May 1, 2012
The Perfect Milk Machine
It's a good life
"It's a Good Life" is a 1953 story by Jerome Bixby, who also wrote It! The Terror From Beyond Space, said to be the inspiration for Alien, and the Star Trek episode "Mirror, Mirror" (the one with evil bearded Spock.) It was made into a famous Twilight Zone episode, and is generally considered among the greatest SF stories ever written. Is "It's a Good Life" about God? Communism? 1950s suburban conformity? Or just about the horror of the self-contained world it creates in its few pages and the terrible realization that it would be possible to survive inside it, for a while?
A Look Inside the Life of Rachel Uchitel and Fellow VIP Hosts and Bottle Girls
They have carefully chosen their clothes and they have spent time in front of mirrors trimming hair from nostrils and tonight is about sex and status and supply and demand and have and have not. . . . The celebrities and the athletes and the tycoons are the ones for whom this world is zealously designed. A rung below . . . are the money guys . . . guys like that one over there in a Boss suit and John Lobb shoes, standing beside the table that cost him $3,000. Standing very close to it, like a Little Leaguer who wants to steal second but has never done it before. This gentleman’s not dancing, but he’s thinking about it. Soon Beyoncé will call all the single ladies to action and they will channel toward him in a centripetal swoosh.
Bottle girls, half-hookers, Tiger Woods, Rachel Uchitel, and the 21st-century courtesan economy. New York magazine takes a look at how America's elite nightclubs operate.
Bottle girls, half-hookers, Tiger Woods, Rachel Uchitel, and the 21st-century courtesan economy. New York magazine takes a look at how America's elite nightclubs operate.
Space Photography, explained
Logos
There's a bear strung up...I assume murdered.
UK parliamentary committee report declares Rupert Murdoch unfit for stewardship
On the basis of the facts and evidence before the committee, we conclude that if at all relevant times Rupert Murdoch did not take steps to become fully informed about phone hacking, he turned a blind eye and exhibited wilful blindness to what was going on in his companies and publications. This culture, we consider, permeated from the top throughout the organisation and speaks volumes about the lack of effective corporate governance at News Corporation and News International. We conclude, therefore, that Rupert Murdoch is not a fit person to exercise the stewardship of a major international company. [more inside]
Which comes first, the pixel or the ping?
On a desktop computer, which is faster: sending an IP packet 3,000 miles across the Atlantic ocean, or sending a pixel a couple of feet to your monitor? According to Johh Carmack, the IP packet arrives first. [more inside]
"Look around the table. If you don't see a sucker, get up, because you're the sucker."
"I never go looking for a sucker. I look for a Champion and make a sucker of of him." - Thomas Austin Preston Jr, aka Amarillo Slim, poker's first celebrity, has died at age 83. [more inside]
My god! There's blood everywhere!
You're walking through the woods. There's no one around and your phone is dead. Out of the corner of your eye, you spot him: Shia LeBoeuf
The Worldwide Leader
Is ESPN columnist Sarah Phillips scamming people on the internet? Eight months ago, a writer who specializes in sports-betting was hired by ESPN, sight-unseen. Fast-forward six months and accusations are swirling that she is either not who she says she is, or she is using her platform to grift internet gamblers and content creators. A story that's about fifty percent JT Leroy and fifty percent Nigerian prince.
The 99% of the Web?
So, would a search engine be more useful if it just didn't include the Most Popular websites? How about the ONE MILLION most popular websites?
Fortunately, it lets you adjust the filter to exclude the top 100,000, 10,000, thousand, hundred or ten. MetaFilter reappears under the 'thousand' setting.
Via WaxyLinks and HackerNews
Fortunately, it lets you adjust the filter to exclude the top 100,000, 10,000, thousand, hundred or ten. MetaFilter reappears under the 'thousand' setting.
Via WaxyLinks and HackerNews
Weavrs in the Web
Weavrs are a species of new autonomous, emotive, social bots. They feed off of social API streams, wandering around the real world looking at things, posting recipes and dreaming. They can be used for what some might consider evil and what some might consider good. You can extend them with your own code or create a hero's journey for them to experience. If the New Aesthetic was a movie, Weavrs would be the extras.
"It's OK to eat cooked meat that's been glued."
What's inside your filet minion could kill you. -- Well, it probably won't, but would you order that $15 steak if you knew it was restructured out of glued-together stew meat?
Is there a Google Doodle in Your May Day?
Google is famous for it's many "doodles", some of which are nation-specific, and some are global. For International Worker's Day (aka May Day), Google has created an appropriate doodle, though it is not shown to visitors from the U.S.
May Day in Bolivia
Bolivian President Evo Morales celebrated the first of May by nationalizing the electrical grid. While the move was not entirely unexpected, the blow to the Spanish-owned power company Repsol YPF is undeniable, especially in the wake of the recent call by the Argentine government to do the same.
"Better" isn't the right word, it just feels different [maaaaaan]
Kevin Shields: The shoegaze titan on the strange saga behind My Bloody Valentine's remasters. [more inside]
Only good for conversation
An acclaimed new documentary, Searching for Sugarman, goes hunting for the lost Dylan, Sixto Diaz Rodriguez. [more inside]
A hidden children's health crisis.
A chronic public health disaster. Complex trauma and toxic stress puts children into a state of reflexive fight, flight, or freeze responses to a perpetually threatening world. The traditional authoritative response only serves to reinforce those behaviours and, perhaps worse, has long-term health consequences:
With an ACE score of 4 or more, things start getting serious. The likelihood of chronic pulmonary lung disease increases 390 percent; hepatitis, 240 percent; depression 460 percent; suicide, 1,220 percent.One doctor describes it as “a chronic public health disaster”. Remediating this problem is going to require listening, kindness, and parachutes.
5 Ways to Spot a B.S. Political Story in Under 10 Seconds
5 Ways to Spot a B.S. Political Story in Under 10 Seconds: David Wong on manipulative, inflammatory media reporting and how to weed through "pointless click-bait filler".
Future Football Stars: The NFL Is About To Destroy Your Life
The game that you fell in love with as a child will seem lost; a thump on the floorboard of your new Mercedes, swerved at high speeds to avoid a shadow in the night. The sights and sounds and smells of football, sensual memories that stir the passions in the soul, will be reconceived and recategorized, buried behind newer, odorless versions.
Former Bronco Nate Jackson offers wisdom on the trappings of stardom to two young draftees.
Former Bronco Nate Jackson offers wisdom on the trappings of stardom to two young draftees.
In the Zone of Alienation: Tarkovsky as Video Game
Nook finds it's niche
Barnes and Noble is spinning off Nook into a subsidiary business after a $300M deal with Microsoft which gives the Redmond company a 17% stake, bringing an end to a patent dispute between the two companies and sending shares skyrocketing. Commentary from John Scalzi and Tobias Buckell. Meanwhile the Kindle Fire, Amazon's competitor to the Nook tablet, has grabbed over 50% of the Android tablet market.
Microinstructions Done
"I started this blog so that anyone wanting to build their own 8-bit computer could learn from my own experience and mistakes."
Blogging Against Disablism Day 2012
"We had no idea we were creating an entirely new form of protest, a 'from bed activism' or an entirely different, radical new way of working for sick and disabled people. We had no idea because we could barely get through each day." For Blogging Against Disablism Day, "Benefit Scrounging Scum" reflects on her experiences fighting both the disability benefit cuts and how people with disabilities are portrayed. [more inside]
Africa In Your Earbuds
OkayAfrica keeps up to date with pop culture and news from across the continent. Africa In Your Earbuds gives DJs and musicians from across the diaspora the chance to curate a playlist or mixtape of their favorite African and African diaspora music. Chief Boima of Dutty Artz starts off Africa In Your Earbuds. [more inside]
The changing of the year
Midway between the spring equinox and the summer solstice is Belatane, when the dark half of the year ends and the light half begins. Some celebrate the spiritual. Some the social.
For some Beltane stirs more earthy observations.
GOTHS NOT DEAD
“This is going to be an historic day in transplant."
“We have attempted to have a sensitive conversation, one that addresses your mortality, at the D.M.V.,” Dr. [Andrew] Cameron said. “Now we move the conversation into your own home or office with 120 of your closest friends on Facebook.” [NYT]
“We have entered the Anthropocene; a new geological epoch dominated by humanity”
Welcome to the Anthropocene: A 3-minute journey through the last 250 years of our history, from the start of the Industrial Revolution to the Rio+20 Summit. The film charts the growth of humanity into a global force on an equivalent scale to major geological processes. [more inside]
John Peel's Record Collection
John Peel's Record Collection "Online interactive digital museum" The Space has begun the mammoth task of digitising DJ John Peel's record collection. Now, nearly 8 years after his death, the first 100 albums under the letter A are ready, with a new letter to be released every week. With bonus content such as photos, Peel Sessions and samples of radio shows (Spotify may be required for some audio), it's a fascinating look inside the great man's never-ending enthusiasm for music.
"Yo, it’s geohot."
Machine Politics. George Hotz, Sony, and the Anonymous hacker wars.
"All that happens to us, including our humiliations, our misfortunes, our embarrassments, all is given to us as raw material, as clay, so that we may shape our art." ~ Jorge Luis Borges
200,000 Clay Figures: British sculptor Antony Gormley is well-known for his life-size sculptures that creatively mimic the human body, but the figurative clay mounds from his series titled Field, though not as accurate in depicting mankind's form, holds deeper value for the artist. Gormley says of this project, "I wanted to work with people and to make a work about our collective future and our responsibility for it. I wanted the art to look back at us, its makers (and later viewers), as if we were responsible - responsible for the world that it [FIELD] and we were in." [Previously] [Previously]
006, 006.2456, 006.378, 006.842 and finally...
Avery SMAvery!
Imagine you've been diagnosed with an incurable genetic disease and you are told you will not only lose your ability to walk and move your arms, but you will die between now and the next 18 months. What would you do? My name is Avery Lynn Canahuati, I'm almost 5 months old, and this has become my reality. [more inside]
HELLO KITTY JET!!
Eva Air has introduced the Hello Kitty Jet! Check in at the Hello Kitty terminals and have a Hello Kitty themed meal. Get out of my way, I need to get a ticket!
Failing to succeed
The learning paradox is at the heart of “productive failure." While the model adopted by many teachers and employers when introducing others to new knowledge — providing lots of structure and guidance early on, until the students or workers show that they can do it on their own — makes intuitive sense, it may not be the best way to promote learning. [more inside]
Let's Start by Breaking Bread Together
Ad Astra Incrementis
Carl Sagan wrote, “We began as wanderers, and we are wanderers still. We have lingered long enough on the shores of the cosmic ocean. We are ready at last to set sail for the stars.” But how will humans or our machine representatives fly to the stars? [more inside]
DRUNKEN TRUMPET
This is Kid Koala refuting any possible argument that a turntable is not an instrument. (SLthreeyearoldYT)
Open Observatory of Network Interference
Tor developers Arturo Filasto and Jacob Appelbaum's OONI project seeks to provide "an accurate representation of network interference" such as website blocking, surveillance, and selective bandwidth slowdowns on the Filternet, aka the internet. Their OONI-probe software tool has already exposed T-Mobile USA's "Web Guard" mobile internet censorship program and Palestinian Authority's censorship of opposition websites, leading to the resignation of the MP overseeing the project. (main git repo) [more inside]
Memories that aren't mine, yet they seem so tangible. Everywhere there's a sense of loss...
"I'd like my work to be found in a skip, in Southgate or somewhere, in forty years' time". Nick Papadimitriou walks and looks and writes and thinks, as he ventures around London and its fringes. He eschews the term 'psychogeography', preferring the notion of 'deep topography' to describe what he does. The London Perambulator, a short documentary about his work, was released in 2009 and features Will Self, Iain Sinclair, and Russell Brand talking about his impact on their work. His first book, Scarp, will be released by Sceptre this summer.
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