January 4, 2012
Hacking the surveillance state
CV Dazzle is camouflage from computer facial recognition.
How to hide from machines: The perilous life of glamour under surveillance.
(Related, but much earlier.)
How to hide from machines: The perilous life of glamour under surveillance.
(Related, but much earlier.)
Raita will be all over this
12 years ago, a Japanese doujin artist drew a sketch of five handicapped girls as an extra page, musing that it would make an interesting dating sim game. 5 years ago, a group of 4channers discussed making that game. Today, the free visual novel Katawa Shoujo was released for Windows, Mac and Linux. (previous discussion about demo) [more inside]
Belgian Fries
If you don’t use the right potatoes, the right oil, and the right fryers, well, you get french fries. And that’s the reason you don’t find Belgian fries anywhere. [more inside]
Like Real Food But Is Toy
Comin' at you like school's out.
Like Film Noir? Like podcasts? Here's Noircast.
Marriage Equality in Washington State
Governor Christine Gregoire announces her support for marriage equality in Washington State. "And let me just tell you, I feel so much better today than I have for the last seven years." (SLYT) [more inside]
Go no onyx. In to battery baritone formative. Carp at ascertain. / It designs by jukebox.
The Spam Poetry Institute is an organization dedicated to collecting and preserving the fine literature created by the world’s spammers
Iconic images without their subjects
Is that a zombie in your wallet?
Bringing Expired Debt Back to Life. A controversial and growing partnership between debt collectors and banks brings back subprime lending through the revival of legally expired debt. [more inside]
Poe's law just got lapped by reality
New Hampshire State Republicans have sponsored a bill to require all proposed legislation "addressing individual rights or liberties" in the State Assembly to cite its authority from the Magna Carta. [more inside]
Possibly also the future of Metafilter posts
We rifled through a bevy of 2012 predictions to bring you the mother of all roundups, every line gleaned from somewhere else.
Capricorn One, for real.
"...Obama isn’t just lying about his identity. He’s lying about his military service record, too. While his political opponents in 2008 attacked him for never serving, in truth, he was concealing his participation in a hidden CIA intergalactic program hosted at a California community college in 1980."
"Horse_ebooks’ voice carried through the trees and echoed into the night."
The Inconsequential Spy
Divide football teams by race, simulate outcome.
We Simulated The NFL White Vs. Black Race Bowl On Madden So You Don’t Have To "Earlier this week, reader Dustin asked who would win between an all-white NFL All-Pro team and an all-black NFL All-Pro team. Mind you, this question was asked without ANY ROOTING INTEREST, and without any hint of RAYCESSNESS. Are we clear on that? Good. BECAUSE WE TOTALLY SIMULATED THAT RACE WAR ON MADDEN TO SEE WHO WOULD WIN." [more inside]
NIH Open Access Policy Under Attack
The Open Access Policy of the National Institutes of Health mandates that NIH funded research is published to PubMed Central. This provides free online full text access to the resulting research. This policy has been very popular. As a result journal publishers have seen their business models threatened. As other government agencies consider similar policies, publishing industry lobbyists have worked to put an end to the practice.. (previously) [more inside]
Obama's War on Whistleblowers
This is a chilling little speech by Jesselyn Radick The Whistleblowing Protection Act is law that was created to protect transparency and integrity in government, and private institutional environments. It appears that these protections are not ironclad. Here's a recent movie that dramatizes the plight of the whilstleblower. A more extreme case is now being waged in the court of Military law. [more inside]
Cheese Ball Invitational
In December, food blog Cheese and Champagne announced its first ever Cheese Ball Invitational. Today it revealed the six finalists (follow links for recipes). [more inside]
A Man. A Van. A Surprising Business Plan.
#Riot
Self-Organized, Hyper-Networked Revolts—Coming to a City Near You: Wired looks at how messaging and social media have influenced the dynamics of riots, protests, other large crowd gatherings.
Sweden Recognizes The Church of Kopimism
Just before Christmas, the Swedish governmental agency Kammarkollegiet registered the Church of Kopimism as a religious organisation. This means that Sweden is the first country to recognize kopimism as a religion.
Previously.
"SO GHETTO!"
Not Quite Stalag 13
Sandusky, Ohio is probably best known for its roller coasters (and maybe the wineries in the area), but one of the most interesting places--a tiny little island in the Sandusky Bay called Johnson's Island--is very often overlooked. Once the home of a prison camp for confederate soldiers, daring (and not so daring) escapes, convoluted espionage schemes, poetry, and eating rats. [more inside]
Apple ][ Cassette Port + Internets
Finally! The unholy alliance of Apple ][ cassette port and Interwebs brings you the Apple Disk Server and the Apple Game Server. [more inside]
Translucent tape art of Max Zorn
Max Zorn makes translucent art with a scalpel and brown packing tape (though he has worked with blue and a bit of green). A self-taught "classical" painter, he turned to back-lit street art in May 2011, and now has a growing gallery of works that are inspired by American Realism/film noir.
Instant Polar Panorama with Google Street View
This link will create a polar panorama of any Google Street View location.
The lady's not for turning?
a human being as plated with artisanal finesse at a Michelin-star restaurant, with a head as garnish
Pony Creator
Pony Creator - create ponies (in the My Little Pony:Friendship is Magic style). [Flash]
Why Pepper?
Should pepper, long known as the Master Spice, maintain its choice place next to salt on our tables? Does its storied history as a luxury item justify it's perpetual privileged placement? Or does this mundane choice need rethinking? [more inside]
Dooooo Yooooo....Feeeeeeel Like I Doooooo
After 30 years, Peter Frampton had been living without 2 critical pieces of his legacy: 1) his hair and 2) the Les Paul that he used in Humble Pie and on the (in)famous Frampton Comes Alive album. But now Frampton can rest easy, as one of those things has been returned to him.
Steve Jobs and the Joseph Stalin Charm School
"“Out of the crooked timber of humanity,” Kant wrote, “no straight thing was ever made.” Not even an iPad." "[A]ll the credit you give Steve Jobs for the ecstasy must be equal to the blame for the agony." Gary Sernovitz on Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson's Steve Jobs (previously), and Mike Daisey's The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs. [via]
NSF luthiers
After Regretsy's previous run-in with Paypal during a bout of fund-raising (previously), a reader contacts them with the tale of the $2,500 'fake' violin.
"He doesn't leave anything on the table, does he?"
"He doesn’t leave anything on the table, does he?" John Hammergren is the CEO of McKesson, a major healthcare system and pharmaceutical provider. He earned $145 million last year, not including an employer-contributed $13 million to his executive pension plan (the employee pension plan was shuttered in 1997, before Hammergren's tenure began), unlimited personal use of a corporate private jet, car and chauffeur, and other perks like a lifetime personal assistant and office and financial counselor. In his ten years with McKesson, Hammergren has earned over $500 million. The Daily Beast dives into the extraordinary compensation of the 0.01%. If you're so inclined, the EDGAR filing has the excruciating detail, including bits like this: [more inside]
"She certainly has “doll-like, almost delicate limbs, small hands, and hardly any hips."
Softening and sexualizing Lisbeth Salander: David Fincher's casting for Stieg Larsson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo examined.
"Because we don't know how to make a wheel that is still generally useful for legitimate wheel applications but useless to bad guys."
Cory Doctorow's 28C3 talk The Coming War on General Purpose Computation (abstract, transcript) warns that "the coming century will be dominated by war against the general purpose computer, and the stakes are the freedom, fortune and privacy of the entire human race." [more inside]
History on a delayed live feed
RealTimeWWII live tweets hourly events from the Second World War, delayed by 70 years. Charles Darwin writes entries in his diary as he travels the world a century earlier onboard The Beagle. The 1940 Chronicle covers events of the Battle of Britain as they happened day by day. For those more inclined to peripateticism, HistoryPin (previously) overlays historical imagery on modern scenes in Google Street View. If you'd like a perspective on your own activities in much shorter timeframe, TimeHop shows you what you were doing a year ago.
Semi-Related: 100 best blogs for your liberal arts education.
Semi-Related: 100 best blogs for your liberal arts education.
You only kiss the missus on the lips.
You've got to worry when a woman comes off worse in 2012 than in 1891.
Is Sherlock sexist? Steven Moffat's wanton women - as River Song would say, spoilers.
Pin-gu... Pin-gu...
Lee Hardcastle Claymation remakes John Carpenter's "The Thing" in two minutes. And it's better than the 2011 Hollywood remake by far!
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