Favorites from Rafaelloello
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The village that re-emerged
AFP photographer Juan Mabromata recently visited the ruins of Villa Epecuén in Argentina, a small touristic village that started slowly re-surfacing after the rising waters of the nearby lake left it completely underwater nearly 26 years ago.
I can picture every part of your comeuppance.
They Might Be Giants' new video
for "When Will You Die?" in which they build a giant paper monster hearse.
I'm gonna sing the Doom song now
China's economy poised to join the rest of us in the toilet.
I certainly hope one of you smart people can prove this article wrong.
Some watch the grass grow, some watch the poles melt
Every summer the arctic melt season plays out as the ice retreats in the summer sun. Are the monthly releases from NSDIC too infrequent for you? Is Cryosphere today lacking context? Neven's blog to the rescue.
Plagiarism or Literary Remix?
17 year old prodigy Helene Hegemann admits that her bestseller "Axolotl Roadkill" is not as original as previously assumed.
"The publication last month of her novel about a 16-year-old exploring Berlin’s drug and club scene after the death of her mother, called “Axolotl Roadkill,” was heralded far and wide in German newspapers and magazines as a tremendous debut, particularly for such a young author. The book shot to No. 5 this week on the magazine Spiegel’s hardcover best-seller list", writes the New York Times.
Unfortunately, parts of it were lifted. "It's not plagiarism", says the author.
Okay, everybody takes a drink whenever Isabella Rosselini says the word "penis"...
Sundance and Isabella Rosselini present season two of Green Porno. Most definitely NSFW. Previously.
If FAS 157 started it will FAS 140 will keep the party going?
The Fed's Public Private Partnership Program, promises to clear down as much as $1T worth of "legacy assets" from banks balance sheets. Globally, equity markets responded positively. But what about assets held off balance sheet?
Treasury paid $100 for every $66 in assets in top-ten TARP deals
The Congressional Oversight Panel, headed by Harvard Law professor Elizabeth Warren, notes in its third monthly report that for every $100 Treasury spent on its ten largest TARP deals, it received back only $66 worth of assets -- significantly less than for roughly comparable private parties.
The Crisis of Credit Visualized
The Crisis of Credit
by graduate design student Jonathan Jarvis is a thorough and visually appealing animation which explains the current credit crisis in clear terms. From the ever helpful NPR Planet Money.
Obama FAIL?
The Bad Bank Assets Proposal: Even Worse Than You Imagined
-- the administration appears intent on building another black swan. This is political capitalism. [via]
The Last Dirt Farmer.
A Loft Filled with Dirt, the Man Who's Cared for it for 19 Years
is a short film about Bill Dilworth, who has maintained Walter De Maria's installation, The New York Earth Room for the past 19 years. One of three "Earth Room" pieces De Maria made in the 1960's and 70's, the NY project is the only one still in existence.
The Lackawanna Cut-Off
A glance will show / Why Phoebe Snow / Prefers this route / To Buffalo.
And Phoebe's right / No route is quite / As short as Road / of Anthracite.
In 1908 the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad began work on the New Jersey Cut-Off to make its New York to Buffalo mainline (the Road of Anthracite so liked by Phoebe Snow) even shorter and faster. It was to have no grade crossings, and was to be as straight and level as possible — through hilly terrain. The 28-mile Lackawanna Cut-Off, as it is now known, was built over three years, cost $11 million, and was an engineering marvel of massive reinforced concrete bridges, enormous cuts, and the largest railroad embankment in the world. All of this has been abandoned for years, though there are plans afoot to restore the Cut-Off for commuter rail.
And Phoebe's right / No route is quite / As short as Road / of Anthracite.
In 1908 the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad began work on the New Jersey Cut-Off to make its New York to Buffalo mainline (the Road of Anthracite so liked by Phoebe Snow) even shorter and faster. It was to have no grade crossings, and was to be as straight and level as possible — through hilly terrain. The 28-mile Lackawanna Cut-Off, as it is now known, was built over three years, cost $11 million, and was an engineering marvel of massive reinforced concrete bridges, enormous cuts, and the largest railroad embankment in the world. All of this has been abandoned for years, though there are plans afoot to restore the Cut-Off for commuter rail.
Grace Jones in chocolate
Grace Jones in chocolate.
That isn’t a clever illustration of an assembly line of Grace Jones heads on the cover of her new album, Hurricane. Those are real chocolate Grace Jones heads made from 16 moulds of her head and body.
Synthetic CDO's: tsunami event when major bankruptcies reaches 9 (currently 6)
Synthetic CDO's are complex little known financial instruments (insurance contracts) that are on the brink of triggering "the most colossal rights issue in the history of the world, all at once .. mandatory." If, out of a list of several hundred major companies, any nine go bankrupt, the CDO's are in default, which would mean a mass transfer of cash (real money) from unsuspecting investors around the world goes into the banking system. How much? Nobody knows, but it’s many trillions. Banks will be flush with cash, perhaps ending the credit crisis, while many investors (individuals, charities, municipalities) will be wiped out. Alternatively, the triggering of default on the trillions of synthetic CDOs could be a disaster that tips the world from recession into depression. Nobody knows, but it won’t be a small event. Thus far the count is six: three Icelandic banks, Countrywide, Lehman and Bear Stearns.
The Resting Place of the Fallen Flowers of Yoshiwara
浄閑寺—Jokanji, the "Throw Away" Temple
"From the street, it looks like many other Tokyo temples, but behind the new main building is an old cemetery that has one particular point of interest, a crypt and monument to twenty-five thousand prostitutes interred there."
Why the DTV lag?
Why does a tv station's digital signal lag behind its analog signal?
brief glimpses into living abroad
Expat Interviews With People Living In Countries Like Japan - Holland - China - Thailand And A Lot More.
You don't really own the shares you think you own
All the stocks and bonds you think you own are actually owned by a company you've probably never heard of, a company owned by the same people who own the US Federal Reserve.
Another potentially huge settlement day for CDS contracts ...
Credit Default Swaps (CDS) are derivative instruments providing the purchaser with protection against default on an underlying financial asset. When Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac technically defaulted on September 7th there was much speculation that the CDS market would collapse as a result of protection being invoked on $1.4 trillion dollars worth of debt. On October 6th these derivative contracts settled, and the CDS market didn't collapse with recovery rates of 92% being observed. Today CDS contracts protecting against the default of Lehman Brothers settle. The problem? Because industry lacks a central clearinghouse for these derivatives, nobody is really sure how many CDS contracts were written either by Lehman or by other banks providing protection against a Lehman default. Next on the list are CDS' covering Washington Mutual, which are due to settle October 23rd.
Meanwhile efforts to create a clearing house continue, as some folks speculate that the settlement of Credit Default Swaps is a major reason why banks are hoarding cash.
Meanwhile efforts to create a clearing house continue, as some folks speculate that the settlement of Credit Default Swaps is a major reason why banks are hoarding cash.
Smells like Jessamyn Spirit
Barack Obama's initials are not a smell.
The women of Bamian.
"Far away from the Taliban insurgency,
in this most peaceful corner of Afghanistan, a quiet revolution is gaining pace. Women are driving cars — a rarity in Afghanistan — working in public offices and police stations, and sitting on local councils. There is even a female governor, the first and only one in Afghanistan." Carlotta Gall writes about promising developments in Bamian. (NY Times; print version.)
Obamix
The Obamix:
King Most puts together the perfect soundtrack to pump Obama supporters up for that next phone bank or canvass.
"Putting your money where our mouth is."
Strategery is a unique hedge fund.
Dr. Strangelove Dr. Strangelove
In Dr. Strangelove Dr. Strangelove, Kristan Horton imitates the satirical movie Dr. Strangelove and creates a new world for the film—silverware become an airplane, plastic and coffee grounds become the sky. [via]
Q.E.D. (quote, ellipsis, diacritic)
Typography for Laywers.
A basic introduction to typography in a clean, well-organized (and still growing) site.
"Merkle's Boner," 100 years later
One hundred years ago today, September 23, 1908, the Chicago Cubs played the New York Giants at the Polo Grounds. In one of the best seasons in baseball history, the two teams were in a hot pennant race - separated by one game with two weeks left in the season. What happened next is one of the most famous blunders (if it even was a blunder) in baseball history.
i can has privilij?
White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack as illustrated by lolcats.
Also, White Liberal Bingo.
A virtual 303, 909 & effects setup in your browser!
303, 909, FX, MIXER
= ACID VARSITY. In other words, two virtual 303s, a 909, effects and a mixer running for free right in your browser.
No more of this.
...and a time to give up (filter). Please help.
Without Posing and Artifice
"Using information provided earlier about their weekly routine, the photographer will arrive on the scene, and unseen, take shots of the subject." This is what Izaz Rony of Methodizaz says he can do for you for several hundred bucks. Or, perhaps use this self-hired paparazzi service as a present for friends and family?
"Without posing and artifice, the camera captures only the natural beauty of the person." Flash website [via].
Our Feature Presentation
If you had HBO in the 80's, you saw this every night at 8pm. HBO put together a brief behind-the-scenes featurette showing everything from the construction of the models to the composition of the music.
The Next Bubble
The Next Bubble: Priming the markets for tomorrow's big crash.
A layman's primer on the genesis and future of today's economic troubles, at Harper's Magazine.
Things you never thought you could do with your camera
One of the most amazing user-led projects out there, CHDK firmware turns cheap Canon cameras into photography powerhouses. You can take take time-lapse movies as in this stunning sunset example; automatically photograph lightening; easily make pretty HDR images and stereograms; have unlimited depth-of-field; and, perhaps most impressively, take photographs with shutter speeds of 1/60,000 of a second!
When keepin' it real goes wrong
You stay classy, San Diego.
A television reporter and an anchorman engage in an embarrassing on-air pissing contest in the middle of a newscast.
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