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Melting into the ocean. In the Alaskan Arctic, villages like Shishmaref have a front row view of global warming.
posted by homunculus at 9:18 PM PST - 19 comments

Welcome to MeatShake! Here at MeatShake Corporation, we have a simple vision: Meat. Lots of meat. We bring you our vision in the most amazing and scrumptious forms imaginable. Our dedication to meat is nothing short of mighty. That's our promise to you, the valued customer. See also: Ugly Duckling [.ram file]
posted by sciurus at 5:42 PM PST - 8 comments

Florida releases a sample ballot for the November election.
posted by anathema at 4:46 PM PST - 11 comments

Prints, and paintings by Dan McCarthy. My faves: 1 2 3 4 5 6.
posted by dobbs at 3:58 PM PST - 12 comments

FOX NEWS RUNNING THE CAMERA POOL at the DEBATES Tonight The press pool rotates who runs the cameras at the various events. Tonight, Fox News just happened to win the spin. Gives new meaning to "TV networks are flexing their muscles, saying they won't be bound by rules set by the Bush and Kerry campaigns that would prevent split-screen and reaction shots and require cameras to stay fixed on the candidate speaking." He who controls the perception of the populace, wins.
posted by jackspace at 3:50 PM PST - 263 comments

Things you wish your computer had... any other suggestions?
posted by feelinglistless at 2:54 PM PST - 33 comments

Eat 'em if you got 'em: hemp-based foods were banned several years ago, thanks to the Drug Enforcement Agency's neverending "war on (some) drugs" but lawyers for hemp-based food companies successfully overturned the law, and the deadline ran out on the DEA to challenge it. Not that I would ever want to eat a hemp cheeseburger, but it's nice to know I can. Hopefully hemp rope will remain legal as well.
posted by mathowie at 2:46 PM PST - 19 comments

Can we predict volcanic eruptions? PBS aired a NOVA program called "Deadly Shadow of Vesuvius" in 1998 which suggests that we can by monitoring small scale earthquakes which "swarm" as an eruption approaches. Why is this important now? Look at this map, which indicates the occurence of over 40 earthquakes under Mount St. Helens just today, with 10 being over 3.0 on the Richter scale. The Pacific Northwest Seismograph Network has issued a series of alerts with more detail. National Geographic is reporting that an eruption is imminent.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 2:24 PM PST - 19 comments

An excellent WashPost primer on the lies each candidate is currently telling about the other, and how they hold up to reality. Also, enjoy the many euphemisms employed to avoid the "L" word: (Misleading. Inaccurate. Oversimplified. Exaggerated. Carefully selected. Unfair. etc etc) Who will be the first mainstream media outlet to state plainly that a politician has told a lie? Login: shutyomouf@hotmail.com - pw:shaftbaby)
posted by luser at 1:43 PM PST - 6 comments

Is there a link between today's headline: Baghdad Car Bombs Kill 34 Children Receiving Sweets (from American troops) and this Wall Street Journal front page article from September 22th?

"Capt. Ayers took lessons from his fellow captains. In April, Capt. Jesse Beaudin convinced a friend from the U.S. to send backpacks, notebooks and pencils for schoolchildren. Kids mobbed troops for the goods whenever they went out on patrol. "The kids provided security. No one attacked us when we were surrounded by children," Capt. Beaudin says. After hearing about this tactic at the dining hall, Capt. Ayers's men also wrote home requesting school supplies." Non-subscribers can read the WSJ article here
posted by miguelbar at 1:17 PM PST - 15 comments

In September 2001 the FDA warned Merck, makers of the painkiller Vioxx, for engaging in a promotional campaign that minimized "potentially serious cardiovascular findings." The previous year, Merck spent $161 million on Vioxx advertising (more than Pepsi or Budweiser spent on advertising that year). Earlier this year, a securities class action complaint was filed on behalf of several Merck investors alleging the company engaged in a marketing campaign that included false and misleading statements concerning the safety profile of Vioxx and that company insiders sold personally held shares of Merck for over $175 million in proceeds. Today, Merck withdrew Vioxx from the market.
posted by Otis at 10:51 AM PST - 18 comments

New! Fast! Automatic! Now! Archigram!
posted by adamgreenfield at 9:47 AM PST - 8 comments

"Just for the record, do you believe the Sun goes around the Earth or the Earth goes around the sun?" : Ages before "Intelligent Design", a bold PaleoCreationist pseudoscientific gobbledygook - embodied by Tom Willis, Creationism's man in Kansas and head of the Mid Atlantic Creation Research Society - strode the Earth. The AAAS dissected the mess in "Lions, Tigers and APES, Oh My! ; Creationism vs. Evolution in Kansas" ( Google cache) and one writer concluded : "The War between the creationists and the public schools is over. The creationists appear to have won" : now, in a Kansas that's scientifically proven flatter than a pancake, Mona Lisa is as happy as a clam, and Kissing Frank's ass and appeals to mysterious watchmakers predominate, while on the national stage, God is a real estate developer.

Meanwhile, a new group proposes better zoning bylaws : Scientists and Engineers for Change
posted by troutfishing at 9:32 AM PST - 22 comments

While reading up on the Detroit City Council's latest brainstorm, African Town, I stumbled upon this blog that highlights many of the once great, now decaying buildings of my former hometown. If you've ever wondered what was inside some of those ancient, boarded up buildings, there are some great photos here.
posted by Oriole Adams at 9:16 AM PST - 7 comments

We are proud, free, God-loving Americans! We don't torture people! We let others do the job for us. The Bush administration is supporting a provision in the House leadership's intelligence reform bill that would allow U.S. authorities to deport certain foreigners to countries where they are likely to be tortured or abused, an action prohibited by the international laws against torture the United States signed 20 years ago.
posted by acrobat at 9:01 AM PST - 16 comments

Watch, watch it now... watch!
I'm Dr. Julius Sumner Miller, and physics is my business.
Witness the drama of science in video clips from a groundbreaking 1960s program, and ask yourself, Why is it so?
posted by putzface_dickman at 8:15 AM PST - 16 comments

Oh My Stars-N-Garters! In addition to the Aardman Animations Wallace and Gromit films online here (previously MeFi-ed here), you can also view the Oscar and Academy Award winner Creature Comforts online! One of my all-time fave films. Joy!
posted by Shane at 7:59 AM PST - 12 comments

DocuTicker : A daily update of new reports from government agencies, ngo's, think tanks, and other groups. A whole lot of grist for the mill.
posted by mfoight at 7:34 AM PST - 5 comments

Kerry Haters For Kerry Are you going to vote for John Kerry even though you find him unpleasant, annoying, arrogant, waffling, misguided or just generally unappealing in some profound way? Then you've come to the right place! We're Kerry Haters for Kerry -- perhaps his largest constituency! No need to hide in the Kerry-hating closet anymore while you pretend to everyone that he'll be a great president. Here you are among friends. You can speak freely and honestly. You can admit: 'He's awful! And I'm for him!' via Wonkette
posted by psmealey at 7:08 AM PST - 63 comments

The BBC News website has introduced links to other news sites' articles that relate to the stories they cover. Google News is based around a similar premise, but as far as I know the BBC is the first major news organization to link to articles not written by themselves.

A good example of this in action is the current headline article about today's bombings in Iraq (look in the right sidebar). Only the top stories seem to have this feature activated, but hopefully (to me at least) it will spread through the site with time.
posted by lowlife at 6:41 AM PST - 9 comments

The Army are tagging honey bees to find UXBs. Now technology lets you silently locate mobile phones in the UK. Now you don't need to be 007 or Austin Powers to track someone. Is tagging offenders the soft option? How could someone already be watching you?
posted by DrDoberman at 5:45 AM PST - 3 comments

Star Wars Chick. Not to be confused with the star wars kid. Besides, Star Wars Chick looks much better in her handmade Slave Leia Cosutme [ via memepool ]
posted by psychotic_venom at 5:33 AM PST - 47 comments

Bad Candy: Despite the lack of new candy reviews Bad Candy remains one of those sites you can go back to time after time. Side-splitting hours within. "None of this prepared us for the taste, of course. My Love is a time-release candy; it doesn't taste unbearable until it has firmly entrenched itself in your mouth. Then, all at once, My Love issues forth its vinegary bitterness, wilting tongue and lips alike with its thick, saucy, Drano-like quality." (this site was mentioned once in passing on the blue, but deserves a post of it's own)
posted by soulhuntre at 5:01 AM PST - 14 comments

My Broken Leg Diaries Everything you ever wanted to know about your broken leg, and lots of anecdotal anecdotes.
posted by keli at 1:21 AM PST - 1 comment

How to Get Ready for Bed. Mrs. Rollman's second grade class provides a series of how-to's.
posted by plexi at 11:04 PM PST - 23 comments

This November help get an Electric-American elected into the White House. Vote Robocratic!
posted by Robot Johnny at 11:00 PM PST - 3 comments

Remember "They booed the results of their vote. They were upset that they had voted for the 'wrong guy'"? Well, now our so-called third graders are all grown up. (via Kos)
posted by soyjoy at 10:21 PM PST - 19 comments

There are some questions that social scientists should be able to answer. Either executing people cuts the homicide rate or it does not. A fascinating look into statistics and the death penalty.
posted by LimePi at 9:31 PM PST - 32 comments

The Crusade Against Evolution. How the next generation of "creation science" is invading America's classrooms, and peer reviewed biology journals. [Via The Panda's Thumb.]
posted by homunculus at 7:54 PM PST - 83 comments

Who is funding a candidate and for how much. You can search by name or zip code to find out. Here is a link to prominent pittsburgh people that have contributed.
posted by Raichle at 7:07 PM PST - 13 comments

Dude, sending money to other starving dudes is so...abstract. Give the needy what they need. Like ducks or something!
posted by holloway at 5:37 PM PST - 14 comments

Judge Rules Against Patriot Act Provision
In what can only be described as "a good thing", a US District judge has found that "Surveillance powers granted to the FBI under the Patriot Act, a cornerstone of the Bush Administration's war on terror, were ruled unconstitutional".
posted by fenriq at 4:52 PM PST - 22 comments

MoveOn's "Leave No Voter Behind" campaign takes off. Tonight, MoveOn.org is starting what is expected to be the world's largest phone bank campaign, using the Internet to coordinate hundreds of thousands of volunteers to get people to register and vote on Election Day. Are the polls getting it wrong as some suggest? Will grassroot phonebanking work in swing states, or will this election be won by "Bible-believing women" instead?
posted by insomnia_lj at 4:03 PM PST - 14 comments

Greedo and Han Solo: Who shot first? Let the court decide
posted by Mwongozi at 3:23 PM PST - 14 comments

What the (Internet) Bubble Got Right Paul Graham has written a thought-provoking essay on the positive lessons we should have taken away from the Internet bubble of the late 90s.
posted by tippiedog at 3:05 PM PST - 10 comments

Language started with emotional signaling. That's the thesis of a new book, The First Idea: How Symbols, Language, And Intelligence Evolved From Our Primate Ancestors To Modern Humans, by Stanley I. Greenspan and Stuart G. Shanker.

Lived emotional experience is key to language learning, the authors suggest. "Mathematicians and physicists may manipulate abstruse symbols representing space, time, and quantity, but they first understood those entities as tiny children wanting a far-away toy, or waiting for juice, or counting cookies. The grown-up genius, like the adventurous child, forms ideas through playful explorations in the imagination, only later translated into the rigor of mathematics."

The book is very ambitious, and I don't think we'll ever know where language came from, but this sounds like a more fruitful line of thinking than Chomsky's deus ex machina "language gene" mutation.
posted by languagehat at 2:49 PM PST - 32 comments

Ze Frank, nigerian 419 scammer. [Quicktime]
posted by gwint at 1:50 PM PST - 14 comments

Foreign correspondence that the readers haven't seen... The New York Observer writes today about a memo, purportedly written by a Wall Street Journal foreign correspondent (although that's in dispute.) The vivid writing is part travelogue, part horror story -- and wholly different than any foreign story I've read since the war started. (And I work for a newspaper.) But this has reportedly seen the halls of the Journal and the New York Times.
posted by krewson at 12:49 PM PST - 24 comments

The evidence is compelling: John Kerry responds to George Bush's GOP acceptance speech with the following opening remarks: "I'll tell you what happened tonight that will be remembered. The Boston Red Sox moved to within 2.5 games of the New York Yankees."

At the time of Kerry's speech, however, the Red Sox had not moved up in the standings. While they won that night, so did the Yankees, and the Sox remained 3.5 games back.

And John Kerry accuses Bush of misleading the American people?
posted by loquax at 11:49 AM PST - 45 comments

Fun and free e-cards for all... for the geek, for the addict, for the artist, for the musician, for the conspiracy theorist, for the chef, for the tasteless, for the tactless, for just about anyone. Where do you go for all of your e-card needs?
posted by MsVader at 10:59 AM PST - 17 comments

No debate. The Commission on Presidential Debates: the "unconscionable fraud" brought to you by Corporate America.
posted by four panels at 10:47 AM PST - 47 comments

The legacy of Dr. Babasahed Ambedkar, Indian Dalit ('untouchable') intellectual and activist who agitated for reform and equality through education for his people. He converted from Hinduism to Buddhism, and encouraged other Dalits to do likewise, based on that religion's casteless nature.
Related :- National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights.
posted by plep at 10:28 AM PST - 7 comments

Utopian Christians, despisers of all ornament, in some rough sense protomodernists, the eighteenth- and nineteeth-century millenarian cult known disparagingly as the Shakers has had an impact on the history of design far in excess of its size. (At most, there were only ever a few thousand, and it's easy to understand why, given their emphasis on "perfection" to the point of celibacy.) Key to the Shaker world view was the perfectability of the material world - its purgation of all decoration, artifice and frippery - as an act of worship. This ethos of design, summarized in these theses toward the improvement of the domestic environment, has gifted us with a legacy of highly esteemed craft objects. None has been more celebrated than that canny apotheosis of domestic utility, the Shaker rail, which survives here in a particularly nice contemporary interpretation. If only half the artifacts we're currently offered were as thoughtfully designed...
posted by adamgreenfield at 9:43 AM PST - 11 comments

The Internet's Most Accurate English-to-English Dictionary This internet service will translate any English word, phrase or passage into English, or vice versa. Your original grammar, style, and spelling are left intact!
posted by adampsyche at 9:10 AM PST - 21 comments

The galleries of Transportation Futuristics illustrate some of the ingenious things people have dreamt up to solve the basic problem of how to get from here to there. Personal favs: the Bee and the flying saucer bus. via the exploratorium
posted by iconomy at 7:22 AM PST - 12 comments

Strangers on my Flight [Flash, blort]
posted by Pretty_Generic at 6:07 AM PST - 20 comments

Grind. Endless drudgery. Too much in your in-tray, not enough in your out-tray. You put your headphones on, but it doesn't really help. You want a distraction - just for a moment or two. "A happy employee is a productive employee" you justify to yourself, although you're not convinced. Then it happens. A 24 carat nugget of plain text escapism lands in your in-box. You're an alt-tab, double-click away from sheer bliss. DNRC; A.Word.A.Day; FlipFlopFlyin Newsletter; The Plain Text Gazette; and the previously mentioned Snowmail and Newsnight Newsletters, which take a less formal but equally sharp look at the day's news, with anecdotes and observations thrown in. What other quality plain text mail lists are around?
posted by nthdegx at 6:04 AM PST - 6 comments

Al Gore on tomorrow's Bush-Kerry duel: The debate tomorrow should not seek to discover which candidate would be more fun to have a beer with. As Jon Stewart of the "The Daily Show'' nicely put in 2000, "I want my president to be the designated driver.''
posted by CunningLinguist at 5:36 AM PST - 37 comments

Terrorising free speech. Al Lorentz is a reserve Non-Commissioned Officer currently serving in Iraq. His blazingly clear, succinct article on Iraq, titled "Why we cannot win", has raged over the wires (also at MeFi) since it was published on LewRockwell.com. Now, the military chain of command is considering charging Al with violation of Article 134 for making a statement with the intent to promote disloyalty or disaffection toward the U.S. by any member of the Armed forces. The military is also considering charging Al with violation of 1344.10, the conduct of partisan political activity, and violation of Standards of Conduct for unauthorized use of Government assets to create and email stories.
posted by acrobat at 5:29 AM PST - 30 comments

Singularity, The. A black hole in the Extropian worldview whose gravity is so intense that no light can be shed on what lies beyond it. "Popular Science" talks about The Singularity, and asks "Is Science Fiction about to go blind?" Also, see previously, here and here.
posted by seanyboy at 5:16 AM PST - 43 comments

Hamas meets Photoshop
[via Beruf Terrorist: The Enemy of all the World]
posted by tcp at 4:50 AM PST - 18 comments

"The key to the Avengers' defeat was a bunch of nonsensical, random bullshit!"
posted by yerfatma at 4:19 AM PST - 12 comments

Your Health and Happiness in Pregnancy - a lovely pamphlet from 1978. From A Little Pregnant.
posted by SuzySmith at 3:45 AM PST - 8 comments

Historic cities - images and maps. [via monkeyfilter]

Also - historic maps of the UK, and many more. Map overload may occur.

posted by jb at 3:18 AM PST - 8 comments

Woody Allen on the 2004 Election
posted by alfredogarcia at 8:51 PM PST - 27 comments

How To Cost Microsoft Money. Microsoft has a form on their website that you can fill out to get a copy of Windows XP SP2 on CD at no charge (with free shipping by Purolator). I ordered one. Then, at the Order Confirmation screen, I clicked Back, then Refresh, then Retry (since the form had to be posted again). I did this 149 times......
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 8:39 PM PST - 47 comments

Would You, as a Human Being, be Willing to Shake Hands with a Jew?
posted by Mick at 8:29 PM PST - 110 comments

Hey Canada! Now you can "Shut Up! Shut Up!" too.
Are our nice, polite, enlightened neighbors to our north really ready for Fox News?
posted by amberglow at 8:21 PM PST - 41 comments

Bet on Iraq
posted by jaronson at 6:37 PM PST - 13 comments

The Lone Star Iconoclast, local newspaper of Crawford, Texas, switches sides and endorses Kerry for president. (Via Daily Kos).
posted by gottabefunky at 4:41 PM PST - 30 comments

A classic snapshot of the last election. Against the current backdrop of alltime high oil prices and soaring deficits.
posted by H. Roark at 4:38 PM PST - 12 comments

Becoming a word. Just over a year ago, Shelley Jackson launched the Skin project, which aimed to tattoo a story one word at a time onto other people. Shelley herself has the title, and here's an essay from a the. I hope the story isn't set on Anglesey.
posted by nylon at 4:33 PM PST - 8 comments

klingons for kerry
posted by angry modem at 4:10 PM PST - 7 comments

Tattoo my head with anything anti-Bush! An interesting interview with someone that put their skin on eBay for an anti-Bush tattoo, but instead of the $10,000-30,000 price tags, her no-reserve auction started at one cent and only ended at $103.50. The final product kinda works no matter who wins, but still, a hundred bucks probably didn't cover the ink, let alone the commitment. Remember the Howard Dean tattoo? How far would you go for your candidate?
posted by mathowie at 3:19 PM PST - 19 comments

The Animaris Rhinoceros Transport: "Since about ten years Theo Jansen is occupied with the making of a new nature. Not pollen or seeds but plastic yellow tubes are used as the basic matierial of this new nature. He makes skeletons which are able to walk on the wind. Eventualy he wants to put these animals out in herds on the beaches, so they will live their own lives." [2MB Quicktime Video]
posted by muckster at 1:54 PM PST - 10 comments

Arnold Signs Prison Smoking Ban
By July 1, 2005, there will be no more cigarette smoking in California's prison system.
Makes sense, no smoking in our bars, no smoking behind our bars.
posted by fenriq at 11:09 AM PST - 116 comments

"Fear presides over these memories, a perpetual fear." He is one of America's great novelists, but you don't expect Philip Roth to be barreling up the best-seller list with a book that hasn't even been published yet. And yet "The Plot Against America" is in the top 3 at amazon.com. It spins a what-if scenario in which the isolationist and anti-Semitic hero Charles Lindbergh runs for president as a Republican in 1940 and defeats F.D.R. "Keep America Out of the Jewish War", reads a button worn by Lindbergh supporters rallying at Madison Square Garden. And so he does: he signs nonaggression pacts with Germany and Japan that will keep America at peace while the rest of the world burns. The Lindbergh administration hatches a nice plan to prod assimilation of the Jews. Innocuously called Just Folks, it's a relocation program for urban Jews, administered by an Office of American Absorption fronted by an obliging and pompous rabbi of radio celebrity. The teenage Roth character is shipped off to a Kentucky tobacco farm, to finally live among Christians. The book is about American Fascism, but while Roth is no fan of President Bush ("a man unfit to run a hardware store let alone a nation like this one"), he points out that he conceived this book (LATimes registration: sparklebottom/sparklebottom) in December 2000, and that it would be "a mistake" to read it "as a roman à clef to the present moment in America." (more inside)
posted by matteo at 10:58 AM PST - 10 comments

This is an odd way to find out about an earthquake in California.
posted by eriko at 10:56 AM PST - 22 comments

The folks at Comedy Central were annoyed when Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly kept referring to "The Daily Show" audience as "stoned slackers." So they did a little research. And guess whose audience is more educated?
posted by ae4rv at 10:56 AM PST - 57 comments

The incredible Michelle Yeoh. The irresistible Maggie Cheung. And now Zhang Ziyi? Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation...of asskicking Asian action heroines.
posted by adamgreenfield at 9:28 AM PST - 25 comments

The racist American Election Thousands of [Florida] felons could get to vote this November for one reason: They're Hispanic.
posted by dash_slot- at 7:26 AM PST - 17 comments

my new shirt folding technique is unstoppable. (QT mpeg)
posted by whatnot at 7:20 AM PST - 24 comments

Can You Pass the Third Grade? (Flash)
posted by konolia at 5:48 AM PST - 30 comments

Inferno Cargo, subsidiary of Sable + Shuck. Advertising interests me, but if it doesn't you, this will waste your time.
posted by nthdegx at 5:43 AM PST - 4 comments

Mr. Bush and His 10 Ever-Changing Different Positions on Iraq: "A flip and a flop and now just a flop." Delightful Moore (to those who like what he does), and a few links to backup his reasoning for those who don't.
posted by acrobat at 5:09 AM PST - 52 comments

The Pig Wings Project: "Rhetoric surrounding the development of new biological technologies make us wonder if pigs could fly one day. If pigs could fly, what shape their wings will take? The Pig Wings Project presents the first use of living pig tissue to construct and grow winged shape Semi-Living Objects."
posted by taz at 3:43 AM PST - 2 comments

The Boobiethon for Breast Cancer is coming round again (more here).
posted by plep at 2:01 AM PST - 4 comments

just in case atom bombs fall - a handbook for civilians.
a neato keen early 50's civil defense booklet.
posted by quonsar at 11:22 PM PST - 20 comments

Biro Web. I'm not really sure what else to say. Despite the 'porn' section, entirely safe for work.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:54 PM PST - 12 comments

The Unfeeling President by E.L. Doctorow:
This president does not know what death is. He hasn't the mind for it. You see him joking with the press, peering under the table for the weapons of mass destruction he can't seem to find, you see him at rallies strutting up to the stage in shirt sleeves to the roar of the carefully screened crowd, smiling and waving, triumphal, a he-man.
posted by Skygazer at 9:42 PM PST - 36 comments

Was your voter registration form thick enough? Ohio's republican secretary of state has issued an order (three days before the registration deadline) to throw out all voter registration forms printed on paper less then 80lb. Coincidence that dem-leaning areas have seen a 250% rise in voter registration, with tens of thousands of new voters in a race expected to be closer then FL 2000?

Oh yeah, the state sent out 40lb forms to those requesting them. Cute, huh.
posted by delmoi at 7:23 PM PST - 82 comments

The soldiers of our voting task force are well trained and ache to confront the BG2 Street Team in an honourable combat!
posted by swift at 6:53 PM PST - 3 comments

The price of deception (Flash) and the price of this animation
posted by nims at 4:22 PM PST - 12 comments

For Sale: Slightly Used, Amazingly Versatile 7-Letter Kit. (Letters included: L-I-N-D-O-W-S) Warning: Improper placement of W may result in lawsuits.
posted by Mwongozi at 3:55 PM PST - 11 comments

Lost Boys of Sudan is an amazing documentary about refugees from Sudan's Darfur conflict finding haven in the US. It's premiering on PBS tomorrow. Their website has local PBS listings as well as locations and times of upcoming screenings in the US. From sleeping on the ground in a UN refugee camp to working at WalMart in Dallas, the men in the film undertake an enormously difficult, but ultimately life-saving journey.
posted by scarabic at 1:58 PM PST - 8 comments

William S. Burroughs demonstrates his cut-up method in this excellent film sequence.
(.swf, 10mb, related discussion)
posted by moonbird at 1:24 PM PST - 19 comments

Voter Vault versus Demzilla
Compare and contrast the voter databases of the major political parties. Open source or proprietary? Locally operated or offshored? Paid staff or volunteers? Do these attitudes and/or methods reflect a more general mindset of the parties? Are there other distinctly different ways in which the national party organizations do business that may reflect wel or poorly on them?
posted by nofundy at 12:31 PM PST - 5 comments

The Tonight Show celebrates its 50th anniversary of national broadcast, it was a local New York show staring in 1953 tonight. Steve Allen was its first host, blazing the trail for all late nights to come (did you know his announcer was Gene Rayburn?). Then came Jack Parr. The world was a better place with Johnny Carson making us laugh nearly every night for thirty years. Jay Leno's rise to host was certainly not easy. And, it seems, on the show's 55th anniversary, it'll be Conan inheriting the throne! Happy anniversary to one of the most entertaining, groundbreaking American institutions ever.
posted by WolfDaddy at 12:17 PM PST - 48 comments

Apple-1 CPU, VG-Mint.
"This computer, as is documented, was bought from Steve Job's parents garage. The checks for the purchase and the original manual are included." More photos here.
[via coudal]
posted by me3dia at 11:50 AM PST - 16 comments

"Mayday, mayday, Estonia, please." 10 years ago tonight, 852 people lost their lives in the cold dark waters of the Baltic Sea. In the middle of the night the ferry M/S Estonia, headed from Tallinn to Stockholm, suddenly capsized and sank. Only 137 people survived Europe's worst maritime disaster since World War II. (more inside)
posted by mr.marx at 11:43 AM PST - 8 comments

With the DVD of Walking Tall hitting stores today, it might be nice to read the legend of the real sheriff Buford Pusser, six-feet and six-inches of Alabaman, two-by-four wielding, vigilante justice. Actually, it's not the first time this story's been told. The 1973 version of Walking Tall is now considered a classic (in some circles).
What's cool is that Alabama-bred country rockers Drive By Truckers have devoted not one, but two songs on their new album The Dirty South to debunking the myths surrounding this folk hero
posted by UncleDave at 10:38 AM PST - 8 comments

Memories of a Dog . Moriyama Daido's pictures are taken in the streets of Japan's major cities. Made with a small, hand-held camera, they reveal the speed with which they were snapped. Often the frame is tilted vertiginously, the grain pronounced, and the contrast emphasized. Among his city images are those shot in underlit bars, strip clubs, on the streets or in alleyways, with the movement of the subject creating a blurred suggestion of a form (warning: NSFW images if you scroll down the page) rather than a distinct figure. His best known picture, Stray Dog, (1971) is taken on the run, in the midst of bustling street activity. It is an essential reflection of Moriyama's presence as an alert outsider in his own culture. Moriyama is also a toy-camera enthusiast (his favorite is the Polga) . He has worked in the US, too: "N.Y. 71". (more inside)
posted by matteo at 10:28 AM PST - 6 comments

Truly meta. We've had posts about outing gay politicians. We had a post about Dick Cheney's gay daughter. We had a Metatalk post about revealing blogs that the author might want to keep private.

Now they're all tied togther in the story of a politician's possibly gay daughter being outed by a blog that she might or might not have been keeping private. My head hurts.
posted by Armitage Shanks at 9:48 AM PST - 26 comments

The evocation of dystopian space with contemporary settings. One of the many challenges faced by directors of low- or no-budget SF films is the convincing depiction of futuristic space, especially where it needs to appear oppressive or totalising. What are you to do, when you lack the wherewithal to create elaborate sets, and even the cheesiest CGI is well out of reach?

You use extant buildings and artifacts, and you crop carefully. But which ones? Frank Lloyd Wright's Marin County Civic Center appears particularly popular in this context: here it is in THX1138, and here in Gattaca - the latter a film which also featured the Citroen DS and Studi Avanti to precisely evocative effect. (What's so sinister about this poor building? In real life it's stunningly pretty.)

Jean-Luc Godard had a field day in Alphaville, with the anomic architecture of mid-60s, high modernist Paris, and again with the same sorts of mainframe installations Lucas relied so heavily upon in THX. Even (cough) Logan's Run found low-rent dystopia in various Dallas and Fort Worth settings, here Fort Worth's Water Gardens.

Maybe the poor Marin Center's a bit played out, huh? As an aid to future directors, then, let me ask you: What are some dystopic settings near you?
posted by adamgreenfield at 9:11 AM PST - 47 comments

Being threatened with litigation by the RIAA? There's always this solution.
posted by anathema at 8:39 AM PST - 4 comments

Tiddlywiki looks fantastic, but the idea's so cool I'm still not sure what I'd use it for. So far, there's a only a tiddly hypertext story. Bears watching.
posted by iffley at 8:27 AM PST - 7 comments

IF jetplane + wall == dust THEN wow(windowsmedia)
Hunt the Boeing my arse.
posted by Pretty_Generic at 7:44 AM PST - 38 comments

Theo Jansen makes strange creatures that prowl beaches, powered by the wind [.avi]. "Not pollen or seeds but plastic yellow tubes are used as the basic matierial of this new nature." - Strandbeest. [via Tipping The Sacred Cows]
posted by Blue Stone at 7:29 AM PST - 12 comments

A short goodby. A memo received by a blogger/journalist. Is this in any way typical? Can we find out who or what it concerns?
posted by donfactor at 7:00 AM PST - 28 comments

This video costs $150,000
What’s wrong with this video?
Well, it only cost $15
$150,000 could make a difference to over 1,000,000 people

In this age of media companies and the RIAA suing everyone and their computer illiterate grandmothers, it’s nice to see an musician take a critical look at what it is that they do, if it’s really necessary, and ask if there was a better way to spend their money. And, quite frankly, it doesn’t surprise me in the least that it was Sarah McLachlan. (QT video)
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 5:32 AM PST - 96 comments

If America were Iraq, what would it be like? Private armies totaling 275,000 men; platoons of Christian Soldiers Militia holed up in Arlington National Cemetery; the grounds of the White House constantly under mortar fire; the Secretary of State, President, and Attorney General all assassinated in the past year; and the Air Force routinely bombing Billings, Flint, Philadelphia, and parts of LA and DC to destroy "safe houses" of "criminal gangs."
posted by johnnydark at 5:05 AM PST - 32 comments

WalMart ends anti-Semitic book sale Bowing to a barrage of complaints from Jewish groups, retail leader Wal-Mart Inc. has stopped selling "The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion," an infamous anti-Semitic tract long exposed as fake.
posted by Outlawyr at 5:02 AM PST - 67 comments

It was bound to happen eventually - Richard Branson announced the launch of Virgin Galactic, a joint venture between Virgin and Mojave Aerospace Ventures, the company responsible for SpaceShipOne. They expect to send up to 3000 people into suborbital space over five years for £115k each (around $200k)and the first ship will be named the Virgin SpaceShip VSS Enterprise (well, I guess he can name it what he wants...). It's all immensely exciting, but personally I think Virgin Spacelines sounds classier.
posted by adrianhon at 2:55 AM PST - 14 comments

America Bashing. By Thai cartoonist Stephane Peray.
posted by plep at 1:57 AM PST - 33 comments

Ten 13 PI Productions Inc. was developed by Frank Serpico and his nephew Vincent Serpico as an organization to develop media projects that progress ethical culture. The Frank Serpico website is the first project in the development of this cooperative endeavor. Maybe you've read the book, seen the movie or even the short-lived tv show. But have you read Frank Serpico's blog?
posted by whatnot at 9:54 PM PST - 1 comment

How to build your own violin, in 45 pictures. Or for guitarists: build your own hollow-body, solid-body electric, or steel guitar. For the budget-minded, PVC flutes. How about bagpipes? No? Surely you cannot resist the tribal sounds of the home-built didgeridoo? Other eclectic (and not so eclectic) home-built instruments.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 9:39 PM PST - 10 comments

Put the quarter in the slot , give it a little backspin. Hit the "1UP START" button, grip the joystick in one hand and the fire button in the other. Until fate takes your lives away--and it always does--nothing else matters.
It's the 50 Best Shooters of All Time. [via that... other filter]
posted by arto at 7:21 PM PST - 55 comments

‘Staying the Course’ Isn’t an Option "If Bush is re-elected, there are only two possible outcomes in Iraq:

Four years from now, America will have 5,000 dead servicemen and women and an untold number of dead Iraqis at a cost of about $1 trillion, yet still be no closer to success than we are right now, or The U.S. will be gone, and we will witness the birth of a violent breeding ground for Shiite terrorists posing a far greater threat to Americans than a contained Saddam."
posted by specialk420 at 6:34 PM PST - 47 comments

If All Stories Were Written Like Science Fiction Stories. "Roger and Ann needed to meet Sergey in San Francisco. 'Should we take a train, or a steamship, or a plane?' asked Ann. 'Trains are too slow, and the trip by steamship around South America would take months,' replied Roger. 'We’ll take a plane.'"
posted by Johnny Assay at 5:13 PM PST - 47 comments

In 1935, a group of French mathematicians came together and published under a single name, with the goal of overthrowing all that had come before: The Rise and Fall of N. Bourbaki.
posted by kaibutsu at 2:42 PM PST - 6 comments

"The Air Force, in their ultimate wisdom, assembled a group of 102's and took them to Southeast Asia. Bush volunteered to go."
posted by Mick at 12:34 PM PST - 36 comments

The Bloggers on the Bus: The New York Times Magazine on bloggers on the campaign trail, and what effect they may or may not have.
posted by mrbula at 10:06 AM PST - 35 comments

Ant Farm's "Media Burn."
posted by adamgreenfield at 9:08 AM PST - 3 comments

And we thought it was just a load of Soviet propaganda: Buran was pretty sweet Well, no doubt a little bit of industrial espionage helped them in its design, but the Soviet Buran really was an impressive technological achievement and in many ways superior to the United States space shuttle. Of particular interest is the impressive technology the Soviet's developed for heavy-lift boosters. Does anyone know what's become of any of this, or know of any other interesting bits of Soviet -v- American space race trivia? This stuff always fascinates me. (Great website for geeky-cool aerospace information as well)
posted by tgrundke at 8:21 AM PST - 11 comments

"It was surprising how thick the smoke had become. It seems like the world has always needed a scapegoat --someone to lead the charge against the Roman Empire. But America wasn't the Roman Empire and someone else would have to step up and volunteer. I really was never any more than what I was -- a folk musician who gazed into the gray mist with tear-blinded eyes and made up songs that floated in a luminous haze. Now it had blown up in my face and was hanging over me." -- from Bob Dylan's new autobiography, Chronicles, with a brief interview, via Newsweek
posted by digaman at 6:12 AM PST - 14 comments

TERRIFYING DIAGRAMS!
posted by Pretty_Generic at 5:15 AM PST - 37 comments

Blair on the slide. Charles Kennedy's dreams may come true next spring, it seems [UKfilter].
posted by dash_slot- at 12:48 AM PST - 38 comments

Front Design has some pretty bizarre art/products. Check the projects section to see tables, chairs, and lamp shades, among other things, made from the interaction of animals/insects/reptiles with the environment. {flash}
posted by dobbs at 11:33 PM PST - 5 comments

"Liberals want to ban the bible!" Guess I missed that meeting where "liberals" decided on this.
posted by mathowie at 9:39 PM PST - 121 comments

Why straights shouldn't marry. "Phil and Pam both loved to eat Twinkies and Cup Cakes as children. On their first date, Phil ended a day of golf with a bottle of champagne and Cup Cakes to munch on as they watched the sun set over the Hudson." (via Holy Shitake.)
posted by adrober at 3:03 PM PST - 43 comments

Welcome to the INFORMATION-CYBER-WAR. Tired of the same old "song & dance" from the "Democrats" & "Republicans"? Glen Glidden knows how you feel. That's why he started "the most dangerous show on public access cable television." He takes on City Hall, revealing that most elected officials in Minnesota suburbs are usurpers, illegally occupying their position. He exposes the truth about November's election: it's Clown vs. Clown. And he's a Rammstein fan (why not?). Take a look, but remember: the truth may hurt.
posted by punishinglemur at 12:32 PM PST - 9 comments

I'll take Closeted Republican Congressmen for 800, Alex. Wonder why you haven't seen GOP Rep. David Dreier of California on tv lately? One of the most visible public faces of the GOP is outed, thanks to Blogactive, who gives him a Roy Cohn Award for 24 years of working against gay and lesbian rights while living as a gay man yourself. Raw Story/Blue Lemur has more, too, including the news blackout by local papers in his district.
posted by amberglow at 11:41 AM PST - 69 comments

putting spam to good use
posted by Grod at 10:06 AM PST - 11 comments

FraudFrond: There are over 32,000 cell phone towers in the U.S. disguised as fake trees, how many can you find? [via]
posted by falconred at 8:58 AM PST - 16 comments

25 years old and I pretty much had made it. The critics’ darling was now a success. So what happened? Why is it that many of you here today aren’t quite sure who the hell I actually am, aside from Rufus Wainwright’s father? Why is finding a CD of mine akin to archeology? Where were the follow up hits to "Dead Skunk," funny animal songs like "I Met Her at the Pet Store" and "Stay Away From My Aardvark?"
My Cool Life by Loudon Wainwright III
posted by dodgygeezer at 8:55 AM PST - 20 comments

For Westerners, the index case of subculture has to be the 1960s UK conflict between the razor-sharp, tailored mods and their mortal enemies, the greasy rockers.

Difference was critical to these first self-identified youth subcultures: difference in dress, in music, in drug of choice, in the favored mode of transport...everything. This obsessive focus on not just standing out, but standing out just so - on showing the world precisely the right angle of a hat, length of a coat, shortness of hair - has defined many a subculture since. We recognize b-boys, ganguro girls, and straightedge punks by such deployments, among many, many other identifiable groups. (It's not just a youth thing, either: leathermen and the delightfully recrudescent roller derby culture are largely adult phenomena.)

To a devotee of a given subculture, such matters, far from being a "narcissism of small differences," are a matter of pivotal import in framing how one presents oneself to the world: how we want to be seen, how we want others to understand us. But I'm getting older now, and further out of the loop, and I realize that just maybe I'm losing the ability to discern these differences in the people I pass walking down the street. I find myself asking, who and where are the new subcultures? And how do they choose to present themselves to us?
posted by adamgreenfield at 8:30 AM PST - 17 comments

Lord of Rings Flatulence Mashup. [NSF mature people] [wmv 53 seconds]
posted by srboisvert at 6:48 AM PST - 7 comments

The Visualization Portal's default description page starts off kind of slow and ho-hum, with some pretty basic and dated looking graphics. And even a little weird, artsy. The actual main news page is better. The Visualization Portal is nearly a Heinlein-esque 3D 3D visualization tank. These pics of past events are cool. You can visit the portal at UCLA for free.
posted by loquacious at 12:52 AM PST - 2 comments

Mekong Delta - the video game starring John Kerry and the men of Swift Boat PCF-94
posted by tsarfan at 12:07 AM PST - 13 comments

The results of the second annual Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge are out and include some dazzling imagery of a feeding tick, a volcano, and movies of a bat in action, an overview of the 2002 European floods, and a presentation on RNA interference.
posted by euphorb at 11:20 PM PST - 2 comments

Three Notes and Runnin' has decided to protest the recent court decision that cited N.W.A. with illegally sampling a snippet of Funkadelic's Get Off Your Ass and Jam that had been modified to the point of unrecognizability. So in the tradition of online civil disobedience such as Grey Tuesday, Downhill Battle has issued a challenge to sample-based artists to create 30-second remixes that consist of nothing but the disputed 1.5-second Funkadelic sample.
posted by jonp72 at 9:43 PM PST - 10 comments

Massacre of Civilians in Fallujah -- "Aw dude!" A war crime in Iraq.
posted by Postroad at 7:56 PM PST - 44 comments

The Conference Bike - It's not just a bike. It's a party on wheels.
posted by dobbs at 7:23 PM PST - 14 comments

Who Was Abused ? There are several ways to view the small white house on Center Street in Bakersfield, Calif. From one perspective it's just another low-slung home in a working-class neighborhood, with a front yard, brown carpeting, a TV in the living room. Now consider it from the standpoint of the Kern County district attorney's office: 20 years ago, this was a crime scene of depraved proportions... [and] this time, through Ed Sampley's eyes. Twenty years ago he was one of the boys molested in the house where sex abuse was part of the weekend fabric. That's what he told Kern County investigators. That's what he told a judge, a jury and a courtroom of lawyers... Now for the first time in 20 years, Sampley is back in the driveway of that small white house. ''It never happened,'' he tells me. He lied about Stoll, an easygoing divorced father who always insisted the neighborhood kids call him John rather than Mr. Stoll and let them run in and out of his house in their bathing suits, eat popcorn on the living-room floor and watch ''fright night'' videos. More Inside
posted by y2karl at 6:24 PM PST - 46 comments

SmartKlamp "Do it Yourself" home circumcision.
posted by ColdChef at 5:28 PM PST - 16 comments

Andrea Armstrong wants to play basketball. She is also a muslim, and wishes to observe traditional muslim attire for a woman of the faith. Intolerance ensues. (A link from my local paper to an Orlando Sentinel story, in that this woman is from Oregon.)
posted by Danf at 3:53 PM PST - 68 comments

When I first saw it I thought, it was fad-freaky Toyko or perhaps fashionably trendy LA, but it's NYC.Let's see... Walk several blocks possibly through a mucking huge park, or park in a expensive pay lot, or take a bus/train/taxi take an elevator to the umpteenth floor of the Empire State Building to take a 25 minute MetroNap in a overgrown egg chair during your lunch hour. Not to mention paying what ever it took to get you there you'll shell out $13 more to take a nap. And no, that's NOT with the optional lunch, or even in a private cubicle. City folk, more money than sense. What ever happend to sleeping under your desk? If it's good enough for George Castanaza, it's good enough for me!
posted by Dome-O-Rama at 2:34 PM PST - 9 comments

The full wealth of the world's religious knowledge has been collated into the quite extraordinary "God FAQ". A valuable resource indeed. [via b3ta]
posted by Pretty_Generic at 2:21 PM PST - 93 comments

Black widow pop. "With tATu, Ivan Shapovalov took the media's obsession with paedophilia, and spun it into a chart-topping lesbo-schoolgirl pop act. Now he's trying to do the same with Islamic terrorism. On Sept 11 in Moscow, he launched nATo, a 16-year-old girl who dresses in a Burqua, much like the Black Widow suicide bombers who are currently terrorising Russia. With the Beslan massacre only a week old, Nato's launch - complete with invitations designed like plane tickets - was not a huge success... Mindful of the dire consequences of being a dissenting voice in Putin's Russia these days, Shapovalov is planning to launch nATo properly in London later this year, and get a recording contract here." stolen from popbitch
posted by mr.marx at 1:58 PM PST - 19 comments

Time-lapse car trip from LA to New York. A (QuickTime) video by Lacquer directed by Michel Gondry. (via Cult of Mac)
posted by Armitage Shanks at 1:22 PM PST - 29 comments

PS2 Vibrator for Her Pleasure (NSFW, suggestive pictures)
Friday Fun: A new add-on for the PlayStation 2 does pretty well nothing but give your girlfriend something to enjoy while you waste hours killing pixelated beasts.
A review by Game Girl Advance gives it a very big and satisfied thumbs up. via As I Lay Laughing
posted by fenriq at 12:14 PM PST - 14 comments

Maths puzzles and more problems. Found whilst searching for the fiendish the Monty Hall Problem. A Tangled Tale, indeed.
posted by plep at 11:27 AM PST - 6 comments

Love in a cage. All Iranian filmmakers working in their homeland have to face the trials of the censor, but if the subject matter includes abortion, adultery and lesbianism, the chances of gaining official approval in the Islamic republic are all but zero. Actress Mania Akbari, the lead of Abbas Kiarostami's "10", explores this territory in her first feature film as a director, "20 Fingers", which unspooled in the new "Digitale" section at the Venice Film Festival (.pdf file) and won the first prize as Best Movie Shot On Digital. The film's use of digital video was also invaluable in getting around censorship: the only way to shoot in Iran on 35mm is to hire equipment from the central authorities, which means script approval and a government minder attending the shoot. Shooting on digital video requires script approval, but no minder is sent along. So 29-year-old Akbari, in an amazing display of courage, gained approval for one script and then duly shot another (she could now be barred from working or from screening her films or from even leaving the country, but she insists on working in Iran, to challenge the system from there and not from abroad). The film is coming soon at the Vancouver Film Festival. More inside.
posted by matteo at 11:09 AM PST - 5 comments

It's the latest buzz to sweep the internet--free iPods for signing up and referring five of your friend. There was plenty of skepticism at first, but when positive reports started coming in, the popularity of the site took off. But like any pyramid scheme, the people who are only signing up now are getting burned. And of course, won't someone think of the children?
posted by turaho at 10:16 AM PST - 13 comments

SPREE: An Escape from Reality - music by Ethan Persoff, made from old records, bizarre noise instruments, circuit bent toys and other unusual sounds.
posted by Peter H at 9:22 AM PST - 1 comment

Sebastian Horsley - a man who's slept with more than 1,000 prostitutes - gives a controversial and candid account of his experience of paying for sex
posted by zeoslap at 9:16 AM PST - 40 comments

Watch out, Best Buy. The Goatse Rescue Floppy is in town. (Page is SFW)
posted by angry modem at 9:10 AM PST - 13 comments

A man and his rocket car. As documentaries enjoy an unprecedented level of popularity and financial success, it's high time that an obscure Canadian National Film Board doc from 1981 was (re)discovered. The story of Ken Carter, who spends several years and millions of dollars of other people's money in the single-minded pursuit of one goal: jumping a jet-powered car across the St. Lawrence River from Canada to the United States. What is it with Canadians and insane dreams?
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:03 AM PST - 10 comments

(Danger! Danger! Silly .gif images ahead!) A little something to file under "wacky web": ballOOns Museum German web site, featuring classic paintings and sculpture with a dollop of goofy animation thrown in for fun. After you enter, click "Gemälde" and "Skulpturen" in the new window to view the galleries.
posted by taz at 7:41 AM PST - 4 comments

Once the stuff of academic and corporate experimentation, ubiquitous computation (or "ubicomp") is gearing up for its commercial debut in the very near future. Along the lines of ostensibly "nanotechnological" pants, the reality of ubicomp as made manifest in consumer products may fall somewhat short of the prognostications: buying a personal communicator designed to work seamlessly within a ubicomp context is not the same thing as living in and with a truly pervasive network.

But already there are signs that the ubiquitous visions beloved by the corporate players and enshrined in their hype are coming into being. So which do you think it'll be? Guardian angel or inescapable, panoptical prison? Neither? Maybe both? I have a sinking feeling we're going to find out, one way or another.
posted by adamgreenfield at 6:23 AM PST - 8 comments

Streamor.com: Streaming Surgical Education 'Featuring the World's First SurgeonCam and The Digital Endoscopy Fellowship. A Digital Window to the OR for Physicians, Trainees, and Patients.' Clips are free, and are available in Real Video & Windows Media formats. "Surgery is an inherently visual art. It must be seen to be understood." (via The Eyes Have It).
posted by misteraitch at 4:40 AM PST - 2 comments

Google News Bias. How second tier websites are gaming the Google News Enging.
posted by srboisvert at 4:17 AM PST - 22 comments

Pressure Groups and Censorship in Israel/Palestine. "I suspect that the causes are complicated and multi-factorial. I suspect that I and others like me – who remained ignorant and negligent on this issue for so long – bear much of the guilt. I suspect that others whose emotional ties to Israel served as blinders on this subject share in our culpability. I suspect that still others who knew the truth and refused to speak of it, or who participated in its cover-up, bear a significant portion of this awful responsibility. I suspect that the career damage and death threats that often result when one begins to speak out on this issue played a part."
posted by acrobat at 3:20 AM PST - 33 comments

Reverse (Friday Flash Frustration Fun).
posted by LinusMines at 10:24 PM PST - 22 comments

Our Eyes photography. Interesting photographs submitted from around the world using a left-right scroll layout of 10-15 shots with various themes. The scrolling is an interactive part of the piece. Caution: Your workplace may be dangerous to these artists. Some (SFW) favorites.
posted by stbalbach at 10:14 PM PST - 6 comments

Chapter 3: Digital Creations
posted by falconred at 9:57 PM PST - 3 comments

Grouper, a different form of P2P.
"The Grouper program does not allow file sharing of music, only streaming. However, you may share other types of files as a download. On the plus side for the persons sharing, Grouper allows the formation of mini networks with email verification. The advantage of this is no script kiddies or annoying fake files from the RIAA." You are sharing privately between friends.
Welcome to the world of legal online music ambiguity. Say hello to Grouper.
posted by dash_slot- at 7:53 PM PST - 20 comments

The Path to Florida A long Vanity Fair article (part one and part two, both PDFs) about the experiences and reactions of US Supreme Court clerks during the 2000 election and Bush v. Gore [PDFs hosted at SCOTUSblog; via Intel Dump]
posted by kirkaracha at 7:37 PM PST - 11 comments

What a coincidence, huh? (wapo, reg reqd) For the third time, environmental advocates have discovered passages in the Bush administration's proposal for regulating mercury pollution from power plants that mirror almost word for word portions of memos written by a law firm representing coal-fired power plants. The passages state that the Environmental Protection Agency is not required to regulate other hazardous toxins emitted by power plants, such as lead and arsenic. The actual proposals and study are here.
posted by amberglow at 6:04 PM PST - 9 comments

Some of the things you can find at Jan Geerinck's Jahsonic.com: A history of disco, "black music", punk, and other genres; extensive writes-ups on media, erotica, art, history, and cinema (broken down into voyeurism, gay, world, Japanese, postmodern, underground, European, and trash cinema, among others); and of course, a blog. Also interesting are the keyword entries for words such as genre, sex, drugs, fiction, cult, taste, etc.

Pretty SFW, but there may be a few film stills or paintings that are iffy.
posted by dobbs at 4:51 PM PST - 3 comments

I'm studying at Warwick University in the UK, and I had just finished my Computer Science finals (I'm going on to do a PhD in Edinburgh next year). I went out and got drunk, had a nice lie in and bought a couple of new games in town, but I just didn't feel totally liberated.

So I decided to build an enormous f*****g sandwich. (via)
posted by Ufez Jones at 3:06 PM PST - 71 comments

My Back Pages--Interesting in his own right Eyolf Østrem still maintains the fan's fan tab, chords and music site, the standard by which all others are judged. I just revisited it the other night, while trying to recall how that little run in Dylan's version of Delia went, and dang, if it didn't have the back story of that ballad. I love this kind of stuff. The source of that account, John Garst, is the folklorist king of such research--he puts John Henry at a railroad tunnel near Leeds, Alabama, just east of Birmingham on September 20, 1887, for example. Murder and heroic death ballad back stories are of extreme interest to me, so I decided to post a few more here: Frankie and Albert, Frankie and Johnny, Casey Jones and Stagger Lee. Did I say I love this kind of stuff?
posted by y2karl at 2:56 PM PST - 10 comments

Milkmen. "David could do it simply through suggestion. He began telling himself that he would lactate, and within a week, one of his breasts swelled up and milk began dripping out." (SFW, but not for my sense of genetic order)
posted by adamms222 at 10:50 AM PST - 31 comments

Marisleysis will do your nails, Joey's back in prison while Amy sells crafts, and Gennifer is in Boobs! The Musical!
posted by pieoverdone at 10:41 AM PST - 13 comments

The Art of Cats:
The Kattenkabinet (Cat Cabinet, the Cat Museum) of Amsterdam: a collection of objects d'art wholly centered around the theme of the cat, among which you will find a wonderful gallery including Picasso. Controversial social taboos are not avoided. Malaysia's Cat City of Kuching has a Cat Museum; more info on the Museum of Meows here (Ancient Egyptians shaved their eyebrows in mourning when the family cat died. Malays attached superstitions to cats believing they possessed supernatural powers...) The scullery of Kathleen Mann's Antiques in London's High Street has a "Purrfect Museum" too, with 250 exhibits from all over the world going back to the 1770s, founded by Kathleen and her mother ... Kitty. Not to be outdone, Lithuania and Russia have cat museums as well.
posted by Shane at 9:00 AM PST - 5 comments

A small new future. 1999 was the year the RIAA began writing checks the record industry couldn’t cash.
posted by xowie at 8:10 AM PST - 16 comments

Loyalty
Note: the 'l' links to a pdf file. There are as many different interpretations/definitions as there are people on this big blue ball. Exactly why does it mean something ever-so-slightly different to everyone? [mi]
posted by kamylyon at 7:44 AM PST - 9 comments

Buildering and urban climbing (found while researching Alain Robert who recently struck again)
posted by shoepal at 7:28 AM PST - 11 comments

What if we voted on issues? "They booed the results of their vote. They were upset that they had voted for the 'wrong guy'."
posted by GernBlandston at 6:22 AM PST - 53 comments

The Situationists famously had their own ideas about cities, and about how to city them; in particular, they held forth the derive, or aimless drift, as the ideal way to encounter and make sense of urban place. It's easy to caricature the derive as an essentially passive mode of experience, but it was intended to be anything but: a playful, lively, engaged, and above all social act.

Now that cities are where most of us live, for better or worse, and we have the ability to document our travels through these conurbations and share them over the Web, might it be safe to say that Situationist psychogeography has gone mainstream? That the moblogged drift, in fact, takes things to an entirely new level, by making the city and its flows not merely more legible to ourselves, but visible to a potentially global audience?
posted by adamgreenfield at 6:20 AM PST - 39 comments

Furl acquired by LookSmart.
posted by tranquileye at 4:48 AM PST - 13 comments

Human Intelligence is a good site from Indiana University that looks at historical influences and current controversies surrounding the study of intelligence. Find out more about topics such as "the Mozart Effect", the theory of multiple intelligences, and the influence of birth order on intelligence, and then browse the brains behind the history of inquiry into human intellect.
posted by taz at 2:33 AM PST - 2 comments

The piatarbajo, the chromelodeon, the trimba, cloud chamber bowls, the simeon, the pyrophone, the virtual rhythmicon, cigar box guitars, the skatar, and all the other assorted instruments by musical visionaries who find guitar, bass, drums, and the symphony orchestra too confining.
posted by jonp72 at 1:32 AM PST - 10 comments

The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography is published today, in print and online: a biographical record of everyone who's ever been anyone in British history (50,000 individuals) and an astonishing feat of scholarly collaboration (10,000 contributors from all over the world). Access to the full database is fearfully expensive, but the official site gives you a good selection of sample entries, with a new one added every day; and a feature in today's Times gives you some more, beginning with Mary Toft, the woman who gave birth to rabbits.
posted by verstegan at 1:13 AM PST - 11 comments

After School Specials. Is that a Trapper Keeper in your locker or are you just happy to see me? Next month, two volumes of ABC's "After School Specials" will be released on DVD (in DVD sets designed to look like Trapper Keepers). After the first two sets, at least four more will follow. TV Shows on DVD has the names of many the specials ("Schoolboy Father," "She Drinks a Little," "Did You Hear What Happened to Andrea?") to jog your memory. Of course, Jump the Shark has plenty of memories of them, too. And anyone who saw Helen Hunt host "SNL" knows that in at least one (possibly two), she jumps out the window. Those were the days.
posted by GaelFC at 11:18 PM PST - 19 comments

"So, during the run of The Judas Contract, Dick Grayson's new crimefighting identity was established. Nightwing was born. Though neither Marv nor I were originally crazy about his new name, in the long run, it seems to have won the fans' hearts. Those who considered themselves Robin-Rooters have proudly followed Dick's new career as avid Wingnuts.
--George Perez

Has it really been 20 years since Dick Grayson stopped being a sidekick? Happy belated birthday Nightwing!
posted by WolfDaddy at 10:37 PM PST - 11 comments

"I must congratulate you on your virtuoso performance, my boy. Centauri is impressed. I've seen 'em come, and I've seen 'em go, but you're the best, my boy. Dazzling! Light years ahead of the competition! Centauri's got a little proposition for you. Are ya interested?"

That's right. The Last Starfighter: The Musical. Can a Planet Of The Apes musical be far behind? What other sci-fi flicks would you like to see a musical made of? And why isn't Carrie Fisher's virtuoso performance from the Star Wars Holiday Special on the new DVD set?
posted by keswick at 8:40 PM PST - 29 comments

Opium Made Easy: One gardener's encounter with the war on drugs.
posted by Gyan at 7:41 PM PST - 35 comments

Color Synth Axis - Useful if you work with color on the web. You'll want to read the manual.
posted by dobbs at 4:45 PM PST - 13 comments

Redemption and the Power of Man. In Christianity, redemption is essentially an act of divine grace, the salvation of a sinful humanity that is incapable of saving itself. In Judaism redemption depends entirely on man, who is responsible for his own fate. To what extent did Judaism influence the development of progressive, pluralistic democracy?
posted by semmi at 4:24 PM PST - 30 comments

Sine Fiction - invented soundtracks for science fiction novels.
posted by ZippityBuddha at 4:24 PM PST - 13 comments

Sweeeet.
posted by brownpau at 2:18 PM PST - 18 comments

Agitator. Blood doesn't politely trickle in Takashi Miike's films: it gushes out in (warning: NSFW, graphic) improbable fountains, painting walls and filling up small cars. His trademark point-of-view shots are taken from places other directors wouldn't dream of: the bottom of a dirty toilet bowl (as a man falls into it after being killed); within the ear canal (as it is pierced by a metal spike); even from inside a character's vagina. He has depicted incest, drug abuse, teenage prostitution, violence against women and children and small dogs, and necrophilia -- and that was just in one film, Visitor Q, his take on Pasolini's Teorema. Miike has just introduced his latest movie, Izo, at the Venice Film Festival (.pdf file). Miike is less sure about why Americans are now embracing Japanese horror films. His country's horror genre is influenced by "kwaidan," traditional Japanese ghost stories that feature revenge and malice: "The stories always have the 'hatedness.' You always bring the feelings of hate [that] you don't see in American cinema". What freaks him out the most, however, is the everyday automobile accident. "Even in a film, I can't bear to watch it -- it's so much (about) how people are weak, to be just crushed with a car. It makes me feel really depressed".
posted by matteo at 1:15 PM PST - 24 comments

Queen + Hip-Hop Mashups = A Night at the Hip Hopera Better than the Grey Album? Cease and desist in 3, 2, 1...
posted by krunk at 12:33 PM PST - 32 comments

The Shocker annoys local high school principal; hilarity ensues.
posted by swift at 12:14 PM PST - 26 comments

God hates Bush voters.
posted by jpburns at 12:13 PM PST - 46 comments

"Tom Ridge unveils a redesigned Air Force 1, painted like the General Lee car from Dukes of Hazzard. No longer will there be a carpeted stairway; instead passengers will have to enter through the windows and holler like they're feeding pigs when boarding the President's jet." Enter the Guess the October Surprise contest and win a coffee mug.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 11:46 AM PST - 11 comments

Booty Shotz! is a place for people who want to share their love for Robert's American Gourmet brand Booty Snacks! Some celebrity admirers include Alan Cummings, Mirah (from K Records), and Ben Folds. (All links SFW)
posted by mcsweetie at 10:59 AM PST - 19 comments

The National Museum of the American Indian opened on Tuesday. Although generally praised, the occasion did draw some mild concern that some groups are under-represented. The museum occupies one of the last few coveted spots on the National Mall. Washington Post collumnist Courtland Milloy comments on the contrast between the opening ceremonies for the museum in the home of the 'Redskins'. And I can't resist throwing in a plug for The Eiteljorg (flash splash screen) which is the only other museum with a partnership with the Smithsonian collection.
posted by KirkJobSluder at 10:49 AM PST - 4 comments

noiserover - cartoons by Jesse Simpson.
posted by Peter H at 10:47 AM PST - 9 comments

Utilikilts: Comfort, Style and Utility for Today's Modern Man - committed to pioneering a comfortable alternative to trousers by producing "Men's Unbifurcated Garments".
I can't decide if its a joke or not. I think it began as a joke and then people started ordering them. Note the trendy Survival Kilt (currently on backorder) or the stranger looking than the others and that's saying something Denim Kilt. And don't worry about the beer gut, fellas, they've got an option for a special cut just for you ($25 upcharge but comfort knows no price!).
posted by fenriq at 10:46 AM PST - 54 comments

A beginner's guide to whaling.
posted by biffa at 7:21 AM PST - 21 comments

Russ Meyer dead at 82. The maker of some of the most fun flicks of his day and the man who introduced us the sexpots of an era. We bid you a fond farewell.
posted by jonmc at 7:01 AM PST - 23 comments

CRAZIEST = 311 points Scrabble can seriously affect your mental health. [Flash]
posted by lagado at 5:17 AM PST - 36 comments

The Glorious Revolution: A Look Back, by Jeff Greenfield (CNN), is one of 16 What if Bush Wins? essays in the September edition of The Washington Monthly.
posted by mmahaffie at 5:17 AM PST - 11 comments

“If You Harbor Terrorists, You Are a Terrorist” While delegates to the GOP convention were congratulating themselves for their candidate’s tough stand against terrorism, the Bush administration was creating an international incident—little publicized in the United States—by harboring a notorious group of international terrorists on U.S. soil.
posted by Postroad at 4:33 AM PST - 33 comments

Anglo-Sikh Heritage. Sikhs and Britain. More at the Sikh Cyber-Museum.
posted by plep at 3:56 AM PST - 3 comments

Feds shut-down overseas voting for Americans. And according to this Salon article, American's living abroad are particularly progresssive and likely to vote Democrat.
posted by Espoo2 at 2:33 AM PST - 25 comments

Death .... online
be sure to check out preservation and decomposition, among other points of interest here....
posted by anastasiav at 10:29 PM PST - 3 comments

Iraq: The Bungled Transition. Iraq: How bad can things get?--The Making of a Mess. Far graver than Vietnam, some now see a Classic guerrilla war forming in Iraq with an Enemy With Many Faces. Iraqi Shiite philosopher--as Juan Cole calls him--and blogger Abbas Kadhim of Calling It Like It Is, likens the Allawi government to an onion farm--This lack of discipline within the Iraqi interim government is not accidental. Indeed, it is the manifestation of a bigger problem: the members of the cabinet consider themselves above the restraints of their respective positions in the government... After all, their nominal chief, Allawi did not choose them, like all prime ministers do to a certain degree. They were simply imposed upon him, and for all practical purposes, he is unable to dismiss any one of them. Iyad Allawi is stuck with a concoction of personalities that may compose a parliament rather than an executive branch.--and as US-backed armies firing blanks notes: Since the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, Washington has been struggling to create a 40,000-strong military force... according to Brigadier General James Schwitters, who is part of the US command responsible for training Iraq's new army, only 3,000 of the soldiers could be regarded as having been militarily trained, as of early August. From March to 2003 to August 2004, the Coalition trained 3,00 Iraqi soldiers. Well? Feelin' lucky, punk? /Dirty Harry (More Inside)
posted by y2karl at 10:21 PM PST - 55 comments

Cat Stevens on NatSec watchlist. "A London-to-Washington flight was diverted to Maine on Tuesday when it was discovered passenger Yusuf Islam - formerly known as singer Cat Stevens - was on a government watch list and barred from entering the country, federal officials said... Homeland Security Department spokesman Dennis Murphy identified the passenger as Islam. 'He was interviewed and denied admission to the United States on national security grounds,' Murphy said, and would be put on the first available flight out of the country Wednesday."
posted by mwhybark at 9:24 PM PST - 79 comments

Women In Iran With the slogan of "Women's Right Is Human Right", the website tries to tell the story of struggles, issues and successes of Iranian women, and in this way we would like to extend our hands to and welcome all those who believe in the social and intellectual equality of women and men.
posted by hoder at 8:41 PM PST - 3 comments

Let your children play with the common cold... introducing giant microbe plush toys. [link via die puny humans]
posted by drezdn at 7:03 PM PST - 8 comments

project hello
"... To give homeless individuals a name, and in the process, encourage others to treat them with dignity, respect, and compassion. "
posted by specialk420 at 6:22 PM PST - 9 comments

JPG Magazine is accepting submissions until October 4. via halcyon
posted by macadamiaranch at 6:19 PM PST - 11 comments

New Hitchhiker's BBC radio series debuted today. I managed to miss it but one can listen online starting Thursday. Previously discussed here.
posted by CunningLinguist at 4:25 PM PST - 15 comments

Slate translates Kerry to English. A lot of the argument lately is that Kerry doesn't really offer up a concete stand on his viewpoint. This article from William Saletan sums up what he believes Kerry is trying to say based on the speech he gave in New York earlier, and how he really stands in opposition to President Bush. Thoughts?
posted by daHIFI at 4:23 PM PST - 31 comments

Howard Dean speaks --on the coming draft. Any of you going to be 20 in 2005, and/or medical personnel? And girls, don't think you'll be exempt. (altho we know Jenna and Barbara of course will be.)
posted by amberglow at 4:06 PM PST - 93 comments

Pongmechanik is a fascinating physical incarnation of the classic video game.
posted by riffola at 4:02 PM PST - 6 comments

MP3's - Covers & Tributes on Guitar101.com. is like karaoke WITH GUITARS!!!! My favorite so far.
posted by turbodog at 3:42 PM PST - 6 comments

What Are You Voting For?
posted by Yelling At Nothing at 1:40 PM PST - 23 comments

No Air-Kissing Please, We're British [via artsjournal]
posted by kenko at 1:02 PM PST - 14 comments

Man beaten to death for refusing to give out cigarette. In unrelated news, studies link nicotine addiction to a genetic predisposition for aggression.
posted by cohappy at 11:39 AM PST - 31 comments

U.S. Geological Survey before and after photos of gulf coast barrier islands in Alabama and Florida showing the impact of Hurricane Ivan.
posted by pitchblende at 11:35 AM PST - 20 comments

Are bluffing bots outplaying human poker players online? They might not be as strong as Vex Bot, but they could spell trouble for the booming online-poker industry.
posted by mrgrimm at 10:53 AM PST - 25 comments

Five Days in Hell - what's it like to be an Iraqi hostage? Canadian war journalist Scott Taylor provides a harrowing account of his recent 5-day ordeal as a hostage of notorious Islamic mujahedin groups. Christopher Delisso has an interview with Taylor, and blogger Zeyad of Healing Iraq offers informed local commentary on kidnappings in his post, "On clerics, fatwas and terrorism."
posted by madamjujujive at 10:50 AM PST - 14 comments

Los Zafiros. A Cuban pop group that could rival the Beatles for song-craft, if not in popularity. Don't take my word for it though. Read Ry Cooder's interview, see the movie, read the movie review, or listen yourself [real|wmp].
posted by Fezboy! at 10:17 AM PST - 13 comments

William Safire on "the izzle": "And now, in the pages of The New York Times, there it is — a word modified with the ubiquitous izzle. Some clever Times copy editor, for a June article about Chrysler's new 300C sedan, created the headline, "Fo' Shizzle, That Big Bad Chrysler Really Does Sizzle". So now that the gray lady herself has been izzled from the inside, is it time for everyone to wish one last fond farewizzle and shed the shizzle? (MTV interview mentioned in the article is here.)
posted by taz at 7:06 AM PST - 33 comments

"Witches are trying to kill me." Standing on his porch dressed in warm-up pants, a T-shirt and a sweat-stained army cap, Jake Jenkins explains Luzerne County is the location of the largest witches coven in the state .... "You have the witches that want to play at it, and then you have the real serious bastards, deadly," he said.
posted by grabbingsand at 6:41 AM PST - 51 comments

Art by Nelson Mandela and others
posted by Pretty_Generic at 6:04 AM PST - 2 comments

The real Vatican is in Kansas. "On July 16, 1990 the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Roman Church elected David Bawden as Pope Michael, ending an almost 32 year long interegnum."
posted by eustacescrubb at 3:52 AM PST - 26 comments

Like cats? Like infinity? You'll love the Infinite Cat project.
posted by triv at 2:14 AM PST - 19 comments

Interesting article on The Loneliness of Being German: "Germans have turned their back on the arrogance of nationalism.. But if nationhood is obsolete then so is identity. It would mean that there is no such thing as being German and that they possess no individuality." Meanwhile, far right wing party growing support in German elections: "It's a great day for Germans who still want to be Germans" -- Holger Apfel, NPD leader in Saxony. Germany's government has described the NPD as a latter-day version of Hitler's Nazi party.
posted by stbalbach at 12:49 AM PST - 12 comments

You're all dummies and you're reading it wrong! Anne Rice's latest book has gotten some crummy reviews on Amazon, and she's seriously POed that the "outrageous stupidity" of the proles allowed to review on the site are tarnishing one of her her editor-free "virtuoso performance(s)." (Scroll down to Anne Obrien Rice- guaranteed real name by Amazon, and feel free to compare this rant to the one on her official website.)
posted by headspace at 11:29 PM PST - 80 comments

Libertarian Presidential candidate Michael Badnarik answers Slashdot's questions.
posted by bitpart at 9:49 PM PST - 11 comments

The Los Angeles Times gives a fascinating look at TBN, home to Paul and Jan Crouch.
posted by togdon at 12:42 PM PST - 21 comments

The results are in (NYT - rr). To follow-up on this thread, the favorite ad icons and slogans have been chosen, as well as the recipients of the "Stars of Madison Avenue" award. And I'm sure I speak for everyone when I say...Derek Jeter?!?
posted by braun_richard at 12:26 PM PST - 12 comments

View the Milky Way at 10 million light years from the Earth. Then move through space towards the Earth in successive orders of magnitude until you reach a tall oak tree just outside the buildings of the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory in Tallahassee, Florida. After that, begin to move from the actual size of a leaf into a microscopic world that reveals leaf cell walls, the cell nucleus, chromatin, DNA and finally, into the subatomic universe of electrons and protons.
posted by semmi at 11:56 AM PST - 18 comments

The Mystery At Webb Hill - In the waning daylight hours of December 7, 1998, three teenage boys, hiking near Webb Hill, St. George, Utah, saw a shirt sleeve flapping in the wind near the top of the hill. Their parents had warned them not to attempt hiking the sheer red rock cliffs. What they discovered inside a stone-walled chamber was the skeletonized remains of a 16 year old male. Positive identification of this young man has eluded investigators for nearly five years. Maybe you can help.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 10:47 AM PST - 17 comments

Ever wanted to go for a really, really, really long walk? Just to make it difficult, how about carrying something really, really heavy (in more than a few ways...) to some rather unfriendly places... Meet interesting people, get famous, predict the future, accumulate amazing numbers, get the real deal on shoes... Even kids can play.What else would one expect from a hippie priest with a recording career that took him From Sunset Strip to the Whitehouse? And, of course, the final frontier. via my friend who loves metafilter but lacks an account
posted by UlfMagnet at 9:23 AM PST - 9 comments

Not everyone's happy about this Lewis and Clark anniversary thing...
posted by gimonca at 8:39 AM PST - 16 comments

Grand Unification Theory: Salavon's work has been mentioned on MeFi before, but I thought in honor of the trilogy finally being released on DVD this week, I'd post a link to this very awesome piece of art using every single frame from Episode Four.
posted by glenwood at 6:37 AM PST - 11 comments

No pain, no gain, they say, and when it comes to real pain, the inverse is true as well. "We now have research indicating there's a memory of chronic pain," said Dr. Doris K. Cope, director of chronic and cancer pain for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. It changes the genic code sometimes, it changes the biochemistry, and it causes new proteins to be formed." Or in other words, the more pain you have, the more pain you have. (More on this.) It's no wonder, then, that more money is spent on pain relief than any other medical problem, and that there has been so much pain research and so many clinical trials revealing such painful facts as redheads feel more pain, men feel less pain, and that there's a genetic difference between tough guys and wimps. (Much more pain inside.)

posted by taz at 6:13 AM PST - 31 comments

Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them. First the NYTimes, then CBS. Who will face reality?
posted by HTuttle at 12:35 AM PST - 97 comments

If you don't know much about contemporary music, there's some good edumacating here: Cuff the Duke, Dirtbombs, Interpol, LIARS, Manitoba, Spiritualized, Stars, Ween, Amon Tobin, Decemberists, Controller.Controller, Heavy Blinkers, Peaches, Gentleman Reg, Calexico, Ted Leo, D.O.A., Blonde Redhead, The Constantines, Hayden, The Notwist, C'Mon, Sea & Cake, A&C, Do Make Say Think, Royal City, Oh Susanna, Death From Above 1979, White Stripes, Tobin Sprout, TV On the Radio, Add n To (X)... some of the stellar bands with streams at CBC Radio's Just Concerts: Live and Studio recordings. {All the recordings I tried were top-notch quality. Unfortch, the streams are Real, but definitely still worth checking out.}
posted by dobbs at 10:54 PM PST - 34 comments

A True Relation, of the Lives and Deaths of the two moft Famous Englifh Pyrats, Purfer, and Clinton who lived in the Reigne of Queene Elizabeth. From Isle of Tortuga, a freecache-linked geocities site. It has a wealth of primary sources and is refreshingly retro to boot! [mi]
posted by mwhybark at 10:18 PM PST - 3 comments

"Black Like me" : the notion of "Race" is know known to be scientifically meaningless, but now roll back the clock to 1959 : "...John Howard Griffin (1920-1980) was a true Renaissance man. Having fought in the French Resistance and been a solo observer on an island in the South Pacific during World War II, he became a critically-acclaimed novelist and essayist, a remarkable photographer and musicologist, and a dynamic lecturer and teacher. On October 28, 1959, after a decade of blindness and a remarkable and inexplicable recovery, John Howard Griffin dyed himself black and began an odyssey of discovery through the segregated American South. The result was Black Like Me, arguably the single most important documentation of 20th century American racism ever written....Because of Black Like Me, Griffin was personally vilified, hanged in effigy in his hometown, and threatened with death for the rest of his life."
posted by troutfishing at 9:15 PM PST - 47 comments

24th Century Interior Design You've met the man....now have him design your home!
posted by oissubke at 8:55 PM PST - 6 comments

Eddie Adams has died at 71. Just last week the NPPA sent out a poignant message warning of his looming death from Lou Gehrig's disease. Who is he, you ask? The photographer who took the iconic image of an on-street execution in Vietnam and who set up the Eddie Adams Workshop. Top video here.
posted by bonaldi at 8:47 PM PST - 3 comments

CoolGov. Weblog on interesting stuff from the .GOV domain. Today's entry was quite appropriate. Maties.
posted by brownpau at 8:27 PM PST - 3 comments

Ladies and Gentlemen, Beatle Bob!
With today being the last day of the Austin City Limits Music Festival, I thought it might be a good time to shine the spotlight on rock and roll gadfly "Beatle" Bob Matonis, who, as per his habit, made the scene like sex machine, shaking his vintage-clad booty back stage (and on stage) at numerous sets this weekend. Though he's actually from St. Louis, Beatle Bob makes it to gigs all across the country, and seems particularly fond of South by Southwest, where his presence can pretty much guarantee you picked the right showcase to attend. Over the years, I've seen Beatle Bob on literally dozens of occasions. Have you had the chance to catch this oddball rock mascot in your town?
posted by Gilbert at 4:20 PM PST - 20 comments

Footbag video tutorials. Because you need more ways to waste your time. Rules and World Champions
posted by srboisvert at 3:25 PM PST - 4 comments

Blue Note: Over 1000 great jazz album covers. [via PCL LinkDump]
posted by soundofsuburbia at 2:21 PM PST - 15 comments

Der Fuehrer's Face, aka Donald Duck in Naziland [80MiB MPEG-1; IMDb]
posted by Pretty_Generic at 11:31 AM PST - 20 comments

A home computer in the year 2004
As envisioned in 1954, via Presurfer
posted by moonbird at 9:08 AM PST - 66 comments

What's a pirate's favorite aspect of computational linguistics? PARRRsing sentences.

Happy Talk Like a Pirate day, me hearties!
posted by louigi at 8:54 AM PST - 14 comments

Little Red Riding Hood's wayward past revealed: "Once upon a time, (the story) was a seduction tale. An engraving accompanying the first published version of the story, in Paris in 1697, shows a girl in her déshabille, lying in bed beneath a wolf. According to the plot, she has just stripped out of her clothes, and a moment later the tale will end with her death in the beast’s jaws — no salvation, no redemption. Any reader of the day would have immediately understood the message: In the French slang, when a girl lost her virginity it was said that 'elle avoit vû le loup' — she’d seen the wolf."
posted by feelinglistless at 7:22 AM PST - 32 comments

Sleeping with the president is not a good idea. Bush had no answers to big questions, such as 'what happens on the morning after.' The Daily Telegraph reports that documents show Prime Minister Tony Blair signed up to the U.S. policy of regime change in March 2002, a year before the conflict started... after he was warned that postwar stability would be difficult and the U.S. had few answers. Oh, no problem. This week, Bush said he is 'pleased with the progress' in Iraq.'
posted by fleener at 7:18 AM PST - 14 comments

What Jesus Would Do? "...And I'm gonna be blunt and plain; if one ever looks at me like that, I'm gonna kill him and tell God he died." Jimmy Swaggart (no stranger to scandal and improper behavior in the past) is at it again, this time regarding marriage and gays. Maybe he should stay away from Paul Crouch, Trinity Broadcasting Network's head, currently embroiled in a gay sex scandal. Was Jesus this hypocritical and violent?
posted by amberglow at 7:17 AM PST - 52 comments

From LGW to ORD Where do three letter airport codes come from? This guy knows. And: origins of British subscriber trunk dialling codes.
posted by carter at 5:37 AM PST - 16 comments

What I am NOT looking for. The dot.com boom must be over, then.
posted by johnnydark at 5:06 AM PST - 150 comments

A Taste of Africa. Life as a development worker in the Horn of Africa.
posted by plep at 1:30 AM PST - 4 comments

Explore your inner beauty. Under our skin, we are all so strange and fragile. Sometimes, we like to frighten ourselves with that fact. Sometimes, we like to turn it into art. No matter how far we advance, the human head and heart will always house awe for our lovely mysteries. (Warning: graphic medical images and animation.)
posted by melissa may at 1:21 AM PST - 5 comments

A hundred social scientists and geneticists gathered this week in Alexandria to sort out the meaning of race, and didn't, quite.
posted by sudama at 8:39 PM PST - 40 comments

B'gawk! It may sound a bit like a joke, but forget about merely watching webcams, or playing with subservient facsimilies. Join the urban farming movement and do it for real. Martha Stewart does it, Hollywood producers make movies about it, and now even hipsters are doing it too: they're raising chickens in urban and suburban backyards. Coops range from the eggs-spensive but low-maintenance "HenSpa" to tricked-out Home Depot sheds to faux-gingerbread cottages to the very cool iMac-style "eglu". Surprisingly, it's usually legal to keep chickens in most areas as long as you only keep hens and no rooster (too noisy), but even in anti-chicken cities like NYC, it goes on in secret and remains legal on public property. And you can always buy your neighbors' silence with fresh eggs. Poultry Power to the People!
posted by Asparagirl at 6:12 PM PST - 27 comments

Why the Bear Market is Not Over. A PowerPoint presentation from the perpetually pessimistic people at The Prudent Bear.
posted by Kwantsar at 4:22 PM PST - 8 comments

Experts Study New Sign Language System A new system of sign language developed by deaf children in Nicaragua may hold clues about the evolution of languages. When the country's first school for the deaf was established in 1977, children were not taught sign language but developed a system of signs to communicate. Childhood learning may determine linguistic rules ...They found that older students used hand signals resembling the gestures employed by hearing people, mimicking the entire event physically. But younger pupils - who had interacted with other deaf children from an early age - used a more complex series of signs. They split the scene into component parts and arranged these sequentially to convey the incident. The constructions resemble the way words and sentences are built in verbal languages, using segments structured in a linear fashion. This indicates that way the younger children learnt the sign language helped reshape it according to these linguistic rules.
............... Fascinating... /Mr. Spock
posted by y2karl at 4:02 PM PST - 20 comments

Hurricane Ivan VS soy sprayed house that wouldn't look bad in Star Trek. Results of the match: house wins ! Proof proved that if you build to last, the building lasts ...but if you don't for whatever reason.... More info on the building here
posted by elpapacito at 3:43 PM PST - 19 comments

Just getting into the spirit of things ready for tomorrow. Again.
posted by ciderwoman at 12:50 PM PST - 23 comments

Great Small Hotels Stumbled on this while trying to figure out where to go on a vacation. [Thanks to antsushi]
posted by jaronson at 11:47 AM PST - 7 comments

The life and death of a supersized man. Walter Hudson was fat. Precisely how fat was impossible to determine, because the one time he agreed to be weighed on an industrial-strength scale, it broke. (Maybe it was something he ate?) But no one denies that Hudson was one of the most obese people of the modern era (note: pictures not safe before lunch). Former comic, erstwhile diet guru, civil rights activist and Michael Jackson proponent Dick Gregory was one of Hudson's many exploiters, but Hudson's agoraphobic existence sounds almost beatific.
posted by digaman at 9:32 AM PST - 24 comments

XXX: 30 P9RN STAR PORTRAITS (a bit NSFW, obviously) by photographer Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, is a book that features paired portraits (one clothed and one nude) of the top stars in p6rn, straight and gay, from legends like (best-selling memoirist) Jenna Jameson, Ron Jeremy and Nina Hartley to (ahem) rising stars like Sunrise Adams, Belladonna, Chad Hunt. The book includes short essays on the intersection of p6rnography and culture by a wide range of writers, from Salman Rushdie to AM Homes. XXX is, essentially, about the much-dreaded "p6rnification" of the culture at large, recently featured in the New York Times. As Gore Vidal writes in the book's introduction, “Doubtless, sex tales were told about the Neanderthal campfire and perhaps instructive positions drawn on cave walls. Meanwhile, the human race was busy establishing such exciting institutions as slavery and its first cousin, marriage.” (more inside, with totally NSFW Terry Richardson)
posted by matteo at 9:24 AM PST - 12 comments

Question for a gray Saturday. What is literature for ? Three litblogs -- Conversational Reading, The Reading Experience, and Leonard Bast -- discuss. Curl up and consider.
posted by dame at 9:14 AM PST - 5 comments

Threadless lets you submit your very own tee-shirt designs. The designs are voted on, and then the winning designs are printed up. They have some Very Cool Designs.
posted by hughbot at 8:24 AM PST - 12 comments

SHOW TUNES 1, FUNDAMENTALISTS 0 [thanks karmakaze]
posted by Pretty_Generic at 7:36 AM PST - 52 comments

Proof of the warming power of whiskey. A pilot project, which will see the first district heating scheme based in a distillery, is being set up at the home of the Old Pulteney in Wick. It will produce environmentally-friendly power and reduce heating and electricity bills for nearly 600 householders.
posted by psmealey at 6:36 AM PST - 5 comments

The 50 weirdest Guinness World Records
posted by bob sarabia at 11:37 PM PST - 20 comments

"I was born in London, England on October 26 1958, the youngest of four and much to my parent's surprise, I was born a dog." The rich inner life of artist Ray Caesar. {keep clicking to see details of prints}
posted by dobbs at 9:37 PM PST - 14 comments

Warning - by visiting this site, you will destroy it. Each visit will remove one pixel from these photographs. However, we will tell you a story. It's a story about Romania, which is to say, it's a story about change.
posted by willnot at 8:37 PM PST - 17 comments

A dangerous intersection in Tampa... then, disaster strikes, on live TV. [note: Windows Media, high bandwidth, graphic]
posted by crunchland at 8:06 PM PST - 55 comments

Conscience Clauses and Health Care --"Yes, we need to respect individual freedom of religion. But at what point does it cross the line of not providing essential medical care? At what point is it malpractice?" she asked. "If someone's beliefs interfere with practicing their profession, perhaps they should do something else." The Protection of Conscience Project feels differently: Protection of Conscience Laws are needed because powerful interests are inclined to force health care workers and others to participate, directly or indirectly, in morally controversial procedures, while NARAL says: ... Many of these clauses go far beyond respecting individuals' beliefs to the point of harming women by not providing them with full information or access to medical treatment. Medicine, not ideology, should determine medical decisions.
posted by amberglow at 7:33 PM PST - 66 comments

Military recruiting getting slow? Here's one solution. Scary.
posted by jeremy at 7:28 PM PST - 13 comments

Godfather Horsehead Pillow.
posted by brownpau at 3:36 PM PST - 14 comments

This is Rock and Roll [3mb wmv via boingboing]
posted by cmicali at 3:30 PM PST - 15 comments

How to contact your elected officials. A civics lesson for sexy people, from the good people at Votergasm. (NSFW, in the Victoria's Secret kind of way.)
posted by PrinceValium at 2:52 PM PST - 6 comments

Tomorrow is National Public Lands Day, a day where you are invited into the national parks to build trails, plant trees and help improve YOUR parks. These national parks normally charge a fee for regular use. It is a growing trend to charge the populace to use their own public lands. Some people are for them (PDF), and others are against them.
posted by BrodieShadeTree at 2:50 PM PST - 24 comments

Geek Nirvana: Star Trek's Federation vs Star Wars' Empire By the Numbers

Because we know the debate rages on......

Now if we could only resolve Kirk vs. Picard for once and all.
via Linux Notes
posted by fenriq at 2:38 PM PST - 45 comments

Canada's True Hero The author Douglas Coupland has a book coming out in 2005 about fellow Canadian Terry Fox. Until then, read this interesting, but heart-warming article.
posted by grefo at 2:27 PM PST - 11 comments

Why You Should Ignore The Gallup Poll This Morning - And Maybe All Of Theirs If you support the Dems, you might want to pass this on!
"This morning we awoke to the startling news that despite a flurry of different polls this week all showing a tied race, the venerable Gallup Poll, as reported widely in the media (USA Today and CNN) today, showed George W. Bush with a huge 55%-42% lead over John Kerry amongst likely voters. The same Gallup Poll showed an 8-point lead for Bush amongst registered voters (52%-44%). Before you get discouraged by these results, you should be more upset that Gallup gets major media outlets to tout these polls and present a false, disappointing account of the actual state of the race. Why?"...
posted by Postroad at 2:05 PM PST - 53 comments

Friday Ebay Feedback Madness
posted by Frasermoo at 11:31 AM PST - 50 comments

Capsula Mundi is an Italian project to promote ecological burial. Alternatively, those who prefer the sea can become reefs. A Swedish company has come up with a freezing method. [Via Aeiou and MoFi.]
posted by homunculus at 11:19 AM PST - 10 comments

100 key books “Cyril Connolly chose 100 key books from England, France and America first published between 1880 and 1950 to represent ‘The Modern Movement’.”

This site asks: “How does the list look now, in the first decade of the 21st Century?” “an additional list of key books is needed for 1950 to 2000. What should be included and why? Does Connolly's selection criteria need adjusting [just England (when so many of the books are from Ireland), France and America!] and if so how should this be done, remembering that Connolly was very precise in delineating the list as Key books, not best books?”
posted by Grod at 9:43 AM PST - 18 comments

I found some of your life. You are unknown to me. Your camera's memory card was in a taxi; I have it now. I am going to post one of your pictures each day. I will also narrate as if I were you. Maybe you will come here and reclaim this piece of your life. (via the Morning News)
posted by Ufez Jones at 8:23 AM PST - 95 comments

A decision has been made to attack Fallujah after the first Tuesday in November, after the election: The violent political albatross of a secret Iraq with canceled elections.
posted by four panels at 7:52 AM PST - 74 comments

Firefox 1.0 Preview Release is now available. The Spread Firefox site hopes to see a million downloads, and they've already passed the halfway mark. The advantages of Firefox have been previously discussed on MeFi, but this version includes an interesting new feature - Live Bookmarks, which allow you to view RSS news and blog headlines in the bookmarks toolbar or bookmarks menu. Obsessively checking MetaFilter is now easier than ever.
posted by Stuart_R at 7:36 AM PST - 47 comments

Hold the phone. You probably already know that many Americans are ditching their land lines in favor of cell phones:

It is part of a generational shift to wireless, says Leap's chief executive, Harvey White. "Our demographic is younger, and when people start a household today they simply never bother to get a land line."

But were you aware that pollsters don't call cell phones? Media saturation, changes in communications technology, and missed demographics (americans abroad, for example) seem to make polls increasingly irrelevant. (first link via e-v.com)
posted by whatnot at 7:24 AM PST - 21 comments

70 things you may or may not know about Leonard Cohen (a nice accompaniment to this mefi thread of yore) [via]
posted by shoepal at 7:07 AM PST - 15 comments

Dear MEFI, I just love Alphabetilately, and I think you will too! Yours sincerely, taz.
posted by taz at 7:01 AM PST - 19 comments

Furbrella [single JPEG link post]
posted by Pretty_Generic at 6:04 AM PST - 9 comments

Devil Worship: The Sacred Books and Traditions of the Yezidiz , by Isya Joseph, 1919. 'This is one of the only public domain sources of information on the religious beliefs of the Yezidi, a small group originally from the northern region of Iraq. Although they speak Kurdish, they are a distinct population from the Kurds. The Yezidi are notable because they have been described as devil-worshippers, which has naturally led to constant persecution by the dominant Islamic culture of the region ... They have many unique beliefs, such as that the first Yezidi were created by Adam by parthenogenesis separately from Eve ... ' New on sacred-texts.com.
posted by plep at 5:44 AM PST - 4 comments

Another good one for "the troops". Iraq is being used to blackmail soldiers to re-enlist, or else...
posted by acrobat at 2:12 AM PST - 36 comments

Gmail checking through Trillian (plugin) "You've Got Gmail" is a Gmail notifier plugin for Trillian Pro. I thought this was a pretty nifty plugin for all the gmailers out there - go see!
posted by erratic frog at 12:27 AM PST - 4 comments

TV themes - classic, and ...not so classic.
posted by jb at 11:55 PM PST - 12 comments

Anne Sexton, American Poet.......172 of her poems online I am reading a biography on her and thought I would share with the class. She had a tough time.
posted by lee at 11:08 PM PST - 3 comments

Score one for tolerance and diversity. Three-year-old Sophia Parlock cries while seated on the shoulders of her father, Phil Parlock, after having their Bush-Cheney sign torn up by Kerry-Edwards supporters on Thursday, Sept. 16, 2004, at the Tri-State Airport in Huntington, W.Va. Do the smirking people in this photo really feel proud for terrorizing a three-year-old girl?
posted by DWRoelands at 9:31 PM PST - 55 comments

Roger Ebert's new web site, launched by the Chicago Sun-Times, includes nearly 10,000 pieces of the newly svelte critic's writing, including more than 5,500 film reviews dating back to 1967. Love him or hate him, that's quite a (free) resource. [via TV Barn]
posted by realityblurred at 8:14 PM PST - 31 comments

Crispy New Freestyle : Featuring such lyrical gems as 'I like to suck mouse dick' (wmv link)
posted by angry modem at 8:00 PM PST - 8 comments

Normal for Us: The Millter Twins This is a pretty amazing documentary, made by Eric Cain for Oregon Public Broadcasting, about twins Michelle and Mariya Miller and their family. The girls were born with Spinal Muscular Atrophy and therefore have never been able to walk. The parents were determined to have their daughters live life and so developed unique motorized transports and a home that accomodates their needs. In a tiny town in Alaska. Talk about pulling the tears right out of their ducts!
posted by billsaysthis at 5:43 PM PST - 12 comments

'Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned' is a trashy, adrenalised, sleaze-funk masterpiece. After six years of silence, The Prodigy have released their new album. Is the electronic music finally getting its head out of its ass? Most of us think so, but some don't.
posted by orelius at 5:41 PM PST - 47 comments

Otherkin. Weird. Otakukin. Very, very weird. Maybe you wonder if sometimes you are part...something. Unicorn? Dragon? You, are one of the otherkin. "Unless you go through some regression therapy to find that Otherkin part of you, chances are you won't have your memories available to you." But don't worry, you're not alone. (Unless you think you're an orc. Cause Tolkien is not a reference.)
Otakukin - even better. You're thing is anime.
posted by Salmonberry at 5:21 PM PST - 24 comments

Mr. Sbock's Parallel Universe: "Boobs - the female front. These are the image files of the fake artist Mr. Sbock. His mission: To create strange new pics. To publish great female forms, fascinating breasts and beautiful buttocks. To show on the net what no one has seen before." And quite possibly what no one ever wants to see again. [nsfw - maybe unless you work here]
posted by toby\flat2 at 5:08 PM PST - 10 comments

Jeff's Magical World of Penis-Unicorns [warning: background midi (and unicorns with penises on their heads)]
posted by mr_crash_davis at 5:08 PM PST - 12 comments

Rate my racks. [Diagrams safe for work. Geek alert.]
posted by pedantic at 3:34 PM PST - 7 comments

Reason's Julian Sanchez thinks he's found the guy who was caught on ABC News kicking a protester at the Republican convention, whose identity has been the subject of much speculation on blogs like TalkLeft. But does this kind of thing have the potential to create the Internet's Richard Jewell?
posted by transona5 at 12:11 PM PST - 53 comments

Some of the results from the city of Vancouver's Art Underfoot contest. "The competition invited anyone who lives, works, or goes to school in Vancouver to submit design ideas for new manhole covers..."
posted by dobbs at 10:54 AM PST - 11 comments

Heckling? Good Natured Fun or Verbal Abuse
The recent assault of a fan by Texas Rangers' reliever Frank Francisco with a folding chair is inexcusable, there's no doubt about that. But what about the fans who literally spend every moment at the park needling, heckling and verbally abusing the players?
There's a difference between ribbing the opposing team and calling an athlete a fat f***. Where does the line get drawn and why is any heckling permitted anymore?
posted by fenriq at 9:55 AM PST - 84 comments

New World Disorder: Issue Three. Attempting to "illuminate some of the weirdest and mind-bending culture from the edge, some of which, following the trajectories of centripetal culture, will come do dominate our lives tomorrow as much as space age religious warriors and mutant pop stars do today." [Via RealityCarnival.]
posted by homunculus at 9:32 AM PST - 3 comments

IN 1877 Isabel Gill visited an inhospitable volcanic blob in the mid-Atlantic to help her husband with ground-breaking astronomical measurements. Then she wrote a wrote a book about it, including an attempt to explain to fellow Victorian ladies the concept of a solar parallax in terms she thought they might be able to grasp:"I myself do not understand mathematical terms, so how could I use them with the hope of explaining these things to my readers? However, I can use knitting-needles, and perhaps they may do just as well."
Wierdly, more than a century later another astronomer visited the site and found the sandy paths which marked the Gill's lava-top camp still undisturbed by the Atlantic winds.
posted by penguin pie at 9:10 AM PST - 17 comments

The Greenskeepers put the fucking lotion in the basket. (link to 10.3 meg Silence of the Lambs-inspired music video Quicktime file, via Waxy)
posted by 40 Watt at 8:11 AM PST - 9 comments

Dan Rather: : "If the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story. Any time I'm wrong, I want to be right out front and say, 'Folks, this is what went wrong and how it went wrong.'" (reg. req.)

Andrew Sullivan: "Memo to Rather: you can't break that story, because someone else in pajamas already did. Check the frequency, Kenneth. You are so far from being out front on this, you are leagues behind in the dust. Have you heard of the Internet? You can find it on that weird machine in your office they call a computer."

Me: Is anyone else astonished as I am at how far CBS seems to have its head up its ass WRT news media in the 21st century?
posted by ericost at 8:07 AM PST - 119 comments

An interesting assessment of the war on terrorism. I love it when blogs seem to be filling a void in media coverage. This one is taking a critical look at the war on terrorism and seems to be finding some holes. If you go past the partisan talk (and it seems like that blog is slanted, even though it claims to be centrist), there's a lot of interesting links in there.
posted by TNLNYC at 7:24 AM PST - 9 comments

20th-century American artist, Alice Neele , "The Auntie Hero": "While Uptowners were making their way downtown to have their portraits painted by Warhol, Downtowners were going up to 107th Street to sit for this bohemian, auntie-like artist." Check out seven decades of raw, sometimes amazing, but always deeply humane portraits of the often larger-than-life figures who peopled the New York art/lit scene and Neel's personal landscape, including such iconic irrepressibles as Joe Gould, Andy Warhol, Annie Sprinkle, and Bella Abzug. (NSFW)
posted by taz at 5:59 AM PST - 13 comments

British History Online. British History Online. See London in 1682, and more.
posted by plep at 4:09 AM PST - 4 comments

Ivan as seen from the Space Station It looks like the French Quarter will be spared. But oh my . . . (Click image for larger version).
posted by jeremias at 3:53 AM PST - 33 comments

Music & photography. How to soup up that digital camera.(via coolios)
posted by johnny7 at 3:22 AM PST - 13 comments

Greg Lindahl presents scans and transcriptions of several early modern texts at his website: for example, there are partly-searchable facsmilies of John Florio's New World of Words, an Italian-English dictionary published in 1611, and, from the same year, Randle Cotgrave's Dictionarie of the French and English Tongues. Also, there are manuals on swordsmanship, dance, cookery, brewing and needlework.
posted by misteraitch at 12:51 AM PST - 7 comments

Hey, ho! He's...gone. Today Johnny Ramone joins Joey and Dee Dee at the great Blitzkrieg Bop in the sky (though admittedly he might not have much to say to either of them). This comes just days after a benefit/tribute concert in L.A. commemorating the 30th anniversary of the first Ramones gig. Catch the new documentary End of the Century in the meantime. Then again, maybe you'll just wanna be sedated.
posted by scody at 9:37 PM PST - 45 comments

Supersonic RC a shockwave game from LEGO.
posted by riffola at 9:15 PM PST - 10 comments

Patrick Dougherty makes outdoor sculptures out of twigs. Unfortunately, his official website only has smallish images of his work, but larger images are scattered across the Web.
posted by Johnny Assay at 8:58 PM PST - 15 comments

Life in Vladimir An amateur photographer would like to introduce you to Vladimir, one of the most beautiful cities of ancient Muscovy. Via Seelangs, a list serve for Slavic and East European Languages.
posted by gesamtkunstwerk at 5:43 PM PST - 1 comment

John Edwards: "No military draft if Democrats win" - which comes as a relief to me today as my own son turns eighteen. However, as it stands, the Selective Service System has been ramping up its ability to begin a draft as early as Spring 2005, especially a possibility should Congressional Bills S. 89 and H.R. 163, known as the "Universal National Service Act of 2003" pass in the House and Senate. Many people who have been in the military feel a draft would actually degrade the quality of our military forces. Nonetheless, this time around, a draft would include men and women. And the Selective Service is also looking for a few good people to become a Selective Service System Local Board Member, one of the tasks of which is to guarantee "that each CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR is properly CLASSIFIED, PLACED, and MONITORED."(emphasis added)
posted by jackspace at 5:38 PM PST - 57 comments

Moore Bush. Because intelligent political discussion is what everybody needs.
posted by seanyboy at 5:00 PM PST - 17 comments

Roman Vassilenko, the press secretary for the Embassy of Kazakhstan, wants to clear up few misconceptions about his country. Women are not kept in cages. The national sport is not shooting a dog and then having a party. You cannot earn a living being a Gypsy catcher Wine is not made from fermented horse urine.
This is a response to Borat, a character from "Da Ali G Show." Previously discussed here, and here.
posted by garethspor at 4:45 PM PST - 15 comments

With the opening of the National Museum of the American Indian in DC next week, the National Mall is now officially full, the usable space intended for museums, monuments and other important national sites have been taken. Chairman of the National Capital Planning Commission, John V. Cogbill III, tells the post that the Mall is "[d]one. We consider the Mall a finished work of civic art."
posted by stbalbach at 4:27 PM PST - 9 comments

Nature presents Bush and Kerry talking science. I never thought I'd see an incumbent president flip-flopping on Mars!
posted by Pretty_Generic at 4:05 PM PST - 16 comments

The World's Most Dangerous Ideas: U.S. and European goals on most issues are quite similar. Both want a peaceful world free from terror, with open trade, growing freedom, and civilized codes of conduct. A Europe that charts its own course just to mark its differences from the United States threatens to fracture global efforts—whether on trade, proliferation, or the Middle East. Europe is too disunited to achieve its goals without the United States; it can only ensure that America’s plans don’t succeed. The result will be a world that muddles along, with the constant danger that unattended problems will flare up disastrously. Instead of win-win, it will be lose-lose—for Europe, for the United States, and for the world.
posted by gd779 at 3:02 PM PST - 21 comments

Tragedy! Now at half price!

I think Lewis Black was right when he suggested that the last stage of grief isn't acceptance, but exploitation.

(And here's how to contact the outfit responsible.)
posted by Vidiot at 1:22 PM PST - 49 comments

Eyetracking for fun and profit. The Eyetrack III study observed 46 people for one hour as their eyes followed mock news websites and real multimedia content. This article summarizes their observations. Too impatient to read? Cool transparent heatmap overlay gizmo here. Via the rather cool creativebits.
posted by stonerose at 12:08 PM PST - 10 comments

Si'down, si'down, stay down... don't try and stand up. [.mov]
posted by Witty at 11:13 AM PST - 57 comments

Why Bush Left Texas Growing evidence suggests that George W. Bush abruptly left his Texas Air National Guard unit in 1972 for substantive reasons pertaining to his inability to continue piloting a fighter jet. A months-long investigation, which includes examination of hundreds of government-released documents, interviews with former Guard members and officials, military experts and Bush associates, points toward the conclusion that Bush's personal behavior was causing alarm among his superior officers and would ultimately lead to his fleeing the state to avoid a physical exam he might have had difficulty passing... If it is demonstrated that profound behavioral problems marred Bush's wartime performance and even cut short his service, it could seriously challenge Bush's essential appeal as a military steward and guardian of societal values. It could also explain the incomplete, contradictory and shifting explanations provided by the Bush camp for the President's striking invisibility from the military during the final two years of his six-year military obligation... There's that elephant in the living room again.
posted by y2karl at 10:09 AM PST - 100 comments

The Greatest War Protestor of All Time --Wise, hilarious, and kind words from Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. If you don't know who he is, fake it.
posted by chinese_fashion at 9:51 AM PST - 7 comments

A firsthand account of the RNC arrest sweep in NYC by 2600 editor Emmanuel Goldstein, who was covering the protest for WBAI radio and Indymedia. Complete with photos and video.
posted by dr_dank at 9:37 AM PST - 20 comments

All in the family. An R. Crumb original will cost you an arm and a leg, but S. Crumb will do you one better, for a whole lot less.
posted by subpixel at 8:12 AM PST - 18 comments

you-are-here.com: Los Angeles Architectural Photo Bonanza. Pictures of buildings in Los Angeles, organized by period (1818 - 1939, 1939 - 2004), building type (theatres, skyscrapers, Victorian homes), or by architect. Also, aerial photos!
posted by ar0n at 7:57 AM PST - 7 comments

nice fonts in a simple yet exceedingly well designed wrapper. via newstoday
posted by specialk420 at 6:23 AM PST - 17 comments

First gay divorce just in time for National Singles Week. (you know, if they were american)
posted by erisfree at 5:59 AM PST - 15 comments

Fused space. Exploring the impact mediascapes - the mobile phone and wireless networks - will have on the ways we inhabit localities.
posted by yoga at 5:42 AM PST - 0 comments - Post a Comment

Google buys a web page
posted by srboisvert at 5:37 AM PST - 16 comments

How safe is your pension? (UK) 'Nine million people in this country, young and old, pay a slice of their wage into final salary occupational pension schemes. But Channel 4's economics correspondent Liam Halligan reveals that most people don't realise they have no legal right to that pension money whatsoever. And some people have lost the lot.'
Think Britain's social safety net is more secure than that of the US? Think again.
Related :- Pensions Theft, a campaigning website set up by pensions activists, some of whom lost their pensions when their company went bust.
posted by plep at 3:06 AM PST - 6 comments

Critique Magazine's On Writing III - Each year, Critique Magazine's staff compiles essays by and interviews with writers, teachers, and translators of merit for inclusion in the special anniversary edition "On Writing".

Basically, a shitload of authors provide thoughts on, ahem, writing. {Both sites are worth a look, imo.}
posted by dobbs at 12:22 AM PST - 18 comments

Do your windows overlook scenes of inspiration? Do you even have windows? Why not choose your view?
posted by sharpener at 10:23 PM PST - 23 comments

Tired of American politics? Want a diversion? Become a Sex Toy Tester. (Not safe for work, unless this is your work.)
posted by Wulfgar! at 4:57 PM PST - 19 comments

A Son's Goodbye
Pierre Elliott Trudeau was Canada's Prime Minister from 1968 - 1984. He was a flamboyant man who believed in one Canada and a strong federal government. His son Justin delivered this very touching eulogy at his funeral in 2000.
posted by Irontom at 3:34 PM PST - 8 comments

Jimmy Carter's Letter to Zell Miller via Boing Boing via Interesting People
A private correspondence between Jimmy Carter and Zell Miller has surfaced where Jimmy expresses his disappointment with Zell's taking part in the RNC and betraying his constituency.
posted by fenriq at 3:30 PM PST - 42 comments

Two Years Before the Mast. "In the following pages I design to give an accurate and authentic narrative of a little more than two years spent as a common sailor,before the mast, in the American merchant service. It is written out from a journal which I kept at the time, and from notes which I made of most of the events as they happened." At the beginning of his third year of Harvard a severe attack of measles interrupted Henry Dana's studies, and so affected his eyes as to preclude, for a time at least, all idea of study. The state of the family finances was not such as to permit of foreign travel in search of health. Accordingly, prompted by necessity and by a youthful love of adventure, he shipped as a common sailor in the brig, bound for the California coast.
posted by weston at 12:09 PM PST - 22 comments

Those of us following the daily heart attack that is electoral-vote.com will notice a new site feature today. If you've ever wondered how the popular vote can be so evenly split when the red state / blue state breakdown glares so overwhelmingly crimson, now you can see a map of the US with states inflated/shrunk according to the proportions of their electoral votes. Presumably, this map will be updated, along with the standard one, with new polling data daily. [thanks to EB for originally pointing me to the site]
posted by scarabic at 12:08 PM PST - 91 comments

The Starving Ocean : A large collection of articles by Debbie MacKenzie on the death of the ocean. The idea is that removing most of the fish from the sea might be sort of bad for the marine ecosystem as a whole. Her writing style is a bit kooky, but she has been right on some points (ie. the Grey Seal thing). Oh, and fishing is also responsible for the rise of atmospheric carbon dioxide.
posted by sfenders at 11:49 AM PST - 10 comments

Fighting Fantasy Gamebooks tried to do Choose Your Own Adventure books one better with D&D-style rules. These massively single-player games, released in Britain, absorbed '80s nerds into the kind of murky, dead-serious fantasy recently parodied by Trogdor, in a decade when interactive fiction was on the rise. A bunch of the Gamebooks are now available to play online. Hang on to those healing potions.
posted by inksyndicate at 10:53 AM PST - 32 comments

Man says he was paid $150 for each chip laid The airstrikes on residential areas in Iraq are designed to lower support for militants by civilians, and create factional in-fighting. This raises two questions for me. Who are these 'scouts', to be trusted to identify legitimate targets? No monetary, revenge, tribal motivation? What are the legal implications of 'collateral damage'. Are innocent victims eligible for compensation? Any lawyers out there? If moral questions are not allowed under the patriot act, what about legal ones?
posted by dreeed at 10:30 AM PST - 8 comments

In China's newly wealthy cities, a research boom is starting. In parts of the countryside, the rivers are black and too toxic to touch.
posted by Tlogmer at 10:29 AM PST - 14 comments

Use one of those heavy U-locks to secure your bike? You might want to think again. It seems the barrel style lock mechanisms some of them employ can be opened by a Bic pen [.mov movie].
posted by normy at 9:44 AM PST - 69 comments

With our shipwrecked hearts. Ninety years ago Dino Campana, impoverished and outcast poet self-published his book Canti Orfici (.pdf file) ("Orphic Songs", mastefully translated into English by poet Charles Wright). The birth of the book wasn't marred only by Campana's mental illness (soon afterwards, he was committed to a mental institution). Initially, the "Orphic Songs" were submitted for possible publication to the poet/painter Ardengo Soffici, who promptly lost the manuscript. Campana spent the next six months reconstructing the book from memory. Finally in 1914, with the help of a local printer of religious tracts, he self-published a first edition of around 500, selling only 44. Campana attempted, with marginal success, to sell the remainder of his portion of the run (the printer had taken half the books as partial printing payment) himself at cafes in Florence. He is now remembered as one of Italy's greatest, most imaginative poets (with biographies ,award-winning movies about his troubled life and his dangerous, scandalous love affair with fellow writer Sibilla Aleramo. (more inside)
posted by matteo at 8:03 AM PST - 11 comments

Ever wanted to get away from the neighbours? Any neighbours? Phelps Dodge, a mining company, is selling off Kitsault, BC, a remote company town built in the early 80s to support a mine that later went bust.
posted by jacquilynne at 7:59 AM PST - 19 comments

Colin Powell in Four-letter Neo-con 'crazies' Row Perhaps Colin should have said they were cheney crazies.
posted by rough ashlar at 7:46 AM PST - 29 comments

Hurricane Risk for New Orleans: "if that Category Five Hurricane comes to New Orleans, 50,000 people could lose their lives. Now that is significantly larger than any estimates that we would have of individuals who might lose their lives from a terrorist attack. When you start to do that kind of calculus - and it's horrendous that you have to do that kind of calculus - it appears to those of us in emergency management, that the risk is much more real and much more significant, when you talk about hurricanes. I don't know that anybody, though, psychologically, has come to grip with that: that the French Quarter of New Orleans could be gone." (Nb. this excerpt from a fascinating 2002 American RadioWorks documentary does not refer specifically to Ivan.)
posted by sudama at 7:41 AM PST - 55 comments

Vladimir Putin, wanted, alive.
Chechen Rebels responding to the 10 million dollar bounty placed by the Russian secret services on rebel leaders Basayev and Mashkadov, have upped the ante offering 20 million dollars for the detention of "the war criminal Putin"...
This is the sort of war crimes they are referring to.
posted by talos at 3:57 AM PST - 89 comments

Livejournal - maybe not the first place you'd look for stunning Photo Blogs. So, here's 1st and 2nd, Aman Geld, M T Lancourt, The Inexplicable Brown Man, Nathan Blaney, Andrew Kendall and ????????????? to change your mind. (Coral links inside)
posted by triv at 3:01 AM PST - 10 comments

Sept. 7: Righteous indignation. Sept. 13: The million dollar question. Sept: 14: The beginning of the answer?
posted by Krrrlson at 1:40 AM PST - 39 comments

Sunday Night's Election Debate  —  National security issues loom large, voters are admonished not to decide to “cut and run”. Medicare and the economy were also points of contention. The greens are being attacked as “commies”. John Quiggin has some observations.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 11:31 PM PST - 20 comments

Cass Sunstein's The Future of Free Speech

"I seek to defend a particular conception of democracy — a deliberative conception — and to evaluate, in its terms, the outcome of a system with perfect power of filtering."
posted by Kwantsar at 11:29 PM PST - 9 comments

As God Is My Cleaning Lady: Crypto-Fado For Bohemian Pagan Popsters. They can't play their classical Fado guitars very well; they have a punky drummer and the Fado singer not only smiles pouts and shakes her hips, but actually seems to enjoy herself! What's become of this country? Are they mad? Reckless, certainly. They call themselves A Naifa and what they've done is taken a massive, ice-crunching Waring Pro blender to all the sacred potions, fruits and flavours of Portuguese traditional music and poured out a vulgar, shameless, disrespectful and utterly delicious shambles of a Pop cocktail. Heresy in old Lisbon? I nearly choked on my 30-year-old aguardente velha, but then realized I was dancing merrily and had already spilt most of it anyway. [Probably not fun for those unfamiliar with the Fado. QuickTime required.]
posted by MiguelCardoso at 11:09 PM PST - 10 comments

What If Bush Wins? Sixteen writers ,right and left, predict the likely consequences of a second term for President Bush.
posted by thedailygrowl at 11:06 PM PST - 40 comments

neurodiversity
An amazingly wide and varied site which began as a collection of articles about Autism but which has expanded to survey such varied topics as left-handedness, gender and sexual orientation, hysteria, and a fascinating collection of articles on "Neurotypical Issues." Hours and hours of material from a wide variety of viewpoints.
posted by anastasiav at 10:01 PM PST - 12 comments

The Beaver Triologyblurs reality and fiction as it tells the story of a teen obsessed with the spotlight. [as heard on This American Life.]
posted by drezdn at 9:43 PM PST - 6 comments

"It's up to the judge to determine, based on the law, whether Nader should be on the ballot or not" - Jeb Bush. In fact, the court has issued an injunction barring placing Nader on the ballot. But today, Bush's Secretary of State issued an order [pdf] to local elections officials, telling them to ignore the current injunction and place Nader's name on the ballot anyway. [via Kos]
posted by falconred at 8:32 PM PST - 42 comments

CliffsNotes is now offering 180 literature guides available for free online viewing.
posted by bob sarabia at 8:09 PM PST - 13 comments

Pictures of Music - fascinating site about graphical music notation, i.e., "non-traditional musical symbols arranged in a visual design rather than conventional musical syntax." Includes zoomable example scores, bios of folks like Morton Feldman, instructions for musicians, lots of sound clips and a detailed animated analysis of Cornelius Cardew's Treatise, the "Mount Everest of graphic scores."
posted by mediareport at 7:58 PM PST - 12 comments

Why al-Qaeda is winning As nihilistic as it may be, al-Qaeda, from a business point of view, is a major success: three years after September 11, it is a global brand and a global movement. The Middle East, in this scenario, is just a regional base station. This global brand does not have much to do with Islam. But it has everything to do with the globalization of anti-imperialism. And the empire, whatever its definition, has its center in Washington. Bin Laden is laughing: Bush's crusade has legitimized an obscure sect as a worldwide symbol of political revolt. How could bin Laden not vote for Bush?
posted by rdone at 7:11 PM PST - 20 comments

Essay on the meanings and significance of Blade Runner. Interesting insights on particular scenes and quotes and how they are more relevant today than ever.
posted by stbalbach at 6:18 PM PST - 26 comments

Oprah I've never cared for her. Except today she gave away 276 new cars to her studio audience, members of which were selected based on need. I now like Oprah. A lot.
posted by Ynoxas at 4:09 PM PST - 166 comments

The Liberal Limericker. Yep... just another site dedicated to astute political commentary in limerick form.
posted by crookdimwit at 3:21 PM PST - 9 comments

"Hey, darling. Love you. Need your vote." Politics without presidents: a soulful portrait of former DC mayor Marion Barry. I was really impressed by the dog in the left-hand corner of the picture. (registration required)
posted by chinese_fashion at 3:18 PM PST - 8 comments

US Ban on Assault Weapons Expires

Without much fanfare the ten year old ban on assault weapons has expired. How does this affect our relative level of safety now that we can all own high powered, high capacity weapons again?
posted by fenriq at 2:47 PM PST - 59 comments

PageWise offers tips and little essays in simple language: Organize your work desk and files, Care for someone with Alzheimer's, Reduce holiday stress, Parenting advice that really works(!), Fix cooking mistakes, The basics of clothing stain removal. It's a cheap shot, but I particularly liked "Help you child in improving their writing skills". But why wouldn't they build in a search feature? I had to google to find again the article on restraining the elderly. (And what's the deal with the similar WebGuru?).
posted by iffley at 2:04 PM PST - 4 comments

Meet the CXT. "We can see it a as a vehicle for business people who want to make distinct impression. For personal use, it's for people who want to make a statement." I think it will leave a little more than an impression.
posted by gazingus at 11:54 AM PST - 87 comments

The paintings of Josh Kil. Click the gallery link.
posted by protocool at 11:29 AM PST - 3 comments

Restaurant Customer Arrested For Tipping Under 18%. Now, we've had discussions about tipping. But I'm not sure that any of us envisioned this.
posted by dejah420 at 11:02 AM PST - 103 comments

Don Juan Nifty guide to the Don Juan legend in European literature.
posted by thomas j wise at 9:57 AM PST - 2 comments

Yesterday, Mazen al-Tomasi, a reporter for Al-Arabiya, was broadcasting live from the scene of a carbombed Bradley Fighting Vehicle, which had attracted a crowd of locals. While making his report, a sudden noise came from behind Mazen.
Two Apache helicopters flew in overhead, and one of them started attacking the crowd, with their guns. The crowd, which included several small children, tried to run away. A helicopter launched a missile...
Mazen al-Tomasi was struck by shrapnel from the blast on live television. His cameraman, Seif Fouad, fell down from the force of the explosion. Mazen's blood spattered across the camera's lens and the screams of the dying and injured were heard. Mazen screamed to Seif for help: "Seif, Seif! I'm going to die. I'm going to die."
Seif grabbed Mazen and started to pull him out of harm's way. Suddenly, another missile was launched, and Seif was hit by shrapnel in the leg and abdomen. Seif, seriously wounded, watched his friend Mazen die soon afterwards. Twelve were killed, 61 wounded in the attack.
A US military spokesman said the helicopters opened fire after coming under attack from the crowd, and that they fired to prevent looters from stripping the vehicle. That said, the vehicle was burning too badly to be stripped, and the television footage showed no evidence of any shooting from the ground, or indeed, any armed Iraqis whatsoever. The full video of this is was seen by millions of Arabs and is apparently something that Reuters has the rights to -- Saif works for Reuters -- but something tells me that it will never make the evening news.
posted by insomnia_lj at 9:07 AM PST - 65 comments

Alas, the new iMac cannot bow before the cross. "At best, it can only give a downward nod or an upward look, and that would just communicate half-hearted politeness rather than an attitude of worship." So says the editor of the Christian Macintosh Users Group. Love Jesus, but not Jobs? No problem - this list of Christian computer users groups has you covered. And hey - Neo/Luddites? Even if you've left the web behind, the web hasn't left you behind.

MeFites, when you're not bowing before the blue, what's your favorite site that melds the sacred with the techno-profane?
posted by stonerose at 8:58 AM PST - 16 comments

Terrorists Arrive in Miami!
A little-noticed but chilling scene at Opa-locka Airport outside Miami last month demonstrates that the Bush administration's commitment to fighting international terrorism can be overtaken by presidential politics — even if that means admitting known terrorists onto U.S. soil.
There are other terrorists that the US government welcomes. I challenge you to name them (hint: Cuban origins for one). What is that smell? Are we fighting terrorism or Islam?
posted by nofundy at 7:40 AM PST - 16 comments

Chocolypse Now. "I love the smell of burnt cookies in the morning. Smells like... Tollhouse." [via the inimitable Websnark]
posted by Johnny Assay at 7:38 AM PST - 9 comments

The Observer does, the New York Times does, the Boston Globe does, and so does the Washington Post. Why don't more newspapers put their weekend magazines online?
posted by jedro at 5:05 AM PST - 13 comments

Save Betamax.
posted by seanyboy at 4:42 AM PST - 4 comments

Lesbian Paperback Covers. [NSFW]
posted by srboisvert at 3:47 AM PST - 17 comments

Delightful magical realism by artist Rob Gonsalves. If you enjoy these, then also be sure to check out the wonderful works of Curt Frankenstein. This post made possible by AskMe, and the kind and lovely MeFites Orb and Faze.
posted by taz at 2:55 AM PST - 5 comments

The OS Girls.
posted by reklaw at 2:22 AM PST - 17 comments

Victor Jara in English. Tribute page to the Chilean folk singer.
posted by plep at 1:50 AM PST - 4 comments

Walking to the Sky (more)
posted by Tlogmer at 12:58 AM PST - 50 comments

The Likudization of the World "....he has cast the United States in the very same role in which Israel casts itself, facing the very same threat. In this narrative, the U.S. is fighting a never ending battle for its very survival against utterly irrational forces that seek nothing less than its total extermination. "
posted by troutfishing at 9:11 PM PST - 42 comments

The Final Chronicles of Thomas Covenant More than two decades after the last chapter, Stephen R. Donaldson is set to release the first of four novels in "The Final Chronicles Of Thomas Covenant." Bonus: a "trailer" of sorts (left side of page, midpoint). Hellfire & White Gold!
posted by davidmsc at 7:21 PM PST - 25 comments

The 25 Best Futurama Moments Ever! Truly the greatest animated show till date. [via 0xDECAFBAD]
posted by riffola at 6:26 PM PST - 54 comments

When you hold a moment of silence for 9/11, it's good to stand with your hand on your heart. But if you're the President, you reach for your crotch.
posted by tapeguy at 5:58 PM PST - 40 comments

Enviromental absorbant products manufacturer, Dyn-O-Mat claims to have removed a cloud from Doppler radar and intends to test their product on a hurricane. They have a patent and everything. The federal government spent two decades on Project Stormfury, an attempt to halt storms by 'seeding' the eyewall of a hurricane. This guy says we are already doing it with the militaries High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program. Even if we're not doing it now, we'll definately by own the weather by 2025. That is, unless we're intentionally causing storms.
posted by cedar at 5:36 PM PST - 24 comments

Movieoke - emote along with your favorite scenes from Casablanca, Taxi Driver, Grease and a bunch of others. All the classics except, inexplicably, A Few Good Men.
posted by milovoo at 12:47 PM PST - 11 comments

You can get at the Oxford English Dictionary for free. Yay. Unfortunately you have to use this backdoor thing. Don't tell anyone.
posted by Pretty_Generic at 12:35 PM PST - 59 comments

You know you've had one hell of a year when you get promoted from Jesus to Superman.
posted by PrinceValium at 12:27 PM PST - 19 comments

A LEVER TO MOVE THE MIND The project is fascinating, even though it is still in the rudimentary graphics stage. As someone who works with people with mental illness this interested me, how about the rest of you? What am I talking about? A way to model what schizophrenia is like.
posted by edgeways at 10:07 AM PST - 9 comments

Ceci n’est pas une goatse.cx (sfw)
posted by madamjujujive at 9:02 AM PST - 35 comments

Anyone up for a little paintball? I'll bring my own gun.
posted by TungstenChef at 11:01 PM PST - 21 comments

oh my. this is not good for business.
posted by quadrinary at 9:02 PM PST - 65 comments

Smurf Name Generator. It doesn't suck, that bad.
posted by Bag Man at 5:58 PM PST - 26 comments

Senior Photos
posted by srboisvert at 2:12 PM PST - 43 comments

Lest We Forget
Today we should look back at how a shift in priorities played a critical role in the attacks of 9/11. Whatever your political leanings there are certain facts that should not be ignored. I present these and ask you to present other relevant facts.
posted by nofundy at 12:56 PM PST - 19 comments

The original thread as posted here on metafilter. On the first anniversary this thread consisted mainly of links related to the terrorist attacks. Last year was this thread. Remember those who were lost in this one thread, please, without the politics.
posted by SuzySmith at 11:31 AM PST - 15 comments

"I follow a dog chasing some invisible bird." Four Stories: Some of the most breathtaking woodcuts I've seen a good while illustrating four sparse but moving stories. After a decade of metafiction and Raygun typography, this letterpressed book of mythic narrative is refreshing, and inspiring.
posted by eustacescrubb at 10:46 AM PST - 6 comments

This September 11th, remember the others.
posted by reklaw at 10:34 AM PST - 4 comments

9/11: Who do we blame? George W. Bush? Democrats? Bill Clinton? Ronald Reagan? The FBI? "The government"? Saddam Hussein? God? Maybe it was punishment for years of legal abortion. Maybe if we had destroyed the sodomites [pdf] those 3000 people would still be alive. Maybe. But with all these conflicting reports, will we ever really know who is truly responsible for the 9/11 attacks?
posted by punishinglemur at 8:56 AM PST - 28 comments

She was destined to lead us.
One year ago today, Sweden got it's own 9/11 trauma. Foreign Minister Anna Lindh died by the hand of a madman.
posted by mr.marx at 6:51 AM PST - 21 comments

Three Years On A sobering analysis by Juan Cole of the strategic motivation behind 9/11.
posted by rdone at 6:51 AM PST - 17 comments

The Library of Congress American Memory site is a good place to start in looking back at 9/11. They feature a twin towers poster that I have always liked and a "Stop Hate" graphic that's now my PC wallpaper (at least for the week). There are also multiple links to a wide variety of related content.
posted by mmahaffie at 6:04 AM PST - 3 comments

Shake it, don't break it! Linked article reviews a few laptops that can really take a beating. Hey, I adore my sexy, sleek Sony Vaio, but I have to admit, if I ever dropped it, I'd have a really big problem. (This article is from April, so I did search of MeFi and there were no returns, so enjoy!)
posted by erratic frog at 5:34 AM PST - 4 comments

Suing the Saudis The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey has decided to join a $7 billion lawsuit that was filed last week by bond brokerage firm Cantor Fitzgerald, which lost 658 of its employees--two thirds of the firm--in the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center, which was three years ago today. It looks like they may be gearing up to use RICO: "[The lawsuit said] Saudi Arabia engaged in a pattern of racketeering as it participated directly or indirectly in al Qaida's work through its "alter-ego" charities and relief organisations, which it funded and controlled." Al Qaida is named as a co-defendant, and four Saudis are mentioned by name: the interior minister, the defense minister, the governor of Riyadh, and the British ambassador, all members of the Saudi royal family.
posted by Asparagirl at 12:13 AM PST - 26 comments

Three years after the day that claimed 658 employees, Cantor Fitzgerald thrives. Controversial CEO Howard Lutnick went from tragic figure to villain in a matter of days when he abruptly terminated the pay of deceased employees, but Cantor has since paid $145 million to families in tribute to former colleagues. Joining many others throughout the country in a movement called One Day's Pay, the firm will donate 100% of Monday's revenues to the family relief fund. -more-
posted by madamjujujive at 12:05 AM PST - 11 comments

One cool thing to have come out of all the typewriter discussion going on these days.
posted by delmoi at 11:19 PM PST - 21 comments

Belly Rolls, mmmmm . . .
posted by jeremias at 8:33 PM PST - 3 comments

Take 100 photos of 100 faces in a metropolitan area, morph them together to create a composite male and female face, and you can see the face of tomorrow.
posted by Orb at 7:31 PM PST - 22 comments

Two Great Tastes That Taste Great Together.
posted by macadamiaranch at 7:11 PM PST - 12 comments

The British Library is putting online 93 high-resolution digitised copies of 21 of Shakespeare's plays. They include many lines and passages that are different from those found in the First Folio editions, which were not printed until after Shakespeare's death. BBC article.
posted by stbalbach at 6:29 PM PST - 9 comments

Catch NASA's solar capsule!
Via B3ta
posted by Mwongozi at 3:51 PM PST - 13 comments

Forged Documents? For Shame.
posted by alethe at 2:55 PM PST - 156 comments

Yeah, so you have to guess the Google Image Search query from the images it returns.
posted by Pretty_Generic at 2:53 PM PST - 6 comments

Kid Beyond is a nifty vocal percussionist I just saw perform. Hear some tracks online [flash]. Try Kashmir. Think: one dude, a mic, and a delay pedal. If you live near Berkeley, you can learn beatbox from the kid himself at the JazzSchool on Sunday, November 7.
posted by scarabic at 12:25 PM PST - 16 comments

"Al Gore...lives on my block." Humorous song by one of Al Gore's neighbors (warning: audio starts up right away when you go to the site). See this week's New Yorker for the full story, but the song itself is quite entertaining with no background at all.
posted by GaelFC at 12:18 PM PST - 19 comments

There appear to be many similarities between the lives of Krishna and Jesus Christ. Exploring the linkage between the two does make one wonder whether the similarities are coincidences or for a very good reason.
posted by riffola at 12:18 PM PST - 20 comments

How to make fried oreos A pictoral guide.
posted by konolia at 11:38 AM PST - 25 comments

Meeksville centers around Joe Meek, Britain's first independent record producer, whose DIY engineering wizardry would transform record-making during the Sixties. Five years after an international #1 hit in the Tornadoes' space-age Telstar (Windows Media or RealPlayer), he would self-destruct, in an end not without tragedy or speculation. His works--along with his trademarked name--live on.
posted by LinusMines at 11:31 AM PST - 4 comments

Behavior in the voting booth. (by Louis Menand)
posted by advil at 11:03 AM PST - 7 comments

Phot'optic Collection — 'Accumulation interactive d'appareils, de publicités de catalogues et de matériels photographiques français.'

Discovered within Ramage's attic.
posted by tenseone at 10:49 AM PST - 2 comments

Testy Copy Editors is a site run by WaPo Financial Copy Editor Philip Blanchard, with guest columns and discussions dedicated to blowing off steam for people in the occasionally tense business of making words fit, parse properly and make sense in print.

If you've actually edited copy under a deadline, or know someone who has, you know how thankless the job can sometimes be.
posted by chicobangs at 10:36 AM PST - 16 comments

"To Kill the Child" and "Leaving Beirut" - two new songs written in response to the Iraq war by Roger Waters, and posted to his website in various streaming formats.
posted by GriffX at 10:14 AM PST - 14 comments

"Conditions are deteriorating, Dwight!" Herald writer's comprehensive guide to Hurricane Journalism. Very important reading for storm-chasing reporters, especially now, as Ivan the Terrible sets its eye on Jamaica, Cuba, and Florida. Found via CapitalWeather. Also check out CaribPundit for Ivan updates and reminiscences of island hurricanes. (Ivan the Terrible? Eye? Get it? Eh? Eh? Yeah, I didn't think it was funny on Fox News either.)
posted by brownpau at 10:04 AM PST - 13 comments

Gettin involvit in the Scottish Pairlament The Scottish Pairlament is here for tae represent aw Scotland's folk. We want tae mak siccar that as mony folk as can is able tae find oot aboot whit the Scottish Pairlament dis and whit wey it warks.
posted by xmutex at 10:03 AM PST - 16 comments

Who's A Rat? "Largest online database of informants and agents." 407 profiles and counting.
posted by mwhybark at 9:43 AM PST - 3 comments

Dick Cheney claims that disappointing jobs numbers are undercounting ebay power sellers. The man is on a tear!
posted by luser at 9:21 AM PST - 47 comments

Heavens Above! This is a pretty neat website for anybody interested in astronomy. Give it your location (City names work, even my white bread red-neck plains town did) and it'll give you star maps, fly by times and viewing instructions for satellites and so on.
posted by substrate at 9:12 AM PST - 6 comments

doodlebug ... create and playback doodles, online. The doodle linked here is of Clint Eastwood (kinda). [note: flash] via j-walk
posted by crunchland at 8:15 AM PST - 13 comments

My cattle grazing grounds are not my idea and vice versa. But thanks to laws I can "own" the idea as if the idea was a cow ; link goes to a interesting university-level paper [PDF]. The author makes some interesting analysis and points attention to the fact that current intellectual property laws can go against well established economic theories at the expense of free market competition theory, technical innovations and society-as-a-whole best interest.

Recommended to people with economic theory experience , but also to everyday public-goods-privatization opposers as the paper isn't (intentionally) way too technical.
posted by elpapacito at 7:20 AM PST - 4 comments

Celebrities have really bad hair days too... ...according to the brilliant folks responsible for Photoshop and those bored folks responsible for these photoshop contests.
posted by hidely at 6:27 AM PST - 10 comments

Flying frisbee dog.
posted by srboisvert at 6:11 AM PST - 14 comments

The Pacific Wrecks Database is an impressive collection of information about lost and found WWII wrecks in the Pacific. The site is a little hard to navigate (I suggest using the past news archives and the direct links in the description slug on the first page, rather than the drop-down menu,) but the content is worth the trouble. Essays from veterans, discovery tales, photographs, maps, and more await.
posted by headspace at 4:15 AM PST - 3 comments

Sure, it's just more Bush-bashing, but it's gussied up durn pretty. Philip Gourevitch on Bushspeak.

He is grossly underestimated as an orator by those who presume that good grammar, rigorous logic, and a solid command of the facts are the essential ingredients of political persuasion, and that the absence of these skills indicates a lack of intelligence. Although Bush is no intellectual, and proud of it, he is quick and clever, and, for all his notorious malapropisms, abuses of syntax, and manglings or reinventions of vocabulary, his intelligence is—if not especially literate—acutely verbal.

posted by grrarrgh00 at 1:42 AM PST - 87 comments

Watermelon carving - a gallery of intricate work and eclectic subjects. In Thailand, there is a tradition of elaborately carving fruit and vegetables, especially when preparing foods for royalty or as part of festivals such as Loi Krathong. This gallery offers some pictorial instructions; books, tools, and sample instructions are also available from the Temple of Thai.
posted by madamjujujive at 10:56 PM PST - 15 comments

Echelon is a Mac application that, if you try to register it with a pirated serial number, will delete your entire home directory. (Windows users: This is a very, very bad thing, second only to wiping the entire drive.) Is this a good way to fight piracy, and can it even be legal?
posted by jjg at 10:42 PM PST - 42 comments

ever miss the feel of a big plastic reciver. I guess these guys did.
posted by delmoi at 10:15 PM PST - 18 comments

All samples must now be licenced according to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, including tiny samples that have been modified to the point of being unrecognisable. "We do not see this as stifling creativity in any significant way." via /dev/null
posted by Jimbob at 9:26 PM PST - 40 comments

This has a value in our profession, and it doesn't have to do with scale at all. It has to do with the actual meaning of a house.
posted by alms at 9:18 PM PST - 8 comments

Just One Question... "How many times have you been arrested, Mr. President?"
$1002.21 Bounty to the first person to ask George W. Bush this question in a public forum. [PayPal donations accepted to increase the bounty]
posted by lagado at 8:16 PM PST - 41 comments

Powell declares a genocide in Darfour , marking a turnaround in America's appraisal of the situation in Sudan. Will something finally be done? And is Powell off the ranch on this, or this actually the policy of the Bush administration? Previously discussed in a number of threads.
posted by hank_14 at 8:11 PM PST - 23 comments

Fiction Bitch "The Fiction Bitch doesn't want to encourage new writers. She wants to weed out terrible writers before they go on to bore millions of innocent publishing house interns to tears."
posted by dobbs at 2:11 PM PST - 48 comments

Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter
posted by Mwongozi at 1:47 PM PST - 18 comments

Life After Death. A look at the legacy of Northern Alliance leader Ahmad Shah Massoud, who was assassinated by al Qaeda three years ago today. It was in the first issue of SixBillion.org, an online magazine of narrative journalism. [Via WorldChanging.]
posted by homunculus at 1:01 PM PST - 4 comments

Ken Jennings, why have you forsaken me? Mr. Kottke, best known for breaking the Teacup Dome scandal, is now reporting that Ken Jennings has lost his 75th game. For the record today he will play his 42nd game, so he still has a long way to go. Perhaps most interesting is that the AP, etc. are all picking up on this but not giving direct credit to Kottke -- as seen in this Slashdot thread.
posted by geoff. at 12:52 PM PST - 47 comments

The grim glory of war. Hundreds of pictures from the front lines in Iraq. I was very skeptical about posting this link, but I thought it'd be useful to all our sofa warriors here at MeFi, so they'll have some images to relate to whenever they equate "support our troops" with "keep them there for as long as it takes".
posted by acrobat at 4:56 AM PST - 40 comments

This is Jon's diary. Jon is in prison on money laundering and drugs charges. "My new co-habitants are enduring the twin evils of a broken swamp-cooler and a cockroach infestation. A neighbouring asthmatic inmate happily described how he inhaled a cockroach that had crept into his nebulizer. He could feel the insect crawling around inside him and promptly vomited his stomach contents. Unfortunately the cockroach was not ejected, as it was lodged in his lung."
posted by urban greeting at 2:44 AM PST - 13 comments

Why no Pliestocene Park? "Everyone seems to assume that the primeval condition of the Great Plains was bison and prairie dog, with the occasional pronghorn herd, but no other large mammals. Yet for 1.65 million years, North America teemed with large animals: the 'pleistocene megafauna.' Then as the last ice age was ending and the first humans were coming over from Siberia, most of them died out." Sad -- doesn't everybody want a pony?
posted by namespan at 12:06 AM PST - 15 comments

CNN reports that Jakarta has been bombed. Here's the explosion cloud rising. Here's a shot of Plaza 89 after the explosion, and here's another from a different perspective. Has flickr beaten textamerica in the race to beat CNN? Are ma_girl and fauzanazmi so different that they must use moblog services to suit their personalities or is it something else? How much specialization and differentation can we expect in the moblog arena? Will there be moblog streams of current events like this bombing in Jakarta? Will tagging suffice for such a task? Or is this just another terrorist bombing in Jakarta, I'm up late, and found a photo from a bombing before the story even broke on any of the major news sites? Ennui.
posted by filchyboy at 12:02 AM PST - 52 comments

Stereoscopy. (1 image nsfw)
posted by protocool at 9:49 PM PST - 16 comments

Reality shows meet real politics as radio talk show hosts John and Ken have chosen Republican David Dreier and Democrat Joe Baca as their Political Human Sacrifices of 2004. Dreier is the chairman of the House Rules Committee who wields tremendous power. But here in Southern California, Dreier is under fire for his pro-outsourcing and pro-illegal immigration stands.

With Dreier's winning vote margin being 45,000, can one radio talk show beat the pundits and upset an entrenched incumbent? The pair will be campaigning against Dreier and Baca every day until the general election. The talk hosts might be getting a little help from, of all people, Larry Flynt's Hustler Magazine, who is in the process of working on a story that will "out" Congressman Dreier (as first reported by the blog which was previously discussed here). Dreier's challenger must be overjoyed.
posted by calwatch at 8:53 PM PST - 3 comments

"Max Power Aerospace is offering Boeing aircraft reused as private residences.  ... The aircraft are mounted on a steel column and bearing so the whole airplane weathervanes, pointing into the wind." For more information, read the Aircraft Home Owner's Flight Manual. (Bikini girl not included, presumably.)
posted by Johnny Assay at 8:46 PM PST - 11 comments

How long til you buy the farm? • "The Living to 100 Life Expectancy Calculator© was designed to translate what we have learned from studies of centenarians and other longevity research into a practical and empowering tool for individuals to estimate their longevity potential." Wasn't this on a Futurama episode?
posted by dhoyt at 8:30 PM PST - 29 comments

The Moon should become a DNA Noah's Ark for repopulating the Earth in case of catastrophe, suggests the chief scientist Bernard H. Foing of the ESA's Research and Scientific Support Department. A more earthly frozen ark is already under construction.
posted by stbalbach at 8:16 PM PST - 7 comments

axisofjustice.org No need to comment... Just wanted to share.
posted by LouReedsSon at 8:08 PM PST - 3 comments

World wants Bush out. "Only one in five want to see Bush re-elected," "Senator Kerry was particularly favoured in traditionally strong US allies." Should America take into consideration the international support of their presidential hopefuls, or can they really go it alone in today's global community?
posted by krisjohn at 7:46 PM PST - 31 comments

"Any day in which Bush's Nat'l Guard service is the dominant news story is a lost day for the Kerry campaign." As another round of media yadayada (see below) is about to emerge over President Bush's National Guard service or lack thereof, Noam Scheiber explains why this is probably very bad news for ... Kerry. We know who Bush is. The election is about the future, not the past. Scheiber's point may have been made in the MeFi thread referenced above, but I'm afraid I lost consciousness after a screen or so.
posted by mojohand at 4:33 PM PST - 77 comments

Log Cabin Republicans Vote to Withhold Endorsement from President Bush.
posted by reklaw at 1:51 PM PST - 58 comments

Body Burden : The pollution in people "In a study led by Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York...researchers at two major laboratories found an average of 91 industrial compounds, pollutants, and other chemicals in the blood and urine of nine volunteers.... Scientists refer to this contamination as a person’s body burden. Of the 167 chemicals found, 76 cause cancer in humans or animals, 94 are toxic to the brain and nervous system, and 79 cause birth defects or abnormal development. The dangers of exposure to these chemicals in combination has never been studied."
posted by troutfishing at 1:36 PM PST - 23 comments

Iran: Blogger/Journalists arrested over banned Reformist websites (stop.censoring.us)
posted by hoder at 1:25 PM PST - 15 comments

Good Time Mix Machine. Artist Rosemarie Fiore has turned a classic Scrambler amusement park ride into the world's biggest Spirograph.
posted by gottabefunky at 12:29 PM PST - 3 comments

Playboy to feature video game characters in the nude. Going too far, or the logical next step?
posted by ben-o at 10:46 AM PST - 51 comments

Visions of Enlightenment: Understanding the Art of Buddhism.
posted by homunculus at 10:39 AM PST - 5 comments

Why truth matters.
posted by rushmc at 10:32 AM PST - 41 comments

George Bushes's Military record: a critical analysis This pdf file is about as definitive a look as we are likely to get on the Bush military record. Clearly most post4ers/readers of Metafilter do not support Bush, but having some clear-cut evidence at hand to use in arguments against those who attack the Kerry militaryrecord, this will give the Bushites reason to move on to other topics
posted by Postroad at 10:19 AM PST - 64 comments

President Bush - Sunday Bloody Sunday (mp3)
posted by bob sarabia at 10:16 AM PST - 27 comments

Project Rebirth went live today. Six time-lapse cameras are shooting one frame of film every five minutes from rooftops near the World Trade Center site. Explore the cameras, or watch the (rather lovely) film trailer.
posted by stonerose at 8:54 AM PST - 9 comments

The end of peace and prosperity. So, remember the Onion's parody of Bush that was published on January 18, 2001, "Bush: Our Long National Nightmare of Peace and Prosperity is Finally Over"? Ha Ha, very funny. Three years later they've published an updated article complete with links. Oh baby, not so funny anymore... via Daily Kos
posted by sic at 6:14 AM PST - 55 comments

Comparison of life in Piscataway, New Jersey; Kochi, Japan; and Zhuzhou, Hunan Province, China by Ernie French.
posted by tranquileye at 5:26 AM PST - 11 comments

Former rebel turned pillar of society Sir Peter Maxwell Davies turned 70 today. For those unfamiliar, his website has audio samples of his published works.
posted by monkey closet at 5:12 AM PST - 2 comments

Happy Birthday David! Today is the 500th anniversary of the statue's unveiling.
posted by azul at 2:42 AM PST - 13 comments

In the late 90s, I used to buy a magazine called Gadfly. They ceased publication in 2001. Today I found out that the editor has a blog and he appears to be republishing some of Gadfly's contents in an attempt to get people to buy back issues. Read interviews with George Plimpton, Emmylou Harris, Ben Marcus, and The Wachowskis. Don't like interviews? There's also articles on Lou Reed, Anais Nin, Brian Wilson, Jack Nitzsche, Lester Bangs, and people you may never have heard of. Their film coverage was also almost always interesting.
posted by dobbs at 1:54 AM PST - 7 comments

These images caused a great debate among my antipodean circle in London whether they are real or have been photoshopped. As far as we can gather it does exist. But it is surreal - and only in the UK surely would something like this be real.
posted by Samuel Farrow at 12:53 AM PST - 85 comments

Banned weapons and WMD parts were shipped out of Iraq after the US forces took power according to the UN. At least thats the best I can make of this article. Does this really say that the UN is upset at us for shipping out of Iraq the exact things they previously said were not in Iraq?
posted by soulhuntre at 10:32 PM PST - 73 comments

Underground French Cinema (literally) Three days later, when the police returned accompanied by experts from the French electricity board to see where the power was coming from, the phone and electricity lines had been cut and a note was lying in the middle of the floor: "Do not," it said, "try to find us." A secret underground cinema is found in the Catacombs of Paris, "You guys have no idea what's down there." Perhaps it's the work of a group of cataphiles called the "Perforating Mexicans".
posted by biscotti at 9:31 PM PST - 17 comments

Russian TV broadcasts siege video: [BBC link: RealPlayer/RealAlternative/Windows MPC] SFW
Unknown provenance of footage, but clearly genuine. Terrorist uses 'Dead Man's Brake' switch on a bomb, also shots of Hoop Bombs'. Beware: NewsFilter
posted by dash_slot- at 3:41 PM PST - 39 comments

Famous Diamonds [Tripod page, but a really good one]
posted by Pseudoephedrine at 3:10 PM PST - 9 comments

Earlier this year the Labour run Welsh Assembly funded a web project to find 100 Welsh Heroes. The winner was Aneurin Bevan, a Labour politician. Now, the IT manager who ran the project says that he was instructed to fix the results. More inside...
posted by ceiriog at 2:47 PM PST - 10 comments

Bore Riders are a strange breed of inland surfers, catching periodic tidal surges (pic) that can carry them for miles upriver. Surf the English countryside, France's Bordeaux region, the freezing waters of Alaska's Cook Inlet, the Amazon jungles, or China's Silver Dragon, the largest tidal bore in the world.
posted by eddydamascene at 2:45 PM PST - 9 comments

Big Dick Lit : I guess this is not safe for work.
posted by angry modem at 1:55 PM PST - 18 comments

Lift & separate. (iTMS link) Then divide and conquer. Don't be a girly man or the terrorists win.
posted by subpixel at 1:21 PM PST - 21 comments

How do you ask someone to be the 1,000th person to die for a mistake? Of course there are people who say the US Media is playing down the casualties. But why would a powerful country need to lie about its losses?
posted by jackspace at 12:58 PM PST - 109 comments

politics.slashdot.org ... Can politics.metafilter.com be far behind?
posted by togdon at 12:51 PM PST - 7 comments

US Army to Rebid Halliburton Contracts
Looks like Halliburton's about to lose its sweetheart deal as the US Army looks to rebidthe contracts.
"Pentagon auditors last month "strongly" urged the Army to withhold paying 15 percent of Halliburton's bills in Iraq, saying the company had not provided enough details to support at least $1.82 billion out of $4.3 billion of logistical work."
Insert inappropriate snide political comment here.
posted by fenriq at 10:44 AM PST - 26 comments

Global Artists. If influential historical figures were reincarnated as artists, what works of art would they produce today? [Via Aeiou.]
posted by homunculus at 10:30 AM PST - 2 comments

The bias of balance : new study of how media "evenhandness" distorts truth "Two researchers argue, in a paper published this month in the journal Global Environmental Change, that following the norms of American journalism, U.S. media have promulgated a bias in the coverage of climate change essentially by giving too much credence to climate skeptics at the expense of the scientific consensus." - "Reporters and editors at four of the nation's top newspapers [ New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal ] adhered to the journalistic norm of balance at the expense of accurately reporting scientific understanding of the human contributions to global warming" (an earlier work in this vein).
posted by troutfishing at 9:59 AM PST - 28 comments

Tuesday Diversion -- puzzling entertainment for those who are having as difficult a time with motivation this Tuesday-after-a-holiday as I am.
posted by papercake at 8:52 AM PST - 13 comments

Does your OB/GYN practice his love on you? Apparently Mr. Bush thinks they're unable to do so because of trial lawyers like Mr. Edwards. This is pretty amazing. This is our president. Wow. Dude.
posted by Shike at 8:45 AM PST - 94 comments

Because spaceflight, in and of itself, is just way to easy. On 08 August 2001, NASA launched Genesis. It was a spacecraft that would spend 1125 days in space, including 884 days collecting 0.4 milligrams of solar particles. At that point, it would launch a 500 lbs return vehicle that would travel 600 mph back to earth. When it enters the atmosphere, at approximately 11:55am EST on Wednesday of this week, it will be going close to twenty-five thousand mph. Oddly enough, this is the easy part of the mission.

Because then, two minutes later, NASA is going to catch it. In mid-air. With a helicopter. Really.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 8:37 AM PST - 32 comments

Skin Deep: A safety assessment of ingredients in personal care products. The Environmental Working Group has published a new report listing possible toxins in over 7,500 personal care products, including soap, toothpaste, shaving gel, and hair dye. The Executive Summary of the report is here, and the most handy tool for consumers is their Searchable Product Guide.
posted by Ufez Jones at 8:06 AM PST - 10 comments

Art thou a knight-errant questing for the favor of thy lady? The Knighthood, Chivalry and Tournaments Resource Library is ready to be thy squire. Heav'n forbid that thou couldst be lax in thy study of the Codes of Chivalry and Rules of Romantic Love. Do not eschew thy escutcheon, impress damsels fair with thy knowledge of heraldry. Lastly, learn thy vocabulary.
posted by sciurus at 5:26 AM PST - 6 comments

Gravity Monuments were erected on several college campuses in the 1960's and 1970's by the Gravity Research Foundation "to remind students of the blessings forthcoming when science determines what gravity is, how it works, and how it may be controlled." I regularly visited the one at Colby College, in Maine. Emory had one, and apparently SMU did as well. Anyone know of others?
posted by mmahaffie at 4:37 AM PST - 14 comments

What has a wet nose, a tail, and an internal combustion engine? Is it possible that we haven't posted the "Dogs in Cars" site before? If you haven't seen it, this collection of hundreds of viewer-submitted photos featuring tail-waggers on wheels should make you smile (unless you hate dogs, in which case you should hightail it over here). Love dogs, hate cars? Sniff around at Dogster.com.
posted by taz at 4:20 AM PST - 10 comments

Russian may have solved Riemann hypothesis. Financial disaster ensues.
posted by Espoo2 at 2:21 AM PST - 17 comments

Did you know that eating is one of the fondest things Clara Bow is of? Ripping the It Girl a new one, circa 1931.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 12:09 AM PST - 21 comments

Collect art films on DVD? You probably already know of DVD Talk (and their forums). But What about Criterion Forums, a place to discuss boutique dvd labels (not just Criterion, but Kino, Anchor Bay, Blue Underground, Plexi, and others), as well as trade and purchase used titles from other collectors/ members? (You'll see more categories in the forums once you register.)
posted by dobbs at 11:34 PM PST - 10 comments

A returned U.K. expat on English drinking's sharp increase.
(supporting study with female subjects) (the gov's counterintuitive but well-researched solution)
Brits: any accuracy to the concerns?
posted by Tlogmer at 10:15 PM PST - 45 comments

So, does posting unreported news on mefi decrease the likelihood the corporate media will pick it up? Let's find out. Greg Palast is at it again, but is anybody listening? Former Texas Lt. Governor admits pulling strings to get Dubya into National Guard and then keeping quiet for big-time money.

... now all we need is a "control group" story. Any ideas? Email me.
posted by joe_murphy at 9:47 PM PST - 24 comments

Coral: The NYU Distribution Network "Are you tired of clicking on some link from a web portal, only to find that the website is temporarily off-line because thousands or millions of other users are also trying to access it? Does your network have a really low-bandwidth connection, such that everyone, even accessing the same web pages, suffers from slow downloads? Have you ever run a website, only to find that suddenly you get hit with a spike of thousands of requests, overloading your server and possibly causing high monthly bills? If so, Coral might be your free solution for these problems!"
posted by jonah at 9:26 PM PST - 4 comments

Are these really the 10 most hated men in rock?
posted by drezdn at 9:22 PM PST - 55 comments

Factfilter: Sen. Bob Graham's new book shows coverup.on Saudi's behalf Bush had concluded that ''a nation-state that had aided the terrorists should not be held publicly to account,'' Graham wrote. "It was as if the president's loyalty lay more with Saudi Arabia than with America's safety.'' And there's stuff about Iraq, too. After wearing 9/11 like a tiara during the convention, will the facts finally be aired?
posted by amberglow at 8:33 PM PST - 28 comments

It's Labor Day today. (newsfilter)
posted by semmi at 8:16 PM PST - 6 comments

Downing Street Says. 'Every day the British Prime Minister's official spokesman briefs a small coterie of political journalists'. This site feeds you summaries and lets you comment. (It's amazing what you can do with a quarter of a £mill chucked at you by John Prescott)

Other related worthy web projects: liftshare.com, timebank.org.uk, publicwhip.org.uk. And they want to 'identify, support and develop internet based projects that have real world impacts at very low cost per person helped'.
posted by iffley at 6:01 PM PST - 7 comments

Edison's New Media. American Memory (natch) offers this sprawling archive of audio files and filmic material. Uncovered while seeking an archive of piano roll recordings, unsuccessfully. Also noted: Fiddle Tunes of the Old Frontier and recordings from the American Variety Stage: Vaudeville and Popular Entertainment, 1870-1920.
posted by mwhybark at 5:10 PM PST - 3 comments

Step aside xprize, here comes the elevator 2010 challenge. Sponsored by the Spaceward Foundation this is a "public challenge centered around the Space Elevator concept, offering a substantial prize for the first laser-powered tether climbing demonstration that can meet specific criteria." more here.
posted by Grod at 4:07 PM PST - 2 comments

Jet-Man Project. Man straps on composite wings and tiny jet engines. From AVweb.
posted by tss at 3:49 PM PST - 11 comments

The Yankees actually do suck (lately). Finding it difficult to win on the field, they try other means. This doesn't look good for people who think the Yankees aren't the personification of evil.
posted by found missing at 3:48 PM PST - 25 comments

Karate for Christ An inspired blend of Eastern Philosophy and Western Religion or just fundamentalism reaching too far? Also check out Kicks for Christ and the Christian Martial Arts Association . This begs the question: if the diciples were ninjas, would Jesus have died on the cross?
posted by graventy at 12:52 PM PST - 27 comments

Cheney disclosed. Rolling Stone's profile of our ambitious vice-president and the team he assembled to keep himself in power: "'They were like cancer cells,' says retired Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski, who worked on the Defense Department's Near East and South Asia desk during the buildup to the Iraq war. 'They didn't care about the truth. They had an agenda. I'd never seen anything like it. They deformed everything.'" [Did you know that "dancing revolution" blogeur John Barlow was a former Cheney campaign worker? I sure didn't.]
posted by digaman at 11:12 AM PST - 21 comments

Breeders are winning. "Conservative, religiously minded Americans are putting far more of their genes into the future than their liberal, secular counterparts." (WaPo link, bugmenot says try fedup@mailinator.com and fedup if you don't care to register. Definition of genetic fitness here.)
posted by jfuller at 10:04 AM PST - 72 comments

Hetch Hetchy is Yosemite's lost valley (the name is Miwok.) But it's no longer necessary as a water supply, so it may be time to bring it back.
posted by homunculus at 10:01 AM PST - 3 comments

Yesterday was the 13th Anniversary of Freddie Mercury's death, whilst [almost] coincidentally, tomorrow marks the occasion of the 13th Mercury Music Prize, which he had nothing to do with.
In that time, we've seen classical-punk piano recitals nominated, agit-prop rockers repeatedly snubbed and Radiohead routinely listed but falling short [though not this year.]. It's always a varied list, but are you really interested in the obscure, the fusion, the orchestral and the jazz?
Listen to 'em all here , and fill up the gaps here. A complete list of past nominees and winners can be found here , and the bookies seem to rate both The Streets and Franz Ferdinand worthy of the accolade, according to odds published here.
Will ascullion again pick the winner? Listen on the web to find out tomorrow, midnight GMT, or watch on digital TV in the UK . Previous years' threads here.
posted by dash_slot- at 9:15 AM PST - 14 comments

Twenty Years Ago, The BBC produced a topical drama called Threads - little did they know the furore it would go on to create. [more inside]
posted by metaxa at 3:16 AM PST - 32 comments

The quite amazing true story of the man on which Spieldberg's new Terminal is based. A tale of Iran, torture, McDonalds' breakfasts, dry-cleaning, and a man who really doesn't seem that well. And who doesn't meet and fall in love with Catherine Zeta Jones.
posted by humuhumu at 1:58 AM PST - 13 comments

The Republican propaganda mill, a brief history It's bigger than Bush vs. Kerry. It's about billionaire funded thinktanks (AEI, Heritage) paying columnists to sit around and make stuff up or legitimize crackpot theories (blacks are genetically stupid, japanese internment was okay). Furthermore its about radio, internet, blogs, tv news and publishing houses working in concert to pummel memes onto the American public. When this stuff infects your culture and is no longer the domain of the loons but now as mainstream as apple pie and Wal-Mart, what do you do?
posted by owillis at 12:54 AM PST - 74 comments

Joe Gould's secret made the brilliant New Yorker writer Joseph Mitchell a legend, and the subject of a movie; but Greenwich Village icon Gould's Oral History of the World in Our Time wasn't as mythical as Mitchell presumed, even if it wasn't the masterwork Gould envisioned. Mitchell, after his lengthy exposé of Gould's imaginary 9-million-word opus in 1964's Joe Gould's Secret, spent years at work in his New Yorker office on a nebulous project and never published again; he died in 1996.
posted by IshmaelGraves at 12:23 AM PST - 5 comments

Strange Attractors ~ 12 independent animators from Australia have set up a showcase of animated films. (via Cartoon Brew)
posted by crunchland at 8:58 PM PST - 5 comments

A Loon. Sometimes when you open your mind too far, your brain falls out. WATER:Flowforms, Vortex and- Implosion in Water was my entry point, having foolishly searched for "laminar water flow" whilst thinking about a fishpond project.
posted by five fresh fish at 8:20 PM PST - 20 comments

IslamicArchitecture.org : Islamic architecture, Islamic patterns and Islamic calligraphy.
posted by obedo at 7:56 PM PST - 8 comments

Saddam Hussein, master of the limerick.
posted by emelenjr at 5:03 PM PST - 28 comments

Bush's missing service year and missing records? no worries. Bush wearing a medal he didn't earn? no problemos. Kerry's 5 Vietnam war medals? Pentagon inquiry. [reg maybe required: use mefi/mefi]
posted by kv at 2:43 PM PST - 160 comments

Bush's National Guard File Missing Records Documents that should have been written to explain gaps in President Bush (news - web sites)'s Texas Air National Guard service are missing from the military records released about his service in 1972 and 1973, according to regulations and outside experts. For example, Air National Guard regulations at the time required commanders to write an investigative report for the Air Force when Bush missed his annual medical exam in 1972. The regulations also required commanders to confirm in writing that Bush received counseling after missing five months of drills. No such records have been made public...
posted by Postroad at 2:07 PM PST - 16 comments

The malefactors of great wealth and the religious right. Economist Paul Krugman on insufficient necessity.
posted by the fire you left me at 11:59 AM PST - 18 comments

A fantastic clearinghouse for thinking about political advertising can be found courtesy of the University of Iowa's Department of Communication Studies. Links include the previously discussed wonder "The Living Room Candidate" and even advertising consulting firms. Pretty good reading, with enough links to keep you busy for a while.
posted by hank_14 at 10:37 AM PST - 3 comments

You may owe your life to this man If it weren't for Stanislav Petrov, many or even most of us reading this might be dead now - or never born, for the teens among us. At least according to this article, and the other links above.
posted by ramakrishna at 8:39 AM PST - 34 comments

Remember Aron Ralston, the guy that was trapped under a boulder for six days, and escaped only by amputating his own arm? In this month's Outside Magazine, he tells his story in excruciating detail.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 8:30 AM PST - 16 comments

Zardoz speaks to you. A fifteen-page essay on John Boorman's, um, rather unusual film. Other analyses are here and here: Imagine a science-fiction film where the entire special effects budget was spent on cocaine. Not just for the director and script-writer, but also enough cocaine to make the producer and studio heads COMPLETELY UNAWARE of the film's content. That's the only way this film could possibly have been made. (reviews contain major spoilers)
posted by Prospero at 8:01 AM PST - 27 comments

The BOBs - Best of the Blogs DW-WORLD.DE, the online portal of German international broadcaster Deutsche Welle, is looking for the best online diarists. With "The BOBs - Best of the Blogs" awards, we plan to honor the best Weblogs in 11 different categories, including Best Weblog, Best Topic, Best Design, Best Weblog Innovation and Best Journalistic Weblog. A total of seven of the Best Journalism prizes will be awarded -- one in each of our competition languages. Weblogs from all over the world can be nominated for the awards, provided they have been written in English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Chinese or Arabic. You can nominate your favorite sites or even your own blog during the open suggestion phase from Sept. 17-Oct. 17, 2004.
posted by ronsens at 5:57 AM PST - 5 comments

The most comprehensive presentation ever mounted on the life, theories, and the social and political involvement of Albert Einstein will be at the Skirball Cultural centerr, Los Angeles, from September 14, organized by the American Museum of Natural History, and revived by Tom Teicholz. Incidentally, Discover magazine dedicates the whole September issue to Einstein (subscription).
posted by semmi at 12:24 AM PST - 6 comments

The Toronto International Film Festival begins Thursday. The 2004 program is one of the best they've had in years (certainly the best since the 90s). Planning on attending? If so, you may appreciate TIFF Reviews - "the online meeting place for fans of TIFF 2004". Since TIFF is the the largest film festival in the world, most attendees (myself included) find it very difficult to pick their films. Once the fest starts, members of the TIFF Reviews forum are encouraged to leave reviews of what they've been watching in the hopes that it'll help other people plan their 10 days in the dark.
posted by dobbs at 10:29 PM PST - 9 comments

The Chinese character meaning 'to have a stuffy nose'. A remark by a Chinese language student on the complexity of the aforementioned symbol turns into an interesting discussion, trawling through a very thick etymology, that almost makes me want to learn Chinese! Fascinating if you're into languages, Chinese or not.
posted by wackybrit at 9:26 PM PST - 23 comments

Hurricane Blog. [via monkeyfilter]
posted by jb at 8:06 PM PST - 17 comments

Land of the Giants and other roadside attractions.
posted by crunchland at 5:47 PM PST - 3 comments

Google Answers: Managing a wayward nun
posted by bitpart at 4:20 PM PST - 14 comments

BBC Test the Nation: Popular Music.
UK centric [slightly] quiz in the Test The Nation series [- but allows a 'not UK' option.]
Who did write the theme from 'The Office' Handbags & Gladrags'?
posted by dash_slot- at 4:02 PM PST - 24 comments

The Official Web Site of the Zipcode Man will help us clear our mental palates.
posted by mmahaffie at 4:02 PM PST - 9 comments

Conservatives have been talking about the Wisdom of Disgust for a long time -- most recently with regard to human cloning, but usually, of course, homosexuality. Nussbaum counters at Reason Online. (And Kimball rips her a new one at the New Criterion.)
posted by Tlogmer at 3:44 PM PST - 12 comments

RumorFilter: The Family by Kitty Kelley, comes out on the 14th. It reveals how Dubya has had a very special friend in the mayor of a Tennessee city, who has has cohabited at the Texas ranch many times is just one of the rumors flying around about this book. Kitty's written about Sinatra, Nancy Reagan, Jackie O, and the Royals, so what's she got up her chiffon sleeves this time? Start dishing!
posted by amberglow at 1:27 PM PST - 103 comments

LetterJames artfully alters photographs of typography with your personalized greeting. Lots of fun (but watch out for all those pop-ups!)
posted by Robot Johnny at 1:20 PM PST - 2 comments

FrozenHorses.com -- where you'll learn the answers to such questions as "Will my stallion freeze?" and "Where can the stallion semen be frozen?"
posted by ewagoner at 12:56 PM PST - 3 comments

Smolin vs. Susskind on the anthropic principle. For those keeping score: Stephen Hawking is for it. Brian Greene is not.
posted by kliuless at 12:13 PM PST - 10 comments

Israeli offshore radio. Read up on the unique situation of pirate radio in Israel, following in the footsteps of Radio Caroline. Until only a few years ago, they were still broadcasting from aboard a ship, the King David, but now last offshore radio ship has been broken up, there are only land-based pirates.
posted by Jimbob at 7:50 AM PST - 2 comments

B'Tselem's Map of Jewish Settlements in the West Bank is an incredible graphic. It'sa 612 KB jpeg but the PDF, which is 1,609 KB has even more amazing detail. Here is the directory for all their images and maps. As you can see, it is quite comprehensive. Here is the Full Fence Mag in English, for instance. Again, the PDF is even more detailed. Here is the summary of B'Tselem's May 2002 report Land Grab: Israel's Settlement Policy in the West Bank. The report is to the summary as the PDF is to the jpeg.
B'Tselem is The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories.   Warning: While the pages linked are in English, the site itself is bi-lingual, so expect many a prompt for a Hebrew text download.
posted by y2karl at 10:38 PM PST - 20 comments

Chris P. Carrot for President Give peas a chance?
posted by ph00dz at 10:06 PM PST - 10 comments

Chernobyl survivor interview - Over at the New Scientist site Alexander Yuvchenko (one of the few surviving workers at the site) talks about the day Chernobyl went kablooie. "...we walked outside. What we saw was terrifying. Everything that could be destroyed had been. The entire water coolant system was gone. The right-hand side of the reactor hall had been completely destroyed, and on the left the pipes were just hanging." "From where I stood I could see a huge beam of projected light flooding up into infinity from the reactor. It was like a laser light, caused by the ionisation of the air. It was light-bluish, and it was very beautiful. I watched it for several seconds. If I'd stood there for just a few minutes I would probably have died on the spot..."
posted by edgeways at 9:54 PM PST - 12 comments

200 dead. In a time when terrorism is a major political platform and given that this event has had a bigger death toll than any other major terror activity since September 11, why is this not bigger news?
posted by dig_duggler at 9:40 PM PST - 72 comments

A century's worth of Olympics posters Awesome Flash-based site with over 1800 posters, official and not, from every Olympic Games, 1896-present (and even one for 2006). The retro-licious posters from the 1980 Summer Games in Moscow are particularly nice and definitely worth checking out. Also neat: posters from Games that never happened due to WWII. Great resource for looking at poster design through the years.
posted by Asparagirl at 6:56 PM PST - 9 comments

World War IV

• 1914-1918: World War I
• 1939-1945: World War II
• 1945-1990: World War III (Cold War)
• 2001 ongoing: World War IV

Every generation has their war to end all wars. Welcome to ours. World War IV: How It Started, What It Means, and Why We Have to Win. [via GlobalSecurity.org]
posted by Meridian at 6:41 PM PST - 111 comments

Self-Referential Aptitude Test
To help to keep our MetaMinds off politics, a recently rediscovered (circa 2002) puzzle from DrunkMenWorkHere.org, who also bring us a version of Internet Qix.
via FunkyMelter.
Give up? Answer key here.
posted by wendell at 6:01 PM PST - 12 comments

The 10 big stories the national news media ignore
"Every year researchers at Project Censored pick through volumes of print and broadcast news to see which of the past year's most important stories aren't receiving the kind of attention they deserve. Phillips and his team acknowledge that many of these stories weren't "censored" in the traditional sense of the word: No government agency blocked their publication. And some even appeared – briefly and without follow-up – in mainstream journals."
Surprise, surprise, most of the stories have to do with the current administration. Some of the stories are pretty shockingly awful, like (links are to referenced resources for the list) 3. Bush administration manipulates science and censors scientists, 4. High uranium levels found in troops and civilians, 5. Wholesale giveaway of our natural resources, 8. Secrets of Cheney's energy task force come to light and finally, 10. New nuke plants: taxpayers support, industry profits.
And people say Kerry gets a free pass by the media?
via Captain Normal (again).
posted by fenriq at 2:53 PM PST - 28 comments

Zell Miller obviously doesn't read Snopes or else he would have known that Kerry didn't ever intend on arming our military with sticks and clubs spitballs. the Martini Republic reminds us that in July snopes debunked the heart of miller's attacks that he delivered in his keynote on wednesday.
posted by tsarfan at 2:10 PM PST - 24 comments

5 Reasons Why Christians Should Not Obtain a State Marriage License
posted by reklaw at 12:41 PM PST - 46 comments

Bush and Kerry Hit Road, Trade Blows on Jobs I can only guess that someone at Reuters has a sense of humor.
posted by BlueScreen at 12:33 PM PST - 21 comments

ElectionProtection is a clearinghouse for folks who want to be part of the US electoral process. They've already shown their stuff in primary elections. They're set to go in Florida. The group is a coalition effort of People for the American Way and a bunch of other organizations--some of the usual leftish/centrist suspects (Working Assets, the ACLU, the NAACP), and some rather strange bedfellows (the United Church of Christ, the African American Ministers' Leadership Council). One hopes that people of all political stripes will be welcomed in this effort to get the vote out and educate people about their rights. One (well, this one, anyway) hopes as well that those of us who post about our impatience with the US electoral process on MeFi will put our time and/or money where our pixels are.
posted by Sidhedevil at 10:57 AM PST - 3 comments

Josh Kinberg arrested in NYC. Bike building details here.
posted by yoga at 10:50 AM PST - 13 comments

Bill Clinton has had a heart attack. Currently he is in a New York hospital awaiting emergency surgery.
posted by the fire you left me at 9:51 AM PST - 41 comments

Birth of a Robot Painting.
Steve at The Sneeze had an idea for a painting: "a real life battle between the toy classic Rock 'em Sock 'em Robots."
Eric Joyner happens to paint robots -- tin robots, to be exact, waging wars against giant donuts and exploring ancient ruins.
It was a match made in heaven.
posted by me3dia at 9:33 AM PST - 7 comments

George W. Bush: Words Speak Louder Than Actions. "So don't listen to the Filter, or the facts. Listen to the words." [6.2MB Quicktime, via Boing Boing.]
posted by homunculus at 9:06 AM PST - 54 comments

Sleeping Katmandu. A brief account by a friend of mine of how he was caught up in the recent unrest in Nepal*.
posted by ed\26h at 8:56 AM PST - 4 comments

Encyclopaedia Metallum. From Abortion Grenade to Zombie Holocaust.
posted by gwint at 7:55 AM PST - 6 comments

*Quite too Utterly Utter!* We all know about the Victoria & Albert Museum site, but did you know about the online V&A Access to Images? I didn't, and I've just spent a couple of happy hours poring over it. Type in any search term, and you are likely to get some interesting results. "Woodblock", for example, returns 16 pages, and "fairytale" nets you three pages of interesting 19th century marionettes. Here's somthing amusing to kick you off...
posted by taz at 7:32 AM PST - 12 comments

Bush by Numbers Another of the UK newspaper The Independent's feature front pages.
posted by brettski at 6:46 AM PST - 19 comments

Did a Boeing 747 really hit the Pentagon? Warning: [flash movie, sound]
posted by banished at 3:39 AM PST - 126 comments

Anwar Ibrahim, Malaysia's dissident ex-deputy PM, released from prison after sodomy charge quashed. More background at the Free Anwar campaign, Human Rights Watch.
posted by plep at 3:35 AM PST - 4 comments

New Behaviour Correction - The North American penal systems are outdated. If we look to the UK, evidence of specific punishment points to a new method of behavior correction. The current NA system seems incredibly unspecific when we punish a host of crimes by sending people to the same cage.
posted by lightweight at 3:13 AM PST - 11 comments

Clandestina is a great online magazine covering illustration and photography. Check out its colors, trips, dreams and interviews with artists.
posted by Masi at 1:36 AM PST - 6 comments

Possibly 1,000 Hostages taken at Russian School. Earlier reports were 350, but an anonymous report claims total is much larger. So far more than one dozen hostages have been killed.
posted by Keyser Soze at 1:19 AM PST - 65 comments

London's Natural History Museum's subsite on Hair has some interesting movies and games.
posted by dobbs at 12:34 AM PST - 3 comments

The full text of George W Bush's acceptance speech. I feel less safe now than I was before, but as of this week it looks like he's going to win.
posted by mathowie at 8:08 PM PST - 268 comments

Malaspina Great Books. A biographical database on culture, in categories.
posted by plexi at 6:31 PM PST - 2 comments

A group of pre-schoolers in Maryland got to meet their Army Reserve pen pal. Fourth graders in New York met their Army pen pal. Sixth graders in Mississippi mourn their National Guard pen pal.
posted by whatever at 6:01 PM PST - 16 comments

"Suppose you are looking for your keys. You check your pocket, then a table by the door, and you finally notice them sitting next to a pile of mail. "These are my keys," you say. Clearly the word "these" refers to your keys. but on what does this fact supervene? Which conditions are such that, necessarily, if they obtain, then your use of 'these' has the referent it does?" Philosophers' Imprint is a web site devoted to the free dissemination of philosophy scholarship. The above by Susanna Siegel, Assist. Prof. at Harvard.
posted by JohnR at 4:01 PM PST - 43 comments

Native Languages of the Americas: Preserving and promoting American Indian languages.
posted by Ufez Jones at 2:31 PM PST - 13 comments

Selves and Others. Daily links to leftist internationalist articles, with a British bent. One neat thing is that the site builds pages for its contributors. You like Naomi Klein? Arundhati Roy? Sidney Blumenthal? George Monbiot? Andreas Whittam Smith? Michael Moore? Mickey Z? Seymour Hersh? It's like they've each got their own newspaper.
posted by iffley at 2:05 PM PST - 5 comments

Stories by Joe R. Lansdale If you're a fan of Joe Lansdale (or wonder who came up with the idea for Bubba Ho-Tep), this site's for you. A different short story is posted every Thursday. Most of the stories are from his early years.
posted by joaquim at 1:39 PM PST - 6 comments

Kobe Kobe Kobe Kobe Kobe Kobe Kobe

Clearly a SportsFilter post . . .
posted by geekyguy at 11:24 AM PST - 75 comments

Protests at RNC test appropriate response
An eyewitness account by I Can't Believe Its A Democracy - "I just have to pause here for a moment to make an observation. How many times have I seen an interview with an arrested protester who claimed he or she had done nothing to provoke the police. Almost always my reaction has been, "Yeah, sure." Only now I was seeing this very situation unfold in front of my eyes. These protesters, while certainly noisy, had obeyed police instructions down the entire length of the street. Now they were being treated as if they had gotten wildly out of control, but they hadn't. I know, because I was there."

Another account from Captain Normal (also an eyewitness and even got arrested and held for 24 hours without being charged or being able to contact a lawyer) discusses a family of French tourists caught up in the sweep as well as some of the other residents of "Gitmo on the Hudson".
posted by fenriq at 10:37 AM PST - 75 comments

smile, YOU'VE JUST BEEN KICKED IN THE NUTS!
posted by Peter H at 9:12 AM PST - 26 comments

Fruity!
posted by anastasiav at 8:52 AM PST - 15 comments

Iraq In Transition: Vortex or Catalyst? (PDF)
A key message of the report is that should Iraq fragment, a sectarian struggle between the Shi’a majority and Sunni minority is more likely to flare up in the context of a political breakdown. Al Qaeda and other militant Sunni groups will contribute to the polarisation between Sunnis, Shi’a and other religious groups in Iraq. A fragmented Iraq could provide a breeding ground for new militant factions, both Islamist and non-Islamist. Press release
posted by y2karl at 8:41 AM PST - 8 comments

Selected sculptures from Free Money and Other Fairy Tales and Tom Otterness on Broadway, from the artist best known for his New York public art. Crying Giant was originally designed for the Trade Center Memorial Competition. Other exhibitions as well, including Fairy Tale Sculptures by the Sea. His work is rarely mentioned without the word "whimsical." (WTC mentioned on MeFi here, and Otterness also mentioned here).
posted by Shane at 8:30 AM PST - 11 comments

Adults are picking up instant messaging in record numbers, with 50% of those over 35 using various systems. This study was funded by AOL, which has a major stake in the instant messaging market through its popular AIM software. But most people who use IM in the workplace are still using free and unsecured systems, despite the availability of secure versions in enterprise software and products like IM Secure.
posted by etoile at 8:29 AM PST - 8 comments

Between Pisces and Aries, a strange signal from space. Communication from an extraterrestrial civilization? Probably not, and an article in Nature suggests it would make more sense to use FedEx.
posted by tranquileye at 7:58 AM PST - 11 comments

It's marching season again in the UK. They always cause a heap of trouble for all concerned [NSFW unless your workplace is tolerant of full frontal noodlety]
posted by srboisvert at 3:28 AM PST - 23 comments

Let's Play "Spot the Crosses!" Can you find any in this picture? Others can... and they're pissed!
"My God, where do they come up with this stuff? Does it look to you like it's a cross? I don't think so." - Karl Rove
When Cheney was speaking, our nation's Great Seal was "crucified" -- which is kind of appropriate, come to think of it...
posted by insomnia_lj at 3:21 AM PST - 45 comments

Echo Company An emotionally trying account of an ambush in Iraq this past April that took the lives of twelve Americans and who knows how many Iraqis, from two journalists who were there. Included is a timeline, audio & video, photogalleries, and reactions from the friends and family they left behind. You can read a USMC account of the memorial service here. via Editor & Publisher [Flash/Real]
posted by trondant at 12:16 AM PST - 10 comments

Four Decades in North Korea: The Far Eastern Economic Review interviews Charles Robert Jenkins, who deserted the US Army in South Korea in 1965 and spent almost 40 years in North Korea. Enjoy a fascinating story that parallels the history of the Cold War and is still unfolding.
posted by gen at 11:39 PM PST - 4 comments

Zell Zell Zell
posted by Addiction at 10:34 PM PST - 138 comments

Half the man he used to be or Copper John can't go to the john anymore.
posted by Bag Man at 9:21 PM PST - 8 comments

Fruity
posted by swift at 7:42 PM PST - 22 comments

Userplane: A blog about online dating trends. Be the first to find out if an online site is tanking financially, new site launches, and miscellaneous finds like Apprentice Friendster profiles, services like lemondate (see if others thought your date was a lemon), and animalattraction.com (a dating service for pet lovers). See also Online Personals Watch for similar online dating news.
posted by onlyconnect at 5:19 PM PST - 4 comments

The inauguration of September heralds the opening of the current opera season within the United States. Predictable mainstays of standard repertoire will return, but a few notable performances will make their debut this season. One of the new performances that has been already generating excitement is Margaret Garner, to be hosted by Detroit’s Michigan Opera Theater in May. With the libretto composed by Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison, the opera is a musical extrapolation of her 1987 novel Beloved. Margaret Garner is the autobiographical account of a Kentucky slave who journeys to Ohio with her family to live in freedom. However, the Garner family is intercepted during their pilgrimage by slave traders who threaten capture, and rather than have her daughter live in bondage, Margaret murders her. Top mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves stars as the lead, and it will be directed by Kenny Leon, last seen conducting P. Diddy in Broadway's Raisin in the Sun.
posted by naxosaxur at 2:15 PM PST - 13 comments

Geography Olympics "Thanks to its global accessibility, the Internet is the perfect medium to hold an international competition such as The Geography Olympics. To join the challenge in support of your country, you simply need to select which country you will be representing and take the quiz. The quiz consists of trying to locate 10 randomly selected countries on a map of the world. It is different every time."
posted by Lizc at 2:07 PM PST - 27 comments

Somebody is keeping count of nearly everything. A valuable suppliment to Harper's Index, because you know statistics don't lie. via Those Damn Dirty Apes
posted by wendell at 1:53 PM PST - 4 comments

After swearing off his (five-part) "Jersey Trilogy" forever with the release of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back in 2001, Kevin Smith (already busy with Fletch Won and The Green Hornet has announced that View Askew is preparing a Clerks sequel, entitled Clerks 2: The Passion of the Clerks. The movie "is about what happens when that lazy, 20-something malaise lasts into your 30s." Since many of us were among those the "lazy 20-somethings" that launched Smith's career, this raises a few questions, most of which are inside. The simple one, though, is this: Is anyone still buying what he's selling? For what it's worth, I am.
posted by Sinner at 1:49 PM PST - 40 comments

Did NASA fake the moon landings? I'm convinced!
posted by glenwood at 1:26 PM PST - 19 comments

Paul Stamets (previously discussed here) says mushrooms are potent antiviral and antibacterial agents, and they also might end up saving the Earth. I wonder what the fungi would say (or sing.) [Via Disinformation.]
posted by homunculus at 1:08 PM PST - 4 comments

A new newspaper for London. The first edition of The Line comes out today - apparently, despite its size, the UK capitol lacked an independent paper until now (please feel free to correct this if it is wrong). It's still thin, but does provide an interesting alternative look at issues both local and global.
posted by jb at 12:19 PM PST - 17 comments

Bando is the brutal fighting style of Burma. Trouble is, its Grandmaster may be a fantasist and a fraud.
posted by the cuban at 12:13 PM PST - 4 comments

NSFW: Childhood misconceptions about sex. Both the male and female (linked as this post's title). I found them quite amusing. In a similar vein, we also have I Used to Believe, which I think has been MeFied previously.
posted by five fresh fish at 10:55 AM PST - 18 comments

Columbus swift boat vet angry about letter Swift boat veteran Bob Anderson of Columbus is ticked. It bothers him that Sen. John Kerry's swift boat history has become such a political hot potato. But he's even more irritated that his name was included - without his permission - on a letter used to discredit Kerry. "I'm pretty nonpolitical," the 56-year-old Anderson said Tuesday. So, when he found out last week that his name was one of about 300 signed on a letter questioning Kerry's service, he was "flabbergasted."
posted by Postroad at 9:04 AM PST - 75 comments

I demand four minutes and twenty seconds of your life. [via ni.vu ni.connu]
posted by lagado at 9:01 AM PST - 24 comments

1001 Things To Hate About The Convention. Funny, and exhaustive, stuff from New York Press.
posted by fungible at 7:12 AM PST - 28 comments

Canto do Brasil [Flash, sound, MiguelCardosoFilter] is a street-level view of Brazil made by photographer Geoffrey Hiller, more precisely a view of Salvador Bahia, Minas Gerais, Rio de Janeiro, and Sao Paulo.

Another amazing project of his is Burma, Grace Under Pressure [Flash, sound], exposing Burma's beauty and sadness.

Also check Eastern Europe: Visions & Icons [Flash] ,where Hiller's post-Berlin Wall photographs are accompanied by Lev Liberman's moving text, New York City: After The Fall [Flash, sound], an elegy to New Yorkers affected by 9/11, and his journal from Vietnam.
posted by Masi at 6:44 AM PST - 3 comments

Sir Clive Woodward to switch from rugby to football? Sir Clive Woodward is the head coach of the England rugby union team. Appointed in 1997, he has had stunning success, including winning the 2003 Rugby World Cup. On Tuesday, the Daily Mail carried an incredible story: Woodward was planning to turn his back on rugby in favour of association football (soccer). Premiership club Southampton appear to be his next port of call with his ultimate aim, the England football team. Is it possible for a head coach to switch sports like this? Many experts think not. Is there any previous example of a coach switching sports like this?
posted by salmacis at 5:42 AM PST - 24 comments

The world's ten worst dictators -- this year anyway. Saddam, who was No. 3 Worst last year, has dropped off the list. Charles Taylor of Liberia (No. 4), also out of power and gone. Moammar Gadhafi (previously No. 8) and Belarus' Alexander Lukashenko (No. 10) also miss the new A list not because, according to the compilers, "they have improved but because other dictators have gotten worse."
posted by jfuller at 3:54 AM PST - 20 comments

2 people making noise {hover yer mouse, click blind, or check the key inside}
posted by dobbs at 2:46 AM PST - 28 comments