A relatively long list of music videos by Michel Gondry. From his humble beginnings with Oui Oui to his eventual mastery of both space and time.
posted by Weebot at 1:59 PM Jun 26 2009 - 31 comments [114 favorites]

Michael Jackson, the undisputed King of Pop, has died of cardiac arrest in Los Angeles, California. He was 50 years old.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 3:56 PM Jun 25 2009 - 847 comments [113 favorites]

HTML Playground allows you to learn HTML and CSS by example.
posted by minifigs at 3:13 AM Jun 26 2009 - 10 comments [105 favorites]

Monks on Segways, with fire on the top of their heads, playing "Lightning" by Philip Glass.
posted by geoff. at 7:07 PM Jun 17 2009 - 82 comments [103 favorites]

How does our language shape our thinking? :"What we have learned is that people who speak different languages do indeed think differently and that even flukes of grammar can profoundly affect how we see the world."
posted by dhruva at 8:52 AM Jun 25 2009 - 101 comments [87 favorites]

WritingFilter: Got the urge to write, but not sure what to write about? Want to practice your freewriting skills? Try these short story idea generators.
posted by Ziggy Zaga at 8:49 PM Jul 8 2009 - 30 comments [86 favorites]

The Guardian's How to Believe series summarizes some great philosophical works in the reversed-date format we all know and love. Giles Frasier evaluates the lasting value of Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals, Julian Baggini tells us what to believe about Hume's critique of religion, Mary Midgeley begrudgingly accepts the majestic contributions of Hobbes' Leviathan, and Simon Critchley throws himself into the hermeneutic circle of Heidegger's Being and Time.
posted by anotherpanacea at 5:05 AM Jul 1 2009 - 63 comments [85 favorites]

Some comics about mental illness by Darryl Cunningham. (via)
posted by MegoSteve at 9:39 PM Jun 12 2009 - 39 comments [80 favorites]

Canning makes a comeback. Is it just another foodie trend? Or is canning back for good?
posted by sararah at 1:49 PM Jun 30 2009 - 106 comments [80 favorites]

"Exactly one hundred years ago a Russian photographer, began a remarkable project. With the blessing - and funding - of the Tsar, Nicholas II, he embarked on an extraordinary journey to capture the essence of Russia in full color photographs."
posted by mudpuppie at 2:53 PM Jun 18 2009 - 47 comments [79 favorites]

By popular demand, your new resident marine biology nerd has compiled some cool information about the Giant Pacific Octopus.The Giant Pacific Octopus (Octopus dofleini) is one of the strangest animals in the sea- and one of the smartest. Though it is commonly believed that vertebrates are always "smarter" than invertebrates, these guys defy that convention. As this video shows, they are able to easily open jars and retrieve food from inside. They are also, as the "Giant" implies, enormous- the biggest one on record was 30 feet across (according to National Geographic)
posted by WhySharksMatter at 6:57 PM Jul 6 2009 - 140 comments [77 favorites]

Before 9/11, the center of the conspiracy theorist's universe was the Kennedy Assassination. And probably the definitive statement on the ridiculousness of the conspiracy theories of that era was the Illuminatus! Trilogy[warning, the entire several hundred page novel in PDF], published in 1975 and written by two Playboy editors at the height of the era of flower power. It drew on many sources, but most distinctively, it drew from a little public domain pamphlet called The Principia Discordia. Many people know the catch phrases (Fnord! Hail Eris!), but not many people know the authors' very real connections to the Kennedy Assassination.
posted by empath at 6:29 PM Jun 29 2009 - 76 comments [74 favorites]

Z҉A҉L҉G҉O̚̕̚ [nsfIa!ia!Cthulhufhtagn.n.....nn../
posted by Avenger at 3:37 AM Jul 6 2009 - 163 comments [74 favorites]

The Wire Files Open-access online journal darkmatter, "producing contemporary postcolonial critique," devoted its fourth issue to the television drama The Wire. An editorial explains that the "special issue aims to examine the place of race in the complex formation of the series." Thirteen articles cover The Wire's political economy, subversion of heteronormative assumptions, racial codes, Herc as a Zelig-like nexus, Baudrillardian urban space and much more in a veritable smorgasbord of academic bean-plating.
posted by Abiezer at 9:02 PM Jun 29 2009 - 36 comments [70 favorites]

One of the hardest things for people to understand about the universe is just how big it is. There are three approaches typically used in describing its size. The first, the song, was pioneered by Monty Python (NSFWish, wireframe of naked woman) and then done just as masterfully by the Animaniacs. The second, the zoom method has been featured twice before here on the blue. The third method is the comparison method (skip to 1:30, unless you like looking at a image of the solar system with terrible distorted orbits), yielding some truly beautiful videos (this one found via the fantastic Bad Astronomy blog). These videos go, at most, as far as looking at the local cluster or the Virgo Supercluster. There are two videos that attempt to show the size of the entire universe, one unsuccessfully (although with great music) and one successfully. (Warning, all links except the first one, are to YT videos).
posted by Hactar at 2:06 PM Jul 1 2009 - 74 comments [69 favorites]

Every episode of Cowboy Bebop.

The Cowboy Bebop movie: Knockin' on Heaven's Door
posted by educatedslacker at 7:50 PM Jul 7 2009 - 58 comments [69 favorites]

As the world watches the conflict in Iran unfold, many commentators have tried to make a connection between the current protests and either the coup of 1953 or the revolution of 1979. But what do we know of the history of that country and how well do we know its leaders? Some of the major political players who have dominated the trajectory of the recent history of Iran include Mohammed Mossadegh, Mohammad Rezā Shāh Pahlavi, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, and Mir-Hossein Mousavi. All links above are to Wikipedia pages. For more extensive articles and information, check below the fold.
posted by billysumday at 7:06 PM Jun 15 2009 - 124 comments [64 favorites]

She did all things enthusiastically, but nothing well. A self-penned obit by someone you may wish you had known.
posted by Faze at 7:01 AM Jul 6 2009 - 36 comments [61 favorites]

"The arc of the Milky Way seen from a truly dark location is part of our planet's natural heritage," said Connie Walker, and astronomer from the U.S. National Optical Astronomy Observatory in Tucson, Arizona. Yet "more than one fifth of the world population, two thirds of the U.S. population and one half of the European Union population have already lost naked eye visibility of the Milky Way." In these areas, people are effectively living in perennial moonlight. They rarely realize it because they still experience the sky to be brighter under a full moon than under new moon conditions. "Reducing the number of lights on at night could help conserve energy, protect wildlife and benefit human health," astronomer Malcolm Smith of the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. One study found an increased risk of breast cancer for women living in areas with the most light pollution (abstract). Some communities are embracing their dark skies, such as the New Zealand community of Tekapo, possibly home to first "Starlight Reserve," waiting on UNESCO's official approval. Not sure where to look in the vast night sky? Follow some guidelines, or check the view in Chile, Queensland, Australia, or Texas.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:51 PM Jun 13 2009 - 74 comments [59 favorites]

Sarah Palin will resign from her position as Alaska Governor. ;-)
posted by Stewriffic at 12:58 PM Jul 3 2009 - 1308 comments [58 favorites]