March 24, 2013

Luna Lee rocks on a gayageum

Awesome rendition of Jimi Hendrix' Voodoo Chile played on a gayageum, a Korean stringed instrument | Scuttle Buttin on the gayageum rocks as well | Joe Satriani's Starry Night, the gayageum version | Luna Lee's YouTube channel. A little about the gayageum.
posted by nickyskye at 10:14 PM PST - 38 comments

Her Name was Lucy Meadows

Popular transgender Lancashire teacher Lucy Meadows was found dead last Tuesday. Blame has quickly fallen on an inflammatory Daily Mail article by Richard Littlejohn, which has lead to a petition to sack the writer. Is this fair? Jane Fae at the New Statesman says it doesn't matter, while the New Scostsman calls it 'monstering'. The f word blog and the Guardian have longer articles on the case and the issues surrounding it.
posted by Charlemagne In Sweatpants at 9:30 PM PST - 77 comments

Using the F-word in PG-13/12A movies

Den of Geek looks at the MPAA rule that a PG-13 movie can contain only one utterance of the word "fuck".
posted by reenum at 8:05 PM PST - 57 comments

Quentin Tarantino Screenplays

A Set of Penguin style book covers re-imagined for Quentin Tarantino's screenplays.
posted by SkylitDrawl at 7:47 PM PST - 33 comments

"Magna est veritas et praevalet"

Last June, the New York Times published an exposé of New York's exclusive Horace Mann School, detailing decades of sexual abuse of students by their teachers. The revelations prompted additional accusations and lawsuits from former students, an all-but-useless investigation, an admission by one of the school's former teachers, and a response by the school to parents (pdf). But one person who escaped the Times' notice was former English teacher Robert Berman.
posted by zarq at 6:40 PM PST - 24 comments

Not-so dumb animals

Frans de Waal argues that animals are smarter than we might think. "Experiments with animals have long been handicapped by our anthropocentric attitude: We often test them in ways that work fine with humans but not so well with other species." [more inside]
posted by Athanassiel at 5:55 PM PST - 68 comments

Surrealism; the birth of the word adopted by a movement.

In 1917 Guillaume Apollinare first coined the word Surrealism in the program notes for the ballet Parade; partly reproduced here.
It was an extraordinary gathering of enormous talents with the set, curtain and costumes by Pablo Picasso (these pictures seldom seen and never published)
The scenario was by Jean Cocteau; and the score by Erik Satie.
It was first performed on 18 May by Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes.
The audience booed and hissed, and some in the crowd even started throwing oranges at the orchestra.
posted by adamvasco at 5:24 PM PST - 8 comments

Brah

When you look up the term Gaybro on Urban Dictionary, two extremely telling definitions appear. The first—“a gay man who acts masculine and is interested in guy stuff like sports, video games, military issues, grilling, knives, gear, working out, gadgets, tech, etc ...”—seems to have been lifted from the Gaybros mission statement. The second is less neutral: “Young masculine homosexual males who exhibit no effeminate characteristics or interests and make a point of going on about how 'normal' they are. Previously they would have referred to themselves as straight-acting but that's so 2005. Gaybros have no gay friends because they can't relate to other gay people. This is something else they insist on telling everyone.”
Slate has posted "Meet the Gaybros", their profile of the r/gaybros subreddit, the increasingly popular subreddit that's "[a] place for guys to get together and talk about, well, guy stuff." The community has had some ink spilt about them recently about their relationship with the gay community at large, their growing meet-ups across the country, as well as the charitible work the group has put together for the Trevor Project.
posted by Weebot at 5:20 PM PST - 44 comments

Adventures in Gay.

25 YEAR OLD RECENTLY OUT ARTIST CHRONICLING HIS ADVENTURES INTO THE WORLD OF GAY. Just a regular guy who happens to like other guys. Currently living in NYC. Work in animation, write and draw for a living. Hopeless romantic. Things I like: cartoons, writing, drawing, uke, piano, basketball, pokemon.
He's dorky, awkward, and struggling with a bit of the ol' internalized homophobia, but I think he's going to be OK.
posted by Nomyte at 5:12 PM PST - 18 comments

Mesmerizing visualizations of genetic algorithms

Genetic algorithms are useful for solving all kinds of problems and their implementations can be quite mesmerizing to watch. Re-producing Mona Lisa, a human face or bull cave painting. Playing Super Mario, Tetris and more Tetris. Simulating a soccer team, fishes, ant colony or Santa's flight path. A documentary about using genetic algorithms in design, e.g. deciding the optimal antenna placement on a Humvee, creating search and destroy behavior for UAVs and designing more efficient wind turbine blades. Should probably learn how to stand and jump and stand again before driving.
posted by Foci for Analysis at 5:04 PM PST - 6 comments

Admit That Byron Was No Good

The Free Information movement as seen through Thomas Pynchon’s ‘Byron the Bulb’ story. In one sense, Byron is a tangent—a rogue sketch that found its way into [Gravity's Rainbow] perhaps because Pynchon liked it. In another sense, Byron is GR condensed to a general thesis. On what? Hell, any number of interpretations could be derived from Byron, but I like to think that it reads as revelation. And the revelation is this: from the moment homo sapiens fashioned the first tool to the moment we are finally and completely extinguished, we are fated to be governed by those who control technology. An essay from Death And Taxes mag.
posted by chavenet at 4:50 PM PST - 5 comments

Secret Universe

The Hidden Life Of the Cell (57:24) There is a battle playing out inside your body right now. It started billions of years ago and it is still being fought in every one of us every minute of every day. It is the story of a viral infection - the battle for the cell. This film reveals the exquisite machinery of the human cell system from within the inner world of the cell itself - from the frenetic membrane surface that acts as a security system for everything passing in and out of the cell, the dynamic highways that transport cargo across the cell and the remarkable turbines that power the whole cellular world to the amazing nucleus housing DNA and the construction of thousands of different proteins all with unique tasks. The virus intends to commandeer this system to one selfish end: to make more viruses. And they will stop at nothing to achieve their goal. Exploring the very latest ideas about the evolution of life on earth and the bio-chemical processes at the heart of every one of us, and revealing a world smaller than it is possible to comprehend, in a story large enough to fill the biggest imaginations.
You may be familiar with molecular movies from my two previous megaposts collecting them, but this extended documentary uses original animation that is collected into a coherent educational narrative and is just so fucking gorgeous. Enjoy.
[more inside]
posted by Blasdelb at 3:48 PM PST - 20 comments

Oy Vey, Christian Soldiers

Maud Newton, who grew up as a Charismatic Christian in a heavily Jewish community, asks: What could be wrong with Bible-believing evangelicals giving their son a bar mitzvah? [slnyt, mostly] [more inside]
posted by Westringia F. at 12:58 PM PST - 114 comments

A Union for Freelancers?

Ms. Horowitz’s new mutualism is based on a simple premise: freelancers should band together to set up social-purpose institutions to serve their mutual needs. That, she says, would be far better than relying on corporations and private investors who might have different priorities, not to mention a desire for substantial profits. This idea, she acknowledges, is not new. But with the changing economy, the decline of organized labor, the end of paternalism among employers and the shrinking role of government, she says, the conditions are ripe for embracing mutual aid societies anew. “The social unionism of the 1920s had it right,” she says. “They said: ‘We serve workers 360 degrees. It’s not just about their work. It’s about their whole life.’ We view things the same way.”
posted by bookman117 at 12:04 PM PST - 38 comments

"It takes a village, people!"

Ash Beckham at Ignite Boulder: why you shouldn't say "that's so gay."
posted by Wordwoman at 12:04 PM PST - 25 comments

"Phreaking Out Ma Bell"

How a buccaneering young engineer built the little blue box that broke into the biggest network in the world
posted by the man of twists and turns at 11:08 AM PST - 17 comments

The Bacon-Wrapped Economy

The Bacon-Wrapped Economy, or how the rise of a new elite of wealthy, predominantly twentysomething, software engineers and startup founders is changing the San Francisco Bay Area's economy and culture. [more inside]
posted by acb at 11:03 AM PST - 134 comments

Lake Erie is sick.

Spring Rain, Then Foul Algae in Ailing Lake Erie: [New York Times]
"A thick and growing coat of toxic algae appears each summer, so vast that in 2011 it covered a sixth of its waters, contributing to an expanding dead zone on its bottom, reducing fish populations, fouling beaches and crippling a tourism industry that generates more than $10 billion in revenue annually."
posted by Fizz at 10:18 AM PST - 17 comments

Solar Scorcher

Backyard Solar Death Ray. Melt pennies in seconds with a fresnel lens repurposed from an old large screen television. Grant Thompson has other fun and liability lawyer unapproved projects such as melting metal, making solid rocket fuel and making a compressed air rocket launcher. (via homunculus and his post on Monkeyfilter)
posted by caddis at 8:56 AM PST - 30 comments

So... I Bought A Firetruck

"When I was a little guy I was infatuated with firetrucks. That's probably not unusual. Boys like trucks. But kids usually grow out of this kind of thing. I didn't. I'm 32 and a half years old and never stopped thinking firetrucks are awesome. So I bought one."
posted by indubitable at 8:25 AM PST - 53 comments

For squares only

Folks who love and/or hate modernist architecture: the functionmag tumblr might be fun. Via things.
posted by mediareport at 8:23 AM PST - 17 comments

Mundane simulation

German Truck Simulator. Bus Driver. U-Boat Simulator. Ski Region Simulator. London Underground Simulator. Street Cleaning Simulator. Who's buying all these niche simulation games, anyway? We found out
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:34 AM PST - 59 comments

A priest, a dominatrix and a brain surgeon walk into a bar

Fifteen people summarise their jobs
posted by hoyland at 6:35 AM PST - 65 comments

The game that puts you on a first-name basis with third-world dictators

"Now the trumpet summons us again—not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need; not as a call to battle, though embattled we are—but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle [...]"
- John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address

TWILIGHT STRUGGLE is a card-driven board game simulation of the Cold War. It has been called a game of crisis management; dealing with them yourself, creating them for your opponent, and their proper timing. There is a extensive blog about the game, Twilight Strategy. This is that site's article on starting out play. This page could help you decide if it's for you. ("Do you enjoy games that are extremely tense and nerve-wracking?") Here's a YouTube video on how to play it. And, although I suggest learning to play with a physical set, the online multiplayer wargaming client Warroom has a Java Twilight Struggle client/server program available. There is also a VASSAL module, but it currently doesn't work with VASSAL 3.2 or later. There's a lot more on the game after the break.... [more inside]
posted by JHarris at 3:29 AM PST - 48 comments

In defence of Page 3

"The snobbishness has struck me as irrational. They want the end of Page 3, but claim to be "sex positive" and pro porn. It's as if pornography for the upper classes - tasteful monochrome Testino images of nudes, Mapplethorpe coffee table books or vintage Tom of Finland* prints are acceptable, yet accessible muck for the working classes is simply de trop. A catwalk show for a milliner featuring chilly looking models completely nude apart from the hat is applauded as high art: Sandra from Dagenham, in a pair of lacy pants, is not."
posted by MartinWisse at 3:27 AM PST - 69 comments

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