June 2, 2012
Kyle McDonald Explains FaceTracker
FaceTracker is an example of a complex technique that builds on top of a series of computer vision, image processing, and machine learning functions in order to achieve its result. Here's an interview with Kyle McDonald, artist and researcher in New York with a background in computer science and philosophy. He released FaceOSC, a tool for prototyping face-based interaction. Kyle has a growing body of work that uses face tracking in an artistic context, notably Face Substitution.
ABC Funfit with Mary Lou Retton
Skycat
Catcopter. I have no idea how these people got their cats wedged into their helicopters, or why.
the new frontier of sharing useful tips might well be Pinterest
35 Lifechanging Ways To Use Everyday Objects - such as using a banana to get the scratches out of a CD or DVD, the very popular "make a hair bun with a sock" trick, and the ever-useful how to open a wine bottle without a corkscrew. "These handy little things are all things you probably own already. I know this is a topic usually reserved for moms on Pinterest..." It's true, the denizens of Pinterest are an excellent source of useful tips: how to peel a potato in 10 seconds, how to get rid of a sunburn, making emergency ingredient substitutions when you're baking, or 20 new ways to use magic erasers; why not iron your kitchen floor to get out ground-in dirt? (previously: how to fold a fitted sheet - a big list of sites that teach you how to do stuff)
Why is the US losing technology jobs?
The US has lost a quarter of its high-tech jobs since 2000, the number declining by 687,000. A veteran headhunter opines on the causes: The technical jobs in Silicon Valley are hard to fill with Americans...I get email every day from new grads, asking for help finding jobs, but honestly, most are Indian or Chinese, not many Americans. He cites a NYT article which claims that the reason iPhone manufacturing doesn't happen in the US is that Apple’s executives believe the vast scale of overseas factories as well as the flexibility, diligence and industrial skills of foreign workers have so outpaced their American counterparts that “Made in the U.S.A.” is no longer a viable option for most Apple products.
Mechwarrior comes stomping back as a free to play online game
Mechwarrior online From Piranha Games and Infinite Game Publshing. After waiting for the "stars to align" properly, have aquired the rights to reboot the Mechwarrior series as a somewhat free to play online game. There is a Founders pack and Elite pack if you want to shell out the money, but the basic game is free to play. [more inside]
Backside 180 casper flip?
Refloating the Costa Concordia
The Costa Concordia ran onto rocks and capsized last year. It's been sitting there ever since. A consortium of Titan Salvage and Mericoperi have just gotten approval for a plan to refloat it and take it to an Italian port to be scrapped. The project is just beginning and it's expected to be finished in about a year. [more inside]
No-Zero Hero?
On May 18, after a hearing with the Superintendent of Edmonton Public Schools, Lynden Dorval was suspended for insubordination after repeatedly refusing to comply with his school's Grading Policy (PDF).
This has sparked outrage and discussion about high school grading policies. Opponents of the "no-zero" policy claim that it does not prepare students for real life, while the Superintendent of EPSB, Edgar Schmidt, claims that it helps the School District achieve it's goal for "more students to complete high school".
The 35-year veteran teacher expects to be fired for his position on the grading policy.
Do not believe in Clooney for he is a false prophet!
Batman Preacher (SLYT)
Power to the people
"Who needs to try when things are meant to be"
29/31 by Garfunkel and Oates (the sensational Riki Lindhome and Kate Micucci), a song about the same woman from a perspective two years apart. (some NSFW language) [previously 1, 2] [via]
Filler Up
The gas station of the future? With ten million in venture capital and more that twenty million in dollars in grants, the fueling station of the future does not offer electricity or natural gas.
Mabo: 20 Years Later
At least the South Africans acknowledged the ownership of 400,000 square miles of South Africa by the original native inhabitants. We would regard [Ian Smith, the then Prime Minister of Rhodesia] as going entirely berserk in Rhodesia if he acknowledged no native land rights at all. But the position in Australia is that we acknowledge no native land rights whatever. We took the lot with our proclamations of sovereignty.That complaint, made by Mr Beazley MP in 1967, was corrected twenty years ago on 3 June 1992, when the High Court of Australia found that "the common law of this country recognizes a form of native title", overturning the doctrine of terra nullius that had held since the 1830s. [more inside]
Iconic Image from the Vietnam war.
The photograph of 9 year old Phan Thi Kim Phuc (often referred to as the "napalm girl"), taken nearly 40 years ago on June 8th in 1972 by press photographer Nick Ut, won a Pulitzer Prize at the time and became one of the most important images from the Vietnam War era. [more inside]
Clown car counts noses
The Global Middle Class Is Bigger Than We Thought A new way of measuring prosperity has enormous implications for geopolitics and economics.[...] the number of passenger cars in circulation serves as the most reliable gauge we have about the size of a country's middle class.
Opinions on health care reform, taxes, and even the president’s dog come down to racial bias
It all comes down to race. Michael Tesler, expanding upon the research of his mentor David Sears, has found racial bias to be a strong indicator of people's opinions on a myriad of political and other issues. The effect extended even to issues that normally would be the most stable and to opinions that would seem divorced from politics. [more inside]
Life without Parole for Mubarak
After a year without Mubarak, Egypt is about to get a much longer reprieve: the 84-year-old former president has been sentenced to life in prison for his role in the deaths of protestors during last year's popular uprising. The former Interior Minister—though not his aides—will also be cooling his heels in a Cairo jail. The effects of this news on national elections, with runoffs to be held in just a few weeks, remains to be seen.
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