June 30, 2013

Cognitive hiccups

Our Brains Weren’t Hardwired To Catch Con Artists [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:11 PM PST - 80 comments

He Made You Sweat One Way and Then The Other

Iconic Blaxploitation star and talented martial artist Jim Kelly died this week. [more inside]
posted by brookeb at 8:30 PM PST - 21 comments

ILOVEYOU & other trips down viral memory lane

Relive techno fears of yore ... malware aficionado Daniel White collects vintage computer viruses, infects his machines and records the results. See more examples at his YouTube channel.
posted by madamjujujive at 7:26 PM PST - 22 comments

Codename: DROPMIRE

According to The Guardian and Der Spiegel, the NSA has bugged EU government offices in Washington and New York, installed spyware on EU embassy communications equipment, and used the NATO headquarters in Brussels as a base to infiltrate the phone and computer networks of the EU's Justus Lipsius building. In addition, the NSA is targeting German civilian communications, monitoring ca. 500 million phone calls, emails and text messages per day.
European leaders are not amused- these revelations could endanger a trade pact worth hundreds of billions of dollars.
posted by anemone of the state at 6:11 PM PST - 367 comments

The Corporate States of America

Steve Lovelace created a map that shows the corporation that best represents each state of the US.
posted by reenum at 5:21 PM PST - 96 comments

Danny MacAskill's Imaginate

Two years in the making, Scottish bike parkour rider Danny MacAskill (Previously) (Previouslier) releases his brand new riding film. Whilst previous projects have focused on locations and journeys, MacAskill's Imaginate sees Danny take a completely different approach to riding a bicycle in ridiculously implausible ways. Enter Danny's mind and enjoy. [more inside]
posted by Blasdelb at 4:16 PM PST - 24 comments

Come on down!

There are people who believe that Plinko is the best game on The Price Is Right. I have a name for these people. I call them "Wrongety Wrong Wrong." They are the leaders of Wrongitania. They are the Doctors Of Wrongology. They are the Wrongtown Rats.
posted by maggieb at 4:02 PM PST - 48 comments

Waiting for Sluggo

Why did Samuel Beckett write to Ernie Bushmiller? Did he feel a sense of kinship with the cartoonist whose strip he read every day? Did he see in Bushmiller a man who quietly pursued his repetitive vocation day after day, no matter what? Did the Bushmiller characters strike a chord in the creator of Vladimir and Estragon? Did Beckett first formulate some of the innovations of his later plays while pondering situations for Nancy and Sluggo? We can never know if the inadvertent surrealistic antics of Bushmiller’s tykes influenced the translator of Eluard and Breton, or what first prompted the author of The Unnamable and Krapp’s Last Tape to begin sending strip ideas to a cartoonist in Connecticut. Was it Beckett’s frustration with his literary career, or the seemingly endless difficulties in mounting Godot that led him to seek another outlet, in yet another literary form, for his ideas and emotions? Whatever the reasons, we are lucky that much of the Beckett-Bushmiller correspondence has been preserved. [more inside]
posted by chavenet at 2:15 PM PST - 19 comments

The majestic, floating tubes that are egg masses of diamond-shaped squid

"On June 20th I received an email: a huge pink blob has been found off the coast of Cuba, and no one can figure out what it is.... They combine my two great loves: random biology facts and digging through the internet. Roughly 247 aquarium forums, journal articles and poorly-translated Japanese websites later, I had my answer. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the biggest mass of teensy eggs that I have ever seen." See also: videos 1, 2, 3. [more inside]
posted by filthy light thief at 2:14 PM PST - 4 comments

Anthony Howe's Kinetic Sculptures

Hypnotic Wind-powered Kinetic Sculptures by Anthony Howe. [Previously]
posted by homunculus at 1:00 PM PST - 16 comments

"Showed my dad pictures of GoT characters and asked him their names."

Game of Thrones character names according to some Imgur user's dad.
posted by delmoi at 12:10 PM PST - 106 comments

Velocissimo, Affrettando, Prestissimo!!

50,000 years of Western music in under 500 seconds: A video of artist Pablo Morales de los Rios creating one of those whiteboard-n'-marker style accelerated drawings spanning ~500 centuries of the stuff that soothes a savage breast. (Spanish, with English subtitles. Warning: may not contain all the things.)
posted by taz at 11:15 AM PST - 12 comments

2013 Locus Awards

The 2013 Locus Awards for Science Fiction and Fantasy have been announced by Locus Magazine, and (at least) two MeFi writers have won in the novel categories. [more inside]
posted by Sunburnt at 11:00 AM PST - 46 comments

America’s Newest Global War

Journalism is under pressure.
Glenn Greenwald speaking on NSA stories, Snowden and journalism. (Contains further links of interest.)
Chris Hayes discussion of how establishment journalists love leaks that serve the interests of political officials, but hate leaks that disclose what those officials want to keep suppressed.
Salon: Obama's war on Journalism.
TruthOut: National Security Journalism on Trial.
posted by adamvasco at 8:06 AM PST - 80 comments

Mouse cloned from drop of blood

Scientists in Japan have cloned a mouse from a single drop of blood. (via)
posted by kliuless at 7:42 AM PST - 33 comments

Hot and Cold

What happens when lava is poured over ice?
posted by Artw at 7:41 AM PST - 56 comments

broken .

"Daniel Somers was a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He was part of Task Force Lightning, an intelligence unit." [more inside]
posted by eviemath at 6:05 AM PST - 46 comments

Promoting A Record Using Vinyl, A box, and A Smart Phone

To promote their latest dance record, the record company mailed out a 12" single. But how could those who received it play it? This is their solution. [Warning: this is technically a promo for an artist and a small record label - I just think its an interesting use of technology]
posted by marienbad at 5:52 AM PST - 80 comments

The Cars-in-a-barn Urban Legend that is Real

For years, there have been rumors among car people about a bunch of unbelievably low-mileage 50's and 60's cars in a barn or warehouse in the upper Midwest. It's true, and they'll be auctioned off this fall. Not Safe for people with a propensity to drool over old metal. [more inside]
posted by pjern at 12:15 AM PST - 74 comments

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