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Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, PalTalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube, Apple are being monitored by the FBI and NSA, with Dropbox "coming soon." So what can you do? Use some alternatives. As Gabriel Weinberg, founder of DuckDuckGo, told NPR: "we made the choice to just not track people so there is nothing to turn over."
posted by filthy light thief at 9:14 PM PST - 118 comments

Braulio Castillo began winning hundreds of millions of dollars worth of contracts with the IRS within months of founding his technology company Strong Castle in early 2012.. [more inside]
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 6:48 PM PST - 83 comments

Olympus Overdrive is a webcomic in which the gods of Greek mythology compete to replace Zeus as the ruler of Olympus. Each deity is rebooted into the modern world and bound to a mortal companion, and together they must try to defeat the other teams. The winner immortal gets Zeus's Thunderbolt, while the winner mortal gets anything they desire. [Via]
posted by homunculus at 5:01 PM PST - 20 comments

Jesse Friedman, one of the subjects of the documentary "Capturing the Friedmans", is in fact a "psychopathic deviant" who molested 17 children in his parents' Long Island home. This, according to a the three-year review that "has only increased confidence in the integrity of Jesse Friedman’s guilty plea and adjudication as a sex offender," Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice said in her 168-page report. The exhaustive report also took aim at the makers of "Capturing the Friedmans," director Andrew Jarecki and producer Marc Smerling. It accused them of using misleading, out-of-context snippets of interviews to further their campaign to exonerate Friedman, 44. Of course, Friedman, his wife, and Jarecki all maintain that Friedman is in fact innocent. [pdf] Previously.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 3:06 PM PST - 115 comments

The United States' National Security organization has many parts, from the famous (NSA, CIA) to the mundane (OCI, NGA) to the more esoteric (NRO, CSS). But even the most dedicated Washington insider may not have heard of INR. [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 2:36 PM PST - 21 comments

David Esterly makes intricate, delicate carvings out of wood, in the tradition of Grinling Gibbons (1648-1721), whose spectacular cascades of flowers, fruits and foliage revolutionized ornamental sculpture during the age of Christopher Wren.
posted by ocherdraco at 1:55 PM PST - 7 comments

Don't go to art school. Why it's a bad idea and what you can do with the money instead.
posted by Artw at 1:49 PM PST - 103 comments

Rape in the Fields is a Frontline documentary that explores the persistent allegations that female agricultural workers in the U.S. are frequently sexually assaulted and harassed by supervisors who exploit their (often undocumented) immigrant status. Victims typically do not seek help from US law enforcement, either out of fear that they will be fired, deported or worse, or from a lack of understanding of U.S. law. Reviews: Popmatters. NY Times [more inside]
posted by zarq at 1:14 PM PST - 21 comments

Summer Talks: "Before Midnight" In a conversation moderated by Phillip Lopate, Richard Linklater, Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke discuss their new film Before Midnight as well as their nearly 20-year collaboration that now spans three features. [Warning, the last two links have some spoilers, but the first link does not]
posted by KokuRyu at 11:41 AM PST - 52 comments

Former Labor leader and Prime Minister Kevin Rudd defeated her in a Labor Party leadership spill, 57-45, on Wednesday. The result has triggered a wave of cabinet resignations, including that of the erstwhile Midnight Oiler and Minister for School Education, Minister for Early Childhood and Youth, Peter Garrett. Previously.
posted by rhombus at 9:17 AM PST - 152 comments

Pussy Riot aren't just on tour. They're on the run. Laurie Penny meets the Russian punk-protest group. [more inside]
posted by not_the_water at 8:58 AM PST - 18 comments

You've played Pac-Man as a terrifying FPS game in 3-D (including ominous music), but Pac-Man is so much more: Pac-Man as a Match 3 game, as a math tutor, as a co-op game, as a 404 error page, as a side-scrolling shooter, as an endless runner, as a Google Doodle, and, finally Pac-Man as an 8-bit roguelike tower defense game. Also, a niceonline clone of the original, which famously caused a coin shortage in Japan when it was released. [some variations from here]
posted by blahblahblah at 8:40 AM PST - 26 comments

Sleeping Dreaming Dancing Kittens [slyt | via | adorable]
posted by quin at 8:40 AM PST - 16 comments

A Deadly Triangle - the proxy war in Afghanistan
posted by Gyan at 7:38 AM PST - 8 comments

SCOTUS declares DOMA Unconstitutional, 5 - 4. The gay rights movement saw a significant victory at the Supreme Court Wednesday, where the justices struck down part of a law barring federal benefits to married same-sex couples. In a 5-4 ruling, the court struck down a provision of the 17-year-old Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) that denies federal benefits -- like Social Security benefits or the ability to file joint tax returns - to same-sex couples legally married. The impact of the DOMA case, United States v. Windsor, is clear for the nation's approximately 130,000 married same-sex couples. Section 3 of the law, the provision that was struck down, denies same-sex couples federal benefits. That provision impacts around 1,100 federal laws, including veterans' benefits, family medical leave and tax laws.
posted by theora55 at 7:15 AM PST - 764 comments

Le Corbusier: An Atlas of Modern Landscapes runs from 15 June - 23 September 2013 at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City. It is the museum's first comprehensive exhibition on Le Corbusier (Charles-Édouard Jeanneret, 1887-1965), and is billed as "the largest exhibition ever produced in New York of [his] protean and influential oeuvre"; in 2014 it will travel to Madrid and Barcelona. Exhibition curator Jean-Louis Cohen, an architectural historian at New York University, gave a tour of the exhibition as part of the "Le Corbusier/New York" symposium at the Center for Architecture on June 8. World-Architects was in attendance, so here we present some insight into the exhibition, accompanied by highlights from the symposium at right.

posted by infini at 7:10 AM PST - 17 comments

How Wikimedia Commons became a massive amateur porn hub
"Diving into Wikimedia Commons is like walking into a hoarder's photography warehouse. It is a vast, comprehensive mess."
Warning: The following story contains sexually explicit language.
posted by andoatnp at 5:59 AM PST - 108 comments

Garfunkel & Oates just released their new song online (probably not SFW) It's the latest of their social commentaries Please note that the latest video is not really SFW [more inside]
posted by I have no idea at 4:13 AM PST - 88 comments

One wasp can seriously ruin your picknick. A wasp nest in or near your home can be dangerous to your health. A yellowjacket wasp nest? Serious trouble. Now imagine a wasp nest holding a million yellowjackets.
posted by MartinWisse at 12:59 AM PST - 119 comments