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People are starting to get a little worn out on Healthcare coverage, or at least, a little worn out on the way it's been covered. Thank god our own grrarrgh00 isn't listening. Because someone has to spread the truth about Obama's nazi socialist communist granny killing satanist witchcraft healthcare reform.
posted by tylerfulltilt at 10:25 PM PST - 63 comments

Tax authorities using social networks to find tax cheats Yet another reason to be careful who you accept a friend request from.
posted by reenum at 9:49 PM PST - 27 comments

Jacques Vergès has defended Milosevic, Carlos The Jackal, Saddam Hussein and nazi Klaus Barbie (you know, with with the one with the museum) in court. What kind person does it take to do that, and why? [more inside]
posted by smoke at 8:57 PM PST - 29 comments

The Computer Chronicles.
posted by Mr. Anthropomorphism at 8:47 PM PST - 12 comments

C0nc0rdance [sytl] asks; How far should we trust common sense? A less than 9 min video on Common Sense as it relates to Science. Enjoy.
posted by nola at 8:36 PM PST - 30 comments

There's drag, and then there's female impersonation. Jim Bailey has been exquisitely demonstrating that difference for decades. Here are his dead-on recreations of Judy Garland, Barbra Streisand, Phyllis Diller, Bette Davis, and Peggy Lee. He still performs.
posted by Help, I can't stop talking! at 7:25 PM PST - 28 comments

Alex Kralie, a film student, was shooting his student project in 2006. It was never completed, due to what Alex called "unworkable conditions", and his friend and classmate talked Alex into handing over the raw footage. The name of the film was to be Marble Hornets, and that's the name of the youtube account used to released interesting or odd snippets from Alex Kralie's aborted film. Marble Hornets Introduction [more inside]
posted by boo_radley at 4:35 PM PST - 124 comments

Transition, the latest from Iain Banks... or is it Iain M. Banks? Anyway, as well dead tree and audio, it's also a free podcast on Itunes... [more inside]
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:27 PM PST - 96 comments

Knossos: Fakes, Facts, and Mystery. "The masterpieces of Minoan art are not what they seem... The truth is that these famous icons are largely modern. As any sharp-eyed visitor to the Heraklion museum can spot, what survives of the original paintings amounts in most cases to no more than a few square inches. The rest is more or less imaginative reconstruction, commissioned in the first half of the twentieth century by Sir Arthur Evans, the British excavator of the palace of Knossos (and the man who coined the term 'Minoan' for this prehistoric Cretan civilization, after the mythical King Minos who is said to have held the throne there). As a general rule of thumb, the more famous the image now is, the less of it is actually ancient."
posted by homunculus at 2:16 PM PST - 16 comments

Look up and smile.
posted by jayCampbell at 12:47 PM PST - 31 comments

Wireless electricity has been mentioned previously. A recent TED Talk actually shows it in action. The presenter, Eric Giler of WiTricity Corp (a startup founded by MIT researcher Marin Soljačić), mentions the first attempt at wireless electricity, the Wardenclyffe Tower, designed and built over a hundred years ago by Nikola Tesla. [more inside]
posted by Deathalicious at 12:10 PM PST - 95 comments

Alternative wine closures are being resisted. Alcoa's new glass stopper with Dupont's vinyl ring costs nearly the same as a cork (50¢ to 70¢ each), but requires new bottling machines. Although cheaper screw caps also prevent undesirable compounds from tainting wine, and eliminates the need for horizontal storage, they change the purist aspect of the bottle and are not biodegradable. Naturalists point out the problem of having cork forests disappear in the Mediterranean region from low demand.
posted by Brian B. at 10:43 AM PST - 97 comments

How do you spread your genes around when you're stuck in one place? By tricking animals, including us, into falling in love. Orchids — Love and Lies [more inside]
posted by netbros at 10:24 AM PST - 15 comments

"There are views in this city where you cannot see, except for a person or maybe a dog, another living thing. Not a tree or a plant. How did a place become like that?" Before and after photo gallery
posted by Glibpaxman at 10:23 AM PST - 13 comments

It really isn't safe out there. Click any link and scroll down for up close shipping and aircraft disasters.
posted by adamvasco at 6:12 AM PST - 17 comments

Ever wanted a visual tally of the computers, personal data, and other property lost by or stolen from the US federal government? Presenting the Government Lost & Found Map, via OhMyGov!.
posted by the littlest brussels sprout at 4:58 AM PST - 3 comments

For the last two years, Flickr user HK Man has been collecting old photos of Hong Kong, finding the exact spots at which they were taken, and taking them again. The result, from his first photo of Victoria Harbor to a more recent one of Nathan Road, comprises a chronicle of Hong Kong's unrestrained vertical development over the past few decades. In a similar vein, Gwulo is a community site for "for everyone that is interested in old Hong Kong" and includes photos, mysteries, and discussions -- such as this one about old Kai Tak Airport. [more inside]
posted by milquetoast at 3:43 AM PST - 28 comments