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Hot Wheels. The 2005 Hot Wheels Convention is going on right now. There are a few days left if you are within easy reach of Irvine, CA. That forty years later some "kids" still love these cars amazes me.
posted by caddis at 9:22 PM PST - 19 comments

Bling Bling Barbie.
posted by swift at 9:00 PM PST - 46 comments

World Toy Camera Day October 22, 2005 (via toycamera.com)
posted by PenguinBukkake at 9:00 PM PST - 7 comments

Fisher College sophmore Cameron Walker apparently didn't like a campus cop and posted about it on a forum at Facebook, a college networking site. He talked about watching the cop closely and trying to set the cop up which is admittedly some dodgy stuff, but is it worthy of expulsion from the university for his off-site comments?
posted by mathowie at 8:03 PM PST - 38 comments

Flying lawn mower (link to .wmv). Alas, FlyingThingz.com has won my vote for making the most inspired-yet-useless invention of the decade. I'd buy one, but I'm allergic to freshly cut sky. The witch might be cool for Halloween, tho.
posted by jeremy b at 7:50 PM PST - 17 comments

The Right Reverend Dr. Frederick J. Eikerenkoetter II, aka Reverend Ike, is, today, perhaps best known for being name-checked in the title song of Parliament's third album, but he's been around for a long time, preaching the gospel of "Thinkonomics," a get-rich-quick scheme rooted in the Holy Scripture. The Rev. makes no apologies for the opulence of his Harlem church, or for his many multicolored Rolls Royces; no one walks so perilously the fine line between fraud and holy man as he. Hear audio and see video (.wmv) of some of Ike's sermons and decide for yourself.
posted by Dr. Wu at 7:32 PM PST - 12 comments

The Evanion Catalogue at the British Library has a huge collection of high-res images (mostly advertisements) relating to Victorian entertainment and everyday life. I had the most fun browsing the subject index. I couldn't resist the Abnormalities - Human category, where I found a poster advertising The Frog Man. Some more mundane things also. Something for everyone here.
posted by marxchivist at 7:11 PM PST - 7 comments

Meebo.com. Web based chat (alpha) for all the main IM protocols.
posted by machaus at 5:29 PM PST - 22 comments

Livemarks. Watch Del.icio.us live.
posted by srboisvert at 4:15 PM PST - 18 comments

BBC confirms the story That box on his back, that earpiece? He's never said exactly how God talks to him, only that He does ....
posted by hank at 3:33 PM PST - 133 comments

America the Free You poor people don't need a dictatorship for a government, you keep yourselves in line very well. How many other examples are there of this? Dixie Chicks CD burning...Others??
posted by SSinVan at 3:16 PM PST - 71 comments

NYC Subway Warning The New York Police Department is investigating what it deems a credible tip that 19 operatives have been deployed to the city to place bombs in the subway, and security in the subways will be increased, sources told ABC News. Also here.
posted by R. Mutt at 3:01 PM PST - 112 comments

So, the US Army is having trouble meeting it's recruitment goals, and is lowering the bar for admission to try and make up the shortfall. Another tactic they are apparently trying is sweetening the deal with 3 free (FREE!!!) iTunes downloads if you agree to talk to a recruiter. It'd be foolish NOT to sign up, frankly!
posted by jonson at 12:37 PM PST - 56 comments

A surprise from Al Gore: I came here today because I believe that American democracy is in grave danger. It is no longer possible to ignore the strangeness of our public discourse . I know that I am not the only one who feels that something has gone basically and badly wrong in the way America's fabled "marketplace of ideas" now functions. How many of you, I wonder, have heard a friend or a family member in the last few years remark that it's almost as if America has entered "an alternate universe"? I thought maybe it was an aberration when three-quarters of Americans said they believed that Saddam Hussein was responsible for attacking us on September 11, 2001. But more than four years later, between a third and a half still believe Saddam was personally responsible for planning and supporting the attack.
posted by Shanachie at 12:37 PM PST - 80 comments

The Great Canadian Mileage Run 2005 - Air Canada is currently selling a 2 month unlimited flights in North America pass for $7000. This guy is blogging his way to 1,000,000 Aeroplan Miles.
posted by jeffmik at 12:35 PM PST - 30 comments

Make Your Own Totally Sweet Mario Question Blocks
Because its Really Awesome
We could all use a PowerUp from time to time. And PosterChild (warning link to website that time forgot) would like to show you how to make your own. Top site briefly mention in this thread. And one among many Mario fansites.
posted by fenriq at 12:01 PM PST - 23 comments

“The Puberty Pals.” [Flash, NSFW] This teaser animation for the “upcoming” feature film, Puberty: The Movie was produced by The B-Squad and The Toilet, who brought you “Leave it to Bush,” and voiced by Amy Sedaris, of Strangers With Candy.
posted by ijoshua at 11:23 AM PST - 19 comments

Al-Qaeda, Meet al-Salsa Salsa music is sweeping the arab world, especially as played by Amr Diab, hailed by an Abu Dhabi taxi driver as "the Ricky Martin of the Arab World." But unlike Ricky Martin, Amr Diab combines Latin rhythms in an appealing mix with guttural Arabic lyrics. It's the type of cosmopolitan fusion that might now be welcome in Iran's growing but barely-tolerated music scene.
posted by teaperson at 11:14 AM PST - 21 comments

The U.S. President speaks to the nation. With an approval rating hovering in the low 40 percentile, the sting of conservative hostility to his Supreme Court nomination Harriet Miers fresh on his jaw, and another deadly day in the Occupied Territories, George Bush summons the courage to approach the microphone to present yet another new rationale for his war: "Some call this evil Islamic radicalism. Others militant jihadism. Still, others Islamo-fascism... we're not facing a set of grievances that can be soothed and addressed. We're facing a radical ideology with unalterable objectives: to enslave whole nations and intimidate the world."
posted by three blind mice at 11:04 AM PST - 195 comments

We See Things Differently - a 1989 story from the perspective of an Arab visitor to a future, run-down America. By Bruce Sterling, science fiction writer and one of the founders of cyberpunk. Besides his science fiction, Sterling is also known for his 1992 book The Hacker Crackdown, available free on-line, and the Viridian Design Project. He's also an entertaining science writer; here's a column he wrote on bacterial resistance.
posted by russilwvong at 11:00 AM PST - 28 comments

On July 13, 1865, one of the most celebrated institutions in the United States, the American Museum, burned to the ground. But thanks to the wonders of technology, it has been rebuilt—sort of—on a Website called The Lost Museum... As it was managed by Phineas T. Barnum, the original American Museum was located in lower Manhattan and presented an ever-growing collection of wonders across five floors, ranging from "cosmoramas" and wax figures, to aquariums and live-animal specimens, to "moral representations" in the Lecture Room.
Via the incomparable Common-place's Finding Barnum on the Internet.
posted by y2karl at 10:31 AM PST - 8 comments

Shoes of local and national rock n' rollers. It all started one day when we were sitting around talking about how much we love each other, how much we love rock n roll, and how much we love shoes, when Amy exclaimed "That's IT!!! We need to make a web site that combines our love of rock n roll and shoes.
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 9:41 AM PST - 14 comments

Downhill Battle Labs: One "poorly paid" coder vs. the powers that be. previously mentioned, nonprofit Downhill Battle, having spun off the Participatory Culture Foundation/DTV TV Project ( "DTV is a new, free and open-source platform for internet television and video." ) has many other open source projects underway. DownHill Battle Labs projects include "Local Ink": "Enter your zip code, write a letter, and send it to the op-ed pages of newspapers in your area, and/or your representatives in Congress.", "Battle Cart": "...shopping cart for small operations. The catalog and the cart sit on the same screen....With a PayPal account, you can start selling things on a website in just a few minutes." Blog Torrent ( see: Metafilter 37204) a P2P Legal Defense Fund, and a Local Wi-Fi filesharing package. And more.
posted by troutfishing at 8:14 AM PST - 7 comments

"Mom, you're not going to like this." A mother of a U.S. soldier tells her son about the latest Iraq torture admissions, only to be told that his unit routinely beat and abused Iraqis. "...suppose you visit an Imam and you want him to call off IED attacks in his neighborhood. If you just go in and ask him politely, he'll tell you he'll try to help; but, he won't . . . But, if you go to that same guy and beat him up thoroughly, then ask him to knock off the attacks, he'll respect you and he'll try to help. . . ." The mother reports that her son was "under the impression that the conduct was in line with military policy."
posted by insomnia_lj at 7:40 AM PST - 172 comments

Now that they're being sued on racketeering grounds, the RIAA says "to hell with appearances" and files suit against a 14-year-old girl. Candy Chan might have succeeded in getting charges against her dismissed, but in claiming victory, she probably didn't have much of an idea that the music cartel would proceed to file suit against her 14-year-old daughter specifically requesting that the court appoint a "legal guardian" for her. Whatever happens in this case, it'll probably be less embarassing than some of their previous cock-ups.
posted by clevershark at 5:48 AM PST - 77 comments

Intelligent Design on trial! The ACLU of PA is blogging the current trial in Dover, PA between the parents of students and the local school board which wants to teach students Intelligent Design. Over at The Panda's Thumb, they're also keeping track of the goings on. The main ACLU website has statements from most of the plaintiff's experts in the case, including this long, well-supported pdf from philsopher Barbara Forrest, whose testimony is being used to dismantle the canard that ID is not Creationism. Over at the Legal Affairs Debate Club Beckwith and Laylock argued, last week, about whether teaching ID is legal. For background: this 2002 special report from Natural History Magazine on Intelligent Design Creationism.
posted by OmieWise at 5:46 AM PST - 81 comments

AOL is buying Weblogs, Inc! Reuters and Paidcontent.org say it's for at least $25 million.
posted by braun_richard at 4:53 AM PST - 27 comments

pointingit comments on links between an architectural photo database and Google Earth. (Windows only, at the moment). Mac users will have to content themselves with looking at the galleries.
posted by tellurian at 12:33 AM PST - 2 comments

Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning is a Finnish Star Trek spoof made over seven years by some three hundred volunteers. You can view the trailer and download the full movie (Finnish with English subtitles) via Bittorrent. Be sure to check out the behind the scenes gallery.
posted by wfrgms at 12:31 AM PST - 12 comments