I'd like to learn how to make my own leather wingtips, but I have not the slightest idea of how to start. What do I need? how do I learn? how much does it cost to make a shoe?
posted to Ask Metafilter by KingoftheWhales at 6:35 PM on February 18, 2008 (12 comments)

You've seen her before: Perfectly coiffed hair. Impeccably dressed. Sensible, yet sophisticated expensive shoes ... and you know she's "old money." Can you cultivate that look or must you be born into it?
posted to Ask Metafilter by Anonymous at 5:07 PM on September 12, 2007 (32 comments)

Is Kant wrong for America, or is deontism defensible? (via)
posted to MetaFilter by Alex404 at 11:44 PM on December 8, 2007 (22 comments)

What books/courses/web tutorials would you recommend to help me learn the Received Pronunciation (BBC) English accent?
posted to Ask Metafilter by scarylarry at 4:31 PM on November 20, 2007 (9 comments)

I am interested in hearing the experiences on applying to MBA programs in Europe (specifically to IESE, IMD, INSEAD, LBS and Oxford/Said) and [the US].
posted to Ask Metafilter by barrakuda at 3:17 PM on October 31, 2007 (2 comments)

Stephen Fry just started blogging. His first post? A post on the iPhone, the history of PDAs and the nature of technological innovation and desire, that's roughly the length of a medium-sized novella.
posted to MetaFilter by flashboy at 4:21 AM on September 20, 2007 (127 comments)

What single book is the best introduction to your field (or specialization within your field) for laypeople?
posted to Ask Metafilter by limon at 5:40 PM on September 8, 2007 (238 comments)

i imagine that kelvin-helmholtz is so long because there's some kind of balance related to radiation pressure (vaguely vaguely like eddington limit?) but i may be way off - never thought about it before. if it is radiative pressure (or anything related to being hot) that holds things up that means that you'll still get an initial collapse and ignition. so i think initial "inner" thermal equilibrium will be much faster, but final steady state could take a long time. and why on earth (or sun) is this chatfilter? delete the stupid answers, not the question. i realise it's not one of your valued "what stupid piece of crap for my kitchen should i waste money on today because i can't cook for shit but boy i know how to use my credit card like a pro?" questions, but it still has a valid answer.
posted to MetaTalk by andrew cooke at 6:15 AM on September 4, 2007 (100 comments)

What's the link between:
1) the quickly-growing number of American homeowners becoming unable to pay their mortgages after their ARM's reset (a trend nicknamed "ARMageddon" -- applicable in the UK too), which is translating into soaring foreclosure rates, and in turn forcing at least 60 US semi-shady mortgage brokers to go belly-up in the past year (i.e. the "subprime meltdown"), and...
2) the recent implosion and impending financial bailout -- which may become the biggest since the Long Term Capital Management fiasco of 1998 -- of two Bear Stearns hedge funds which dealt in mortgage securities? [more inside]
posted to MetaFilter by Asparagirl at 5:13 PM on July 11, 2007 (123 comments)

Cat-Scan.com is one of the strangest sites I've seen in some time. I have no idea how these people got their cats wedged into their scanners, or why.
posted to MetaFilter by Stan Chin at 12:43 AM on July 14, 2007 (111 comments)

Applicant who failed the MA bar exam sues not only the exam board, but the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court and four justices. Why? Because a question on the exam involved a Lesbian Couple, and therefore "the Massachusetts state government...are purposely-advancing Secular Humanism's homosexual agenda." (link goes to pdf of the complaint full of hilarious claims like this one)
posted to MetaFilter by allen.spaulding at 11:36 AM on July 3, 2007 (101 comments)

What are some good books on Postmodernist literature?
posted to Ask Metafilter by SansPoint at 11:46 PM on June 27, 2007 (8 comments)

Insults - they just don't make them as they used to.
posted to MetaFilter by swift at 8:24 AM on January 4, 2007 (38 comments)

Woodstock^ (YouTuner)
Day ☼ { Richie Havens ♪ Country Joe McDonald ♪ John Sebastian ♪ Sweetwater ♭ Incredible String Band ♪ Bert Sommer ♭ Tim Hardin ♪ Ravi Shankar ♭ Melanie ♪ Arlo Guthrie ♪ Joan Baez ♪ }
Day ☼☼ { Quill ♪ Keef Hartley Band ♭ Santana ♪ Canned Heat ♪ Mountain ♪ Janis Joplin ♪ ♫ Sly & the Family Stone ♪ Grateful Dead ♪ Creedence Clearwater Revival ♪ The Who ♪ ☻ ♫ Jefferson Airplane ♪ ♫ }
Day ☼☼☼ { Joe Cocker ♪ Country Joe & the Fish ♪ Ten Years After ♪ The Band ♪ Blood Sweat & Tears ♪ Johnny Winter ♪ Crosby, Stills & Nash ♪ ♬ ♫ Paul Butterfield Blues Band ♪ Sha-Na-Na ♪ Jimi Hendrix ♪ ★ ♫ }

posted to MetaFilter by pruner at 6:20 AM on May 15, 2007 (50 comments)

Twatter - A global community of friends and strangers answering one simple question: Who are you doing?
posted to MetaFilter by chrismear at 10:58 AM on May 14, 2007 (33 comments)

I have eleven sombreros.
posted to Ask Metafilter by luftmensch at 9:42 AM on June 16, 2006 (35 comments)

The Hostile New Age Takeover of Yoga [print version]. Standard "omg commoditization" rant, but has a delectable anecdote wherein someone mistakes clingy navel-gazing for reflection. ("What part of no don't you understand?" his note said. "I never want to hear from you again.")
posted to MetaFilter by Firas at 11:11 PM on April 6, 2007 (103 comments)

Poets on YouTube: Bukowski; Dylan Thomas; Jim Morrison; Allen Ginsberg; Sylvia Plath; Billy Collins; Cookie Monster; and what the hell, even Jacques Brel.

But there's plenty of readings by amateurs as well: for example, lilcutiewithabooty06 reads e e cummings; Michael reads cummings really fast; Tom Waits and Bono read Bukowski; bearded men read Lewis Carroll and Shakespeare; and what if Emily Dickinson had a ukulele?

Mouseover links to see titles; feel free to add your favourites.
posted to MetaFilter by goodnewsfortheinsane at 12:31 PM on March 26, 2007 (30 comments)

Welcome to Desktop Tower Defence Creeps will try and make their way from left to right (and, depending on difficulty setting, from top to bottom). Use money to purchase canons which you then position to force the creeps to route around while sustaining fire. Killing creeps generates more money, which allows the purchase and/or upgrade of canons, which come in useful as the creeps getting stronger/more resistant to fire as the game progresses.
posted to MetaFilter by jonson at 7:26 PM on March 6, 2007 (30 comments)

The Castle in Front of the Cave is, unsurprisingly, a castle in Slovenia fully integrated with a cave system; built in several stages beginning in the 13th century, the castle serves as the front to a large network of caves in the side of a mountain. This excellent flickr photoset has plenty more detail about the castle's history, defense systems & more. For those who want more detail, a series of QTVR panoramic images of the insides of the castle available on this Slovenian site. Via.
posted to MetaFilter by jonson at 11:49 AM on February 20, 2007 (24 comments)

Everything you ever wanted to know about the Belshaw Donut Robot (Model 42.)
posted to MetaFilter by ikkyu2 at 3:16 AM on November 20, 2006 (52 comments)

two part question: Can I ingest cellulace by eating assloads of termites or would my digestive system break it down into its base parts before it hits my blood stream? Second part - If i can get it into my body in a usable form, about how many would I have to eat before I could derive nutritional benefit from eating grass/paper/wood?
posted to Ask Metafilter by Tryptophan-5ht at 10:51 PM on January 21, 2007 (14 comments)

Interview with 36-yo entrepreneur Elon Musk of SpaceX and Tesla Motors (22min, video or audio, Jan 3 2007).
posted to MetaFilter by stbalbach at 7:08 AM on January 21, 2007 (9 comments)

This smells like chatfilter--the circumcision of Stalin's declawed cats kind of chatfilter.
posted to MetaTalk by fandango_matt at 5:45 PM on December 8, 2006 (27 comments)

FSI Language Courses
posted to MetaFilter by anjamu at 1:35 AM on August 17, 2006 (36 comments)

This year's Malinowski Memorial Lecture at the London School of Economics was presented by David Graeber, until recently an Associate Professor at Yale, entitled Beyond Power/Knowledge: an exploration of the relation of power, ignorance and stupidity. (PDF link) Although Yale declined to provide a reason for Mr. Graeber's recent dismissal, it's likely that his outspoken anarchism and activism, as well as his support for a union of graduate students, were influences in the decision. He explained some of his views on anarchism, "globalization", and, yes, hope for the future, on the Charlie Rose Show. (Youtube) Weekend reading assignment: Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology. (PDF link)
posted to MetaFilter by dinsdale at 4:56 PM on June 10, 2006 (22 comments)

The Monkey Chow Diaries. In the spirit of Seth Roberts' dietary self-experimentation, Angryman has decided that he's tired of cooking, scrubbing pots and pans, and wasting time in the checkout lines. Instead, he is looking for a constant diet of pelletized, nutritionally complete food: Monkey Chow [pdf]. [via]
posted to MetaFilter by monju_bosatsu at 8:11 AM on June 6, 2006 (48 comments)

Utopian Pharmacology. Can safe, sustainable analogues of MDMA (link to 1914 German patent) be developed? There is an urgent need for non-neurotoxic empathogens and entactogens suitable for lifelong use. Alas no single "magic bullet" yet exists that replicates the subjective effects of MDMA on a long-term basis. Hence most of us are doomed to display the quasi-psychopathic indifference to each other characteristic of the MDMA-naïve state.
posted to MetaFilter by three blind mice at 1:29 AM on May 27, 2006 (44 comments)

Modern contract law, which frames and defines our modern economy, is shaped by old and rather mundane disputes. Consider some of the seminal cases: Hadley v. Baxendale (1854); Hamer v. Sidway (1891); Carlill v. Carbolic Smoke Ball Co. (1892); Mills v. Wyman (1825). These cases, while minor in their actual factual footprint, still shape the world of contracts over a century later. (more about the cases inside)
posted to MetaFilter by dios at 11:30 AM on May 25, 2006 (32 comments)

What's That? Sadly, the education of the youth of amerika is declining in more than one way. The other day I was at the grocery store and the checker was unable to identify a portabello mushroom. And no, she wasn't new...and to make matters worse the checker next to her didn't know either. (more inside)
posted to MetaFilter by MiHail at 9:25 AM on November 12, 2005 (1032 comments)