September 28, 2014

'the way you remember it...'

Vintage Disney Parks [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 8:07 PM PST - 30 comments

How Not To Fuck Up Tools Like A Goddamned Ape

Walt Disney Studio takes 18 minutes to explain how to use hand tools for General Motors employees
posted by boo_radley at 6:44 PM PST - 80 comments

"We haven’t found the right planet."

Alien 3 was flawed from its inception and it was certainly flawed—actually, pretty fucked up—well before we started shooting. So there you go. Take all of the responsibility, because you’re going to get all of the blame.” — David Fincher [previously]
posted by brundlefly at 4:59 PM PST - 253 comments

They have grown so big they no longer simply suck blood

This absolutely horrifying clip from forthcoming BBC documentary Wonders of the Monsoon shows a giant red leech sucking down a giant blue earthworm like spaghetti, deep in the forests of Borneo. [more inside]
posted by EXISTENZ IS PAUSED at 4:17 PM PST - 103 comments

The Mysterious Crimes of Valdice

Some of the worst brutality of Communist Czechoslovakia happened in a place most people have never heard of. By the 1970s and 1980s torture and murder were not routine tools of the Czechoslovak regime. Except in one place, about which even to this day not much is known. No one knows its victims, and the perpetrators live quietly among us. We decided to revive the forgotten story and to bring back to the map of Czech history a place that shows what great power does to people and how difficult it is to find earthly justice: the Third Department in Valdice. Part 1. Part 2. Part 3.
posted by orrnyereg at 4:08 PM PST - 8 comments

To create an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the Matrix

Agent Smith finds the atom fascinating. Morpheus can barely stay awake.
posted by DoctorFedora at 3:24 PM PST - 10 comments

Spacedrum and Hang, evolution of the steelpan drum

This solo performance of "New Moon" on a Spacedrum by Yuki Koshimoto is mesmerizing, but without much context. Who is she, and what is her instrument? This blog post has a bit more on Yuki, and here is some information on Metalsounds' Spacedrum and other similar metal instruments. If you want more background on the instrument, here's a documentary on the PANArt Hang, something of the predecessor to the Spacedrum, both of which have evolved from the steelpan or steel drum. Going back further, here's Toshi and Pete Seeger, documenting the making of a steel drum, in 1956.
posted by filthy light thief at 2:40 PM PST - 9 comments

Remodeling consent

Two prominent kink bloggers propose that we change how we think about consent to combat rape culture and to create positive, meaningfully consensual experiences for all. [more inside]
posted by zeusianfog at 2:06 PM PST - 103 comments

Massive Pro-Democracy Protests in Hong Kong

"Hong Kong police have used tear gas to disperse thousands of pro-democracy protesters near the government complex, after a week of escalating tensions." Hong Kong: Tear gas and clashes at democracy protest. Hong Kong's unprecedented protests and police crackdown, explained. South China Morning Post Topics: Occupy Central [Paywall after a few free articles]. Occupy Central with Love and Peace is on Twitter, and there is a live thread on Reddit.
posted by milquetoast at 1:48 PM PST - 68 comments

Six Uncollected Stories by Saki

Six short stories by Edwardian humorist and short-form master H. H Munro (Saki) that do not appear in any yet-published collection of Saki’s “complete” short stories, taken from an appendix in A.J. Langguth’s A Life of H.H. Munro (1982).
posted by The Whelk at 12:13 PM PST - 21 comments

Big Shoulders, Big Hair, Big Perfume: 1980s Through Fragrance

"The beginning of my interest in fragrance coincided more or less with a momentous year in perfumery: 1981. It was in that first year of what would later be called the Big Eighties that a Beverly Hills boutique released an eponymous scent housed in a box with yellow stripes that evoked the store’s awning. Giorgio was an immediate and a ubiquitous smash, a powerhouse floral so outsized that restaurants were said to refuse seating to Giorgio-wearing patrons." The '80s ushered in a new era in perfumery. [more inside]
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 12:10 PM PST - 84 comments

10 things you should never say to someone with bipolar disorder

Are you bipolar? This is a small thing, but there’s a little linguistic point to be made here. Referring to somebody as “bipolar” sort of insinuates that the only thing this person is is an illness. Their entire entity is just a disease. My surname is Parkinson so, can we not add to this, please? Rather, I think it is more polite to say someone “has bipolar” than “is bipolar”. You wouldn’t say that somebody “was cancer”. You wouldn’t say: “This is Maya. She is diabetes.” But people will talk of someone “being bipolar”.
posted by danabanana at 7:30 AM PST - 110 comments

Assuming a Body

University of South Carolina Upstate based the Critical Lede interviews Gayle Salamon about her groundbreaking transgender study, first published in 2010 titled Assuming a Body.
In the interview, Gayle and the academic panel discuss her book and evenly explore the nuanced tensions that exist between performativity, gender construction and trans identity
. [more inside]
posted by Annika Cicada at 6:34 AM PST - 9 comments

There is a Starbucks inside the CIA

Welcome to the “Stealthy Starbucks,” as a few officers affectionately call it. Or "Store Number 1," as the receipts cryptically say.
posted by gauche at 5:50 AM PST - 77 comments

The human being is very often not profitable from the system’s POV

According to the philosopher Anselm Jappe, who has come to Lisbon to give a talk at the Teatro Maria Matos, in capitalism we are defined by our relation to labor. But the system is a “house of cards that is beginning to collapse”. It is time to rethink the concept of labor.
posted by a_curious_koala at 5:41 AM PST - 67 comments

Bloody difficult actually

Want a new timesink but clicker games are not your thing? Let Rock, Paper, Shotgun introduce you to Compact Conflict, a Riskesque strategy game programmed in only 13 kilobytes.
posted by MartinWisse at 5:11 AM PST - 23 comments

"No negativity—we just want to be admired."

Generation Wuss » by Bret Easton Ellis [Vanity Fair]
"In his books, he used to shoot at the materialistic excesses of his generation. But today, youth has become Bret Easton Ellis' favorite target. According to him, young people are just too sensitive, too narcissistic ,too stupid. But ultimately, as he explains in this exclusive text, he kind of feel sorry for them ( and they love it !)."
posted by Fizz at 4:59 AM PST - 64 comments

I ♥ TO

10 Videos That'll Make You Fall In Love With Toronto [more inside]
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 1:23 AM PST - 26 comments

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