January 13, 2010
Bat Boy's Back and Ed Anger's Angry!
Two and a half years after ceasing publication, and months after its back catalog was archived by Google Books, The Weekly World News has returned to the dead-tree marketplace as a comic book in a limited 4-issue series from IDW. So what's next for Bat Boy and his Friends? A TV show? (Maybe...)
When transphobia interferes with quality healthcare
"Melissa" (name changed for privacy) is a transwoman who was badly injured in a car accident and is in hospital in critical condition. While in treatment, some of the medical staff and her family decided that since she still had a "male" body, to make things "less confusing", they will erase 4 years of her female identity by referring to her as a man and taking her off her hormone therapy. (Warning: possible triggers) As little light puts it:
And if she woke up as from a deep sleep, she’d wake up into a world where her best friend was dead, where her body had been forcibly edited back to its pre-transition state and given a few more years of the influence of testosterone to boot, where her memory and self were hazy and confusing and nobody was calling her by the right name and pronouns, they were in fact pretending four years of her life, the four years she finally got to be honest and true to herself, those had never happened, and shh, she’s just confused, shhhh, calm down, let’s work on fixing your memory some more.[more inside]
First Person Tetris
Ever wondered what it's like to be a piece in tetris? Now you can know in first person tetris. (Warning, this may be disorienting/dizzying)
The Americanization of Mental Illness
"We have for many years been busily engaged in a grand project of Americanizing the world’s understanding of mental health and illness. We may indeed be far along in homogenizing the way the world goes mad." Ethan Watters examines the growing evidence that some mental illnesses are cultural phenomena that can be exported. [more inside]
Anarchism or Barbarism
Who says anarcho-primitivists have no friends? Anarchist thinker John Zerzan will be the keynote speaker at January 15th's centenary meeting of the 100,000-member Spanish anarcho-syndicalist union Confederaction General del Trabajos. Zerzan, who has previously called syndicalism "self-management of alienation" will speak on the topic "Anarchism or Barbarism?". What will anarchy look like in the future?
Another Peek Inside Facebook
(Adobe) Flash Gordon!
Gordon is an open-source Flash runtime -- in JavaScript! Demos here and here. It only supports version 1 so far, but with hardware acceleration for things like <canvas> and SVG gaining traction, could have real potential. It even works on the iPhone. Only for Safari/WebKit, Firefox & Chrome. [via] [more inside]
It's always September 13, 1999 somewhere
Space: 1999 (1975-77) is a British sci-fi series, the last production of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson who were first recognized for their work in "Supermarionation." This series saw the end of the couple, with Sylvia Anderson leaving the show at the end of the first season. She was replaced by Fred Freiberger, who brought in some Star Trek sensibilities and attempted to cater the show more to the American action-adventure audience. A third season was planned but not produced, and left the series unfinished, ending on an episode that was "like bad Shakespeare, or worse, bad Star Trek." Fans still support the show in many forms, even creating a semi-official fan-produced mini-episode entitled Message from Moonbase Alpha to bring some completion to the series, which was shown on September 13, 1999 at the Breakaway: 1999 convention. Another group of fans has recently taken to updating the whole series, to bring Space:1999 into the future. [more inside]
In this city, we know how to get down
The sarcasm mark
A long-standing online problem has been solved: Sarcmark Inc has invented the "sarcasm" indicator. [more inside]
Our pizza doesn't suck any more
Jay Reatard dies.
much too young.. Prolific, awesome, sometimes hated musician Jay Reatard dies in New York. [more inside]
Avon Barksdale Lives Among Us
Nathan Avon "Bodie" Barksdale is a real life Baltimore gangster upon whom the character from "The Wire" was based. Now, Nathan Barksdale has a chance to tell his side of the story in this upcoming documentary. [more inside]
So long, Rob. It's been Real swell
You remember Real, right? They made that media player you tried (and sometimes failed) to uninstall. They took on Microsoft and won a few years back, and Real remains propped up on that pile of cash. Last year, Real took on the motion-picture industry, and failed. A few days ago, a follow-on suit was slapped around the ears by judge Marilyn Patel, the same Patel that sent Napster packing. Yesterday, Real's COO resigned. Today, Real founder Rob Glaser stepped down as CEO.
If we can make public transit more convenient, more people will ride public transit. More people riding public transit equals less driving. Less driving equals a healthier planet.
City-Go-Round is a website that gathers reviews of transit-related mobile apps. It's also trying to shame the 670 transit authorities it knows of who don't have open data (versus a paltry 97 that do) into releasing it by listing them and asking its users to petition the head of each one. (From FrontSeat, the same folks who brought you Walk Score [previously] and the Predatory Lending Association [previously].)
Putting the tackle into Society of the Spectacle
"One might be tempted to say that the LFL is a startling critique of the homoerotic undertones that are rife within men’s American Football. Indeed American Football’s hyper-masculine qualities, its predilection for tight trousers, bottom patting and suggestive positional names (‘tight end’) have long made it an easy target for artists, theorists, critics, or anyone who is not American. Yet while to claim such satirical depths for the LFL would be disingenuous, what the LFL does achieve is equally subversive." Highbrow British art magazine Frieze discovers the Lingerie Football League. Warning: pictures on both links are NSFW.
Flying bicycles
Kolelinia is a city fly attempt. We are born to move, this makes us alive. The transport is not only a transport, it has to be an experience! (via)
A man of means by no means
One hot June morning in 1953, a retired couple from western Missouri packed their Chrysler New Yorker with 11 suitcases and started driving east. A few hours later, they stopped at a diner in Hannibal, Mo., and ordered fruit plates and iced tea.
“We thought we were getting by big as an unknown traveling couple until we went to the counter to pay the bill,” Harry Truman later wrote of that lunch. “Just as we arose from the table some county judges came in and the incog was off.”
And thus began an excellent adventure of a type that happened once and will never happen again: The Harry and Bess Truman Ex-Presidential Road Trip. [more inside]
Rhymes with ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay.
Playground Jungle: The "folk process" in the subversive songs, rhymes, stories and jokes you told when the teacher wasn't around. Visit the whole (growing) collection via the index of first lines.
The Magic Garden
"This is a garden of make believe, a magical garden of make believe where the flowers chuckle and birds play tricks and the magic tree grows lollipop sticks." - If you were a kid in New York, New Jersey or Pennsylvania from 1972 to 1984, chances are you watched The Magic Garden. [more inside]
Black flowers blooming
After publishing it's 50 Greatest TV Dramas Of All Time as picked by its television critics (but no Brooker) The Guardian launches it's TV Club to discuss those that didn't make the cut. First up: Edge Of Darkness.
All Gnytte Long
The Sexaholics of Truthteller Planet - yes, it's one of those rotten logic problems, one of many that can be found at Tanya Khovanova’s Math Guide to the MIT Mystery Hunt.
A Better Boarding Pass
Boarding Pass/Fail, "I was heading back from New York where I had met up with fellow designer Dustin Curtis. If you are not aware of Dustin's take on American Airlines, go read this. Anyway, I was inspired by Dustin and his attitude towards shittily designed things, to say the least. I was bored so I started rummaging through my stuff trying to find something to read when I grabbed my boarding pass. So I stared at it for a while. Rubbed my eyes, then stared at it some more. "
"Truth is the highest thing that man may keep." - Chaucer
"I'm needy, but I'm not greedy. It's better to be honest." A New York City cabbie returns over $21,000 left in his taxi.
A similar case occurred three years ago when a Manhattan cabbie returned half a million dollars worth of diamond rings.
Honest taxi drivers can be found on the West Coast, as well.
Penguins aren't much help with surgery.
He drinks a whisky drink, He drinks a vodka drink, He drinks a lager drink, He pays a fortune for the privilege...
The House of Commons Health Committee recommends (report) that England should introduce a minimum price for alcohol.
Unsurprisingly, the British Medical Association agrees, saying that the country needs "minimum pricing, higher taxation, reduced availability, improved regulation and better treatment for patients who have alcohol addiction problems" while the alcohol industry does not." So, what is the worth of a pint? [more inside]
I must look like a vandal, a kid or an amateur...
Further to the recent FPP about the end of his time on Dr. Who, Whovians can now find out more behind the scenes information about Russell T Davies' thoughts, experience and creative process in The Writers Tale: The Final Chapter. Here, one can learn twenty or so things about the final season that you might not already know... or read Russell confronting head-on some criticisms of his work on the show... [more inside]
Men's Fashion and Style
Valet — An online lifestyle publication focused on the latest and best in fashion, culture and gear for men. Includes the two-part survey The Female Perspective, A Modern Guide to Dating from the Minds of 150 Opinionated Ladies.
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