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Libraries all over the US and Canada are wrestling with bedbug infestations. In fact, the Travel Channel has named libraries the #1 bedbug infestation spot. Some libraries are closing temporarily due to bedbug problems; others have had to destroy valuable historic books due to serious infestations caused by well-meaning patrons (who then contemplate suing to get their library privileges back). The problem has become so common that some libraries are posting their bedbug management policies on their websites, and several have detailed them to the news media. Rest assured, however, the bedbugs are not a terrorist attack. [more inside]
posted by rednikki at 10:44 PM PST - 144 comments

Ordinary objects made beautiful by physics: a red scarf surrounded by electric fans. Half-filled water balloons and Jello (previously) dropped and shot at 6200 frames per second. Two ball bearings welded together and set to spin with a breath.
posted by Bora Horza Gobuchul at 9:56 PM PST - 34 comments

So what happens when a variety of B-list actors and some extremely strange looking full-body puppets make a movie with a children's marketing expert? You get the worst opening weekend for any movie, ever.
posted by WinnipegDragon at 9:35 PM PST - 130 comments

Undone: a short, stop-motion film by Hayley Morris. [via]
posted by brundlefly at 8:34 PM PST - 6 comments

Quebec throws out Charest, elects PQ minority government Quebec has handed a minority government to the Parti Quebecois, a left-leaning separatist party who promised to freeze tuition, the subject of massive demonstrations discussion previously on the blue. [more inside]
posted by chapps at 8:06 PM PST - 87 comments

Is your elementary school youngster struggling with math? Are they a visual person? Would math games and videos help them learn? Enter Math Playground, to assist with problem solving and real world math. Try the enticing logic game Sugar, Sugar or beef up your math word problem skills. There are plenty of games to help educate while entertaining.
posted by netbros at 4:34 PM PST - 14 comments

Two hamsters try to navigate a running wheel at the same time, with varying success (SLYT)
posted by pombe at 3:45 PM PST - 66 comments

The Walker Internet Cat Video festival took place last week I was there, and I'd say that crowd estimate of 10,000 was pretty accurate as far as I could tell. Most of the content was, eh, but speaking as a not-cat-video fan there were a few that were pretty good not that far off. There were videos in multiple categories. [more inside]
posted by lon_star at 3:01 PM PST - 21 comments

For the fans, a biography of David Foster Wallace (Also...)
posted by Yellow at 2:30 PM PST - 13 comments

Though it might sound like a marriage made by management,* but the collaboration between The Orb and Lee "Scratch" Perry on The Orbserver in the Star House has been widely praised for unfettered vitality that is not always achieved when legends from different genres meet in the studio, as a proper collaboration between the 75 year old godfather of dub and veteran ambient electronica stalwarts, complete with a nod to 1991 with Golden Clouds. Hold Me Upsetter was the first track released from the album, and you can listen to the whole album on Soundcloud. [more inside]
posted by filthy light thief at 1:22 PM PST - 39 comments

Do Go On - A tumblr celebration of totally rad 90s video game magazines [via mefi projects]
posted by The Whelk at 11:50 AM PST - 42 comments

HTML5 Map of the Firefly 'Verse
posted by Artw at 11:08 AM PST - 78 comments

In 1913, a man named Noble Drew Ali, (born Timothy Drew) Formed a religious organization called The Moorish Science Temple, based on a supposed lost section of the Koran. Drew's teachings were heavily influenced by Freemasonry, Rosicrucianism, and The Aquarian Gospel of Jesus the Christ, which was written by Levi Dowling in 1908, and flourished again in the late 60's and was an influential precursor to the New Age Movement. [more inside]
posted by billyfleetwood at 10:23 AM PST - 65 comments

"The school even had its own vocabulary: Its shock device was known as the 'graduated electronic decelerator' or GED. Staffers didn’t shock residents but instead gave them GED 'applications.'" Founded by Harvard grad and Skinner disciple Matthew Israel, the Judge Rotenberg Center for the developmentally disabled is built around the idea of conditioning behavior through corporal punishment/"adversives". Israel is a technology pioneer in the technology of applying electric shocks for behavioral modification...and some parents are grateful for his controversial methods of "retraining" some of his most challenging patients. However, at least two UN officials" have called it "torture." A response to the center's arguments on the efficacy of this "treatment."
posted by availablelight at 10:11 AM PST - 99 comments

Aaron Valdez collects celebrity workout videos. New York magazine chose their ten favorites.
posted by Egg Shen at 9:33 AM PST - 17 comments

The Gangster Princess of Beverly Hills. (Single page version) [more inside]
posted by zarq at 9:28 AM PST - 30 comments

Edgy Comics Bingo (NSFW, rape references.) [via]
posted by griphus at 9:27 AM PST - 43 comments

Non-orthogonal soccer fields, a slideshow
posted by Tom-B at 9:23 AM PST - 37 comments

Harry S. Truman would make a good show of things, but he was a little guy. No reach. No intimidation.
posted by Lucinda at 9:16 AM PST - 129 comments

"Only the kittens kept us sane." In 1956, three Canadians lashed together nine old telephone poles to create a raft, loaded up on some comforts of home (including two kittens), and set off from Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. The kittens snoozed on the deck and climbed the masts. The men tied scarves around their heads, grew hipster beards, played chess, and drank coffee and liqueurs. Everyone ate the sardines. 88 days later, they reached Falmouth harbour in Britain. The kittens lived lavishly and happily ever after with the Duke of Bedford. The men had their ups and downs. Pictures. The Pathé newsreel from 1956. CBC Newfoundland reunites one of the sailors and a Newfoundland sailor who intercepted them over 50 years later. Radio summary of the tv story.
posted by maudlin at 9:14 AM PST - 29 comments

What kind of book reader are you? More types of book reader.
posted by rollick at 8:57 AM PST - 63 comments

Photographer Noah Kalina (previously, previouslier) has taken a photograph of himself everyday for the last 12.5 years. In 2006, he released the first video showing six years of the perils of time on the human form. Well, the human face. It went viral. The Simpsons parodied it (alt). Time named it one of YouTube's 50 best videos. The work in progress comprises of 4514 photos (so far).
posted by guiseroom at 7:38 AM PST - 30 comments

BBC documentary from 1973 on the London Chapter of the Hell's Angels (SLYT 24:37)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 7:14 AM PST - 23 comments

Now that we're in the homestretch toward the November Presidential election, it's time to choose your favorite electoral-vote projection oracle. All of these are sites that monitor individual state polls and voter sentiment trendlines. Here are some options: — Electoral-vote.com has been at it since 2004 and is a bonanza for polling stats junkies. Currently it's calling the electoral vote at 332 for Obama, 206 for Romney, with no toss-ups. (It takes 270 to win.) The site is run from The Netherlands by Andrew S. Tanenbaum, who prepares daily commentary and news analysis. His leanings are Democratic; for those who are bothered by that, he suggests a Republican-leaning alternative: [more inside]
posted by beagle at 7:01 AM PST - 88 comments

Paris in Motion is a beautiful time-lapse stop-motion video by Mayeul Akpovi.
posted by quin at 5:34 AM PST - 5 comments

The AntiSec hacking group claims to have released a set of more than 1 million Apple Unique Device Identifiers (UDIDs) allegedly obtained from breaching an FBI agent's laptop via a Java vulnerability. The group claims to have over 12 million IDs, as well as personal information such as user names, device names, notification tokens, cell phone numbers and addresses. There's a tool to help you check if your device is in the list. [more inside]
posted by unSane at 5:24 AM PST - 154 comments

Victor Lustig escaped from prisons, fooled Al Capone, and counterfeited millions of dollars. Oh, and he sold the Eiffel Tower for scrap iron.
posted by Chrysostom at 5:20 AM PST - 8 comments

The fine people over at the International Guild of Knot Tyers Forum talk knots. On Mars.
posted by Foci for Analysis at 4:47 AM PST - 33 comments

A documentary by Adam Curtis on Henrietta Lacks and HeLa cell line created from her cells. Previously. Previously.
posted by hat_eater at 4:11 AM PST - 7 comments

Trade-offs between inequality, productivity, and employment - "The poor do not employ one another, because the necessities they require are produced and sold so cheaply by the rich. The rich are glad to sell to the poor, as long as the poor can come up with property or debt claims or other forms of insurance to offer as payment..." [more inside]
posted by kliuless at 12:20 AM PST - 45 comments