September 24, 2012
Border crossings and shifts
Who Draws The Borders Of Culture?(NYTimes) Cultural border, as opposed to national borders, are funny things. One country can contain many (Coke vs. Soda. Vs. Pop, previously and previously-er). Cultural borders often appear as food and drink choices, like sweet tea, forms of alcohol, or BBQ sauce. [more inside]
High-altitude wind power
In honor of the opening of Shepherds Flat Wind Farm in Oregon this week, the largest wind farm in the United States, let's take look at 'high-altitude wind power', HAWP: [more inside]
Composite mummies
"...scientists have discovered that two 3,000-year-old Scottish "bog bodies" are actually made from the remains of six people."
The Study of Cartridge Blowing
Animated Gifs for Adults
Cinemagraphs are elegant, seamlessly animated gifs that capture action in a subtle way that makes you feel like you're watching a video. There are cinemagraphs for everyone, including Stanley Kubrick fans, fashion aficionados, and people who like rain or kittens. Photojojo explains how to make your own. But of course, there's an app for that.
Tom Sawyer: Fireman, Policeman, Customs Inspector, Alcoholic Superman
The Adventures of the Real Tom Sawyer " Mark Twain was nursing a bad hangover inside Ed Stahle’s fashionable Montgomery Street steam rooms, halfway through a two-month visit to San Francisco that would ultimately stretch to three years. At the baths he played penny ante with Stahle, the proprietor, and Tom Sawyer, the recently appointed customs inspector, volunteer fireman, special policeman and bona fide local hero."
Business Card Tricks
Business Card Tricks I love the contradiction. Handing someone a business card is an act of optimism. It says, "Hi, this is me. I want to know you." I love the idea of pairing this optimism and hope with the complete opposite. I love that I can hand this to someone and they will look at it and smile, say "thanks," then turn it over and look at me puzzled. That's making an impact, which is a business card's job. [Cached version of link; scroll down]
Meeting A Troll
I was petrified. They had my address. I reported it to the authorities and hoped for the best. Two days later I opened my front door and there was a bunch of dead flowers with my wife's old Twitter username on it. Meeting A Troll.
"How Can We Stop Pedophiles? Stop treating them like monsters."
"The counterintuitive, distressing, but necessary way to stop child sexual abuse." A Slate essay on the state of mental health services available to non-offending, self-aware pedophiles. Another recent essay on those "born this way."
A Liberty University professor's "expose" of the group B4-UACT, an advocacy group for mental health services for those with pedophila, led to accusations that the group (and the mental health professionals associated with a recent conference) were attempting to "normalize pedophilia." B4U-ACT does take the stance that reducing stigma for "Minor-Attracted People" (MAPs) is the best way to increase the likelihood of therapeutic intervention; they believe the DSM-V description is too "adversarial.
Fighting Dirty
Tactics of Waste, Dirt and Discard in the Occupy Movement: a photo essay by Max Liboiron, The essay was intended as part of this academic article (free download, for now) on the same topic, situated within the emerging field of "discard studies", but copyright permissions led to it being published on the Discard Studies blog.
The Amazing(ly Connected) Dave
It has never been easier to be an amazing mind-reader. (SLYT German PSA w/subtitles... any more would be telling)
The "bug model" of mistakes
Adobe Edge Web Fonts
Adobe is getting in on Google's act, offering 500 font familes of Typekit fonts for you to use for free on your website.
Tom wants you back
Among the Alawites: Nir Rosen reports from Syria
Boy, was I right!
What happens when you put Mitt Romney's words in Lucille Bluth's mouth?
#bloodbath
Science faculty’s subtle gender biases favor male students
Whenever the subject of women in science comes up, there are people fiercely committed to the idea that sexism does not exist. They will point to everything and anything else to explain differences while becoming angry and condescending if you even suggest that discrimination could be a factor. But these people are wrong. This data shows they are wrong. And if you encounter them, you can now use this study to inform them they’re wrong.
Richard Olney
Like all shrines, this one is on a hill, and built into solid rock. Richard Olney saw it first in 1961 on an excursion south from his adoptive home in Paris. Olney, whose The French Menu Cookbook was recently judged the best cookbook ever by this magazine, immediately knew he had found his proper place on earth. [more inside]
Truth or Facebook
"The psychology of the dare is that the dared person is caught in a double bind. They have the choice of either accepting the dare or appearing as a coward and suffering a social lowering in status. Faced with such a choice, many people accept the dare, attracted as much by the potential kudos as the fear of ridicule."^ Now available in Web 2.0. [more inside]
"That's terrible!"
Remember that great scene in "Toy Story 3" when the toys were about to fall into the incinerator? Well, a couple of siblings with a copy of Final Cut Pro decided to make the movie end there, with the toys going off to a fiery end - then showed it to their mom, who had never seen the film, and told her that was the real ending. [slyt]
Yes, lets walk towards the active volcano
"After a hair raising 400 metre descent myself and Bradley Ambrose become the first people ever to get this close. Climbing down to within 30 metres of the lava it was so hot (1150 degrees) that without protection we could stand the heat for 6 seconds before retreating..." Photographer Geoff Mackley visits the Ambrym volcano, located in the archipelago of Vanuatu. [more inside]
There once was a postman who designed scarves for Hermès....
Leaving Moscow
Second Person Feline
"You are a cat.
You don’t know your name, or where you are, or how you got there. You are sitting on a pile of clothes that smell familiar, and the room around you is quiet and dark." So begins A Stray In The Woods, an online collaborate comic/illustrated interactive fiction about being an amnesic cat. Take control of the story by suggesting things for the cat to do. [via mefi projects]
Ben Krasnow builds neat things.
Ben Krasnow shows us how he built a small hybrid rocket engine. Ben makes a lot of other cool things too, like astronaut ice cream, a DIY scanning electron microscope, and why not, carbonated fruit slices.
And you thought one logo and one client was hard? Pfft.
Time to make the logos. Take 300, yes 300, fan blogs with all kinds of inconsistent, homemade, clip-art, crappy logos and re-design ALL of them to be consistent with one over-arching look and feel. Oh... and do it in 7 weeks. [more inside]
THE resource on the net for the history of GLBT music
Queer Music Heritage is a sprawling website about the history of queer music. You can listen to twelve years' worth of monthly radio shows (link goes to the first year, 2000); take a look at the Queer Music History 101 overview; check out the extensive photo galleries in the female impersonators section; or read through the blog, which features interesting tidbits from gay musical history, like this overview of the Sissy Man Blues. [more inside]
Alex Rovt, the Fertilizer Baron of Manhattan
Gategate?
Andrew Mitchell, Conservative Chief Whip, faces calls to resign after he reportedly said to police officers who refused to let him through the main gate of Downing Street: "Best you learn your fucking place. You don't run this fucking government. You're fucking plebs." [more inside]
Trapped By The Hairy Hand Of Fate!
Jess Nevins presents: Six-Gun Gorilla! The story of one gorilla's quest for vengeance across the Old West. The archetypal cowboy ape, publicly available for the first time.
Originally published in 1939, Six-Gun Gorilla is available as a result of Nevins' (completed) Kickstarter for the Encyclopedia of Golden Age Superheroes. [more inside]
Wear Kevlar
Camp Bastion, a sprawling, well-fortified British-run base in the desert in southern Afghanistan, is the size of the UK town of Reading and home to almost 30,000 people. Bastion - with its own water bottling plant, hospital, police force and even Pizza Hut - is widely regarded as a safe haven for troops. However, a Taliban attack breaching the perimeter and resulting in the death of two US Marines has shown it is not impregnable.
What's it like inside Camp Bastion? Explore the graphical representation of the base ... to find out. [more inside]
Let me Take a Photo of Everything You Own
Photographer Travels China, Taking Pictures of Families and All Their Possessions Huang Qingjun has spent nearly a decade travelling to remote parts of China to persuade people who have sometimes never been photographed to carry outside all their household possessions and pose for him.
The results offer glimpses of the utilitarian lives of millions of ordinary Chinese who, at first glance, appear not to have been swept up by the same modernisation that has seen hundreds of millions of others leave for the cities. [more inside]
"You will depart immediately, before we set the dogs on you."
Dave Hartnett was surprised with an award this week for his services to tax avoidance. He was celebrating his retirement as head of the UK's tax and customs department, where he agreed "sweetheart" deals with Goldman Sachs and Vodafone, letting them off outstanding tax bills. Cue some pleasantly awkward confusion as the partygoers realise what is going on.
"A love for the magic of creation"
Adam Doyle paints "beautiful gestural portraits of birds," according to the art blog Colossal. His other work includes book covers, paintings and illustrations aimed at children, and contributions to the 52 Shades of Greed card deck (4 of clubs, 5 & 6 of hearts, and 7 of spades).
American-Owned Private City in Honduras Greenlighted
“Our goal is to be the most economically free entity on Earth.” The Honduran government has agreed to allow an American investment group build a private city, with its own laws, government, and taxation structure, from scratch. While some laud the project as a "beacon of job creation and investment," others decry it as an assault on human rights and democracy. One murder has already been attributed to the political tensions related to the plans for the private city.
De-listing of the MEK
The Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), or People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran, is an Iranian dissident group that has been formally designated for the last 15 years by the US State Department as a "foreign terrorist organization". When the Bush administration sought to justify its attack on Iraq in 2003 by accusing Saddam Hussein of being a sponsor of "international terrorism", one of its prime examples was Iraq's "sheltering" of the MEK. Its inclusion on the terrorist list has meant that it is a felony to provide any "material support" to that group.
Now, in the with the support of A-list American politicians who have been handsomely compensated for their efforts, the MEK are being delisted. [more inside]
For no other reason other that we thought it would be quite nice
Dr Roy Lowry of Plymouth University demonstrates what happens when you allow liquid nitrogen to vapourise in a sealed container, with the assistance of 1,500 ping-pong balls (SLYT) [more inside]
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