January 26, 2013

Baseball Card Vandals

Baseball Card Vandals Baseball cards, vandalized. Slightly NSFW.
posted by davebush at 9:34 PM PST - 28 comments

Adaptive Systems

"Who is Adaptive Systems and where did he come from? How did he have an encyclopedic knowledge of everything from molecular biology to European intellectual history? Is it possible he was a famous author or an artificial intelligence? What is he doing now? Is he writing a book? [more inside]
posted by Charlemagne In Sweatpants at 7:58 PM PST - 69 comments

I heard it through the

Vinepeek shows you a continuously updating stream of uploads to vine, a recently launched video clip sharing startup that Twitter acquired last October. Fascinating, mesmerizing 6-second clips of life from all around the world. (via)
posted by yourcelf at 6:56 PM PST - 65 comments

Positive energy YES!

Brody Stevens: Enjoy It! (2, 3, 4, 5, 6) is the story of cult comedian Brody Stevens—his friendship with Zach Galafianakis, his falling out with Chelsea Lately, his infamous "Twitter meltdown" and, of course, his credits.
posted by Lorin at 6:50 PM PST - 13 comments

I ♥ DULUTH, The Story of the Maria Bamford Show

About a year after her participation in the groundbreaking Comedy Central documentary series the Comedians of Comedy, Maria Bamford was on stage at the Friars Club in LA when a heckler began shouting at her. What happened after that isn’t entirely clear, other than Bamford had a breakdown, walked off stage, and disappeared. She was found three months later selling clock radios on the sidewalks of Detroit. A fellow homeless person, who was also a Comedy Central fan, recognized Bamford and eventually her parents were contacted. They brought her back home to Deluth, Minnesota and began to get her help. Maria decided to document her recovery in a series of short videos called The Maria Bamford Show, which were first posted to the TBS networks' now abandoned Super Deluxe Web site. [more inside]
posted by Toekneesan at 4:41 PM PST - 108 comments

A bit of nostalgia for canucks who were kids in the 1970s (youtube vid)

I'd been searching for this for some time and recently discovered that someone had unearthed it. [more inside]
posted by SpecialSpaghettiBowl at 4:04 PM PST - 30 comments

Another Hard Day of Trying to Stay Alive

Almost as soon as we got back to Dash-e Towp, I overheard some U.S. officers loudly complaining about the inability of Afghan soldiers to make appointments on time. Afghan soldiers do have difficulty making appointments on time, it’s true. They also don’t like to stand in straight lines or dress according to regulation or march in step or do so many of the things intrinsic to a Western notion of professional soldiering. When a lieutenant calls a formation of Afghan privates to attention, they will inevitably resemble, as my drill sergeant used to say, “a soup sandwich.” But they will also accept a much higher level of risk than any coalition force ever has. Their ranks are filled with tough and brave men who run toward the fight without body armor or helmets or armored vehicles and sleep on the frozen ground without sleeping bags and dig up I.E.D.’s with a pickax and often go hungry and seldom complain. - A week in the life of an Afghan National Army battalion, on its own in the wilderness. (NYTimes)
posted by beisny at 4:04 PM PST - 13 comments

Carrie and the final frontier...

Trek and the City "Needless to say, the Prime Directive wasn't the only thing Samantha violated that night." (Single Link Twitter Feed)
posted by crossoverman at 3:29 PM PST - 40 comments

55m Down Somewhere Off Maui

Whales off Maui Divers encounter a group of humpback whales (slyt).
posted by jontyjago at 3:09 PM PST - 20 comments

Data Storage in DNA Becomes a Reality

"The researchers began with the computer files from some notable cultural highlights: an audio recording of MLK Jr.’s 1963 “I Have a Dream” speech, all 154 of Shakespeare’s sonnets, and, appropriately, a copy of Watson and Crick’s original research paper describing DNA’s double helix structure. On a hard drive, these files are stored as a series of zeros and ones. The researchers worked out a system to translate the binary code into one with four characters instead: A, C, G and T. They used this genetic code to synthesize actual strands of DNA with the content embedded in its very structure. The ouput was actually pretty unimpressive: just a smidgeon of stuff barely visible at the bottom of a test tube. The wow factor arose when they reversed the process. The researchers sequenced the genome of the data-laden DNA and translated it back into zeros and ones. The result was a re-creation of the original content without a single error, according to the results published in Nature on Wednesday."
posted by SpacemanStix at 2:33 PM PST - 37 comments

Albert Dubout

Albert Dubout (1905-1976) was a highly popular and prolific French cartoonist and illustrator, whose works were ubiquitous in France from the 1930s to the 1970s: Dubout illustrated books, film posters (notably those of Marcel Pagnol), magazines, advertisements, postcards and some of his cartoons were eventually adapted as a movie. Today, Dubout is best known as the creator of the Dubout couple (movie version; figurine version), consisting of a very large, full-bosomed, dominating, angry-looking wife with a diminutive, hapless and mustachioed husband in tow. Dubout's work is often highly detailed, and images larger than the tiny ones available on the official website are shown under the fold. [more inside]
posted by elgilito at 2:24 PM PST - 2 comments

The Hunter

The many lives of Donald Westlake creator of noir antihero Parker. (Previously)
posted by Artw at 1:47 PM PST - 17 comments

Is Legendary Comic-Book Vigilante “Judge Dredd” Light In The Gavel?

Since first appearing on the scene in 1977, Judge Dredd has been the comic-book world’s answer to Dirty Harry, serving as judge, jury and executioner in a dystopian future. Now, in the latest issue of 2000AD, titled “Closet,” it appears as if the legendary lawman is coming out of the closet. On the first page of the comic, Dredd is shown sharing a passionate kiss with another man, with a caption reading: “I guess, somehow, I’d always known I was gay. I was just too scared to admit it.” Note: these links contain SPOILERS. [more inside]
posted by chavenet at 1:24 PM PST - 81 comments

Good morning

A NASA chronology of wakeup calls in space (PDF).
posted by avocet at 1:23 PM PST - 8 comments

Deep Space Nine. Deep Space Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine (Not Deep Space 8).

"You know, before Star Trek Enterprise, none of the Star Trek shows had theme songs with words. Until now. And so, I present to you, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the theme song, with words." [MMLYT] [more inside]
posted by Deathalicious at 11:35 AM PST - 97 comments

micro cars are the best cars

The Bruce Weiner Microcar Museum, located near Atlanta, will close forever today. The collection will be auctioned off in February. Only the virtual tour will remain as a way to see all of these cars together, but now is your chance to collect any one of these unique pieces of automotive history. Who among us hasn't desired a car you could drive into your office? [more inside]
posted by ninjew at 10:48 AM PST - 35 comments

A Great Package Deal

The US Postal Service is celebrating the 100th anniversary of Parcel Post by renaming it "Standard Post". [more inside]
posted by Knappster at 10:32 AM PST - 45 comments

Light Travelling Faster Than Sound

"Most films of nuclear explosions are dubbed. If they do contain an actual recording of the test blast itself.........it's almost always shifted in time so that the explosion and the sound of the blast wave are simultaneous. This is, of course, quite false: the speed of light is much faster than the speed of sound....." Unearthed recently from some Russian archive, this document of a nuclear detonation is one of the few films of its kind that includes a recording of the audio. The sound is not what you might expect.
posted by shackpalace at 10:31 AM PST - 46 comments

This music station is fully operational

Mark Salud on YOURSELF presents.
posted by Algebra at 10:31 AM PST - 1 comments

A Trip to the Moon, a triumph of science and scenic art

In 1889, the Urania Astronomical Society of Berlin put together an illusion of a trip to the moon and a solar eclipse, created with painted scenery, transparent screens, and a variety models, created live before an audience. Three years later, the same show was presented at Andrew Carnegie's Music Hall, as covered in Scientific American, a decade before Le Voyage dans la Lune, the film by Georges Méliès (previously). The stage show was documented in 1897, in Magic; stage illusions and scientific diversions, including trick photography (Archive.org, direct link to Trip to the Moon; also available on Google Books). [via io9, who have a summary of the special effects]
posted by filthy light thief at 10:17 AM PST - 4 comments

Potential employers might not love your Beer Pong trophy

Facewash is the newest app to help people make themselves more attractive in the job search. [more inside]
posted by DoubleLune at 10:15 AM PST - 44 comments

Nikolai Tesla's Planetarium Collection

Owen Phairis, aka “Nikolai Tesla, Man of Lightning”, has a planetarium projector museum near Bear Lake, CA. Cool Hunting takes a tour.
posted by zamboni at 9:50 AM PST - 4 comments

Radially symmetric self-organizing behavior in juvenile canids

Puppy pinwheel [SLYT]
posted by moonmilk at 8:58 AM PST - 29 comments

Slow Motion Sneezing

Sneezing in Slow Motion; somehow simultaneously more fascinating, terrifying, and disgusting than you'd imagine it'd be. [more inside]
posted by Blasdelb at 8:22 AM PST - 27 comments

World's Largest Snowball Fight

While, ostensibly a promotion for a camera company, the world's record for the largest snowball fight was staged earlier this year by Snow Day and benefited the Boys and Girls Clubs of King County. It also looks like it was a lot of fun to participate in.
posted by quin at 8:11 AM PST - 3 comments

Bizarro

Weird Vintage - a tumblr of weird ads, illustrations, and photographs of a vintage or antiquated nature
posted by growabrain at 7:29 AM PST - 29 comments

Bring me more genomes

"If the history of public health has until now been embodied by the map—as in British physician John Snow’s famous map, which allowed him to curb the London cholera outbreak of 1854 and to found, in doing so, the modern field of epidemiology—Snitkin was embarking on a new kind of epidemiology: one founded on the phylogenetic tree." Writing for Wired, Carl Zimmer describes how Evan Snitkin and Julie Segre used genome sequencing to halt a bacterial outbreak at the National Institute of Health's Clinical Center. (via The Feature)
posted by catlet at 7:10 AM PST - 9 comments

A gentleman from sole to crown

Aleksey Vayner, Whose Tale the Internet Mocked, Has Died at 29. A strangely poignant article on his death, from a reporter who had interviewed him in 2010.
Previously -- his viral fame, in 2006.
posted by Countess Elena at 6:55 AM PST - 35 comments

"But what is the sane response to an insane situation?"

My So-Called Stalker [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 4:23 AM PST - 47 comments

Punk Voyager was built by punks.

They made it from beer cans, razors, safety pins, and did I do this part already?  Whatever.  They loaded it with the most precious artifacts of human culture they could find in Mexican Johnny D-bag’s van. “You gotta make it faster than regular Voyager,” said Red.  “So our culture gets to the aliens before the CIA’s fascist pseudo-culture.”
posted by Tom-B at 3:36 AM PST - 13 comments

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