a SWATting.
posted by SansPoint at 10:28 AM PST - 84 comments

Gamasutra: “TV host Stephen Colbert has jumped onto [Twine] with a new, free game: Escape from the Man-Sized Cabinet.”
posted by Going To Maine at 9:55 AM PST - 10 comments

You don't get any of those things by staying quiet. On the contrary, the best way to get politicians to listen, and to force them to deal with an agenda, is to frighten them. So BlackLivesMatter came to Netroots Nation, and it showed that its activists have a lot of energy, a lot of passion, and a lot of support. They forced Sanders and O'Malley to address their issues.

Noah Berlatsky: Why I'm Glad Bernie Got Interrupted.
posted by MartinWisse at 9:28 AM PST - 467 comments

With F. A. O. Schwarz's iconic 5th Avenue store closing for good last week (Gothamist photos), why not look back at the 1911 Spring And Summer catalog and the conversation effort to preserve the catalog at the Cooper Hewitt design museum..
posted by The Whelk at 9:00 AM PST - 15 comments

Beautiful video of a man experiencing purple (and green, and pink) for the first time. [more inside]
posted by penguin pie at 8:22 AM PST - 23 comments

"Who are you and how did you get in here?"
"I'm a locksmith. And... I'm a locksmith." [more inside]
posted by zarq at 8:18 AM PST - 33 comments

Innuendo Studios (tumblr | twitter) updates with a 6 part series discussing GamerGate, self-image, and innocence: Why Are You So Angry? [more inside]
posted by postcommunism at 8:18 AM PST - 22 comments

Husband films wife giving birth in the front seat of the (moving) car. "Should I stop or should I keep going? [more inside]
posted by CrazyLemonade at 7:49 AM PST - 39 comments

Die Woodys - Fichtl's Lied: Eine Produktion von Tony Marshall. Superhitparade der Volksmusik 1984
posted by growabrain at 7:38 AM PST - 9 comments

Scribe By Night is a calligraphy Tumblr which seeks out calligraphy to reblog, from people just starting out to people who are very skilled. [more inside]
posted by Elementary Penguin at 6:41 AM PST - 8 comments

Eleanor Parker of A Clerk of Oxford writes Public Engagement and Personal Enthusiasm, St Mildred and Me

I can't say how far the personal inspired the scholarly interest, or the other way around - perhaps I was drawn to Mildred because I'm from Thanet, or perhaps studying Mildred has made me more interested in Thanet's Saxon history, which I didn't really know about or think about when I actually lived there. It's probably a bit of both. Who can explain why they're drawn to the subject they study?

posted by the man of twists and turns at 5:53 AM PST - 3 comments

Experts have discovered the identity of Pingu's spoken language: English in an Irish accent. (Bleeped, but possibly still not feckin' worksafe, y'old bollocks.)
posted by BiggerJ at 3:26 AM PST - 14 comments

Cheating website AshleyMadison has reportedly been hacked. Besides snippets of account data apparently sampled at random from among some 40 million users across ALM’s trio of properties, the hackers leaked maps of internal company servers, employee network account information, company bank account data and salary information. They want the site taken down, not because of the cheating, but because the company offers a "total delete" function and charges for it, but doesn't actually do it.
posted by nevercalm at 12:02 AM PST - 91 comments

Books in the films of Wes Anderson - a video essay.
posted by Artw at 7:27 PM PST - 8 comments

In a bid to woo increasing numbers of tourists from India, South African Tourism had to create awareness of the different flavours of vegetarianism. Starting with how to distinguish between run of the mill vegetarians, from vegans and Jains, they ultimately found themselves launching a cookbook. Now you too can eat bunny chow and bobotie!
posted by infini at 12:31 PM PST - 64 comments

You Just Got Out of Prison. Now What? [New York Times] Carlos and Roby are two ex-convicts with a simple mission: picking up inmates on the day they’re released from prison and guiding them through a changed world. [more inside]
posted by Fizz at 10:39 AM PST - 26 comments

Infographic: Know Your Fonts [Electric Literature]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 10:21 AM PST - 30 comments

Prolific actor Alex Rocco, perhaps best known for his performance as Moe Greene in "The Godfather", has passed away at the age of 79.
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 10:20 AM PST - 32 comments

Another of the dead of Duffy's Cut is being reburied in Ireland. Archaeological and historical work near Malvern, Pennsylvania has located the shantytown where 57 Irish immigrants died in 1832. Originally eight deaths were attributed to cholera, but papers located by the grandson of a railroad executive suggested the encampment was larger. Now we know that some of the victims were killed, possibly after escaping a quarantine, and their bodies are slowly being returned home. NYT article from 2010. Six-minute YT trailer for an Irish documentary (in English).
posted by immlass at 9:59 AM PST - 3 comments

Islamic Geometric  — Shakil Akram Khan has taken the ancient art of Islamic calligraphic decoration to a whole new place.
posted by scruss at 9:41 AM PST - 13 comments

The fastest ships in the universe. All universes, sci-fi and otherwise, that is.
posted by Melismata at 9:34 AM PST - 66 comments

Fighting to Bring Women in History to Central Park [New York Times]

For Myriam Miedzian, a former philosophy professor who lives on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, the need to correct the gender imbalance is obvious. She cites as evidence a bronze equestrian statue of King Jagiello near her home. “What is a 14th-century Polish king doing in Central Park?” she said.

posted by lunch at 7:39 AM PST - 44 comments

Extreme Wheelbarrowing (SLYT; German with English subtitles. 'Barrowing starts at 1:19)
posted by NoraReed at 3:14 AM PST - 30 comments

QuoDB is a search engine for movie quotes, developed by Luis Sobrecueva [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:04 PM PST - 25 comments

The Sad, Stately Photo Of Nixon's Resignation Lunch
posted by incomple at 9:33 PM PST - 198 comments

Galaxy of Terror, Mutant (NSFW), Contamination and the joy of cheap alien knockoffs. Prefer the sequel? Here's Aliens remade under the name "Terminator 2". Sadly one take on the franchise that will not be seeing the light of day is Alien Identity, a fan film recently shut down by a cease and desist from Fox. Meanwhile the Neil Blomkamp Alien film continues to incubate.
posted by Artw at 4:46 PM PST - 48 comments

Gary Dahl, Inventor of the Pet Rock, died in March. [more inside]
posted by chavenet at 2:31 PM PST - 32 comments

Hitchhiking robot begins journey across U.S. "This trip will be unlike any other," said co-creator Dr. David Harris of hitchBOT, which has already explored Canada, Germany and the Netherlands thanks to helpful humans. "HitchBOT's goal is not only to hitchhike across the U.S., but also to visit a number of historic sites and monuments." [more inside]
posted by Michele in California at 1:03 PM PST - 44 comments

Julia Child and the OSS Recipe for Shark Repellent [more inside]
posted by CrystalDave at 11:58 AM PST - 10 comments

GLITCH TV
posted by JHarris at 11:42 AM PST - 11 comments

Jon Bois uses the science of crowdsourcing to create the perfect game of baseball.
posted by Navelgazer at 11:16 AM PST - 17 comments

"Inside the crates were maps, thousands of them. In the top right corner of each one, printed in red, was the Russian word секрет. Secret" -- Inside the Secret World of Russia’s Cold War Mapmakers by Greg Miller, WIRED
posted by The Whelk at 9:46 AM PST - 21 comments

Seeking the Source of Ebola by David Quammen, photographs by Pete Muller [National Geographic] The latest Ebola crisis may yield clues about where it hides between outbreaks. [more inside]
posted by Fizz at 9:30 AM PST - 5 comments

What it says on the tin. 58 seconds of adorable.
posted by HuronBob at 9:11 AM PST - 17 comments

Advantaged people with high levels of self-control and resilience age slower. Disadvantaged people with high levels of self-control and resilience age faster.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 8:58 AM PST - 34 comments

Three astonishing covers that illuminate the songs:

   k.d. lang: "Crying" (from 1990's Tribute To Roy Orbison)
   Linda Ronstadt: "The Dolphins" (Fred Neil's haunting anti-war song)

and in newly-restored footage of the Blues Alley performance:

   Eva Cassidy: "Over The Rainbow"
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 8:07 AM PST - 47 comments

"If you grew up watching Looney Tunes, then you know Chuck Jones, one of all-time masters of visual comedy. Normally I would talk about his ingenious framing and timing, but not today. Instead, I’d like to explore the evolution of his sensibilities as an artist." Tony Zhou's "Every Frame a Painting" (previously here) 'breaks the format' to show how the great animator started with gags and developed characters (visually and psychologically), using clips from over 60 of his Warner Bros. shorts.
posted by oneswellfoop at 12:58 AM PST - 26 comments

After intense negotiations, the Obama administration has started a new phase of defending the nuclear deal with Iran that could determine whether Congress will approve it after a 60-day review. Obama's deal with Iran could become his administration's foreign policy legacy. But is Iran’s nuclear capability the issue anyway?
posted by Sir Rinse at 10:44 PM PST - 179 comments

I still love Kierkegaard [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:00 PM PST - 12 comments

Daniel Radcliffe Was Our Receptionist for an Hour [SLYT]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 6:37 PM PST - 57 comments

A website where headlines from news agencies around the world are randomly chained together by a robot.
posted by ilama at 4:53 PM PST - 13 comments

Battle Lines is an essay by academics Robyn Creswell and Bernard Haykel in The New Yorker on the poetry of jihadis, especially those who follow the Islamic State. They argue that the way to understand them is to study their cultural products, especially poetry, which is part of their daily socialization, as discussed in this video. Poetry has a special status in the Arab world. Elisabeth Kendall explores that context in her essay Yemen’s al-Qa'ida and Poetry as a Weapon of Jihad. Jihadi poetry is closely linked to the nasheed tradition of songs which are usually sung a capella. Behnam Said traces their history in the essay Hymns ( Nasheeds): A Contribution to the Study of the Jihadist Culture.
posted by Kattullus at 2:35 PM PST - 11 comments

The computerisation of calligraphic fonts has damaged the livelihoods of the remaining few calligraphy artists or Katibs in Urdu Bazaar, Delhi.
posted by infini at 2:34 PM PST - 13 comments

Pluto Shits on the Universe - a poem by Fatimah Asghar. Here's the text. [via]
posted by brundlefly at 2:23 PM PST - 24 comments

This photo depicts Dr. Anandibai Joshi of India, Dr. Keiko Okami of Japan, and Dr. Sabat Islambouli of Syria, three women who became doctors in 1885, at least two the first female physician in their own country, and 36 years after Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell became the first woman to receive a medical degree in the United States. (All three completed medical school at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania.) Be sure to click "See More" to read the full post at the first link. (Previously, on the lives of trailblazing women in medicine.) [more inside]
posted by ocherdraco at 1:49 PM PST - 20 comments

Gone are the days of pro-life rallies led by middle-aged men. These social-media savvy women are the newest–and youngest–faces of the anti-abortion movement. They’re using controversial tactics to get their point across, and it might actually be working. In a new collaboration with the BBC, Nightline on Fusion explores the new leaders of the pro-life movement. [more inside]
posted by numaner at 1:38 PM PST - 73 comments

Melissa McEwan - Ladies' Man: "When I tell people that I adore Iain for how much he likes women, the very compliment is received with suspicion... Straight men aren't supposed to like women, unless they want to fuck them." (via Phire) [more inside]
posted by flex at 1:28 PM PST - 43 comments

How does Shazam recognize music? Christophe Kalenzaga sifts through an old research paper (pdf) by Shazam's founder and conducts a short (written) course in signal processing, acoustics, Fourier transformations, and fingerprinting music. [more inside]
posted by jquinby at 1:18 PM PST - 13 comments

Dim the lights. Light candles. A romantic evening awaits. An evening of speed dating.
posted by perihare at 12:42 PM PST - 8 comments

"The Confederate flag didn't get hijacked. It took off from Defending Slavery Airport and landed, right on time, at Defending Segregation Terminal." Jay Smooth: 12 symbols of Southern pride actually worth celebrating. [more inside]
posted by NoraReed at 12:28 PM PST - 126 comments

Trans* activist Christin Scarlett Milloy resigns from her role as Volunteer Team Lead of the Trans Pride Team at Pride Toronto [more inside]
posted by Conspire at 12:17 PM PST - 22 comments

When Lana Del Rey included a cover of Nirvana's Heart-Shaped Box in her live show a few years ago, Courtney tweeted at her with some interesting pop trivia. "You do know the song is about my vagina, right?" Courtney wrote. "So umm next time you sing it, think about my vagina will you?" -- Let's rethink Courtney Love, suggests Nick Levine for Vice.
posted by MartinWisse at 12:01 PM PST - 67 comments

G.K. Chesterton was one of the most accomplished authors of the 20th century, a devout Catholic and an endlessly fascinating man of contradictions. Should he be a saint? [more inside]
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 11:44 AM PST - 41 comments

As If: A Journey Through the Los Angeles of Clueless
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 11:01 AM PST - 25 comments

How my dog finds me in a field (SLYT)
posted by griphus at 9:47 AM PST - 28 comments

The New York Times profiles a cargo ship to illustrate the lawbreaking that is common in international, transoceanic shipping. [more inside]
posted by entropone at 9:41 AM PST - 25 comments

If Tom Hardy Were Your Boyfriend (slTheToast)
posted by Kitteh at 9:36 AM PST - 22 comments

My Letter From Oliver Sacks by David Friedman [The Morning New]

In 2002, David Friedman thought of a question he wanted to ask Oliver Sacks, on the topic of 3D glasses and “pseudoscopic” vision. A week after he sent the letter, he received a typewritten reply, complete with diagrams.

posted by Fizz at 8:58 AM PST - 8 comments

Rosin Cerate is an "intensely researched blog" bringing you all kinds of interesting and odd knowledge about biology and creatures and how certain esoteric metals give you garlic breath. [via mefi projects] [more inside]
posted by moonmilk at 8:32 AM PST - 5 comments

From Village Girl to World Ultramarathon Champion | She has innate talent, but it was her early life that prepared her for such races. After dropping out of school, she worked as a trader carrying upto 28 kg sacks of rice up and down mountains. “Many considered this to be a hard life, but now I see it was really good training,” Rai laughs.
posted by Nevin at 8:14 AM PST - 2 comments

Shannon Proudfoot on the joys, sorrows and culture of sports radio. Welcome to sports call-in radio, the world’s cheapest therapy. You don’t have to wait too long for an appointment, and like a 12-step meeting, it’s first names only—and you can even lie about that if you want. There’s no real psychological expertise on offer, but that’s not why anyone tunes in. Call-in radio is, quite literally, about making your voice heard. These shows are their own intense little communities—complete with local celebrities, crackpot street-corner prophets and unwritten etiquette—built on the foundation of obsessive sports fandom.
posted by frimble at 7:01 AM PST - 27 comments

The end of capitalism has begun
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 5:14 AM PST - 90 comments

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has ruled that federal law already bans discrimination based on sexual orientation (17-page PDF), because "Discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is premised on sex-based preferences, assumptions, expectations, stereotypes, or norms. 'Sexual orientation' as a concept cannot be defined or understood without reference to sex." [more inside]
posted by Etrigan at 4:59 AM PST - 28 comments

New teaser for the upcoming X-Files reboot!
posted by valkane at 3:51 AM PST - 59 comments

July 11, 2015: Anthrocon Fursuit Parade [~24m] 1460 animals of various species and styles pass before your eyes. [more inside]
posted by hippybear at 1:16 AM PST - 55 comments

Scott K. Johnson, an Hydrologist and freelance writer for Ars Technica attended the Tenth International Conference on Climate Change (ICCC-10) held on June 11-12.

For a science writer, however, the event was fundamentally a tedious experience. On the first night of the conference, one of the presenters actually invaded my dreams. In the dream, I was in some sort of friendly geology group, gathering to discuss some interesting research. When this fellow announced his topic, I interrupted him. “Wait—is this more of that retired medical doctor’s weird theory about volcanoes that you talked about for two hours last time?” I asked. The presenter blinked, puzzled by my tone, and said, “Well, yeah. Of course.” The rest of the group shot me pained glances and sank down in their chairs.

That’s kind of what the conference was like.
posted by michswiss at 8:19 PM PST - 27 comments

Manisha Aggarwal-Schifellite, How Esquire Engineered The Modern Bachelor,The Awl.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 7:36 PM PST - 24 comments

Marlene Sanders’ Feminist Legacy [Slate obit] - "She wrote of her accomplishments: 'As I look back on my career, the women's movement provided an exceptional point when time, place and position all came together to give me the power and focus to contribute to the country’s awareness of the status of women.'" [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 6:28 PM PST - 4 comments

"The thing I find very exciting is waiting for the subway train and sometimes you'll get a glorious one that arrives decorated like a birthday cake!" Watching My Name Go By is a short 1976 BBC documentary about graffiti, artists, and graffiti artists in New York City. The film is based on Norman Mailer's 1974 essay for Esquire magazine, "The Faith of Grafitti." [via]
posted by Room 641-A at 6:14 PM PST - 5 comments

Twinkle Tush is a jewel you hang from your cat’s tail. Add some bling to your cat’s bum and watch them strut their stuff. Your cat secretly wants it.
posted by Stewriffic at 5:13 PM PST - 58 comments

Even during the years I was sound man for the Grateful Dead, I stuck to my guns and remained totally carnivorous. Owsley Stanley, underground chemist, ate nothing but meat for 50 years, until he was killed in a car crash. [more inside]
posted by mrbigmuscles at 5:01 PM PST - 100 comments

Smarty Pins is a trivia game played with Google Maps
posted by desjardins at 4:58 PM PST - 21 comments

Wilco have released a new album called "Star Wars", featuring 11 new original songs, free for a limited time on their website.
posted by anazgnos at 4:53 PM PST - 37 comments

Mike Klimo offers a thorough analysis of Star Wars as chiasmus. [more inside]
posted by Tevin at 3:59 PM PST - 39 comments

A recent civil rights lawsuit alleges that undocumented parents are being denied birth certificates for their children born in Texas, effectively denying the children the birthright citizenship enshrined in the Fourteenth Amendment and federal law. State legislators have voiced their concern.
posted by goatdog at 2:27 PM PST - 90 comments

Animal Planet presents The Cute Channel, with clips from their show Too Cute. Caution: With this much concentrated cuteness, you may be rendered temporarily speechless. [more inside]
posted by zarq at 1:27 PM PST - 28 comments

Confronting New Madrid (Part 1): In the winter of 1811-12, the New Madrid fault in southern Missouri triggered a series of earthquakes in so powerful they altered the course of the Mississippi River and rang church bells as far away as Philadelphia... and we still don't fully understand why. A similar quake today is estimated to be the costliest disaster in US History.
Confronting New Madrid (Part 2): As dangerous as the threat of "the big one" might be, however, the real disaster is us. [more inside]
posted by absalom at 1:21 PM PST - 39 comments

At Pitchfork, Marc Hogan has put together a long read on “how playlists are curating the future of music.”. He speaks to various folks in positions of power at the different services, including former Pitchfork editor-in-chief Scott Plagenhoef (now running music programming and editorial across Apple Music) and former Pitchfork associate editor Jessica Suarez (now lead streaming editor at Google).
posted by Going To Maine at 11:58 AM PST - 24 comments

Elliot Schultz creates mesmerizing embroidered zoetrope animations using turntables
posted by The Whelk at 11:00 AM PST - 13 comments

With designs inspired by Peking opera the facekini protects its wearer from jellyfish stings and sunburns.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 10:39 AM PST - 38 comments

Not since (Socalled's) The Socalled Seder has Hebrew and hip-hop been so thrillingly merged. In his signature funky collage style, Alchemist layers drum brakes, with various warped and looped vintage Israeli records. On “Shalom Alechem,” a pitched up vocal recording of the Sabbath song refrains over a hard, 90s style boom-bap beat, spiced up with intermittent “check it out”s from the voice of an unidentified hype-man. It's awesome.

From Shalom Life's review of The Alchemist's new instrumental album, Israeli Salad. The review also notes that this is similar to Alchemist’s 2012 album Russian Roulette, which uses 1970's Soviet music as its main source material.
posted by filthy light thief at 10:18 AM PST - 10 comments

What if Nicolas Cage played every character in Game of Thrones?
posted by chavenet at 9:31 AM PST - 24 comments

Fabio: Confessions of the Original Male Supermodel. Known to the world as Fabio (no last name needed), he is king of the stereotypical romance covers, spokeshunk for I Can't Believe It's Not Butter, and is doing just fine, thanks. [more inside]
posted by Kitteh at 9:01 AM PST - 52 comments

The Shannara Chronicles [Official First Look] [YouTube]

Watch an exclusive first look at ‘The Shannara Chronicles,’ a new scripted series based on Terry Brooks’ best-selling fantasy books, coming to MTV in January 2016. This preview originally debuted inside "The Shannara Chronicles" panel discussion at San Diego Comic-Con 2015.

[more inside]
posted by Fizz at 8:51 AM PST - 79 comments

If David Cameron, or his Chancellor or Health Secretary had announced such an inquiry to re-consider a principle that has been sacrosanct since 1946, you’d expect front page headlines and Newsnight specials considering the implications.

The Tories are launching in investigation into a for pay NHS, switching from a tax supported to an insurance/charges model, according to Richard Grimes at OpenDemocracy.net.
posted by MartinWisse at 6:16 AM PST - 95 comments

What it’s like to actually eat the food in Oakland County Jail.
posted by ellieBOA at 4:51 AM PST - 34 comments

If you heard that Robert Bartleh Cummings was attached to direct a biopic of Groucho Marx's last years from a screenplay by the writer of I'm Not There and Love & Mercy, you might shrug. But what if you knew that Cummings changed his last name back in the '90s to match his stage name: Rob Zombie? [more inside]
posted by Etrigan at 4:48 AM PST - 20 comments

Cat Pianos, Sound-Houses, and Other Imaginary Musical Instruments "One might suppose that imaginary musical instruments, deprived of physical reality, have no place in the cultural histories and heritages that a museum of musical instruments aims to illuminate and preserve. Yet in their own strange ways, imaginary musical instruments exist. What’s more, they have not merely shadowed or paralleled musical life; they have formed a vital part of it, participating in ways that show the fragility of the distinction between imaginary and real."
posted by frimble at 4:34 AM PST - 8 comments

Slovenian band Laibach, known for their ambiguous martial pop reworkings of Europe's The Final Countdown, Queen's One Vision, and Edwin Starr's War, to name but three (along with the many original tracks you hear over the course of their live set), are due to be the the first foreign band to play North Korea. [more inside]
posted by iivix at 2:28 AM PST - 43 comments

Starting in the late 70s and throughout the 80s, Australian Rock strode the earth like a tiny, screaming colossus. Whether Hard Rock (drummer convicted of death threats), Pop Rock (lead singer dead from autoerotic aspyxiation), Pub Rock (lead singer's kids no longer forced to play), or what we'd now call Indie (they broke up, get over it) the 80s was the high water mark in Aus/NZ music history.Then the nineties and naughties ushered in an ero of reality-TV driven drivel... [more inside]
posted by Neale at 10:51 PM PST - 77 comments

Meanwhile in Portland, in an incident Mashable describe as the acockalypse, dildos are appearing on power lines in increasing numbers. The Metro notes that the items are usually paired red and yellow. Speculation persists on where the items came from e.g. "There was Empire Labs that did Clone-A-Willy but that was awhile ago", while Bustle asks "Who knows this dildo man? Where can I find him???" Speigel reports that Unbekannte hängen Hunderte Dildos an Stromleitungen , while the BBC will not directly use the d-word because British, but will replicate some tweets which use it. Death and Taxes thinks this is biblical in nature, while Austria is concerned that "Rätsel um Dildo-Invasion in US-Stadt". And previously in Portland.
posted by Wordshore at 9:50 PM PST - 124 comments

The Life Cycle of Programming Languages, by Betsy Haibel [previously] for Model View Culture. [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 6:24 PM PST - 113 comments

Six Brazilians a day die at the hands of state security forces - the brutal result of a civil war between police death squads and criminal gangs.
In Rio de Janeiro militias are present in 148 communities within 28 neighborhoods.
posted by adamvasco at 6:08 PM PST - 10 comments

Over a decade ago, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow laid the foundations for today's effects-driven blockbusters. Why haven't its creators made a film since?
posted by Artw at 5:52 PM PST - 105 comments

Lena Dunham Is Launching A Newsletter For Young Women
posted by oceanjesse at 4:41 PM PST - 48 comments

The Weakerthans were a perfect Sunday afternoon in a particularly difficult year that made you feel like everything might be better soon. And now they’re gone. [more inside]
posted by lownote at 4:19 PM PST - 78 comments

A conversation with Bartlomiej Sienkiewicz

This is significant because in Europe all political thought is imperialist. This means that politics as we know it today, implemented by countries small, middle-sized or large, incorporates the experience of imperial politics from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century. That was when the foundations of what we call "the political" were forged, which always entails a balance between power and weakness, and must be the result of an analysis of your strengths and vulnerabilities against the strengths and vulnerabilities of your opponent. To risk banality: politics without political realism is not politics. You see, all European politics is founded on political realism produced by imperial politics. And this experience is completely alien to Poles.

[more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 4:04 PM PST - 11 comments

Carlos Kleiber conducts the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Beethoven's Seventh Symphony. Second movement. Third movement. Fourth movement. Christopher H. Gibbs of the Philadelphia Orchestra writes about the piece for NPR. Classical Notes discusses the piece in detail. [more inside]
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 3:52 PM PST - 19 comments

Jane Austen Screecaps + Onion Headlines. That is all.
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 3:36 PM PST - 16 comments

The war against genetically modified organisms is full of fearmongering, errors, and fraud. Labeling them will not make you safer.
posted by Drinky Die at 3:32 PM PST - 131 comments

Housework is not work. Sex work is not work. Emotional work is not work. Why? Because they don’t take effort? No, because women are supposed to provide them uncompensated, out of the goodness of our hearts.
posted by sciatrix at 2:38 PM PST - 2054 comments

It's a Mad Mad Mad Max Fury Road
posted by brundlefly at 2:29 PM PST - 26 comments

Micah Lee at The Intercept provides a deep and wide introduction to encryption (with a clever but helpful Romeo & Juliet framing device) then brings us all the way through the doorframe, past thinking or talking about it—Chatting in Secret while we're all being watched. [more inside]
posted by infinite intimation at 2:23 PM PST - 19 comments

Sick kids, desperate parents, and the battle for experimental drugs There’s growing unrest with the realization that when a company denies a request, patient voices are getting louder. The power of the Internet and especially social media has allowed patients and their families to take their plea to the masses and, in some cases, see their story go viral.
posted by Michele in California at 2:14 PM PST - 14 comments

"Historically, spinsterhood has meant a kind of radical unavailability to straight men, implying either rejection of them or rejection by them or both. This sought or unsought rejection has the potential to be experienced by women as a source of strength. It can mean making the choice not just to set your own terms on the marriage or meat market, but to opt out of the market altogether." [Briallen Hopper for LA Review of Books: On Spinsters.] [more inside]
posted by divined by radio at 1:55 PM PST - 8 comments

Beyond the Model Minority Myth : "Discussing certain Asian groups’ material advantages today as a type of transhistorical “privilege” or “complicity” with power — rather than the result of a specific set of immigration and domestic policies that have aligned with shifting national attitudes — mystifies the mechanisms of capitalism rather than elucidating them."
posted by Conspire at 1:01 PM PST - 22 comments

The cast and crew of SCTV play softball (SLYT). The Super 8mm footage of the game, which was taken at a park in Edmonton (possibly Pleasantview Park) in 1982, was discovered by Rose Candy, John's widow. via AV Club.
posted by Cash4Lead at 12:19 PM PST - 11 comments

Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, the premiere American mystery magazine for 74 years, has a podcast featuring many great short stories, both classic and new. [more inside]
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 11:43 AM PST - 7 comments

Heroes Reborn [Trailer] [YouTube]
posted by Fizz at 8:17 AM PST - 146 comments

An Update on the Gay Debate: evolving ideas, untidy stories, and hopes for the church

While I struggle to understand how to apply Scripture to the marriage debate today (just like we all struggle to know how to interpret Scripture on countless controversial topics), I’ve become increasingly troubled by the unintended consequences of messages that insist all LGBT people commit to lifelong celibacy. No matter how graciously it’s framed, that message tends to contribute to feelings of shame and alienation for gay Christians. It leaves folks feeling like love and acceptance are contingent upon them not-gay-marrying and not-falling-in-gay-love. When that’s the case—when communion is contingent upon gays holding very narrow beliefs and making extraordinary sacrifices to live up to a standard that demands everything from an individual with little help from the community—it’s hard to believe our bodies might be an occasion for joy. It’s hard to believe we’re actually wanted in our churches. It’s hard to believe the God who loves us actually likes us.

[more inside]
posted by imnotasquirrel at 8:07 AM PST - 137 comments

"Let me begin by saying that I believe this is the greatest and most important event ever captured on film. I saw it live, but I was alone, sadly, and had no one with whom to share it. For a while, I wasn’t even sure I had seen what I thought I had seen, and I couldn’t go back to double-check. This was in 2000 — before TiVo became a verb, kids. This document is essentially prehistoric. It might as well be printed on papyrus." Michael Schur, The Greatest Moment in the History of the Triple-A All-Star Game
posted by everybody had matching towels at 7:51 AM PST - 40 comments

Lament for the Dead is an online community poetry project which will mark the death of every person killed by police this summer, and every police officer who loses life in the line of duty, with a poem
posted by hydropsyche at 6:42 AM PST - 9 comments

A story in the Atlantic about "Ralph", the camera taking the tan-and-sepia-toned high-resolution photos of Pluto.

Because different materials shrink at different rates, “We actually built the mirrors and the chassis out of aluminum so that as they shrink, they would shrink together, to maintain the same focal length."
posted by artsandsci at 6:11 AM PST - 6 comments

For, by, and about fans of fandom. [SLYT]
posted by Sir Rinse at 5:32 AM PST - 59 comments

Inspect A Gadget reviews the frankly horrific Egg Master
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 4:01 AM PST - 190 comments

How often do ethics professors call their mothers? My son Davy, then seven years old, was in his booster seat in the back of my car. ‘What do you think, Davy?’ I asked. ‘People who think a lot about what’s fair and about being nice – do they behave any better than other people? Are they more likely to be fair? Are they more likely to be nice?’ Davy didn’t respond right away. I caught his eye in the rearview mirror. ‘The kids who always talk about being fair and sharing,’ I recall him saying, ‘mostly just want you to be fair to them and share with them.’
posted by elgilito at 2:03 AM PST - 75 comments

Radio broadcasts leave Earth at the speed of light. Scroll away from Earth and hear how far the biggest hits of the past have travelled. The farther away you get, the longer the waves take to travel there—and the older the music you’ll hear.
posted by frimble at 1:47 AM PST - 34 comments

The constant arms race among the makers of internet cat videos may have its first true superpower: the SUPER EPIC CATS video series started with one cat, a flat-faced slightly-less-grumpy-than-GrumpyCat feline, who, accompanied by a dramatic orchestra, demonstrated his ability to levitate (somewhat disruptively), some impressive potion-mixing (while wearing a Bill Nye bowtie), telekinesis, magnetism, then some loneliness-triggered engineering that ended up creating a challenger, who showed off his laser eyes and other superpowers, after which the cats' human took charge and (with the series' best special effects yet), made his own CATZOOKA!
Enjoy, and be thankful YOUR cats can't do that.
posted by oneswellfoop at 12:44 AM PST - 6 comments

Smuggled Photos Document Thousands Of Detainee Deaths In Syria - "The photos are graphic. They were smuggled out of Syria by a regime photographer - a military officer - who had the job of documenting the deaths of some 11,000 detainees. Activists put the photos online, and Syrians are searching them for missing loved ones." (previously)
posted by kliuless at 11:00 PM PST - 7 comments

"When a user submits a comment, echochamber.js will save the comment to the user's LocalStorage, so when they return to the page, they can be confident that their voice is being heard, and feel engaged with your very engaging content. It does not make any HTTP requests. Since LocalStorage is only local, you and your database need not be burdened with other people's opinions."
posted by NoraReed at 9:37 PM PST - 95 comments

“A semicolon is used when an author could’ve chosen to end their sentence, but chose not to. The author is you and the sentence is your life." [more inside]
posted by flex at 9:30 PM PST - 47 comments

Ruler Comics and other small and wonderful comics by alabaster. [more inside]
posted by moonmilk at 7:53 PM PST - 3 comments

In the mid-1800s, a snail spent years glued to a specimen card in the British Museum (now the Natural History Museum) before scientists realized it was still alive. What became of this snail? Ask Metafilter found out! [more inside]
posted by nicebookrack at 6:40 PM PST - 55 comments

Metafilter's Own™ Adam Savage has a tradition (2014, 2013, 2012) of taking an incognito floor walk through Comic-Con clad in an elaborate costume. This year he upped the ante, bringing Colonel Chris Hadfield (yes, that Chris Hadfield) along with him, both of them clad in replica 2001 spacesuits.
posted by adamrice at 6:31 PM PST - 46 comments

"Lovato's song, on the other hand, is all about desire. She wants the girl because she wants the girl. Her perspective is that of a newbie, but that doesn’t make her a tourist; when she says 'Even if they judge / Fuck it,' she's going through the same process most every queer person has had to go through. Mostly, though, the song is about pop music's favorite topic: being attracted to someone hot." Demi Lovato's 'Cool for the Summer': The Next Great Gay Anthem?, Spencer Kornhaber for The Atlantic [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 6:17 PM PST - 36 comments

Sarah Silverman and Jeff Goldblum sing "Me & My Shadow" (Note: Quite adorable, but also shot vertically. You've been warned).
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 2:57 PM PST - 42 comments

Charles Dickens (of previously, previously, previously, &c.) was, of course, a novelist. But he was also a journalist and editor, most importantly of Household Words (1850-59) and All the Year Round (1859-70; continued until 1893). As in many Victorian periodicals, the articles in All the Year Round appeared anonymously, meaning that later scholars have had to piece together (and guess at) authorship using correspondence, stylistic comparisons, and so forth. Well, until now. [more inside]
posted by thomas j wise at 2:45 PM PST - 13 comments

J. A. Micheline on The White Privilege, White Audacity, and White Priorities of STRANGE FRUIT #1:

I was hardly surprised to find that for every white person who says something racist, there is always either (a) a white person to tell the other white person that they're wrong or (b) a black person to say nothing and show no resistance. (b) happens only once, while (a) happens pretty much throughout the work. It's a perspective common to stories of racism written by whites — in order to make white audiences comfortable, white creators (of any medium) frequently show that "not all whites" were pro-slavery or racist. It is simply inconceivable to write a story in which every white person is racist, because, in their minds, how could that possibly be true? You set the Klan up, the obvious racists, just to knock them down with white saviors, to remind readers/audiences that whites are still good people and knew better and wanted to help.

[more inside]
posted by divined by radio at 1:48 PM PST - 159 comments

After the recent rout of the Labour Party by the Scottish National Party (SNP), at the age of 20, Mhairi Black became the UK's youngest MP since the Reform Act of 1832. Her maiden speech to the House of Commons is a witty, sharp, unsparing account of how Labour failed Scotland and the UK, generally.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 12:45 PM PST - 56 comments

Sarah Becan, one of the best food-focused comics creators in the business, worked on some comics for Truth-Out.org's Ladydrawers series.
* Roots and Migrations looks at how food culture and traditions came to the United States.
* Stinging Nettles: Holding on to Indigenous North American Food Culture takes a peek at the food culture and traditions of North America before colonization - and what it takes to keep them alive today.
* Food and Freedom explores US food policy.
Melissa Mendes adds to the series with Cultivation: Shifting People of Color's Access to Land Use and Cultivating Policy.
posted by jillithd at 11:55 AM PST - 4 comments

In a five-part series, the San Francisco Chronicle’s Carolyn Said examines Airbnb’s impact in San Francisco. (Previously) [more inside]
posted by Room 641-A at 11:54 AM PST - 64 comments

The Web We Have to Save. SLhoder: "The rich, diverse, free web that I loved — and spent years in an Iranian jail for — is dying. Why is nobody stopping it?" (h/t mkb, via ...uh... facebook.)
posted by advil at 11:28 AM PST - 69 comments

It was the third of June, another sleepy, dusty Delta day
I was out choppin’ cotton, and my brother was balin’ hay
And at dinner time we stopped and walked back to the house to eat
And mama hollered out the back door, “Y’all, remember to wipe your feet!”
And then she said, “I got some news this mornin’ from Choctaw Ridge
Today, Billy Joe MacAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge.”
(Movie trailer, previously, previouslier) [more inside]
posted by Going To Maine at 11:10 AM PST - 90 comments

“Trash Cat” by Kelsey Goldych is an animated short about cats and trashcans
posted by The Whelk at 9:40 AM PST - 13 comments

As the first in our In-Depth Retrospective series, we’re going to dive headfirst into the tale of this long-lost attraction, discussing the history and lore that surround it. As time marches on, fewer and fewer guests can actually recall what Alien Encounter was like, so we’ll walk you through the harrowing experience from the entrance doors to the exit and then discuss what brought about its demise. Could Alien Encounter have found a new home at Disneyland Resort? What of the original attraction remains today? Let’s look back together.

[more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:18 AM PST - 39 comments

The suggested patent on hexagonal seating. Airlines love the idea of cramming more people into a plane, despite the horror of potentially being forced into eye contact and even closer proximity to strangers.
posted by Kitteh at 9:16 AM PST - 127 comments

Rare Footage Surfaces of Thom Yorke Performing "High and Dry" With Pre-Radiohead Band [YouTube] [Video]

The origins of Radiohead's 1995 single "High and Dry" dated back to Thom Yorke's short-lived pre-Radiohead band Headless Chickens. The band only played a few shows and released one song. Redditors pointed to some rare footage of a young Yorke performing the song with that band in the late 1980s (via CoS). Video shot at Exeter University's Lemon Grove.

posted by Fizz at 8:09 AM PST - 13 comments

Sure, G.A.R.F.I.E.L.D. was funny. And who doesn't love "The Pebble"? But with the latest installment in the Monster Factory series, pushing character creation in videogames farther than ever intended, have Justin and Griffin McElroy gone too far? Behold: Truck Shepard, human(?) Spectre, nightmare fuel. [more inside]
posted by kmz at 8:00 AM PST - 14 comments

The Book Graphics blog collects thousands of gorgeous covers and illustrations, with special emphases on Russian artists, fairy tales, and antiquarian books.
posted by Iridic at 7:58 AM PST - 5 comments

50 years to day after Mariner IV gave humanity its first closeup glimpse of another planet, the New Horizons spacecraft brings us our first close up image of Pluto. [more inside]
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:48 AM PST - 301 comments

Cat-Scan.com is one of the strangest sites I've seen in some time. I have no idea how these people got their cats wedged into their scanners, or why.
posted by yhbc at 5:35 AM PST - 154 comments

There is no game.
posted by signal at 4:50 AM PST - 24 comments

It’s true that my detective is physical—she is sometimes criticized for being too physical, for courting danger and taking her lumps. Her main function, though, is to speak, to say those things that people in power want to keep unsaid, unheard. Her job is to advocate for those on the margins. It is her speech that unleashes a physical reaction against her: she does not provoke the powerful by punching their noses, but by speaking when they want her to be quiet.

The Detective as Speech: Sara Paretsky talks about the origins of V. I. Warshawski in the context of Second Wave Feminism's high point and why it's important to have female heroes who didn't become detectives out of unresolved trauma.
posted by MartinWisse at 2:43 AM PST - 16 comments

Have you kept up with your Flash patches (TWO more major vulnerabilities found in the last week), or is is time to disable it in your browsers or just uninstall it completely? (Uninstall in Windows | Uninstall in Mac) A few hours ago, Mozilla started blocking Flash by default in Firefox. Facebook's new chief security officer wants to set a date to kill Flash. And YouTube gave up on it ages ago, so you don't need Flash to see cute videos.
posted by maudlin at 10:08 PM PST - 132 comments

On the off chance you're a parking enforcement officer and you see Eugene Mirman breaking the law, take a breath before you whip our your ticket book and mutter, "Screw you, Gene Belcher...". Because Eugene Mirman will make your life a living hell for daring to give him a $15 ticket for parking in the wrong direction. Well, maybe not hell. But he'll totally take out a full-page ad in your local paper to rant about it. So... consider yourself warned.
posted by Etrigan at 7:50 PM PST - 91 comments

The American Girl Dolls are back. And this time, they're not playing around. [slyt]
posted by sciatrix at 5:30 PM PST - 17 comments

Suicide Squad [official trailer]
posted by litleozy at 4:58 PM PST - 178 comments

The Pentagon took a significant step Monday toward lifting its ban on allowing transgender men and women to serve in the military, announcing a six-month study designed to clear the way. The study will "start with the presumption that transgender persons can serve openly without adverse impact on military effectiveness and readiness, unless and except where objective, practical impediments are identified," Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter said in a statement announcing the move.
posted by Sir Rinse at 4:56 PM PST - 37 comments

The 1955 Ford "Beatnik Bubbletop" Custom goes up for auction. Frustrated by roof pillars blocking your line of sight when you shoulder check? Well your problems are solved. Powered by a 350-cubic-inch Chevy V8, the Beatnik lacks a blind spot completely. It previously went up for auction in 2011 - "“Chopit” started by completely removing the roof from a ’55 Ford. There’s not much left of the original Ford now. “Beatnik” rides on a modified ’88 Lincoln Town Car chassis." Separate bubble for noisy kids and/or mother-in-law not included.
posted by GuyZero at 3:55 PM PST - 33 comments

"The race starts after a presentation at National Flag Square, which is a square with a flag that is 70 meters wide billowing off a pole that is the third tallest in the world. Far below, EDM blasts while a man with an English accent announces each team. Horner is asked some rote questions that are hard to hear over the techno, and after some traffic-jam crockery, we are off. I'm in the front seat, Johnson is driving, and Purdy is in the backseat with the extra wheels.

Ten minutes into the race, the shit hits the fan. Race radio is peppering us with innocuous facts about the oil platforms, stadia, and mosques we are passing on our way out of Baku when suddenly, our worst fears come true. "AIRGAS! 51! Rear wheel! Puncture." It's Horner. Our plans for the day could be f****d." - Azerbaidjan On Two Wheels, a 5 Part Essay by Patrick Redford on Vice about the Tour d'Azerbaidjan
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:38 PM PST - 7 comments

This Doctor Knows Exactly How You Feel Mirror-touch synesthetes struggle with the constant intrusion of others’ feelings. At a symposium on mirror-touch synesthesia last year in London, a woman named Fiona Torrance of Liverpool described how she had once seen one man punch another. She promptly passed out in a car. Her boyfriend at the time found her unconscious and took her to the hospital. “I felt the punch,” she explained. As a child, she once saw a man kill an otter with a spade on television. She was inconsolable for a month, feeling as if she’d killed the otter herself. To this day, she takes medication to control the sensory onslaught, and she does not own a television. A recent episode of the NPR program Invisibilia profiled another woman with the condition who has essentially become a shut-in.
posted by Michele in California at 2:09 PM PST - 22 comments

In 2004 Ashley Mote stood as a European Parliament candidate for the anti-EU right-wing UK Independence Party on a platform of opposing corruption. Elected, his standing with UKIP was withdrawn when the party discovered he was being prosecuted for benefit fraud, for which he was later convicted despite attempting to invoke immunity from prosecution. But that offence was dwarfed by the expenses fraud he committed as an MEP. In May this year, Mote was convicted of embezzling nearly half a million pounds, and today he was sentenced to five years in prison. Mr Justice Stuart-Smith did not exactly mince his words when handing down sentence.
posted by Major Clanger at 1:26 PM PST - 32 comments

Think of the ways we talk about manliness: as making necessary sacrifices, doing what needs to be done, choosing the ugly truth over the pretty lie. In all of those definitions, we're still just talking about being good, brave, responsible. And if that's what we mean by manliness, then we have to acknowledge the fact that women are now — and always have been — as good at it as men are. Which, in turn, means that men can, and ought to, learn manliness from women.

Franklin Strong for The Millions: The Manliness of Joan Didion. [more inside]
posted by divined by radio at 1:20 PM PST - 24 comments

In the last decade, some cities have created unusual municipal projects using personal and institutional technologies and Open Data, to keep things running smoothly. In Chicago, there’s a text-based pothole tracker. Pittsburg, Chicago, NYC and other cities have snowplow trackers during winter storms. Boston asked people to adopt-a-hydrant and shovel them out after snowstorms. In Honolulu, you can adopt a tsunami siren. In 2013, the city of Melbourne assigned email addresses to 70,000 trees as part of their Urban Forest Project, so citizens could report problems. Instead, people wrote thousands of love letters to their favorite trees, and in many cases, the "trees" wrote back. [more inside]
posted by zarq at 1:17 PM PST - 15 comments

What does it mean for algorithms to be fair? Our lives are increasingly influenced by opaque algorithms. Thoughts on how our existing laws are handling this new environment.
posted by laptolain at 1:11 PM PST - 31 comments

Turn videogame sprites into LEGO mosaics (via).
posted by roll truck roll at 12:08 PM PST - 14 comments

Lost Friends: Advertisements from the Southwestern Christian Advocate:

Two dollars in 1880 bought a yearlong subscription to the Southwestern Christian Advocate, a newspaper published in New Orleans by the Methodist Book Concern and distributed to nearly five hundred preachers, eight hundred post offices, and more than four thousand subscribers in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Arkansas. The "Lost Friends" column, which ran from the paper's 1877 inception well into the first decade of the twentieth century, featured messages from individuals searching for loved ones lost in slavery.

[more inside]
posted by metaquarry at 11:40 AM PST - 15 comments

I, Racist "Here’s what I want to say to you: Racism is so deeply embedded in this country not because of the racist right-wing radicals who practice it openly, it exists because of the silence and hurt feelings of liberal America."
posted by scaryblackdeath at 11:32 AM PST - 61 comments

Em Ford is a filmmaker, beauty blogger, and former model. When Ford, who suffers from acne, began posting pictures of herself without makeup on social media, she received over 100,000 comments. In response, she created the short film, You Look Disgusting [SLYT] "to show how social media can set unrealistic expectations on both women and men." [more inside]
posted by Room 641-A at 10:33 AM PST - 77 comments

Thirty days in a gay CrossFit cult [more inside]
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 10:09 AM PST - 137 comments

Breathe in strength. Breathe out bullshit. A guided meditation for these exhausting, infuriating times. [SLYT, nsfw audio]
posted by gottabefunky at 9:44 AM PST - 19 comments

Kenny "The Snake" Stabler died last week. Sports reporter Bob Padecky recalls a memorable interview with the Oakland Raiders quarterback.
posted by prize bull octorok at 9:31 AM PST - 13 comments

In March 2014, the Vatican Library announced it was beginning its efforts to digitize a portion of its extensive collection in coordination with the Bodleian Libraries at the University of Oxford. In the past year, they've made good progress, as documented on the project's blog, which provide some good insight into the process and the documents that have been digitized to date. [more inside]
posted by filthy light thief at 9:06 AM PST - 12 comments

So what happened? In the run up to 2008, Jon Huntsman Jr. wanted to be a player in national politics, and Mitt Romney all but patted him on the head and urged him to sit on the bench. Three years later, the specter of the next presidential election would fan smoldering resentment into flaming disgust in full view of the political world. Huntsman, then ambassador to China under President Barack Obama, left his dream job for his own White House run against Romney, whom he considered an exceptionally weak front-runner. Romney, for his part, saw Huntsman as a political opportunist he would relish crushing. Members of both families deny a feud exists and instead offer polite, politically correct compliments about their counterparts. Behind the facade, though, lie two political tribes that have grown to dislike and distrust one another.

posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:03 AM PST - 12 comments

An earthquake will destroy a sizable portion of the coastal Northwest. The question is when.
posted by Artw at 7:49 AM PST - 264 comments

Swamp Gas? Meteor? Ice Methane? Buried Ordinance? You decide! Strange things afoot at a Narraganset beach this weekend, where a woman was thrown 5 feet in the air and 10 feet laterally by some type of explosion. The link goes to a google compilation of articles. A genuine New England summertime mystery! [more inside]
posted by joecacti at 5:40 AM PST - 59 comments

For those of you suffering through Monday with an office job "bean counting", keep your courage up with the tales of "Science Fiction & Fantasy's Most Bad-Ass Accountants"
bonus content: Sing along with Monty Python's "Accountancy Shanty" (may not be advisable at some workplaces)
posted by oneswellfoop at 3:04 AM PST - 34 comments

Tips for first-time wheelchair pushers.
posted by MartinWisse at 2:22 AM PST - 45 comments

Small as it was, perhaps our offer of sunflower seeds might bring a little solace. Amid the wreckage of MH17 and a war, Paul McGeough and Kate Geraghty decided to collect a keepsake for family and friends of the victims.
posted by Wolof at 12:46 AM PST - 10 comments

Australian journalist Margaret Simons visited Angeles City in the Philippines to find the children left behind by Australian sex tourists. She found a lot of them. (Trigger warning for sexual abuse of minors)
posted by retrograde at 12:38 AM PST - 27 comments

Twenty-five years after the strip was purchased by Donald Trump and the staff fired, Bloom County will return. [more inside]
posted by Countess Elena at 9:53 PM PST - 202 comments

IT'S SHOWTIME
TALK TO THE HAND "hello world"
YOU HAVE BEEN TERMINATED
posted by boo_radley at 8:55 PM PST - 19 comments

The Dynamic Periodic Table... probably the only periodic table most of you will ever need, or want, to consult (aside from Tom Lehrer's musical version). What makes this periodic table different? Take it for a spin and find out!
posted by not_on_display at 8:39 PM PST - 13 comments

"The allegations of hypocrisy became the through line of her legacy. Even today — in Frank Langella’s recent memoir, on the celebrity gossip site Oh No They Didn’t, or my own piece on [Clark] Gable, published four years ago, [Loretta] Young is understood as a woman who didn’t live by her own set of publicly propagated values: a sinning saint. "Yet as Linda explained, “With Judy [her child with Gable], she was trapped. She had this lie and no way to frame it. She took full responsibility for hiding it all her life. To be stuck — so caught, in such a public way. What could she have done with that?”" - Anne Helen Petersen [previouslys] revisits Loretta Young's greatest scandal [TW for rape]
posted by cendawanita at 8:38 PM PST - 10 comments

Welcome to the line for Comic-Con's famed Hall H line. Over a mile long... and yet only 5% of the attendees can make it in to even the biggest of events. Spend your days tanning in the California sun, and then get prepared for the hopping nightlife! Cockroaches! Mice! The occasional bat. Free donuts too, if you're lucky. Worth singing about?!
posted by markkraft at 6:47 PM PST - 34 comments

Satoru Iwata, president of Nintendo and former president and star programmer at HAL Laboratories (he was one of their first programmers), main coder of Earthbound, programmer of NES/Famicom Balloon Fight, coder on some early games in the Kirby series and many other games besides, and the author of the Iwata Asks columns on Nintendo's website, has died at 55 of a bile duct growth. Kotaku article. The Verge.
posted by JHarris at 5:42 PM PST - 117 comments

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice [YouTube] [Trailer #1]
posted by Fizz at 5:16 PM PST - 192 comments

"...and Indigenous resistance in Canada would never be the same." [more inside]
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 5:11 PM PST - 20 comments

An Introduction to Sour Beers + 5 to Get You Started - Billy Broas, Primer Magazine: "Sour beers are hot right now, but they’re anything but a new concept. They’ve been brewed in Belgium for hundreds of years." [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 4:38 PM PST - 56 comments

Japan’s new geostationary satellite Himawari-8 captures an image of Earth every 10 minutes. The New York Times combined some of them into a spectacular view of a single day over the Pacific Ocean.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 4:36 PM PST - 23 comments

Ben Bullington was a small-town doctor in Livingston, Montana, who wrote and recorded country/Americana music in his spare time. In November of 2012 he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and decided to start crossing things off his bucket list. One of those things was doing a songwriting workshop in Nashville, and that brought him into the orbit of the great Darrell Scott. [more inside]
posted by jbickers at 12:07 PM PST - 6 comments

The history of British slave ownership has been buried: now its scale can be revealed The T71 files have been converted into an online database; a free, publicly available resource.
posted by infini at 11:49 AM PST - 38 comments

Once he mastered supersharp composites, Krehel started testing out time-lapses. [more inside]
posted by infinite intimation at 11:29 AM PST - 9 comments

Roger Rees has passed away at the age of 71. Mr. Rees, who most recently starred in The Visit on Broadway with Chita Rivera, won the Olivier and Tony Awards for Nicholas Nickleby. Among his many memorable roles on television, Rees created the roles of Robin Colcord on Cheers and Lord John Marbury on The West Wing. He is survived by his husband, and partner of more than 30 years, Rick Elice. [more inside]
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 9:29 AM PST - 39 comments

What it's like to be face-blind. [more inside]
posted by John Cohen at 9:17 AM PST - 47 comments

Today, ultra-distance runner Scott Jurek will mark the end of a 47 day journey when he summits Mt. Katahdin in Maine. If he reaches the top before 4pm, he will break the previous Appalachian Trail world speed record set in 2011 by Jennifer Pharr Davis, who completed the trek in 46 days, 11 hours, and 20 minutes. You can follow Jurek's progress here.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 6:16 AM PST - 55 comments

A gallery of erasers from around the world. Included are school and office staples, such as from Eberhard Faber, collectibles from Iwako, and assorted oddities (e.g. 1, 2, 3).
posted by needled at 5:31 AM PST - 26 comments

Constellations throughout the ages ☆ Sun replaced with other stars ☆ Moon replaced with other bodies
posted by Wolfdog at 4:45 AM PST - 24 comments

[slatlantic] Are you telling me there’s nothing there worth playing?
posted by St. Peepsburg at 1:50 AM PST - 48 comments

Mapping Metaphors with the Historical Thesaurus [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:33 PM PST - 11 comments

"The Animation School Dropout" (1:30) (2014) has actually been doing animation for over 40 years, including a 'bicentennial' film commissioned by the United States Information Agency (USIA): "200" (3:00) (1975) (previously here). A USIA propaganda production featuring hot dogs AND peace signs? Not bad. [post warning: possible visual triggers for epilepsy] [more inside]
posted by oneswellfoop at 9:02 PM PST - 11 comments

Colorado’s Effort Against Teenage Pregnancies Is a Startling Success, by Sabrina Tavernese, New York Times [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 4:30 PM PST - 66 comments

Paper Chasing by Jake Bittle On the subject of why we collect books as opposed to simply read them. [more inside]
posted by Fizz at 3:50 PM PST - 125 comments

1. Brush your cat 2. Form the hair you brushed into a toupee and place toupee on cat 3. Share & tag @trumpyourcat or #trumpyourcat
posted by NoraReed at 3:29 PM PST - 38 comments

"Rapper Nasir 'Nas' Jones and director Adam Sjoberg take us on a world tour of breakdancing in the most unexpected places, as we visit the slums, shanty towns and ghettos of the world, where hip-hop really means something. With jaw-dropping breakdancing moves, b-boys and b-girls in Uganda, Yemen, Cambodia and Colombia give us an inspiring tribute to the uplifting power of music and movement." [more inside]
posted by jammy at 2:29 PM PST - 4 comments

The Invisible Man: The End of A Black Life That Mattered Or how Charly Keunang finally went home.
posted by stagewhisper at 1:17 PM PST - 8 comments

soundsgood bucks the trend of algorithmic playlist generation by allowing curators (née users) to submit playlists and give feedback on others. Playlists are accessible via the web, dedicated apps, and other services such as Deezer, Spotify, YouTube, SoundCloud, Rhapsody, Rdio, Xbox Music and Beats Music/Apple Music. (via The Next Web)
posted by anarch at 12:58 PM PST - 17 comments

What It’s Like to Face a 150 M.P.H. Tennis Serve.
posted by storybored at 11:59 AM PST - 27 comments

There are several key years to keep in mind...
posted by Foci for Analysis at 9:55 AM PST - 34 comments

An American Psychological Association report highlights how it allowed torture clinicians to operate in its ranks. The 542-page report raises questions about collaboration between A.P.A. psychologists and both the C.I.A. and the Pentagon. According to the report, leaders of the American Psychological Association weakened the association’s ethical guidelines to allow psychologists to take part in coercive interrogation programs after September 11, 2001.
posted by Sir Rinse at 6:18 AM PST - 56 comments

It's time. PC gaming supersite Rock Paper Shotgun with their thoughtful, well-argued top 50 role-playing games on PC. Disagree away, Argunauts! 41-50 31-40 21-30 11-20 6-10 2-5 FINAL BOSS MONSTER
posted by Sebmojo at 2:46 AM PST - 184 comments

In 1945, Vannevar Bush described a physical storage, search and retrieval system that worked like an early hypertext. He called it a memex. Earlier this year, DARPA released the open-source components for it's own project named Memex, a powerful engine for searching the deep, dark web. [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:28 PM PST - 18 comments

Ash vs. Evil Dead - trailer.
posted by Artw at 9:15 PM PST - 75 comments

Pete and Arlo, Carnegie Hall, November 30, 2013. Pete died on January 27, 2014.
posted by HuronBob at 8:36 PM PST - 9 comments

Dr. Farid Fata, a prominent cancer doctor in Michigan, admitted in court to intentionally and wrongfully diagnosing healthy people with cancer. Fata also admitted to giving them chemotherapy drugs for the purpose of making a profit. The cancer doctor’s guilty plea shocked many in the courtroom, according to The Detroit Free Press. Fata owned Michigan Hematology Oncology, which had multiple offices throughout Detroit’s suburbs.

One of the more horrifying crimes I've heard of. You're welcome. [more inside]
posted by grobstein at 8:34 PM PST - 84 comments

"Ellen Pao is stepping down as Reddit’s CEO, a move that comes amid mounting pressure after a series of management mishaps that has angered its very vocal online community. Steve Huffman, Reddit co-founder and its original CEO, is taking over immediately."
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 3:31 PM PST - 572 comments

DoubleX Gabfest: The Beazel Better Have My Money Edition - "On this week’s Gabfest, Slate’s Hanna Rosin and June Thomas join New York editor Noreen Malone to talk about what it means to be asexual, Rihanna’s music video for 'Bitch Better Have My Money' and other prefatory uses of bitch, and the 1939 film The Women." [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 1:26 PM PST - 26 comments

African sci-fi features all manner of weird and outlandish things, from crime-fighting robots to technological dystopias. But could they be closer to predicting the future than they realise?

posted by infini at 1:04 PM PST - 24 comments

​Omar Sharif, 83, a Star in ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ and ‘Doctor Zhivago,’ Dies. [New York Times]

Omar Sharif, the Egyptian actor who rode out of the desert in the 1962 screen epic “Lawrence of Arabia” into a glamorous if brief reign as an international star in films like “Dr. Zhivago” and “The Night of the Generals,” died on Friday in Cairo. He was 83. His death, at a hospital, was caused by a heart attack, his agent, Steve Kenis, said. Mr. Sharif — who later became as well known for his mastery of bridge as he was for his acting — was a commanding, darkly handsome presence on screen. He was multilingual as well, and comfortable in almost any role or cultural setting.

posted by Fizz at 12:57 PM PST - 63 comments

The Big Open-Ended Question: On Loving and Accepting My Asperger’s

For years after, I tried to hide who I was and had some success. On the rare occasions when I did disclose my diagnosis, the response would usually be something along the lines of, “Wow, I didn’t know you were autistic!” I always took that as a compliment. After I graduated from college, I got a job and earned a reputation as an excellent employee, who was praised by her superiors and co-workers for her industriousness and attention to detail. But it always ended there. ... Even when I didn’t say anything, even when I just talked about work, I could tell that I still seemed a little odd to most people. A recruiter once told me that I had “an edge” about me, and didn’t really elaborate on what she meant by that. Co-workers told me that I was “too eager” or “forceful.”

[more inside]
posted by dialetheia at 12:52 PM PST - 21 comments

Whether it’s a barbecue or a bonfire, there’s nothing quite like a cold one when it’s hot outside. Here are 11 delicious craft brews to check out this season.
posted by griphus at 11:51 AM PST - 161 comments

U.S. music fans have long remembered the anticipation of new album releases on Tuesdays, a bright spot in the long slog of the week. Brits and Dominionists were lucky and got them on Mondays, while the Aussies and the Germans had to wait until Friday for no appreciable reason. As of this week, however, the whole world will be synchronized to Friday releases. [more inside]
posted by Etrigan at 10:40 AM PST - 36 comments

Damn Interesting, a regular feature here on the blue, has publicly called out comedy/history podcast The Dollop for using its articles without permission or attribution. The Dollop with its hosts, comedians Dave Anthony and Gary Gareth Reynolds, has seen its share of attention here as well. The Dollop has gone into damage control mode, deleting comments and banning people from its subReddit and Facebook pages.
posted by the christopher hundreds at 10:38 AM PST - 44 comments

Megasoid started in the winter of 2006/2007 as a Montreal-based mobile soundsystem making aggressive street-bass and remix music. For the following 3 years Vaughn Robert Squire and Hadji Bakara spent their time playing their music out of vans, throwing amps in basements for live sets, lugging modular synths to rooftops of hotels, and setting up big PAs under bridges and at after-hours spots [more inside]
posted by Going To Maine at 9:58 AM PST - 6 comments

Actress Patti LuPone talks about the incident at Shows for Days at Lincoln Center on Wednesday night where she, without breaking character, Ms. LuPone walked into the audience and took an audience member's cell phone who had been texting during the play. Ms. LuPone is not a stranger to taking charge of similar incidents. [more inside]
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:50 AM PST - 228 comments

Doctor Who season nine unveiled at San Diego Comic-Con [more inside]
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 7:44 AM PST - 57 comments

Coining brr-geoisie, Daniel Engber suggests in Slate that "the case against AC has always been more a moral judgment than a scientific one", responding to the idea that America is "over air-conditioned" as argued in this article by Kate Murphy in the NY Times.
posted by numaner at 7:21 AM PST - 178 comments

If you're like me, you're still kinda recovering from the abrupt dissolution of The Dissolve earlier this week. This morning over at the AV Club, they posted a new entry in their series "Scenic Routes", which may be the best Movie-centric feature AV Club runs. And at this moment of recovery for dedicated movie geeks, it's a great opportunity to review some of their more memorable entries over the years. [more inside]
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 5:38 AM PST - 8 comments

Exhausting a Crowd is an interactive video you can annotate yourself, using footage from a London street. It was commissioned by the Victoria & Albert Museum as part of their All of This Belongs to You exhibition.
posted by like_neon at 5:36 AM PST - 13 comments

With a tip of the clown hat to Doctor Who, everybody's favorite rap duo brings you the 2015 Gathering of the Juggalos Infomercial. [more inside]
posted by dr_dank at 4:57 AM PST - 28 comments

It's San Diego Comic Con weekend. Here's how KFC is celebrating it.
posted by MartinWisse at 4:28 AM PST - 51 comments

Jon Chait, New York Magazine: The Party of Andrew Jackson vs. the Party of Obama

Downplaying or ignoring Jackson’s conservatism, while conjuring a liberal ideology on his behalf, served a partisan interest for 20th-century Democrats. But there are also honest reasons that may have led historians like Schlesinger astray. From the standpoint of the 20th century, the United States had evolved into a two-party system in which the more liberal of the two parties had its strongest base in the Deep South. As this felt to many to be the inevitable direction of American politics, it seemed natural to peer back at the 19th century and see those coalitions in protean form. Despite its conservative views on race and suspicion of Washington, the white South probably appeared like a plausible base for the development of a liberal party. From the standpoint of the 21st century, things look very different.

[more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 10:24 PM PST - 51 comments

Queer women's web magazine Autostraddle, one of the few sites where it's safe to break the rule of "don't read the comments", muses about online commenting culture and how the move to social media commentary affects communities on comment-heavy sites like itself.
posted by divabat at 10:14 PM PST - 12 comments

A raccoon died on the streets of Toronto. Once Twitter got wind of it, the people began to mourn even spawning his own hashtag. City Councillor Norm Kelly (formally Deputy Mayor during the Ford days) got into the fun, tweeting the memorial progress. Then, the city came and took away our fun. Toronto has always had an interesting love/hate relationship with the raccoon. They seem to be everywhere, in the green spaces, in our garbage and even up a condo tower mid-construction. Earlier this year, Toronto Mayor John Tory announced the war on Raccoon Nation, introducing a new organics bin designed to foil them. The city of Toronto produced a jazzy surveillance video of raccoons testing the new bin. Also, there is a Toronto raccoon that tweets his waddling adventures, as well as the occasional defecation. Toronto raccoons previously on mefi.
posted by typewriter at 10:00 PM PST - 58 comments

At last: Read the first chapter of Harper Lee's Go Set a Watchman. First impressions from Jason Steger of Melbourne's Age newspaper.
posted by misterbee at 9:40 PM PST - 47 comments

Thick clouds of dust and gas prevent our eyes from seeing much of our Milky Way galaxy. But infrared light travels through that dust easily. Using infrared light, the Spitzer Space Telescope has been taking high-resolution images of our galactic center since 2003. Combining over 400,000 of those images in multiple wavelengths of light reveals a new view of our galaxy. Floating along the Milky Way (in 4k60p if your computer can handle it).
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 7:43 PM PST - 22 comments

"Yeah, and I heard he eats them out of cracks in the sidewalk! In Berkeley!"
"You mean weeds like this? So gross!"
"I don't know... I sorta like them, too."
"You're such a weirdo."
posted by sutt at 6:44 PM PST - 40 comments

Dr. Dave Southall is an engineer who makes things, like monowheels, mini-monowheels, water bottle jetpacks, racing mowers, racing bars stools, uniboards, and other fun things.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 6:02 PM PST - 7 comments

Stephen King has a Corgi puppy. Your early weekend dose of cute. Her name is Molly, but he refers to her as The Thing Of Evil. (His Twitter is unsurprisingly kind of awesome)
posted by biscotti at 6:00 PM PST - 13 comments

A new study investigates the experiences of self-identified vampires in disclosing their identity to helping professionals. The study seeks to understand the experiences and concerns of people self-identifying as vampires who are faced with the choice of disclosing their identity to professionals such as social workers and counselors when seeking help for various issues. The actual journal article in Critical Social Work can be found here.
posted by Sir Rinse at 4:03 PM PST - 184 comments

From Key & Peele, it's the feminist pirate chantey of the summer!
posted by nicebookrack at 3:59 PM PST - 47 comments

...that my insecurities will kill me one day." On Monday, Irish fitness blogger Emma Murphy posted a video of herself to facebook, still sporting the black eye given to her by her partner three days earlier when he punched her in the face. The mother-of-two talked about her decision to leave him after prolonged abuse, and encouraged other women to escape their own abusive relationships.
The video has been watched more than 7 million times in three days, and her story has made headlines in Ireland and around the world. [more inside]
posted by penguin pie at 3:35 PM PST - 13 comments

The Magic Chocolate Flower Dessert was created by Portuguese pastry chef Joaquim Sousa. Here he demonstrates how to make it. (Via)
posted by growabrain at 2:06 PM PST - 8 comments

The Mixed-Up Brothers of Bogotá:

After a hospital error, two pairs of Colombian identical twins were raised as two pairs of fraternal twins. This is the story of how they found one another — and of what happened next.

A fascinating and improbable tale of coincidence, family, class, and genetics. [SLNYT]
posted by mr. manager at 1:44 PM PST - 12 comments

Democratic presidential candidate Martin O'Malley has a plan for providing debt-free access to a college degree for all students within five years. [more inside]
posted by Dashy at 1:21 PM PST - 35 comments

For the majority of white people, race is something that happens to other people. Whiteness is a default that needs no name — all deviations must be categorized and given a "race." If race is always something that happens to other people, how are you able to see the part you play in the system?

An essay by Ijeoma Oluo (previously, previouslier) for Scenarios USA. [more inside]
posted by divined by radio at 1:01 PM PST - 71 comments

Would you like A black felt bicorne hat, worn by the Emperor Napoleon, or a lock of Hair from the Mane of Buonaparte's favourite white Charger, or perhaps an Original hand blown bottle … with a crowned 'N' enclosed in laurel wreath, no label, level of liquid is 8 in. (20 cm) below base of cork? Well, you just missed your chance.
posted by R. Mutt at 12:40 PM PST - 7 comments

What I Assume Honoré de Balzac Thought After Drinking Each of His 50 Daily Cups of Coffee (SLNewYorker) [more inside]
posted by joechip at 11:48 AM PST - 48 comments

Armed police in England and Wales only fired their weapons twice over the course of 14,864 operations that took place from 2013-2014.
posted by veedubya at 11:32 AM PST - 74 comments

Website, profiled While the rest of the content industry on the web coalesces around platforms, The Awl chases a small, "indielectual" readership. Why are the most important people in media reading The Awl? [more inside]
posted by General Malaise at 11:06 AM PST - 29 comments

DeepDream, Google's code for visualizing neural networks, is being used like some unholy Lovecraftian Instagram Filter to produce disturbing, surrealistic photos and videos,including upping the psychedelic ante in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Many, many of the photos and videos are Not Safe For Life, Work, or Sanity. Almost all of them are very weird, especially the food ones.
posted by Cookiebastard at 10:34 AM PST - 94 comments

If Will Graham Were Your Boyfriend - by John Leavitt aka Mefi's own The Whelk, for The Toast.
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 10:12 AM PST - 37 comments

Kate Young makes recipes for her virtual Little Library Cafe, reimagining meals from her favourite fiction and writing about the significance each book has in her life. More at Young's website, The Little Library Cafe.
posted by Kitteh at 9:25 AM PST - 9 comments

He also convincingly pitches Gaddis as an exemplar of what Thoreau called “the memorable interval” between “the language heard” and “the language read,” which he describes as “a reserved and select expression” that is “too significant to be heard by the ear, which we must be born again in order to speak.” This is a beautiful reiteration of how Gaddis’ novels, which sometimes contain nothing but dialogue for pages on end, echo the idea that “America itself can be regarded as nothing more, or less, than the speech of Americans.” --Jonathon Sturgeon reviews Joseph Tabbi's new biography of William Gaddis [more inside]
posted by chavenet at 9:04 AM PST - 14 comments

http://🍕💩.ws is a website that lets you convert URLs to emoji. via
posted by Going To Maine at 8:37 AM PST - 71 comments

We lost the incomparable poet James Tate yesterday. [more inside]
posted by West of House at 8:23 AM PST - 19 comments

Pluto, the Renewer is a short orchestral piece by English composer Colin Matthews, commissioned by the Hallé Orchestra as an addition to Gustav Holst's suite, The Planets. Program notes by the composer. Matthews commented on the piece, and Pluto's place, in an NPR interview a few years ago. The BBC's Discovering Music gives a good discussion of Holst's original suite (which you can listen to here).
posted by Wolfdog at 8:22 AM PST - 11 comments

"Over and over, the United States has touted education — for which it has spent more than $1 billion — as one of its premier successes in Afghanistan, a signature achievement that helped win over ordinary Afghans and dissuade a future generation of Taliban recruits.... ut a BuzzFeed News investigation — the first comprehensive journalistic reckoning, based on visits to schools across the country, internal U.S. and Afghan databases and documents, and more than 150 interviews — has found those claims to be massively exaggerated, riddled with ghost schools, teachers, and students that exist only on paper. The American effort to educate Afghanistan’s children was hollowed out by corruption and by short-term political and military goals that, time and again, took precedence over building a viable school system. And the U.S. government has known for years that it has been peddling hype."
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 7:44 AM PST - 47 comments

Summer's upon us, and that means it's time to wallow in delicious ice cream over at Serious Eats. Learn how to make sorbet, sherbet, gelato, fro-yo, and soft serve. While you're at it, mix in the best ways to swirl in chocolate, nuts, and booze. Top it off with myth-dispelling advice from the pros on when to use corn syrup, age an ice cream base, add eggs to a recipe, incorporate a stabilizer, and create a smoky finish. If the ice cream sounds like too much work, make a no-churn Key Lime Pie instead. For you vegans out there, we've got something for you too.
posted by sciatrix at 7:38 AM PST - 25 comments

Conan O'Brien and Andy Richter take the Fury Road (SLYT)
posted by exogenous at 7:22 AM PST - 16 comments

Vanity Fair profiles Kelly Sue DeConnick, writer of the comics Captain Marvel, Pretty Deadly, and Bitch Planet.
posted by Stacey at 7:00 AM PST - 44 comments

The Internet History Sourcebooks Project is a collection of public domain and copy-permitted historical texts presented cleanly (without advertising or excessive layout) for educational use. The main sourcebooks cover ancient, medieval, and modern history. Subsidiary sourcebooks cover African, East Asian, Global, Indian, Islamic, Jewish, Lesbian and Gay, Science, and Women's history.
posted by jedicus at 6:46 AM PST - 6 comments

It won't be important to everyone, most people probably won't even notice it, but Facebook's icons are changing, in more than one case specifically so that the woman isn't "quite literally in the shadow of the man". [more inside]
posted by greenish at 6:46 AM PST - 59 comments

BBC: "Thirteen million UK families will lose an average of £260 a year due to the freeze in working-age benefits, says the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS)." BBC: Benefit Changes, who will be affected? "Hundreds of thousands of UK families will be affected by cuts of £12bn in the UK's welfare budget announced by the chancellor." BBC: Budget Calculator.
posted by marienbad at 6:44 AM PST - 12 comments

"[I]t is her flipping of masculinist scripts—the reclaiming of chauvinistic language, the cartoonish and flippant treatment of violence, her insistence on getting paid for her labor, and her reenactment of machismo through her hyper-feminine fashionista presentation (replete with an all-girl posse)—that makes the BBHMM video [NSFW] much more layered than a simple woman-hating narrative, as some have labeled it." [more inside]
posted by melissasaurus at 6:40 AM PST - 102 comments

Writing at FiveThirtyEight.com, Sam Dean argues that until very recently, there has been no way to meaningfully measure web traffic. For advertisers and site owners, "just having a number that everyone can point to as an acceptable proxy of reality is more important than how accurate that number may be." [more inside]
posted by kewb at 5:59 AM PST - 10 comments

Back in 1987 Apple looked forward to the far future of 1997 (SLYT)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:08 AM PST - 27 comments

Humans have been baking breads successfully for thousands of years. Don't know where to start, or looking for new ideas to try? Although this wonderful resource comes up regularly in ask.mefi, I thought it was high time to be featured on the Blue. Truly belonging to "The Best of the Web": The Fresh Loaf (News & Information for Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts) forums, handbook, lessons, recipes and more.
posted by spock at 11:47 PM PST - 37 comments

The Story Behind Janis Joplin’s ‘Mercedes Benz’
posted by flapjax at midnite at 8:42 PM PST - 35 comments

The National Building Museum in Washington DC is hosting an interactive installation by the design collaborative Snarkitecture: THE BEACH [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 8:16 PM PST - 9 comments

May I present One Minute Time Machine. It is the best 5 minute and 40 second time travel romance film that will ever have been made.
posted by Mad_Carew at 7:20 PM PST - 23 comments

NYC Public Advocate Letitia James and 10 children in foster care have filed a federal class action lawsuit [PDF, trigger warning] against the child welfare agencies of New York City and New York State, alleging "that the city’s Administration for Children’s Services fails to provide the services, planning and caseworker training to help children find permanent families before they suffer irreparable harm".
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 7:07 PM PST - 15 comments

Once again, the ability of ordinary people to use strong encryption is under threat from lawmakers. In the wake of the exposure of the Five Eyes spying dragnet, consumers have demanded encryption, while the FBI claims encrypted devices will prevent it from fighting crime (or will they?) While the FBI has its own solution, experts deride it as impossible. Meanwhile, online mercenaries sell spyware to anyone who will pay them.
posted by Lycaste at 5:53 PM PST - 49 comments

Khinkali Battle Challenge
Khinkali Battle Challenge #2
Spoiler: Battle #2 is much better, the guys are shirtless, and better eaters.
posted by OmieWise at 5:51 PM PST - 10 comments

Pamela Hutchinson of Silent London reported this weekend that the second reel of Laurel and Hardy's Battle of the Century has been found. That's the reel with a thousands of pies pie fight that was hugely influential (and hilarious) and largely considered to be a lost classic. Slate provides some backstory and history around how the reel got lost - and on the 1950s highly edited remix that has been the only surviving parts of the piefight for decades .
posted by julen at 5:34 PM PST - 19 comments

Amber Carvaly and Caitlin Doughty on distrupting the funeral-home business:

"Although Undertaking L.A. will offer a conventional service like cremation, it will also work with families to facilitate what the two call a “more natural” death — no formaldehyde cocktail, no pods that fill hollow eyes, no mouth former, no satin-lined casket, no metal vault. The goal is to promote home funerals. If family members care to, they can undress, bathe, and cool the body with ice themselves or they can watch Carvaly and Doughty do so. “What I believe to be the problem is the lack of the dead body, the lack of reality, the lack of the ritual around the death,” Doughty says. “The solution is a return to all that.”

Caitlin Doughty, previously
posted by Room 641-A at 5:10 PM PST - 57 comments

Teachers and administrators still rely overwhelmingly on outdated systems of reward and punishment, using everything from red-yellow-green cards, behavior charts, and prizes to suspensions and expulsions. [... ] But consequences have consequences. Contemporary psychological studies suggest that, far from resolving children's behavior problems, these standard disciplinary methods often exacerbate them. They sacrifice long-term goals (student behavior improving for good) for short-term gain—momentary peace in the classroom. What If Everything You Knew About Disciplining Kids Was Wrong?
posted by desjardins at 4:57 PM PST - 52 comments

How An Atlanta Strip Club Runs the Music Industry (slGQ, NSFW)
posted by box at 3:37 PM PST - 49 comments

Violinist Kevin Yu has invented a high-tech tux shirt. The Coregami Gershwin incorporates athletic wear principles and technology to bring symphonic musicians' formal wear into the 21st century.
posted by Faint of Butt at 12:52 PM PST - 36 comments

Goosebumps [Official Trailer] [YouTube]

Upset about moving from a big city to a small town, teenager Zach Cooper (Dylan Minnette) finds a silver lining when he meets the beautiful girl, Hannah (Odeya Rush), living right next door. But every silver lining has a cloud, and Zach’s comes when he learns that Hannah has a mysterious dad who is revealed to be R. L. Stine (Jack Black), the author of the bestselling Goosebumps series. It turns out that there is a reason why Stine is so strange… he is a prisoner of his own imagination – the monsters that his books made famous are real, and Stine protects his readers by keeping them locked up in their books. When Zach unintentionally unleashes the monsters from their manuscripts and they begin to terrorize the town, it’s suddenly up to Stine, Zach, and Hannah to get all of them back in the books where they belong.

posted by Fizz at 12:46 PM PST - 78 comments

A federal judge has ordered the cancellation of the Washington NFL team's registered trademarks, upholding the United States Patent and Trademark Office's 2014 ruling that the trademarks are "disparaging" to Native Americans.
posted by leotrotsky at 12:18 PM PST - 91 comments

Technology blog The Verge has decided to turn off their comment system "for a bit". [more inside]
posted by fairmettle at 11:31 AM PST - 86 comments

Ernest Cline’s Armada is everything wrong with gaming culture wrapped up in one soon-to-be–best-selling novel
posted by Artw at 11:20 AM PST - 200 comments

The Vulture came up with a trailer for Marvel's upcoming Ant-Man film as a '50s-style horror picture -- complete with narration by the great Vincent Price! (Ant-Man previously, previously) [more inside]
posted by Gelatin at 11:06 AM PST - 2 comments

As Peter Singer's new book is released, the Boston Review hosts a forum on "The Logic of Effective Altruism." [more inside]
posted by HoraceH at 10:51 AM PST - 43 comments

"Don't say 'Edge is busted open,' instead say, 'Edge got his teeth knocked down his throat!'" [more inside]
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 9:43 AM PST - 15 comments

This Handy Dice Simulator Gives You A Number (SLCH)
posted by Cookiebastard at 9:42 AM PST - 6 comments

The NYPD uniform is as iconic as it is polarizing. Wearing it makes me a target for both praise and censure—neither of which I, in most cases, did anything to deserve. My character becomes a many-sided die, the cast contingent on the preconceptions and experiences of whoever is looking. With each person I encounter I wonder how it’s going to be: Am I an oaf? A hero? A pawn? A tyrant?

An anonymous female NYPD officer reflects on what it's like to wear the blue.
posted by Cash4Lead at 9:25 AM PST - 23 comments

Tucking his shapely legs underneath his curvaceous body in the dimly lit booth, Chris Hemsworth looks longingly at the bread basket the waiter places on the table in front of us. “Screw it — I could die tomorrow, right?” He smiles charmingly at me as he grabs a crisp roll and wraps his mouth around it, not even caring who’s watching. He closes his eyes and moans, savoring the carb-loaded moment like it could be his last. “If I die, bury me in a bread casket,” he says, displaying the kind of outrageous humor that doesn’t quite match his angelic looks.
posted by Kitteh at 9:10 AM PST - 124 comments

Jun, a small Andalusian town founded by the Romans 2,200 years ago, is using Twitter to reduce bureaucracy, serve its citizens, and run a more efficient administration.
posted by infini at 8:36 AM PST - 12 comments

Dear People Who Live in Fancy Tiny Houses… "You look so freakin’ happy in that Dwell Magazine article or Buzzfeed post, but c’mon, you can’t tell me that you don’t lie awake at night, your face four inches from the ceiling because the only place your bed fits is above the kitchen sink which also acts as your shower, and think, I’ve made a terrible mistake."
posted by Windigo at 8:34 AM PST - 175 comments

How British Gay Men Used To Talk: A short film featuring Polari, the cult language of UK homosexuals derived from theatre and circus slang, popularized in the 1960s by the camp radio characters Julian and Sandy. Need a dictionary? Or a translated Polari scene from Velvet Goldmine?
posted by The Whelk at 8:22 AM PST - 48 comments

The Queens neighborhood of Willets Point is an anomaly - on some of the most valuable land in New York City, you have a mass of auto shops that look completely out of place. And for decades, the area has been a target for redevelopment, being next door to Flushing Meadows - and for decades, the mechanics who made their living there had fought back. But finally, it seemed like a deal had been made - in exchange for allowing the city to redevelop the land, the community would be moved to the South Bronx, with assistance to transition these businesses. But after legal snafus, bureaucratic roadblocks, and other failures - why did the mechanics feel that their only option was to go on hunger strike?
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:03 AM PST - 8 comments

It's possible you don't know what I'm talking about. Maybe you're a moderate drinker who baby-sips two glasses of wine and leaves every party at a reasonable hour. Maybe you are one of those lucky people who can slurp your whisky all afternoon and never disappear. But if you're like me, you know the thunderbolt of waking up to discover a blank space where pivotal scenes should be. My evenings come with trapdoors.

An excerpt from Sarah Hepola's new memoir: "Everyone has blackouts, don't they?" [more inside]
posted by divined by radio at 7:37 AM PST - 109 comments

The End ..because of the various challenges inherent in launching a freestanding website in a crowded publishing environment, financial and otherwise, today is the last day we will be doing that.
posted by cnanderson at 6:47 AM PST - 67 comments

Star Trek: Axanar - Prelude to Axanar is a documentary style prelude to Star Trek: Axanar the upcoming (2016) fanfilm about the story of Garth of Izar during the Four Years War between the Federation and the Klingon Empire.
posted by yann at 6:33 AM PST - 8 comments

Moses, meanwhile, stepped out into the searing midday heat and stretched her legs. She saw six people sitting on the concrete steps of an office across from her lab. Some had been nurses and researchers at Kenema; a couple were part of a newly formed survivors’ union. That’s how they’d heard about Moses’ mission. All six had been infected with Ebola and survived. Hypothetically, that made them immune to the disease. That’s why Moses had returned—to harness that immunity to try to ensure Ebola never killed anyone again.
posted by sciatrix at 5:40 AM PST - 3 comments

About once a year he has nightmares of earth becoming a very alien planet. "Part of being a scientist is you don't want to believe there is a problem you can't solve."
posted by bitmage at 5:30 AM PST - 85 comments

Contrary to the fears of our parents, teachers, and pastors, 80s metalheads did not grow up to be drug and booze addled Satan worshipers.
posted by COD at 5:21 AM PST - 27 comments

Video proves that 1982 was the best summer for sci-fi movies - slyt(via)
posted by octothorpe at 4:40 AM PST - 31 comments

It was revealed this week that YouTube gaming star Felix Kjellberg, aka PewDiePie, made $7.4 million in 2014, sparking predictable Internet grizzling. He responds to the report in an admirably frank and charming way, discussing money, work, charity, hotdogs and the haters.
posted by nerdfish at 3:36 AM PST - 70 comments

"In Argentina, a person dies in a car accident almost every hour. 80% of those happen on roads, often when cars are attempting to overtake another vehicle. In a country with hundreds of one-lane roads, large transport trucks that obstruct views ahead can cause many dangerous overtake situations. In an attempt to reduce the danger, Samsung thought maybe a built-in wireless camera broadcasting to TV displays on the back of the truck would let drivers know when it was safe to pass." [slyt] [via]
posted by ellieBOA at 3:26 AM PST - 28 comments

The Most Exclusive Website only gives full access to one person at a time for one minute. You take a 'ticket' at the 'lobby' and wait your turn. It's like a virtual deli counter, but with much higher numbers. Of course, it's on a current list of "10 Completely Useless Websites" (which is, itself, a rather useless list). [more inside]
posted by oneswellfoop at 1:44 AM PST - 29 comments

Fred Perry Subculture Films - A series of short films documenting the evolution of street style, music and counter culture over the last 60 years. [more inside]
posted by unliteral at 11:36 PM PST - 4 comments

Researchers strapped a GoPro to a sea turtle's back.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:16 PM PST - 13 comments

The appeal of symmetry in art or inanimate objects (74 submissions currently and growing). Previously.
posted by growabrain at 8:40 PM PST - 26 comments

After reading a "nicer" ending for the musical Hamilton proposed by a young fan, Lin-Manuel Miranda (as Alexander Hamilton) and Leslie Odom Jr (as Aaron Burr) decided to give it a shot. Written by and starring Tony-award winner Miranda and based on the Ron Chernow biography, Hamilton is a hip-hop musical about the life and times of the first Secretary of the Treasury. Hamilton starts previews soon on Broadway after an acclaimed and sold-out run at the Public. [more inside]
posted by kmz at 8:38 PM PST - 12 comments

Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducts the Chamber Orchestra of Europe in Mozart's 40th Symphony. Second movement. Third movement. Fourth movement. The famous chromatic bit at the start of the development of the fourth movement. Program notes written for a performance of the piece by Redwood Symphony. [more inside]
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 7:22 PM PST - 6 comments

RINGLESS Filofax Pocket Malden Setup | May 2015 Filofax Organization: Daily Planning System | How I Customize My Kate Spade Spiral Planner & Why I Use It Instead of Filofax | April 2015 Planner Setup: Franklin Covey - Hobonichi - Erin Condren | My updated planner setup part 1- Franklin Covey- Faux Filofax | New Giada Franklin Covey (Filofax/Planner) | Huge Decorating My Filofax Compilation: 4 Weeks in my Filofax [Previously]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 7:20 PM PST - 38 comments

Authors as breakfast cereal mascots by Kate Gavino, creator of last night's reading, which is a collection of drawings and quotes from readings she attends in New York.
posted by betweenthebars at 7:13 PM PST - 9 comments

Enjoy! Best in translation.
posted by vrakatar at 6:09 PM PST - 28 comments

With Vancouver's average detached home price rising 28% to $1.12M (CAD), what the heck is going on? Canadaland's Jesse Brown interviews South China Morning Post columnist Ian Young, author of Hongcouver about wealth migration, racism, and immigration schemes. [more inside]
posted by GuyZero at 5:15 PM PST - 79 comments

From Software left fantasy for horror, and the results are mind-blowing. More detailed analysis and spoilers below the jump. _{WARNING! THIS POST CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS FOR THE GAME BLOODBORNE. IF YOU HAVEN'T PLAYED THIS YET AND WOULD LIKE TO, IT SPOILS SOME COOL REVEALS LATER IN THE GAME! LIKE EVEN MOUSING OVER URLS COULD SPOIL STUFF - BE WARNED.} [more inside]
posted by codacorolla at 3:45 PM PST - 49 comments

After seeing a young friend struggle with body image and depression, Florida-based photographer Natalie McCain was inspired to start the Honest Body Project, a series of portraits of mothers showing their beauty and imperfections to their children, paired with their stories in their own words. “My goal with this project is to help mothers everywhere learn to love their bodies and wear them proudly in front of their daughters,” McCain says. “Stop calling yourself fat. Stop shying away from being in photos. Stop body-shaming. Learn to love your body, and in turn, set a good example and start conversations with your children about how women really look.” A small number of images may be NSFW or triggering. Further details within. [more inside]
posted by zarq at 1:53 PM PST - 6 comments

Deaf West Theatre in Los Angeles has announced it will bring its production of Spring Awakening to Broadway this fall. This will mark the first Deaf West production on the Great White Way for Deaf West since 2003's Big River.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 12:03 PM PST - 5 comments

Our long Springfield nightmare is over: Harry Shearer will indeed be coming back for the next season of the Simpsons (previously). Simpsons fans are understandably happy with the news, but others who had hoped to replace him may be a little bummed out.
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 11:48 AM PST - 99 comments

Spock the Impaler: A Belated Retrospective on Vulcan Ethics - Peter Watts As you know, Bob, Nimoy’s defining role was that of Star Trek‘s Mr. Spock, the logical Vulcan who would never let emotion interfere with the making of hard choices. This tended to get him into trouble with Leonard McCoy, Trek‘s resident humanist. “If killing five saves ten it’s a bargain,” the doctor sneered once, in the face of Spock’s dispassionate suggestion that hundreds of colonists might have to be sacrificed to prevent the spread of a galaxy-threatening neuroparasite. “Is that your simple logic?” The logic was simple, and unassailable, but we were obviously supposed to reject it anyway. [more inside]
posted by CrystalDave at 11:28 AM PST - 67 comments

If you've ever visited a Disney theme park, you likely saw the work of Blaine Gibson. Gibson died earlier this month at the age of 97. [more inside]
posted by kimberussell at 11:16 AM PST - 10 comments

Avatar: The Last Airbender and Korra creator previews new graphic novel Threadworlds [Entertainment Weekly]

Imagine five planets that share a single orbit. Imagine an inquisitive young scientist, curious about the world, setting out on adventures across the universe. That’s the grounding for Threadworlds, a new graphic novel by Bryan Konietzko, best known for creating the internationally acclaimed animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. Published by First Second Books, Threadworlds is Konietzko’s graphic novel debut and takes you on a science fiction journey that promises to inspire you, captivate you and thrill you all at once.

[more inside]
posted by Fizz at 11:10 AM PST - 21 comments

A program at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts inviting visitors to don a replica kimono from a Monet work has sparked protests over appropriation. Boston Art blog Big, Red & Shiny also has a write-up. [more inside]
posted by PussKillian at 10:54 AM PST - 77 comments

The BBC micro:bit – a pocket-sized, codeable computer that allows children to get creative with technology. In the BBC’s most ambitious education initiative for 30 years, up to 1 million devices will be given to every 11 or 12 year old child in year 7 or equivalent across the UK, for free. "We happily give children paint brushes when they’re young, with no experience - it should be exactly the same with technology. The BBC micro:bit is all about young people learning to express themselves digitally, and it’s their device to own."
posted by adept256 at 10:45 AM PST - 39 comments

While hanging out in a coffeeshop, Toronto-based writer Anne Thériault live tweeted the bad date that took place at the table next to hers.
posted by orange swan at 10:26 AM PST - 791 comments

A pristine time capsule from 1962. Stunning pictures and video from this classic terminal, designed by famed Finnish architect Eero Saarinen. [via] [more inside]
posted by SpookyFish at 9:58 AM PST - 40 comments

Supreme Court rules against gerrymandering - "Ginsburg's opinion is now the law, and I suspect that, in a few decades, this case will be considered one of the most important of the term. Thus far, only California has copied Arizona and created an independent redistricting commission. But with the court's blessing, more states are likely to follow suit. These commissions have been hugely successful thus far, a real boost for representative democracy and a cure for the notoriously stubborn problem of gerrymandering. Had Justice Anthony Kennedy swung away from Ginsburg and aligned with his fellow conservatives, America would be facing down a distressingly undemocratic future."
posted by kliuless at 9:41 AM PST - 61 comments

Marsh Davies talks about how games distribute power to players and how power fantasies often fail to work as parables about bigotry through the window of Deus Ex: Human Revolution, with side discussions of how violent combat became so common in video games, how stealthy paths can be less interesting than combat-heavy paths, the tension between player power and narrative, and how these narratives can encourage people who already have power to feel sorry for themselves. [more inside]
posted by Copronymus at 9:22 AM PST - 22 comments

There was a thought that there weren’t enough bands with guitars that were exciting in the same way as the bands we cared about so we had the thought let’s try and do it better ourselves ... What I wanted that was something post-punk or whatever you want to call it but with songs. There was a while there where I wasn’t hearing any songs.

Formed in 2013, North London band Desperate Journalist take their name from an obscure 1979 beef between The Cure and the NME's Paul Morley. Together, they make jangly, intense indie pop, redolent of faded seaside resorts, cramped book-filled bedsits, and English winter chill. Their debut album, Desperate Journalist [Spotify], appeared earlier this year. [Youtube.] [more inside]
posted by Sonny Jim at 8:48 AM PST - 21 comments

Comparison between a scene in the film Whiplash and the short film it was based on(MLYT) (NSFW) [more inside]
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 8:08 AM PST - 3 comments

Eric Holder goes home.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:27 AM PST - 29 comments

The editor of the 63-year old weekly music magazine announces a new direction for Britain's flagship music publication. Following the trend of shrinking sales across all printed media (from a peak of over 300'000 issues sold weekly to barely staying above 15'000 last year), the NME will continue as a free "music and lifestyle" magazine and a new, revamped web presence. [more inside]
posted by lmfsilva at 7:03 AM PST - 38 comments

Excerpts from either a memoir by a first-time parent or a post-apocalyptic novel.
posted by paleyellowwithorange at 6:19 AM PST - 33 comments

Remnant of Boston’s Brutal Winter Threatens to Outlast Summer [more inside]
posted by Elementary Penguin at 5:12 AM PST - 53 comments

Ten years ago, four suicide bombers carrying rucksacks packed with explosives attacked central London, killing 52 people and injuring hundreds more. It was the worst single terrorist atrocity on UK soil. [more inside]
posted by NordyneDefenceDynamics at 4:11 AM PST - 42 comments

Ryan Richardson has recently digitised and made available the entire run of Slash, an LA punk magazine, which ran from 1977 to 1980. [more inside]
posted by frimble at 1:40 AM PST - 13 comments

"On July 18, in a moment of belated poetic justice, a stone will be laid on the otherwise unmarked grave of Thaddeus Marshall, an African-American street vendor from Rutherford, N.J., noting his unsung contribution to American literature."
posted by How the runs scored at 11:54 PM PST - 12 comments

Ask a Manager is a work advice site linked to sometimes on the green. In April a letter was published on a sex club at work and in June an update was sent in, with some pretty interesting details Real or fake? Commenters were divided.
posted by Aranquis at 8:26 PM PST - 69 comments

Win a Date with Channing Tatum: a Twine game by Mefi's own nerdfish [via mefi projects; also mentioned in MetaFilter Podcast 106] [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 6:59 PM PST - 23 comments

Leonard Bernstein conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in Johannes Brahms's First Symphony. Second movement. Third movement. Fourth movement. Listening guide to a Bernstein performance with the Vienna Philharmonic from 1983, two years after this one. Tom Service writes about the piece in The Guardian. [more inside]
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 6:18 PM PST - 16 comments

James Comisar has amassed a collection of movie and TV props which he currently houses in storage while he sets up the actual Museum of Television.
posted by growabrain at 5:04 PM PST - 9 comments

Calvin and Markov [via mefi projects] [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 2:54 PM PST - 70 comments

Burt's Bees (SLYT) Ingram Berg Shavitz, known as Burt Shavitz, was an American beekeeper and businessman notable for founding the Burt's Bees personal care products company with businesswoman Roxanne Quimby. Burt's likeness is featured on the Burt's Bees products. [more inside]
posted by shockingbluamp at 2:36 PM PST - 32 comments

After 167 years of continuous trading, the end of trading bell today in the open outcry futures pits of the Chicago Board of Trade, along with it's sibling at the New York Mercantile Exchange, will signal their permanent closure . Along with the closure of the pits will see the disappearance of multi coloured trading jackets (get 'em while you can), scenes of grown men screaming numbers at each other, a private sign language and gruff traders comprised almost exclusively of men, save for a few women.
posted by PenDevil at 1:52 PM PST - 48 comments

Dispatches from Trauma Island. An essay by author Katie Coyle regarding the loss of her daughter, who was stillborn in May.
posted by zarq at 1:05 PM PST - 11 comments

Buttered cat? Buttered cat! Cat butter? Butter-cat paradox? Butter your cat (or maybe not).
posted by divabat at 12:48 PM PST - 17 comments

"Now all of us single people are pathetic, not just the straight ones. “Marriage responds to the universal fear that a lonely person might call out only to find no one there,” writes Justice Anthony M. Kennedy in the majority opinion of the Supreme Court in Obergefell v. Hodges. ...Isn’t it enough to be denied the “constellation of benefits that the States have linked to marriage”? A constellation my coupled queer sisters and brethren now can hold dearly if they just make it official? Once again, being single is the dreary, awful, mournful alternative to marriage. A condition to be pitied, and quickly corrected by a sprint to City Hall." (Spinsters previously)
posted by Lycaste at 12:23 PM PST - 81 comments

CT Business Travel presents an infographic on business etiquette around the globe.
posted by Shepherd at 10:28 AM PST - 76 comments

The purpose of the project is to cover an entire album by another artist in one day, using an informal and fluid collective of musicians. "Joining in this time we had three of my favorite bands— Liars, Annie Clark and Daniel Hart from St. Vincent, Sergio Dias from the legendary Brazilian band Os Mutantes, as well as RC veteran Brian Lebarton, just back from the Charlotte Gainsbourg tour. The record covered this time was 1987 blockbuster 'Kick' by INXS. The record was chosen by fellow Aussie, Angus from the Liars. It was recorded in a little over 12 hours on March 3rd, 2010. It was an intense, hilarious, daunting and completely fun undertaking. Thanks to everybody for being there and putting so much into it. Many classic moments, inspired performances and occasional anarchy." -Beck Hansen
posted by slacy at 9:23 AM PST - 26 comments

Diorama Club - a site where you can play interactive stories or use a simple tree syntax to create and share your own.
posted by Artw at 9:12 AM PST - 12 comments

The Houghton Mifflin Readers (1971): Textbook Illustrations that Blew a Million Minds. Vintage textbook graphics, from covers to poetry to illustrations.
posted by maryr at 8:39 AM PST - 34 comments

Most Anticipated: The Great Second-Half 2015 Book Preview [The Millions]

If you like to read, we’ve got some news for you. The second-half of 2015 is straight-up, stunningly chock-full of amazing books. The list that follows isn’t exhaustive — no book preview could be — but, at 9,100 words strong and encompassing 82 titles, this is the only second-half 2015 book preview you will ever need. Scroll down and get started.

[more inside]
posted by Fizz at 8:21 AM PST - 38 comments

Ukip seemed to be waging an American-style culture war — but the British didn’t appear to be interested. From October to election day, the party’s standing in the polls fell from 18 to 13 per cent. The dip can’t all be pinned on Ukip’s drift towards Tea Party politics, but a number of Kippers feel that Farage’s infatuation with America distracted him from his mission at a crucial moment, and unbalanced the delicate ecosystem that had allowed the party to flourish.

The transatlantic flirtation behind Ukip’s sudden meltdown.
posted by MartinWisse at 8:14 AM PST - 25 comments

She got off to an inauspicious start when she was born in poverty and then was struck by lightning as a small child. But when her father died when she was ten, leaving her family without any means of support, Mary Anning made her own luck with her skill at fossil finding. Her first big find came when she discovered the first complete skeleton of an Icthyosaur at twelve years old. She went on to discover pivotally important skeletons of plesiosaurs, pterosaurs and a fossil fish which was hailed as the "missing link" between sharks and rays. Despite being self taught, she was widely regarded as one of paleontology's greatest experts in the world when she died. Previously.
posted by sciatrix at 7:36 AM PST - 12 comments

Italian surveillence software vendor Hacking Team were hacked, with 400GB of data dumped. According to leaked invoices, Hacking Team sold offensive software to countries including South Korea, Sudan, Kazakhstan, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Lebanon, and Mongolia, Ethiopia, Egypt, and Luxemburg. There are initial indications that Hacking Team had pretty poor operation security, for example, using the password Ht2015!. [more inside]
posted by These Premises Are Alarmed at 7:16 AM PST - 43 comments

Death Metal Grease (SLYT)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 7:04 AM PST - 34 comments

Who need jetpacks and flying cars if you (might) have Giant Robot Battles?
posted by signal at 6:17 AM PST - 21 comments

Remember "Bartkira" (previously here), which adapted the manga Akira into the world of The Simpsons? (Now with a website where you can read the first three volumes) Of course you know Akira was adapted into an anime, and now, so has Bartkira... kind of... at least a shot-for-shot remake of the Akira trailer. (For comparison, the original Akira trailer it's modeled from.) [more inside]
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:44 AM PST - 15 comments

Dante Gabriel Rossetti (/ˈdænti ˈɡeɪbriəl rəˈzɛti/;[1] 12 May 1828 – 9 April 1882) was an English poet, illustrator, painter, translator and wombat enthusiast. He celebrated it in poetry and image; others have since done so with baking. [more inside]
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 10:42 PM PST - 12 comments

Are you angry on the internet? That's ok! Perhaps, though, this would be an excellent time for you, angry person on the internet, to review (MeFi's own) Andrea Phillips's helpful flow chart of how not to be a bullying mob. [via mefi projects]
posted by MeghanC at 10:25 PM PST - 31 comments

Pixar's 15 movies, ranked: Vulture | Collider | ET | EW [slideshow] | TV Guide [slideshow] | The Wrap | Washington Post, which disagrees on methodology: "My way to rank the Pixar canon is simple: How much did the film give you the feels?" [more inside]
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 6:41 PM PST - 204 comments

"[W]hat moves me [about women's soccer] is not a beautiful pass, or a bad refereeing call, or even the players’ backstories. What moves me is the players’ faces, and watching women want. ... And we need to see this, because when you’re in the act of wanting something badly enough, there isn’t room for self-consciousness. How you look, your stance, your hair, your makeup, whether you appear pretty, your sex appeal: all of these things that coalesce in my brain, and maybe yours, to form a hum so low and so constant that I take it as a state of being—and when you want, they disappear. When you want, the want goes to the fore. The you can take a backseat."
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:05 PM PST - 47 comments

Just don't do it:

What this advice boils down to is ‘talk like a man’. The writer doesn’t even try to argue that there’s some inherent reason to prefer ‘less body language’ (whatever that means) to more. It’s preferable simply because it’s what men are said to do. Men are more successful in the workplace, so if women want to emulate their success, the trick is to mimic their behaviour.

[more inside]
posted by NoraReed at 5:54 PM PST - 71 comments