April 9, 2007

the art of keeping time

Top 100 watch sites on the web. Strangest watches, odd watches, tactical sniper watch, geek watches, TokyoFlash watches, abstract LED, math watches, Pimp watches, micromechanical engineering for connoisseurs. Nooka watches, USB Data Storage watch, dot matrix watch, futuristic cool vintage 1, 2 and 3, funkadelic diamond rotolog, not fussy about the exact time watch, Rolex or replica?, horological hallucination watches, solar powered braille watch, Philippe Starck style, war watches, our growabrain's super collection of timepieces. A brief history of watches.
posted by nickyskye at 11:22 PM PST - 34 comments

Sylvia Beach

Shakespeare and Company, the first English/American bookshop and lending library in Paris, may be the most famous bookshop in history.
posted by serazin at 10:20 PM PST - 20 comments

Canadian Wireless Data Access Worse than Third World Countries

Recent discussion regarding the iPhone availability in Canada (Rogers says they'll carry it - Then denies doing so) has spurred ideas as to what it might cost. This tore open a nasty wound in the hearts of Canadians, having realized that their mobile data access is worse than that of third world countries. A petition has already been started.
posted by patr1ck at 10:00 PM PST - 29 comments

Jackie Robinson Day

"A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives." - Jackie Robinson

This Sunday April 15, 2007, Major League Baseball celebrates Jackie Robinson Day in commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the breaking of baseball's color barrier. For one day, superstars and managers throughout the sport as well as entire teams will be saluting his memory by wearing Robinson's retired number 42. Robinson is honored for his tremendous leadership both on and off the field (previously), he is remembered for his determination in overcoming racial prejudice and hatred, and for his post-career activities as a civil rights advocate. Perhaps the highest compliment is to say simply that Jackie Robinson was one of the greatest players to ever grace a baseball diamond, but his contribution to baseball, and to equality in America was far greater than statistics and pennants.

"Mr. Rickey, do you want a ballplayer who is afraid to fight back?" "I want a ballplayer with guts enough not to fight back!" See The Jackie Robinson Story, starring the man himself. (1:16:29, Google video)
posted by edverb at 8:43 PM PST - 20 comments

Is that a parasite in your trunks or are you happy to see me?

Martin Strel finishes 3272-mile swim through the Amazon River. BBC has an FAQ, and here are videos of Strel passing various checkpoints. Thing to avoid while swimming in the Amazon: the toothpick fish, aka the candiru. [previously]
posted by phaedon at 3:39 PM PST - 37 comments

72 Hour Party People

"This is the shit JFK was getting jacked in his ass during the Cuban missile crisis. I shouldn't even be calling this shit 'shit,' because it's disrespectful." Following 72 hours in the lives of some high-roller meth addicts.
posted by chunking express at 2:55 PM PST - 106 comments

Can Wiki Travel?

Can Wiki Travel? Ever try using Wiki Travel as your sole source of travel information? One man gives up his Lonely Planet and Fodor's and goes pure Wiki for a trip to Thailand -- and says it was a disaster. Anybody else have Wiki Travel horror stories?
posted by Kraftmatic Adjustable Cheese at 2:49 PM PST - 41 comments

Porn for Women

Porn for Women is a new photo book by the Cambridge Women's Pornography Collective that asserts that what really turns women on is a man who cleans the house and asks for directions. Others disagree. (All links SFW.)
posted by desjardins at 2:41 PM PST - 58 comments

panoramic navigation made easy

Field of View's SPi-V engine (pronounced "spiffy") lets you take panoramic images from places like flickr, and turn them into interactive, full-screen environments. (note: shockwave required)
posted by Dave Faris at 2:15 PM PST - 6 comments

The gun markets of Pakistan

The gun markets of Pakistan (NWFP)
posted by theemperorhasnoclotheson at 1:45 PM PST - 45 comments

No Blood for Blubber!

Bomb Iceland instead of Iran is the modest proposal of Princeton Professor of Political Economy Uwe Reinhardt in today's Daily Princetonian. Some enterprising Aussies are way ahead of him on that one. Heck, it wouldn't even be the first time the U.S. and Britain occupied Iceland. [via RÚV, the Icelandic state broadcaster]
posted by Kattullus at 1:04 PM PST - 26 comments

HEY HO LETS GO

Punk Rock For the People States love symbols. Colorado has the Stegosaurus as its state fossil. New York has the Sugar Maple as its state tree. And every state has an official song. But what about an official punk rock song? Connecticut is leading the way. [warning: youtube / wikipedia / websites that were designed in frontpage 95 ]
posted by Stynxno at 12:22 PM PST - 27 comments

blinded me with (beautiful) science

"To determine whether a diagram is good or bad, one needs to determine for what context it was designed for." PingMag (1, 2) interviews Andrew Vande Moere of infosthetics . A quick, informative read which includes pretty pictures of some MeFi faves.
posted by oneirodynia at 12:19 PM PST - 11 comments

i'm in ur mac, indexing ur filez

Google Desktop for Mac OS X finally saw beta release last week; so far, the beta includes search but not Gadgets. Initial reactions have been tepid amid concern about how extensively the installer modifies your system. Nonetheless, some people seem to like it.
posted by myeviltwin at 12:05 PM PST - 65 comments

The Death of a Nation

The death of Russia [google video]. A very interesting documentary made for Channel 4 in the UK on the state of modern Russia from Marcel Theroux. Marcel is older brother of Louis Theroux and son of the travel writer Paul. Marcel's documentary style is more sober than that of his brother and he deals with a tragic subject delicately and with a sympathetic tone. A very depressing but nonetheless very watchable documentary told by a literate, compassionate journalist. [48 minutes running time]
posted by ClanvidHorse at 12:05 PM PST - 18 comments

Not a first for Imus

Name calling not unusual for Imus Imus has of course made an apology at his blog. And sometime soon, I expect, he will shoot off his big mouth again. His recent offensive remarks are not a new thing for this guy, a pompous "pundit," and simple "sorrys" would be ok except for his history of being a bad human being. And, yes: homophobic remarks too, lest he be accused of being picky in his hate
posted by Postroad at 10:52 AM PST - 168 comments

Police Training Playgrounds

First Responder Training Sites. For police training purposes, in Southern California ten locations have been set up to look like "anytown, usa", where target practice & hostage situations are acted out. These areas are known in the industry as situation simulation villages, tactical training sites, or Hogan's Alleys (?). Emergency State is an online exhibit of over 200 photographs of these strange prop towns.
posted by jonson at 10:34 AM PST - 18 comments

Pop culture watercolor prints for cheap

Linking to someone's store usually isn't kosher, but Etsy user elloh's work is pretty unique. Featuring prints of her watercolor work for fairly low prices, her paintings focus on pop culture. There are moments from Office Space, Little Miss Sunshine, and Bob Ross immortalized in her art. But the cream of the crop is her series of portraits from The Office. Kevin, Creed, and Stanley are my faves and she even includes the UK version players as well.
posted by mathowie at 10:14 AM PST - 15 comments

If You're Into Colors Check Out Kuler

Everyone needs more Kuler. There a lot of color pickers out there...and I generally like all of them...but Kuler takes things a step further by making a community of color and color themes. Of course it's tied with their products but that doesn't distract from the usefulness of this free online application. It is also a beautifully designed website both in form and function.
posted by rmmcclay at 7:41 AM PST - 14 comments

Buy Metafilter a species!

Are you annoyed that there is no species of blind cave spider named Sinopoda metafilteris or worm salamander named Oedipina bluepepsi? You can fix that for 3,000 Euros at the controversal BIOPAT. For inspiration, the Curiosities of Biological Nomenclature site collects the puns, insults, and other weirdnesses that can be found in the scientific names of various plants and animals [prev.]. Genes are not immune to weird names, especially in the case of the fruitfly, where clever naming is normal; but even better are the world's strangest dinosaur names, which allow you to tremble in fear in front of the bambiraptor and meet the Dragon King of Hogwarts.
posted by blahblahblah at 7:26 AM PST - 13 comments

Bumper crop

Climate change fruitful for fungi: more than one third of the species recorded have started to fruit twice per year.
posted by prostyle at 7:25 AM PST - 15 comments

Congratulations!

Clive James on Scams and Hoaxes. "If the flim-flam man is sensible enough to offer you a return of only twice as much, the scam might even work. I was once defrauded of a heartbreakingly-large sum by a fellow writer who was smart enough to offer no return at all. True to her word, she didn't return my money either."
posted by Blue Stone at 5:32 AM PST - 18 comments

IT'S THE ONLY WAY TO BE SURE!

All these worlds are yours, save Europa. Attempt no landings he...llo! What the hell is wrong with you!? Did you just nuke Jupiter?
posted by loquacious at 4:14 AM PST - 86 comments

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