MetaFilter

Lightning On Demand is a volunteer organization of engineers, artists, scientists and machinists. Our key objective is to produce a controllable discharge of lightning at the greatest physical scale imaginable using modern technology. They've built the worlds biggest Tesla coil, Electrum, a Taser Cannon and some other projects
posted by warbaby at 9:32 PM PST - 19 comments

Hey Everybody! Since I became an occult investigator, my life has turned into one non-stop party! I'm having so much fun, and learning all kinds of cool things about myself and the world. It's really an absolute blast!
Tim Boucher isn't a paranoid occult-conspiracy theorist, a strident anti-occult crusader, or a neo-pagan or New Ager, but he is an occult investigator. That is, he's a fun-loving guy with a penchant for reading and writing about cool or weird things humanity has done in a search for a higher purpose.
posted by CrunchyFrog at 8:47 PM PST - 16 comments

10,000 kltes to be flown ”on both sides of the 500-kilometer long barrier that separates Israelis and Palestinians” on my birthday (but not in my honor). Inspiring, or just silly?
posted by LeLiLo at 8:44 PM PST - 26 comments

Raymundo Punongbayan, Retired Philippine Volcanology Chief Dies in a Chopper Crash. They were unschooled; he was a scientist. But when the Aeta of Zambales province reported through a nun Mount Pinatubo's initial signs of unrest in April 1991, Dr. Raymundo Punongbayan listened and trusted their indigenous mastery of their environment. It was through that mutual faith between the Aeta tribesmen and Punongbayan that efforts to save lives began for what turned out to be the world's worst volcanic eruption in the second half of the 20th century.
posted by azul at 7:02 PM PST - 5 comments

"We are here to hand over to you the power in order to avoid bloodshed." Today is the thirtieth anniversary of the Fall of Saigon.

A secret plan to end the war. After the rewarding the Vietnam war's technocratic architect with the Presidency of the World Bank, after the twin failures of President Nixon's "madman plan", to scare the Soviet Union into concessions over Vietnam out of fear of Nixon's insanity, and of "Vietnamization", turning over responsibility for the war to the South Vietnamese, the North nevertheless won the war.

Disposable helicopters. Operation Frequent Wind, the chaotic evacuation of the American Embassy, brought to a close fifteen years of American hubris. Karl Marx, who got little else right, observed "History repeats itself, the first as tragedy, then as farce."
posted by orthogonality at 4:41 PM PST - 50 comments

"I Punched Saddam in the Mouth" • A man known only as "Samir" worked as an Arabic interpreter for United States Special Forces in late 2003 when Saddam Hussein was captured in Tikrit: "I was so angry. I began cussing at him, calling him a motherfucker, a son-of-a-bitch -- you name it. I told him I was Shiite from the south and was part of the revolution against him in 1991. I said he murdered my uncles and cousins. He imprisoned my father. In Arabic, Saddam told Samir to shut up. And when Saddam called him a traitor, an enraged Samir silenced his prisoner with a flurry of quick jabs to the face. I punched Saddam in the mouth."
posted by dhoyt at 4:18 PM PST - 87 comments

Machine by SymmetryLab: fixed points, spinners, pistons, elastics, and connectors. Dig the frictionless world.

SymmetryLab's other stuff is noteworthy as well.
posted by gramschmidt at 4:01 PM PST - 5 comments

How Bob the Tomato got squashed by Barney the Dinosaur
Phil Vischer, creator of those Veggie-Tales cartoons gives a reflective account of why he did not become "The Christian Disney". So why did Big Idea Productions fail while other "Holy Cultural Warriors" are thriving? (Maybe this guy was too sincerely Christian?)
A shorter version of this Tale from "Christianity Today" magazine here.
via the spiritual center of animation on the web: Cartoon Brew
posted by wendell at 3:00 PM PST - 21 comments

a-wimoweh a-wimoweh..
In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight.
via
posted by peacay at 2:45 PM PST - 15 comments

The truth behind the spin? - three party political broadcasts (.wmv) made by Lee and Dan, the men behind the VW Suicide Bomber advert, and commissioned by the UK's Channel 4
posted by Navek Rednam at 2:23 PM PST - 10 comments

10 most bizarre employment cases of 2004 - At least two of these cases were previously discussed on Mefi. (1), (2)
posted by madamjujujive at 1:51 PM PST - 8 comments

Tony's rap. Blair, Bush, Blunkett and co, with a little help from Michael Jackson. By way of Counterpunch, where Alexander Coburn has unearthed a woodpecker conspiracy. Someone is being kept out of the news, he says, because it doesn't make a good story to have an extinct bird discovered by a member of the NRA.
posted by TimothyMason at 10:24 AM PST - 15 comments

Tsuga Recreational Area: abandoned Japanese amusement park photos (translation here).
posted by moonbird at 10:20 AM PST - 30 comments

Wilderness Survival Lesson: How to make fire from a can of Coke and a chocolate bar. If, for some reason, you'd ever need to...
posted by jenleigh at 9:38 AM PST - 12 comments

A Big Win for Human Rights. A settlement was reached in the case of Doe v. Unocal (previously discussed here), just in time for Unocal to be acquired by CevronTexaco.
posted by homunculus at 9:27 AM PST - 7 comments

Spit is good for your health. An experimental drug made from gila monster saliva may help with type 2 diabetes.
posted by C17H19NO3 at 9:27 AM PST - 6 comments

The "Soup N***" has Rules or "No soup for you!". The Soup Man has no imitators. Coming Soon: 1000 franchises at food courts across America.
posted by stbalbach at 9:06 AM PST - 29 comments

The Goatse Tribute Page [nsfw at all]
posted by srboisvert at 8:45 AM PST - 21 comments

Today's the day for Mac OS X Tiger (10.4). Operating systems have come a long way, baby (what about the future?), and Tiger presents a couple of features that are worthy of mention because of their design approach. The approach is to let "tiny-scale developers," developers that might not be able to write an entire application, even a small one, develop plug-ins and extensions for core system functionality. Dashboard has a budding user community (check dashboard exposed, apple's official gallery) as does Spotlight (and not just a way to add filetypes, check this out!) and Automator. It's interesting to note that the most hyped features of the new operating system will all have end-user-submitted extensions and additions making them even more essential.
posted by zpousman at 6:15 AM PST - 45 comments

A Florida court has blocked a thirteen year old girl's abortion. The judge's ruling comes in spite of Florida state law which specifically does not require a minor to seek parental consent before an abortion.
posted by thirteenkiller at 12:41 AM PST - 172 comments