April 22, 2008
Purgatory Iron Works
The folks at Purgatory Iron Works are making a series of 10-minute how-to videos for beginning blacksmiths. Current introductory topics include anvils, building a forge (part 2), and making charcoal (part 2); if there are topics you'd particularly like to see, the host is taking requests.
Sitting Out Earth Day
The new face of hunger -- “World agriculture has entered a new, unsustainable and politically risky period” says the International Food Policy Research Institute. Food riots have erupted in countries all along the equator because of soaring food commodity prices. So, where does the world get more food? If the extra supplies are to come mainly from large farmers in America and Europe, then they may be trapped in a farm subsidy Catch-22. Increase production per acre? We just learned about the myth of GM crops (previously of MeFi). All of this is why some are just sitting out Earth Day.
Typography posters and videos
Two blogposts from Smashing Magazine: Breathtaking Typographic Posters and Typography in Motion. Some notables: Retro Artist Feature, Linocut Print of London, It's the Outsideness Flavour of It, Zeitgeist, Hier Vorne, 80 of 500 Handdrawn Posters and music video for Ya no sé qué hacer conmigo by Uruguayan band Cuarteto de Nos.
How Shoes Are Ruining the Human Foot
You Walk Wrong. "It took 4 million years of evolution to perfect the human foot. But we’re wrecking it with every step we take." [Via]
Daiquiris on the Bounty!
no image tag, no problem
Alabama Songs
Alabama - Alabama Bound - Stars Fell On Alabama - Alabama Song - Alabama Jubilee - Alabama and, as if you could leave it out of this post... Sweet Home Alabama. Oh, and by the way, I'm told that other states occasionally appear in songs as well. You can verify that here. [NOTE: see hoverovers for link descriptions]
Typhoon Cobra
WWII. The Pacific. Three destroyers sunk, five carriers and three more destroyers heavily damaged [more inside]
new old music
Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu doesn't speak much, but when he takes up his guitar, he sings, literally and figuratively. He sings of growing up in an Aboriginal community on a remote island off the north coast of Australia; he sings of coming to terms with being born blind; and he sings the creation stories of his Yolngu people.
City of Memory
The Brooklyn Elite Checkers Club [flash] is just one of the stories on the recently released site, City of Memory - 'a public map that generates social interaction, personal expression, and collaborative storytelling'. [more inside]
Chocolate Creme and Goo!
Joseph Herscher spent 6 months creating his "Monster Marble Machine," an entrant in Cadbury's "Unleash The Goo" competition. While just a runner-up, he's gaining attention for his Rube Goldberg inspired solution.
Anybody got a match?
From Aircraft to Zodiac, from Tricks to Trucks, the Zippo Gallery has something for everyone. (Well, everyone who likes Zippos, anyway.)
Modelling human memory, predicting forgetting
Modelling Human Memory. Or, really, predicting the point of forgetting.
Illustrated Histories of Various Recording Technologies
Bad Company
The CIA's Odd Man Out: CIA station chief Bob Lady coordinated the secret kidnapping of Islamic militant Abu Omar in Milan and Omar's "extreme rendition" to Egypt where he was tortured. Italy indicted various CIA agents; Lady is on the run in Central America, abandoned by the agency. The twist: Lady opposed the mission all along. And Abu Omar will probably end up with Lady's home in the foothills of the Alps. [more inside]
Rawrrr!
Joshua Allen Harris makes inflatable sculptures out of found trash bags: bear, creatures, monster.
via wooster collective.
I want you to want me
I want you to want me is the latest project from Jon Harris and Sep Kamvar. It's an interactive touch-screen installation at MoMA, part of the current exhibit called Design and the Elastic Mind. The installation culls dating profiles from the Internet and visualizes trends and statistics. Each person is represented as a floating balloon. If you're in NYC, check the exhibit out before it closes on May 12. Otherwise, here's a
video.
Screw this
Unscrew America!! Flash 9 Activism designed to promote interest/activity in replacing regular old incandescent lightbulbs with energy-efficient CFL and LED bulbs.
Global food studies
Exposed: The great GM crops myth. A new study shows some genetically engineered crops (soy, cotton) produce less than equvilent conventional crops. Meanwhile the IAASTD - sort of the IPCC of agriculture composed of 400 experts from around the world - has concluded in a major report that GM crops are not the answer to world hunger and there must be a "paradigm shift" (IAASTD report summary). They predict global demand for food will double in the next 25-50 years, but with the current food crises, some GM crops are already less taboo, but PETA is banking on vat grown meat.
Avoiding death by plastic
Talk about plastic accumulating in the North Pacific gyre has popped up on and off for quite a while now. Vice is running a series on the state of the gyre, as part of their "Toxic Series".
Given the fact that most plastics are not biodegradable, we need to start looking more carefully at how much damage we are doing to ourselves through our use of plastic, and what we can do about it. [more inside]
Studying Really Pays Off!
This story from NPR's morning edition discusses a program in a Georgia middle and high school that pays students $8 per day to go to after school study sessions twice a week.
Jackie Cushman is the originator of the project. She is also Newt Gingrich's daughter. [more inside]
A Candle On The Water
The Lighthouse Directory. An information portal for over 9000 lighthouses, and sites of former lighthouses, all around the world. Photos, histories, technical specifications, etc. Most of the links are very thorough, with some including excerpts from keepers' logs. The site also includes links to current news stories and general historical articles related to lighthouses.
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