March 6, 2010

Some helpful sites

Stackoverflow is great for getting questions answered, but sometimes I want to fix up someone else's code, or learn Python by doing, or solve some language-agnostic puzzles, even if they're meant for high schoolers or undergraduates. Sometimes I try to wrap my mind around some incomprehensible or deceptively comprehensible programs. Sometimes I want to write Haskell in C++ or one- liners in Python.
posted by d. z. wang at 10:58 PM PST - 14 comments

RIP Mark Linkous

Mark Linkous of Sparklehorse has died of an apparent suicide. [more inside]
posted by threetoed at 10:18 PM PST - 88 comments

Ishman Bracey, Delta bluesman, 1901-1970

The Victor Talking Machine Co. of Camden, New Jersey is proud to present the following Orthophonic Recordings by bluesman Mr. Ishman Bracey: Leavin' Town Blues - Trouble Hearted Blues - Brown Mamma Blues and Saturday Blues. And remember, for best results, use Victor Needles. [more inside]
posted by flapjax at midnite at 10:18 PM PST - 1 comments

Third-world (and first) diagnosis under $0.01

Detecting a handful of diseases with comic book ink and a postage stamp (well, not quite, but the technology is related to the ink and it's on a postage stamp sized piece of paper). What's best is that the result is a simple visual that can be sent to doctors far away for recognition.
posted by swimming naked when the tide goes out at 9:36 PM PST - 16 comments

Tracking the Knowledge Economy

It has been looked at for many years (link to a 2003 PDF revised edition of a 1983 report). Inspiring reports trying to predict where this was heading, the knowledge economy is incredibly difficult to get a grip on, mainly because its products are intangible. [more inside]
posted by JoeXIII007 at 7:36 PM PST - 8 comments

discovering a whole tiny world

My Father's Garden brings you up close and personal with some truly magnificent garden creatures. (video short, 6:37)
posted by madamjujujive at 7:00 PM PST - 14 comments

Inspiring final lines of a speech that douchebags will quote in their Facebook profiles!

A Trailer for Every Academy Award Winning Movie Ever (single link cracked.com video)
posted by crossoverman at 6:42 PM PST - 55 comments

The Idea of Anthropogenic Global Climate Change

In 1896, Swedish physical chemist and Nobel laureate Svante Arrhenius calculated that doubling CO2 in the atmosphere would raise Earth's temperature 5-6°C. The idea didn't get traction at the time, in part because many believed it impossible for humanity to affect the climate (sound familiar?), but Arrhenius might have been on to something. Historian and physicist Spencer Weart's history of the century-long scientific investigation and popular debate will re-frame your perspective on today's crisis and arm you to educate the uninformed. If you don't know the history, you are probably repeating it. [After I-don't-know-how-many years, my first FPP]
posted by guanxi at 4:35 PM PST - 34 comments

Hilariously sleazy 'network marketing' with Yoli

Hilariously sleazy network marketing videos for Yoli. The "Yoli's Hybrid Comp Plan" video specifically is quite ridiculous, as are all the ones from the company founders. Yoli is a network marketing product, a health drink specifically, with some terribly creepy videos over-promising their get rich quick product to suckers worldwide.
posted by sp160n at 4:30 PM PST - 43 comments

...but can it run Crysis?

According to a customer report on the TribalWar forums, Newegg.com accidentally shipped bogus Intel i7 920 Retail CPUs. There are photos on Overclockers Forums and HardOCP. There's even a YouTube video of the fake CPU, fan and manual.
posted by stringbean at 3:43 PM PST - 58 comments

DNA’s Dirty Little Secret

DNA’s Dirty Little Secret: A forensic tool renowned for exonerating the innocent may actually be putting them in prison.
posted by homunculus at 1:47 PM PST - 40 comments

Brooms - the Perfect Weapon

Ben Driscoll, the cartoonist behind Daisy Owl, made a timelapse video of the creation of this comic.
posted by Navelgazer at 12:45 PM PST - 32 comments

He's Not Literate, but He's Nice

“Do DPS control the Foundation or outside group? If an outside group control the foundation, then what is DPS Board row with selection of is director? Our we mixing DPS and None DPS row’s, and who is the watch dog?” What job opportunities are there for someone who graduated high school with a 1.8 GPA and who took 15 years to get his Bachelor's Degree (darn that pesky English proficiency requirement)? Why, president of the board of education, that's what! [more inside]
posted by Oriole Adams at 11:31 AM PST - 73 comments

How to Succeed in Evil

How to Succeed in Evil is the story of Edwin Windsor, Evil Efficiency Consultant. He's like Arthur Anderson for Supervillans. A novel by Patrick E. Mclean (the guy behind the Seanachai podcast). The novel (promo mp3) will be available March 16th, but the entire thing is already available free in audiobook form as itunes files (zipped) (err..should be eventually but dropbox was giving a 500 error when I tried it) or mp3/stream. There is also a promo comic (pdf) illustrated by Nicolaus Rummel.
posted by juv3nal at 11:25 AM PST - 10 comments

Spin Magazine's early days: putting the Gucci in Guccione

Founded in 1985, the first year of Spin Magazine spilled ink on all sorts of great American fringe music. Swans, Sonic Youth, Jandek, Glenn Branca, Hüsker Dü, and Squirrel Bait. The magazine's entire run is available on Google Books. [more inside]
posted by porn in the woods at 11:03 AM PST - 39 comments

I Believe I Can Help You Fly

Ever wondered about the gadgets air traffic controllers use to get you back on the ground? The folks over at Ars Technica have a overview of the technology of air traffic control. [more inside]
posted by rodgerd at 10:04 AM PST - 13 comments

Director of Research at Google and AI genius

Reddit interviews Peter Norvig (reddit discussion) related: Seeds of AI at Google -- how the internet is shaping intelligence and learning and, in turn, the role of human culture in natural selection1,2 and why we are not living in western civilization. (via)
posted by kliuless at 9:41 AM PST - 13 comments

Will the past last in the digital age?

Digital disappearance. "In a recent survey of 110 news organizations, the Toronto Star found that increasingly, publishers are fielding regular requests from anxious and embarrassed readers to “unpublish” information, sometimes months or years after it first appeared online." [more inside]
posted by severiina at 9:22 AM PST - 31 comments

The homeless

Invisible people. A multi-link Vimeo post. Mark Horvath gives homeless people a forum, removes their invisibility. (Via NPR's Weekend Edition)
posted by caddis at 8:37 AM PST - 4 comments

What if Twitter... came to life?

We asked some of our friends to film their favorite tweets. We didn't care how they did it. They could read it. They could act it. They could do it with puppets. Whatever they wanted. The only rules were it had to be a tweet written by someone else and it had to contain the entire tweet and nothing but the tweet. (via Matt Haughey's Twitter)
posted by gman at 8:23 AM PST - 43 comments

Food Choice Sometimes Isn't

Before You Criticize the Food Choices of Others… think about how people with disabilities face limitations on how vegan/organic/fair-trade/free-range/local/food-political they can be.
posted by divabat at 4:32 AM PST - 171 comments

Overhead, without any fuss, the stars were going out

With only three of the ten nominated best pictures in this years Oscars having big name leads and last year's top five earners in the film business being directors, is this the end of the big name, big earning, Hollywood star actor?
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 4:30 AM PST - 61 comments

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