MetaFilter

The Vietnam Syndrome. "In the 1960s, the United States blanketed the Mekong River delta with Agent Orange, a chemical defoliant more devastating than napalm. Thirty years after the end of the Vietnam War, the poisoned legacy lives on in the children whose deformities it is said to have caused." Photo essay by James Nachtwey, written essay by Christopher Hitchens. [Previously discussed here and here, via C&L.]
posted by homunculus at 11:30 PM PST - 31 comments

The Mineralogy Database contains 4,442 individual mineral species descriptions with links and a comprehensive image library. Recent additions to the image library include barite, zinkenite/stannite, and zanazziite/kosnerite. There's also a clickable periodic table, that lets you pick an element and see information about minerals that contain it. Learn about crystal forms with a fun little java applet. Search for minerals by cleavage, color, diaphaniety, habits, hardness, and more.
posted by owhydididoit at 10:36 PM PST - 9 comments

the voice fires robert christgau the decimation of what was once the village voice continues apace.
posted by sdn at 10:23 PM PST - 44 comments

Interpretations of Trivium
posted by hellbient at 7:39 PM PST - 8 comments

iPod + iTunes + Bob Dylan = Modern Times?
posted by persona non grata at 7:35 PM PST - 17 comments

In the late Seventies and Early Eighties, Dial-a-Poem put out recordings of William S. Burroughs, John Giorno, Sonic Youth, Cabaret Voltaire, Coil, Diamanda Galas, Anne Walderman, Charles Bukowski, Amiri Baraka, Gregory Corso, Phillip Glass, Patti Smith, and many many more. Apparently, the incredibly awesome Ubuweb has streaming mp3s of all twelve Dial-A-Poem releases here. Yay!
posted by elr at 4:54 PM PST - 14 comments

Even though there's no listing for this cliche in the Shark Jumping database, inevitably in every superhero TV show of the 1970s, the hero would face (and defeat) a creature with powers similar to (and usually greater) than their own. Like when Steve Austin battled the SEVEN million dollar man (or when he fought bigfoot). Or when the incredible hulk fought the incredibler hulk. Or when the Knight Industries Two Thousand did battle with its prototype, KARR.God bless YouTube for collecting these precious moments
posted by jonson at 4:40 PM PST - 67 comments

Our characters met in North Freeport in EverQuest. His dark elf cleric was on top of the roofs, an area which I didn't know characters could access. I sent him a /tell, asking how he got up there, and he kindly showed me how. [EQ, F, 22] Massive Multiplayer Online games make for "impossible" romances.
posted by bigmusic at 4:31 PM PST - 12 comments

So Much Fire To Roast Human Flesh from Arthur Magazine--an 18-track, multi-artist compilation CD curated by Foster featuring exclusive contributions from some of the more outspoken members of the nation's burgeoning psychedelic folk scene, ... All profits will be distributed to specific counter-military recruitment and pacifist organizations and programs who effectively advise high school students and other Americans at risk of being taken advantage of ... (and you can listen here). Some might remember Arthur vs. Godsmack--their music is heavily featured in recruiting ads.
posted by amberglow at 3:32 PM PST - 8 comments

The Great War: "People at the time experienced it differently. We may think they were misinformed and deluded, and perhaps they were, or maybe we have become incredibly cynical and mistrusting. What were once considered to be civic virtues are now thought to be quaint anachronisms at best or grand delusions at worst. Things change." The site proffers an incredible variety of popular-press articles and imagery concerning the unfortunate European events of 1914 to 1918.
posted by mwhybark at 2:58 PM PST - 40 comments

The Secret History of Hacking [google video from a C4 documentary] is a fun romp through the exploits of Steve Wozniak, John Draper (a.k.a. Captain Crunch) and Kevin Mitnick. [via]
posted by MetaMonkey at 1:15 PM PST - 13 comments

Canada's a nice place to live. At least I think so, anyways. And so do, apparently, about 150 delegates from the International AIDS Conference. They've decided that they'd rather stay here than go back to their homes, mostly in Africa, and are claiming refugee status in order to meet this goal. While it's understandable that some of these claims may be legitimate, and that the home countries might not have been as enticingly developed as Canada, it does seem that for some "delegates", their claims are not what they may seem.
posted by Kololo at 12:27 PM PST - 28 comments

Children of Hoarders: unpacking family secrets.
posted by Falconetti at 12:24 PM PST - 43 comments

They rode on Mothra's back. They were The Peanuts. They were a band. The released albums. They have been digitized (and digitized some more). They summoned monsters (video link) with monster theme songs. But what happened to them?
posted by Astro Zombie at 12:23 PM PST - 9 comments

The Royal Society has an excellent video library of lectures given there over the past few years. For example Jared Diamond with Collapse: how societies choose to fail or survive. Martin Nowak with Why we cooperate, or try Sir David Attenborough Perception, deception and reality.
posted by econous at 12:08 PM PST - 2 comments

Mao who?
posted by mr_crash_davis at 11:24 AM PST - 36 comments

The Euston Manifesto. We are democrats and progressives. We propose here a fresh political alignment. Many of us belong to the Left, but the principles that we set out are not exclusive. We reach out, rather, beyond the socialist Left towards egalitarian liberals and others of unambiguous democratic commitment. Indeed, the reconfiguration of progressive opinion that we aim for involves drawing a line between the forces of the Left that remain true to its authentic values, and currents that have lately shown themselves rather too flexible about these values. It involves making common cause with genuine democrats, whether socialist or not. via
posted by semmi at 11:13 AM PST - 28 comments

South Park Refugees. "The G.O.P. used to have a sizable libertarian bloc, but I couldn't see any sign of it at the conference. Stone and Parker said they were rooting for Hillary Clinton in 2008 simply because it would be weird to have her as president. The prevailing sentiment among the rest of the libertarians was that the best outcome this November would be a Democratic majority in the House, because then at least there'd be gridlock."
posted by ZenMasterThis at 10:01 AM PST - 107 comments

Japanese professor Kenji Sugimoto has a long-standing fascination with the brain of Albert Einstein. In the early nineties he travelled to the United States in search of it. This bizarre 1994 documentary (YouTube, multiple parts) by Kevin Hull (UK) chronicles his quest. Fake or real? [more inside]
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 9:59 AM PST - 12 comments

"An Ohio legislative panel yesterday rubber-stamped an unprecedented process that would allow sex offenders to be publicly identified and tracked even if they've never been charged with a crime... [t]he concept was offered by Roman Catholic bishops as an alternative to opening a one-time window for the filing of civil lawsuits alleging child sexual abuse that occurred as long as 35 years ago." From Megan and Sarah to Amie to...well...this.
posted by Sticherbeast at 9:06 AM PST - 78 comments

Why does it stink when I pee?
posted by three blind mice at 9:00 AM PST - 46 comments

Tacheback '06 starts today. If, like me, you need a charitable reason to cultivate some face furniture without your wife withdrawing the conjugals, then this is our lucky day
posted by handybitesize at 8:02 AM PST - 17 comments

In honor of the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, here are YouTube videos of bridges being destroyed. Only this one is sad to watch.
posted by thirteenkiller at 7:03 AM PST - 13 comments

Jowling is when you shake your head from side to side as quickly as possible while a picture is being taken. It has been around for awhile (previously kind of), but we squares are just now finding out about it, and it is cool.
posted by ND¢ at 6:36 AM PST - 36 comments

When they aren't collecting rings, or defeating the lids of McFlurries, hedgehogs are fine little creatures. Remember your precious Groundhog Day? Where do you think the inspiration for that came from? That's right. After you realize just how cool hedgehogs are, you can't help but making one of those spiny bastards a pet. Just make sure it isn't illegal where you live.
posted by QuarterlyProphet at 4:37 AM PST - 45 comments

Flash Friday: Reaction Effect Click the circles to try to setup a chain reaction. Via games1.org, which also features cubefeild and drift
posted by delmoi at 4:14 AM PST - 30 comments

The Lovecraft Collection. Scents inspired by the works of H.P. Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos.
via Cheryl's Mewsings
posted by thatwhichfalls at 2:25 AM PST - 39 comments