September 29, 2014
The next big thing is privacy
The way you beat an incumbent is by coming up with a thing that people want, that you do, and that your competitors can’t do.
Ind.ie is the same. They have, rather excellently, found a way of describing the underlying message of open source software without bringing along the existing open source community. [more inside]
Ind.ie is the same. They have, rather excellently, found a way of describing the underlying message of open source software without bringing along the existing open source community. [more inside]
"something like a sense of despair often took hold of me"
In Defense of Ms. Hill
Artists make art for themselves. Art is an honest expression. Artists who pander to their fans by trying to make music “for” their fans make empty, transparent art. The true fan does not want you to make music for them, they want you to make music for you, because that’s the whole reason they fell in love with you in the first place.Hip hop artist Talib Kweli pens a response to an article criticizing R&B legend Lauryn Hill for being tardy to shows, arguably treating fans with contempt, and a lack of meaningful artistic output since 2002. Others have argued that Lauryn Hill's ouevre should be viewed with a critical eye and raised concerns about potentially homophobic and transphobic lyrics in her recent work.
Ms. Hill previously.
Ultimate mountaineering photography
Photographer Robert Bösch works with Swiss mountaineering brand Mammut and teams of climbers to produce elaborate and visually stunning Alpine works. His most recent endeavor is the 150 year commemoration of the Matterhorn's first ascent. Peta Pixel features a gallery of his works and a variety of "making of" videos. Robert Bösch
Broke into the wrong goddamn rec room, didn't ya you bastard!?
Monster Legacy, a blog "trying to delve into the secrets of the making of Movie Monsters," presents Subterranean Terror, an in depth look at the creature effects of the greatest Precambrian sandworm horror-comedy franchise of all time. [more inside]
"Maybe you should just look the other way."
Inherent Vice trailer: [SLYT] “Inherent Vice” is the seventh feature from Paul Thomas Anderson and the first film adaptation of a Thomas Pynchon novel.
When P.I. Doc Sportello’s ex-old lady shows up with a story about her current billionaire land developer boyfriend and a plot by his wife and her boyfriend to kidnap that billionaire and throw him in a looney bin… well, easy for her to say. It’s the tail end of the `60s, paranoia is running the day and Doc knows that “love” is one of those words going around, like “trip” or “groovy,” that’s way too overused–except this one usually leads to trouble. With a cast of characters that includes surfers, hustlers, dopers and rockers, a murderous loan shark, LAPD Detectives, a tenor sax player working undercover and a mysterious entity known as the Golden Fang, which may only be a tax dodge set up by some dentists... Part surf noir, part psychedelic romp–all Thomas Pynchon.
What Happened To Mitrice Richardson?
Five years ago this month, African-American lesbian Mitrice Richardson disappeared after being released from Los Angeles County Sheriff custody in Malibu in the middle of the night. A year later, her body was discovered; the initial investigation, was later found to be flawed. In 2011, her parents settled a lawsuit against the LA County Sheriff's Department.
Her family maintains a website, Bring Mitrice Justice. A documentary, Lost Compassion, is in progress.
No Such Thing As A Dull Fact
A new(ish) podcast from the QI elves, No Such Thing As A Fish serves up a delicious selection of facts, including that someone in Japan has patented curry, that certain octopuses eat their own arms when stressed and that a blow-up doll once saved a man's life. Binge-listen on SoundCloud.
BOOM
The Sound So Loud That It Circled the Earth Four Times. "It was 10:02 AM local time when the sound emerged from the island of Krakatoa, which sits between Java and Sumatra in Indonesia. It was heard 1,300 miles away in the Andaman and Nicobar islands ('extraordinary sounds were heard, as of guns firing'); 2,000 miles away in New Guinea and Western Australia ('a series of loud reports, resembling those of artillery in a north-westerly direction'); and even 3,000 miles away in the Indian Ocean island of Rodrigues, near Maldives ('coming from the eastward, like the distant roar of heavy guns.'1) In all, it was heard by people in over 50 different geographical locations, together spanning an area covering a thirteenth of the globe."
Chicken or egg? There was no moment when a dinosaur became a bird.
A team of researchers, including University of Edinburgh paleontologist Stephen Brusatte and Swarthmore College Associate Professor of Statistics Steve C. Wang, cataloging 853 skeletal characteristics in 150 dinosaurs and analyzing the rate at which these characters change, and they found that "there was no grand jump between nonbirds and birds in morphospace." In other words, birds didn't suddenly come into existence, but evolved, bit by bit, or characteristic by characteristic. But when birds were finally a thing, they went crazy. "Once it came together fully, it unlocked great evolutionary potential that allowed birds to evolve at a super-charged rate."
Why "F* You, Pay Me" Is A Necessary Mantra
In order to promote her new book, Lena Dunham has elected to engage in some AFPesque labor exploitation:
Last month, the writer, actor and producer Lena Dunham started an ambitious project. Nearly 600 people responded to an open call for video auditions on her website, including a sand artist, a ukulele player, a cappella singers, gymnasts, performance artists and stand-up comics, even some exceptionally charismatic babies.
The seven who made the final cut won’t be making cameos in “Girls,” Ms. Dunham’s HBO show about Brooklyn 20-somethings. Instead, they’ll be the warm-up acts — performing free of charge — on an elaborately produced, 11-city tour to promote Ms. Dunham’s new book, “Not That Kind of Girl.” [more inside]
The Tylenol Murders of 1982
The perpetrators of the crime have never been found, and that's due in part to the ease in which they were able to kill seven random people. All that was involved was taking a bottle off the shelf, opening it, inserting a number of cyanide laced capsules, then screwing the cap back on and putting it back on the shelf for the next person who came along to purchase it. In the wake of those seven deaths, an unprecedented recall was undertaken, a groundbreaking PR campaign was launched, and measures were taken that would forever change the way we consume medication.
Poor man's bitcoin mining
So you wanna join this bitcoin thing but can't afford the processing cycles to actually mine stuff? Now you can earn bitcoins using pencil and paper!
ATCSCC ADVZY 020 DCC/ZAU 09/26/2014 ZAU GROUND STOP
On Friday, ATCSCC Advisory 20 of 26-Sep-2014 went out. When operators, controllers and airport managers saw the title, a gasp of disbelief was heard. The problem was simple enough to state in three words, and complex enough to cancel thousand of flights and cost hundred of millions of dollars: ZAU ATC ZERO. [more inside]
Thinking about disease
Ebola and the Construction of Fear by Karen Sternheimer (Everyday Sociology)
"Sociologist Barry Glassner, author of The Culture of Fear: Why Americans are Afraid of the Wrong Things, explains how misguided panics are not just benign opportunities to prevent something horrible, but can divert attention and public funds away from more likely threats. He notes:[more inside]Panic-driven public spending generates over the long term a pathology akin to one found in drug addicts. The money and attention we fritter away on our compulsions, the less we have available for our real needs, which consequently grow larger (p. xvii).
WE ARE HAPPY FAMILY I AM SIMPSON
To kick-off its 26th season, The Simpsons handed the couch opening gag to cult animator Don Hertzfeldt (previously) who transformed Our Favorite Family into a surreal nightmare vision of the far future.
Violence Against Women Along Route 29
UVA Hospital employee and former Charlottesville cab driver Jesse Matthew has just been linked to the September 2014 disappearance of UVA student Hannah Graham, the unsolved rape and murder of Morgan Harrington, whose body was discovered on a farm outside of Charlottesville in 2010, and a 2005 sexual assault in Fairfax, VA. Graham and Harrison are two of a number of women who have gone missing near Charlottesville in recent years. [more inside]
People of Times Square
Meet the people hanging out in Times Square late at night. Over 330,000 people pass through Times Square every day. Here you can see the Times Square eccentrics in the 90s before the corporations took over.
confessions of a former troll
How The Simpsons Co-Creator Sam Simon Is Facing His Own Tragedy
Diagnosed with terminal cancer two years ago, and given only months to live, Sam Simon is still alive and still racing to spend the fortune he made as co-creator of The Simpsons on causes he loves, whether he is rescuing grizzly bears (and chinchillas and elephants) or funding vegan food banks. Sam Simon and philanthropy previously on Metafilter
Happy birthday to no one.
Deathsplaining
Alison Atkin is a Ph.D. student in osteoarchaeology at the University of Sheffield, studying plague cemeteries. Her research is presented in this quirky, hand-drawn poster. Don't miss GIFs of the interactive panels at her blog, Deathsplanation.
7 Little Words
Daily Puzzle online. Free apps. Student aids.
How come he don't want me, man?
The true story behind the saddest scene in "The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air" history
A handy 10-step guide to defending yourself, your country, or your boss.
"None of this is a competition."
Beyonce feminism vs. Emma Watson feminism. "The Internet’s overwhelmingly positive reactions to Watson’s feminism were exciting, but also troubling when I remembered the way Beyoncé’s feminism was dissected, critiqued, and doubted last year when she dropped her self-titled album that included a recording of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie speaking about feminism."
The Good, the Bad, and the Nights Watch
The theme from GoT covered as a western, à la Ennio Morricone.
Life in the North Dakota oil patch
An eight-year oil boom in North Dakota has drawn thousands of investors, laborers, and fortune-seekers. But from behind the counter of a local truck stop, it’s unclear just how much anyone is winning.
"he succeeded at shifting the immigration debate"
The Method To Steve King's Madness
"Sahil Kapur takes a look at how rank and file congressman Steve King (R-IA) came to call the shots on one of the most important issues of the modern era [immigration]."
"Sahil Kapur takes a look at how rank and file congressman Steve King (R-IA) came to call the shots on one of the most important issues of the modern era [immigration]."
Silent but Readly
"Midway through the Confessions, St. Augustine recalls how he used to marvel at the way Ambrose, the bishop of Milan, read his manuscripts: 'His eyes traveled across the pages and his heart searched out the meaning, but his voice and tongue stayed still.' Scholars have sparred for decades over whether Augustine's offhand observation reveals something momentous: namely, that silent reading—that seemingly mundane act you're engaged in right now—was, in the Dark Ages, a genuine novelty...Could the earliest readers literally not shut up?"
Harry Potter DIY - optical cloaking on a budget
John Howell and Joseph Choi at Rochester's Institute of Optics have built an optical cloaking device which uses just 4 readily available lenses. Eat your heart out Harry Potter.
Do you even know who the Notorious B.I.G. is?
30 years of Coens
"In honor of the 30th anniversary of the Coen brothers' debut, Blood Simple, I’m re-watching their 16 feature films and attempting to jot down observations on one per day, in order of their release. For a fuller explanation of what I’m doing and why, see my first entry, on Blood Simple. (Here, too, are my entries on Raising Arizona, Miller’s Crossing, Barton Fink, The Hudsucker Proxy, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, The Man Who Wasn’t There, Intolerable Cruelty, The Ladykillers, No Country For Old Men, Burn After Reading, A Serious Man, True Grit and Inside Llewyn Davis." -- Christopher Orr, writing in The Atlantic.
Privacy matters even with Tory ministers
Last Saturday, Tory cabinet minister for civil society Brooks Newmark resigned on the eve of the publication about his sexting habits. Allegedly he had sent unsolicited dirty pictures to a woman he thought was a Conservative Party activist, but was in fact an undercover reporter for the Sunday Mirror. Good, you may think, another scumbag who doesn't know the meaning of consent uncovered, but was this really the case, or was this actually a borderline criminal sting operation on the Mirror's part? [more inside]
Paper birds
Diana Beltran Herrera sculpts beautiful birds out of paper. She's currently working on a series based on postage stamps; you can see some of the new birds on her Facebook page. [via]
How to eat: chips
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