May 8, 2014
Making Planet Express look good
In the future, making a delivery will require dedication, intelligence and observation. Or not. A sunny sweetly-drawn Jetsonesque animated short Johnny Express about interplanetary delivery that evokes Independence Day and War of the World. Written, directed and animated by Kyungmin Woo. Found on Gizmodo.
Safe for work, but if you laugh at this you may be a very bad person (I did).
You mean they might have a point?
A refreshing, well researched, measured take on gun control The police officer smiled and handed me a bucket with a revolver and thirty loose rounds of ammunition. Outside, it was dusk and the snow was falling sideways.
Why don't you take a picture, it'll last longer!
Photobooth Innards: the inner workings of a vintage black and white photobooth in real time. Via photobooth.net, the most comprehensive photobooth resource on the internet (previously)
[Ba]king [Br]ead
Maybe you've tried a pan full of water. Maybe you've tried to find some way to hack up one of those Steam Shark things. Maybe you just open the door and spray. Those days are over, because the best way to get your oven good and steamy to keep your bread crusts thin and crisp has been discovered, it doesn't require anything you won't almost certainly already have around, and it's dead simple.
I AM FEELING IT TODAY! HIGH-FIVE!
"I decide I should really read this Updike biography from cover to cover right now if I want this essay to be worth reading." Heather Havrilesky (of the fantastic Ask Polly) on How to Write.
Sphere Factory
you do not control a machine you embody a bird
Birdly: An Attempt to Fly. "‘Birdly’ is an installation which explores the experience of a bird in flight. It tries to capture the mediated flying experience, with several methods. [...] Visualized through HMD (Oculus Rift) the participant is embedded in a virtual landscape where his body is the body of a Red Kite. The whole scenery is perceived in the first person perspective of a bird.
To intensify the embodiment we include additional sonic, olfactoric and wind feedback. Soundwise you perceive only the roaring of the wind and the flaps of the wings." [more inside]
bell hooks sounds off on Beyonce
bell hooks calls Beyonce a "terrorist" and a "slave" At a panel discussion at the New School yesterday, bell hooks raised eyebrows in a conversation about the controversial Time magazine cover seen here, saying that Beyonce "colluded in the construction of herself as a slave," going on to say “I see a part of Beyoncé that is in fact anti-feminist — that is, a terrorist, especially in terms of the impact on young girls.” [more inside]
Goes well with that post about the Pantone of 1692.
OctopEscape
"Hey, how am I gonna keep this octopus I have somehow obtained?" you ask.
"This handy jar will suffice," your friend tells you.
Your friend is way wrong. via kottke
"This handy jar will suffice," your friend tells you.
Your friend is way wrong. via kottke
ASCII Webcam
Masala Dosa to Die For
P.Rajagopal is a fast food magnate who may be South India's answer to Ray Kroc. He's also a twice-convicted murderer. And possibly something like a god. (SLNYTimes Magazine).
Lead-Free Solder - friend or foe?
Lead-Free Solder - friend or foe? In 2005, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency published a report (pdf), in which it assessed the environmental impact of tin-lead vs lead-free solder.
In July 2006, RoHS legislation banned the use of lead in electronic products destined for sale throughout Europe with a few exceptions.
But not everyone thinks this was a good idea:
But not everyone thinks this was a good idea:
- Lead-free assembly is not better for the environment, it is worse. The additional tin mining required to produce high-purity tin alloys, plus the mining of other precious metals required to alloy with tin in substitution for lead is a poor trade for the use of existing lead, much of which comes from recycled products.
- Lead-free assembly is less reliable than lead-based assembly. The E.U. environmental commission admits this point. That's why they grant exceptions for military and high-reliability applications that still use SnPb solder.
Happy 77th, Pynchon!
Typewriters v. Computers: the argument revisited (again).
How the typewriter is/isn't better/worse for your writing. A little bit about ye olde handwriting in there as well.
Nation of Ulysses/The Make Up/Chain and the Gang
How the “Sassiest Boy in America” became the most interesting man in rock-and-roll.
Early Life in Death Valley
"...they’re all saying the same thing: This was a good kid."
Staten Island, long a blue-collar bastion of police officers and other New York City workers, is confronting a heroin epidemic. Thirty-six people died from heroin overdoses in 2012, the highest number in at least a decade, according to the most recent available city health department records; the death rate was higher than the city’s other four boroughs had seen in 10 years.Heroin’s New Hometown
Goosebumps, drawn from memory. FOREVER.
Screen Gems
Slightly unheralded prince of television themes, Steve Barri.
Plus, a look at his early songwriting career with P.F. Sloan. [more inside]
Drill, Comrade, Drill.
There is a place in Russia called the Kola Penninsula that is just a jump away from both Norway and Finland. At this remote locale, people can visit a crumbling cinder block building in the middle of nowhere that is surround by debris. Amongst this debris is a nondescript metal cap secured with a dozen rusting bolts. Beneath this cap is the deepest hole in the world. [more inside]
Valentina Lisitsa: the Bieber of Classical music goes minimal
Valentina Lisitsa is a classical pianist who credits her current fame to YouTube, where she has uploaded more than 200 videos of her performances. Were it not for the popularity of these videos (Beethoven "Moonlight" Sonata op 27 # 2 Mov 3 - 7 million views; Beethoven "Für Elise" - 4 million; Liszt "La Campanella" - 3 million), she would be, in her own words, "totally dead" in "the age of child prodigies". Her newest work is not a thousand notes a minute as featured in some of her popular videos, but more minimal, as heard in "The Heart Asks Pleasure First," the first track from her album (Soundcloud snippet preview of all tracks) of music by minimalist composer Michael Nyman. [more inside]
"transit-oriented development" and "magical" in the same sentence
Can Atlanta Go All In on the BeltLine?
That magical TOD experience came courtesy of the BeltLine: Atlanta's multibillion-dollar, 25-year project to transform 22 miles of railroad and industrial sites into a sustainable network connecting 45 inner-city communities. The project envisions wide walking and biking paths, access to nearby neighborhoods and businesses, parks and green space, and new homes, shops, and apartments.
That magical TOD experience came courtesy of the BeltLine: Atlanta's multibillion-dollar, 25-year project to transform 22 miles of railroad and industrial sites into a sustainable network connecting 45 inner-city communities. The project envisions wide walking and biking paths, access to nearby neighborhoods and businesses, parks and green space, and new homes, shops, and apartments.
Dragons are totally real tho
The uncommonly well-moderated and researched Ask Historians subreddit answers the question: What common medieval fantasy tropes have little-to-no basis in real medieval European history?
(•ˇ‿ˇ•)-→ ✿♬ﾟ+.(｡◡‿◡)♪.+ﾟ♬✿。 :: ೖ(⑅σ̑ᴗσ̑)ೖ :: °˖✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧˖° ~(˘▾˘~)
JapaneseEmoticons.net solves all of your Japanese emoticon needs
By 1909, the hatpin was considered an international threat
In March 1910, Chicago’s city council ran with that idea, debating an ordinance that would ban hatpins longer than nine inches; any woman caught in violation would be arrested and fined $50. The proceedings were packed with curious spectators, men and women, and acrimonious from the start. “If women care to wear carrots and roosters on their heads, that is a matter for their own concern, but when it comes to wearing swords they must be stopped,” a supporter said. Cries of “Bravo!” from the men; hisses from the women. Nan Davis, there to represent several women’s clubs, asked for permission to address the committee. “If the men of Chicago want to take the hatpins away from us, let them make the streets safe,” she said. “No man has a right to tell me how I shall dress and what I shall wear.” [more inside]
Manners are sort of my thing, and I’d love to teach you some.
Why does Godzilla keep growing?
The Ever Increasing Size of Godzilla: Implications for Sexual Selection and Urine Production
So You Want to Be a Heroine?
Crystal Shard games presents Heroine's Quest: The Herald of Ragnarok. Modeled on the old Sierra Quest for Glory games, Heroine's Quest is available for free here and on Steam. [more inside]
Helps alleviate boredom when Snowden
The Navy has developed its own stripped down eReader for use on ships and submarines called NeRD (Navy eReader Device). It will have no ports, no removable storage and no wireless connectivity to assist with security concerns. While it will only hold a static collection of 300 books, it will take up much less space than the current minimalist library on board submarines today. [more inside]
All the Kings’ Men
Hack-a-Shaq, inconsistent officiating, poisoned room service, and the road to the last NBA three-peat: Grantland's oral history of the 2002 Western Conference finals. [more inside]
The 100 most important cat photos of all time
But it's an honour to be leered at; what would you need decent pay for?
"NFL teams stepped easily into the creepy patriarch role. Today, they enforce expectations for the way their cheerleaders look (according to the suit, the Jills’ guidebook mandates everything from the cheerleaders’ nail polish color to how they clean their vaginas) while rewarding them, not with money, but with the supposed prestige of appearing as one of their city’s most desirable women."Amanda Hess for Slate writes about the cheerleader revolt against low pay and humiliating working conditions. (previously) [more inside]
[...]
"The old stereotype of cheerleaders as bimbos has also worked in the NFL’s favor. NFL cheerleading is such an obviously raw deal, some might assume that women must be stupid to agree to it. (Tell that to Dr. Monica Williams, who cheered for the Tennessee Titans while fulfilling a research fellowship at Vanderbilt.) That’s not a stigma that, say, coal miners fighting against unfair working conditions have to overcome to get what they’re owed."
Velveteen vs. The Front Page Post
Velma "Velveteen" Martinez is a toy-animating super hero created by Seanan McGuire, a.k.a. Mira Grant. Over the past six years, McGuire's "Velveteen vs." story cycle has been released gradually on LiveJournal, achieving a dedicated following thanks to the story's overall emotional complexity. As fantasy author Tanya Huff has written, "Velveteen is about a young woman who fights crime in a pair of rabbit ears in much the same way Buffy was about a girl who killed vampires. That being, not so much." [more inside]
Save the Microbes
Humans have co-evolved with the resident microbes that call us "home", known as the microbiota, consisting of trillions of cells that colonize our bodies. The microbiota carry out many beneficial functions, such as producing vitamins, aiding in digestion, and protecting against invading microbes, but disruption from antibiotics or delivery by Caesarian section may have consequences for human health. Recently, antibiotic use has been linked with obesity and asthma. Using both human studies and experimentally observed mice, we are beginning to understand how antibiotics may lead to the disappearance of microbes and to identify key microbes that impact our health.
Save the Microbes[more inside]
The only hope you have is to accept the fact that you're already dead.
Todd VanDerWerff at the A.V. Club is in the process of reviewing the 2001 HBO miniseries Band of Brothers. Episodes reviewed so far: Currahee --- Day of Days --- Carentan --- Replacements --- Crossroads --- Bastogne.
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