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posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 7:55 AM on April 27, 2007

Cool stuff... on the Mordor Link, just beside the tower a black sigil appears if you mouseover. Below it is written "Secret Vale" but unlike most of the other things on the page, clicking doesn't bring up any information.

Anyone figure out if there's a way to interact with this "Secret Vale"?
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 1:43 AM on February 22, 2007

You can listen to all the tracks, not just the ones linked to in dhruva's last link, by going to

http://www.sescsp.org.br/sesc/hotsites/missao/faixas/audio/cdX_YY.mp3

and replacing X by the cd number (1 through 6) and YY by the track number (between 01 and 60, in some cases).

Great link, dhruva. Thanks a ton.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 12:26 PM on January 30, 2007

That story about Damascan steel is pretty awesome.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 1:19 AM on January 26, 2007

It's almost enough to make me want to sue my bank.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 12:23 PM on January 25, 2007

jack_mo, strange as it may seem, being charged to receive calls and SMSes is standard in North America. Maybe you already knew that, though, and I'm doing the usual fail-to-pick-up-on-net-sarcasm thing.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 4:03 AM on December 3, 2006

Yeah, that's a wonderful resource -- thanks! It's great that you link to all the speeches as well ... just spend an hour reading old ones, very interesting stuff.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 12:36 PM on November 4, 2006

Beautiful photos. Thanks, mediareport.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 5:00 AM on October 23, 2006

sourbrew, my friend originally sent me the video on this page.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 9:00 AM on August 18, 2006

Some background on ultracold plasmas and Rydberg gasses, for the lay scientists among you who might actually be interested in the subject.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 10:00 AM on June 2, 2006

Wolfdog, given that it actually only does one page, I don't think it's possible to have a cycle. Most of the coloured dots aren't links, either, recall.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 10:40 AM on May 27, 2006

.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 11:35 PM on April 29, 2006

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posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 3:58 PM on April 26, 2006

Those are really beautiful. They're great fun to make, even when, like me, you have no idea what you're doing.

Ukranian tradition has it that making pysanka eggs keeps the world safe from evil, so they're not just fun and beautiful, but you can sleep easier after you make them.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 11:19 AM on April 16, 2006

Hey, that's pretty cool. Not a great chess player here but I sure enjoyed reading that game.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 6:39 AM on February 21, 2006

John Laroche: Then one morning, I woke up and said, "Fuck fish." I renounce fish, I will never set foot in that ocean again. And there hasn't been a time where I have stuck so much as a toe back in that ocean.
Susan Orlean: But why?
John Laroche: Done with fish.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 12:01 PM on November 11, 2005

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 1:07 PM on October 26, 2005

Other Iraq news: forty-five per cent of Iraqis believe attacks against British and American troops are justified and eighty-two percent are strongly opposed to the presence of coalition troops, according to a UK Ministry of Defense Survey.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 1:01 PM on October 25, 2005

This is exactly the kind of post I've come to expect from anastasiav - and it's why I have her posts page bookmarked. Thanks so much, av!
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 8:03 AM on October 9, 2005

The photos in the architetural database are great (though the enforced delay between one photo and another is stupid). Too bad I'm a mac user and won't get to explore pointingit.

Thanks, tellurian.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 7:22 AM on October 6, 2005

I was going to say the same thing as delmoi ... weird atoms :)
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 10:35 AM on September 23, 2005

intermod, try allowing popups for the site. When you tried to click, something probably appeared near the top of your browser window saying that Firefox just prevented the site from opening a popup. When you click on it it will give you the option of allowing popups from this site.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 8:33 PM on September 20, 2005

Yeah, that is great. Thanks, jonson. Well worth the time. I didn't mind the interface.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 7:50 PM on September 20, 2005

From FlamingBore's self-link refutation link comes this from the true creator of heygod.org: "I don't even know what metafilter is, but they seem grumpy." But it's really more snark than grump, isn't it? I mean, you didn't all get out of bed on the wrong side, you got up on the right side and are enjoying a good sitebashing, yeah?

but i must say, this kind of site is a bit played out
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 9:17 AM on September 19, 2005

iPood.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 9:44 PM on September 13, 2005

Nice page title, Citizen Premier.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 6:26 PM on August 25, 2005

God is so totally awesome, dude, and if you would pretend that Creed and POD were good bands, you would realize that.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 6:37 PM on August 25, 2005

This is great. Thanks, Wolfdog!

Are you a Combinatorist? I see you're Hungarian ...
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 1:28 AM on August 21, 2005

Are you a friend of Nick, too many notes? I agree with you about his motivation for doing this - it's good. The site, though, is not a terribly effective bit of promotional material.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 4:41 PM on August 19, 2005

Today, in the world, roughly 2.2 million people will die. Don't think about the reasons for their death - whether they were just or unjust, preventable or inevitable. In fact, don't even think about their deaths at all. Don't analyze it. Just feel some sort of vague, ill-defined sadness over the fact that people are dying.

Then go back to your work.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 6:22 AM on August 3, 2005

In other words: what's the point of thinking about the deaths of strangers without placing them in some context, trying to understand how they fit into some picture of the world, and maybe trying to figure out how things could be different? Do you just enjoy feeling bad, specifically about the deaths of people from your own country? Why?
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 6:26 AM on August 3, 2005

A personal anecdote: two years ago I was visiting a distant cousan of my wife, an 80-ish photographer who took photographs of Hiroshima in the days after the bomb (and suffered lifelong health consequences as a result). His photographs were classified - he was supposed to have turned everything over to the British Army. He told us that he still had copies of the photos, but he wouldn't show them to us (not sure I could have stomached them anyway).

He just died two... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 11:34 AM on August 2, 2005

Black feminism. Some black feminists.
I guess the idea behind this post is: look, people with crazy sexist ideas! But it's funny, because they're black!
Am I missing something?... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 2:20 AM on August 2, 2005

three blind mice: let's not condemn hundreds of millions for the actions of a few, huh? most muslims detest the actions of a man such as mohammed bouyeri in the same way that most christians detest the actions of the kkk.

it's pretty scary when the (largely moderate) followers of any religion can be painted with the swastika in what passes for reasonable discussion. i for one am not ready for wholesale religious war - do you think the vast majority of muslims are any... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 8:07 AM on July 13, 2005

Where are the boycotts, the protests, the ultimatums--led by mainstream Muslims, against radicals--that can genuinely make a difference?

This is a good question, zardoz - to answer it it's instructive to ask the same question of ourselves, and see what sort of conclusions we draw, about what American Christian response has been to some of the radical actions of extremist Christian sects. For example: in 1995, there were 20 murders classified as hate... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 8:37 AM on July 13, 2005

On post: what CynicalKnight said. And: more recent statistics about hate crimes in the USA, from the FBI.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 8:39 AM on July 13, 2005

On post: what CynicalKnight said. And: more recent statistics about hate crimes in the USA, from the FBI. And, three blind mice, I would ask: why should the average Muslim have to spend any more time condemning Bouryani's actions than you spend condemning the hate crimes I mentioned in my last post?
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 8:42 AM on July 13, 2005

ArsncHeart, that's called the "rubber band" solution. It's mathematically pretty complex, actually, but the idea is beautifully simple. (It doesn't always work for this problem...)
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 3:04 PM on July 12, 2005

"Tengo una remera del Che y no sé por qué" is bang on, and it's one of the reasons I won't wear or own Che paraphenalia. And yes: he's not a saint. This article, though, is a piece of shit, and shouldn't be read by anyone interested in coming to an informed opinion on the issue.

One example: "The period in which Guevara was in charge of most of the Cuban economy saw the near-collapse of sugar production, the failure of industrialization, and the... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 11:36 AM on July 12, 2005

Incidentally: whatever "the conclusion" might be. According to the author, it seems to be that Castro was a brutal bumbling psychopathic killer. Easy thing, though, to pick out some choice quotes from someone who a) wrote copious amounts in his diaries and b) spent his time planning revolutions, and make them sound violent...
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 11:42 AM on July 12, 2005

Where did you hear that, peacay?
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 4:47 AM on July 7, 2005

It's pretty unclear either way about what happened with the Israeli Embassy: Arutz Sheva wrote:

"Army Radio quoting unconfirmed reliable sources reported a short time ago that Scotland Yard had intelligence warnings of the attacks a short time before they occurred.

The Israeli Embassy in London was notified in advance, resulting in Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu remaining in his hotel room rather than make his way to the hotel adjacent... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 5:25 AM on July 7, 2005

rfb1138, i just used sms.ac to text message an un-found friend in london ... anyone can use this account if they want: username atozota, password mefi, email address atozota@mailinator.com
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 9:09 AM on July 7, 2005

rbf, works for me ... email me at the address in my profile.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 9:24 AM on July 7, 2005

nkyad said: Now I would be hard pressed to find a characteristic in any particular species that was not (at least minimally) selected for survival at some point in time.

What about masturbation? Evolutionary argument in favour of masturbation: teaches us the joys of orgasm, leading us to desire intercourse. Evolutionary argument against masturbation: teaches us that we can have orgasm without intercourse, reducing the amount we have intercourse.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 7:28 AM on May 21, 2005

On reading further: of the things I've mentioned, masturbation seems like the only one of my examples that fits your criterion of being "important" in some sense. But I think it holds up as an example of something that significantly changes how we approach sexual reproduction, yet probably wasn't selected for. Once humans ended up with the ability to orgasm, we were just clever enough to figure out masturbation (as many other primates have been).
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 7:49 AM on May 21, 2005

YOU FOOLS! Al-Fatah has infiltrated Spain and is now running the Spanish government and police force! Are you blind?
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 6:33 AM on May 21, 2005

Thanks so much, Lush. I was planning to go to bed ... so much for that.

All you Calvino afficionados should read the collection of autobiographical writings Hermit in Paris, expecially his American Diary and all his writings about his experiences as a partisan during WWII.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 8:29 PM on May 20, 2005

I agree exactly, kmtharakan. But ...
double post.
posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 3:42 PM on May 20, 2005

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posted to MetaFilter by louigi at 11:11 AM on May 20, 2005