Virgin Galactic unveils SpaceShipTwo
comment posted at 7:44 PM on Dec-7-09
comment posted at 11:30 PM on Dec-7-09

Joshua Peter Tubbs is a self-proclaimed "kool" kid - class (co)president, Mr. Timberlane, a national honors student - who decided that for NaNoWriMo he would write an honest review of all 349 students in his senior class
comment posted at 4:32 PM on Dec-6-09

NPR fact-check of environmental protest group Plane Stupid's latest commercial featuring polar bears falling from the sky. [Warning: graphic.] This is not the only commercial that has people upset. Enter PeTA's "Grace" which several NBC affiliates predictably refused to air during Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
comment posted at 1:58 PM on Nov-26-09

The nation's Catholic bishops approved a broad new document on marriage. "Since marriage and same-sex unions are different realities, it is not unjust discrimination to oppose the legal recognition of same-sex unions," the letter says. "These unions pose a serious threat to the fabric of society that affects all people." Also Tuesday, the bishops reaffirmed a moral obligation to maintain nutrition and hydration for patients in a persistent vegetative state and approved a document on reproductive technology. "Life-Giving Love in an Age of Technology" reaffirms Catholic teaching against in vitro fertilization, egg, sperm and embryo donation, surrogates and cloning.
comment posted at 11:18 AM on Nov-18-09

"I funded the company myself but I did every horrible thing in the book to, just to get revenues right away." So said Mark Pincus, CEO and founder of Zynga, the company behind social games like Mafia Wars and Farmville. It's the latest revelation in a week-long bit of drama between TechCrunch and the companies running the shady virtual currency that makes the games profitable.
comment posted at 1:56 PM on Nov-6-09
comment posted at 2:04 PM on Nov-6-09

I Just Made Love shows on the map of the world places where people just made love.
comment posted at 3:04 PM on Oct-8-09

The history of Monopoly has been a long one, but the game also helped change history through its participation in providing hidden maps and tools to help British POWs during WWII.
comment posted at 8:47 AM on Sep-19-09

Childrens' cable television mainstay and media brand Nickelodeon is rebranding as "The Nick" with a new splat-less logo.
comment posted at 10:19 PM on Aug-4-09

Katamari Damacy wedding [via the King]
comment posted at 7:40 AM on Aug-4-09

The author of a new book on how rising oil prices will change America makes the claims that higher gasoline prices will make the country healthier and safer. Christopher Steiner asserts that, for every $1 that gasoline prices rise, obesity rates drop by 10% (as people walk more and eat out less). As for "safer", that comes in when high gasoline prices force police out of their cruisers and onto bicycles and foot patrols, where they can interact more closely with their communities.
comment posted at 8:38 AM on Jul-22-09

As I sat there, dazed and sweating, I felt hung-over, bordering on ashamed. ”Dear Lord,” I whispered, “what have I done to myself? I still have an entree coming! Will I survive?
comment posted at 10:04 AM on Jul-19-09

On the Street and On Facebook: The Homeless Stay Wired. "Like most San Franciscans, Charles Pitts is wired. Mr. Pitts, who is 37 years old, has accounts on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter. He runs an Internet forum on Yahoo, reads news online and keeps in touch with friends via email. The tough part is managing this digital lifestyle from his residence under a highway bridge. 'You don't need a TV. You don't need a radio. You don't even need a newspaper,' says Mr. Pitts, an aspiring poet in a purple cap and yellow fleece jacket, who says he has been homeless for two years. 'But you need the Internet.'"
comment posted at 1:21 PM on May-31-09

Now preparing for departure: PetAirways, an airline exclusively for animals that begins service to five US cities in mid July. Entrepreneurs Dan Wiesel and Alysa Binder came up with the idea of catering to the in-flight comfort of your four-legged friend, using specially modified cabins with pet attendants. Will it take off? The most recent APPA National Pet Owners Survey estimates that US pet owners spent $45.4 B on their animals in 2009.
comment posted at 8:03 PM on May-22-09

Asheville, NC and Portland, OR have tied in the contest for Best Beer City in the USA. It was a heated contest (scroll down for the comments) done in conjunction with Craft Beer Week, an event we can all support. Asheville is a beer city, it is true and clearly, so is Portland.
comment posted at 10:16 PM on May-9-09

It's shocking enough that 90 people have been killed in mass shootings in the US in the past 2 years. But it's even more shocking that 44 of those deaths have occurred within the month since March 10, 2009, when Michael McClendon touched off a firestorm of violence that ended with the deaths of 10 people in rural Alabama. This has been a month of grave infamy in the United States.
comment posted at 2:28 AM on Apr-6-09

Legend of the Seeker is a syndicated TV show based on Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth novels from some of the people behind the mid-90s Hercules show and Xena: Warrior Princess. It is in a similar vein, yet now with more earnestness. The entire series is available on Hulu for your enjoyment.
comment posted at 12:00 AM on Mar-17-09

Sci Fi has a new name. Now it's SyFy. The Sci Fi Channel is distancing itself from its geek demographic by rebranding its network. The former SyFy Portal website (a nerd news outlet) has been rebranded "Airlock Alpha" after selling the name to an "undisclosed recipient".
comment posted at 1:20 AM on Mar-17-09

A startup is proposing a new model for harnessing the power of the web for activism that gets results: bite sized actions, under written by corporate sponsors.
comment posted at 6:35 PM on Mar-3-09

Whereever you go, there you are: One step closer to a Holodeck (SLYT)
comment posted at 12:16 AM on Feb-25-09

Moving beyond no means no. The anthology Yes Means Yes brings together writers, male and female, to explore the power of enthusiastic consent and to promote female desire free of coercion. The book has spawned a series of readings, live chats, and some interesting blog responses.
comment posted at 3:12 PM on Feb-21-09
comment posted at 3:31 PM on Feb-21-09

TripAdvisor's 2009 Top Ten Dirtiest Hotels in the USA, Asia Pacific, UK, and elsewhere. Topping the list: the Hotel Carter, Times Square. [The Carter recently mentioned here.]
comment posted at 1:50 AM on Jan-29-09

Basketball coach is fired b/c of 100-0 point game, his team won
comment posted at 7:41 PM on Jan-27-09

Police Officer Seen on Tape Shoving a Bicyclist Is Indicted - Update to the widely viewed video of a NYC police officer shoving a critical mass rider off of his bicycle, reported on MeFi here.
comment posted at 11:03 AM on Dec-16-08

Kay S. Hymowitz strikes again. Previously, she wrote an article positing that "that too many single young males (SYMs) were lingering in a hormonal limbo between adolescence and adulthood, shunning marriage and children, and whiling away their leisure hours with South Park reruns, marathon sessions of World of Warcraft, and Maxim lists of the ten best movie fart scenes."
Now she has a new thesis: That angry, disenfranchised single young men use "Darwinist" philosophy to justify "resistance to settling down" and "unsentimental promiscuity". [via]
comment posted at 12:32 AM on Nov-18-08
comment posted at 12:38 AM on Nov-18-08

Want to sell your pain reliever to mothers? Rule #1: Don't make an ad that pisses off the "Mommy Bloggers". Twitter is currently "Motrin Moms" central- but that's not good news for Motrin.
comment posted at 2:34 AM on Nov-17-08

Star Trek XI, the trailer. (previously)
comment posted at 4:09 AM on Nov-17-08

"When my friend Richard Renaldi showed me the first images from the new series Touching Strangers I was just amazed. Asking two complete strangers to not only pose with each other, but to also touch each other while doing that... And this in a culture whose discomfort with touching someone you don't know, or touching something that someone else might have touched still baffles me, even after having spent almost ten years in it!" - A Conversation with Richard Renaldi about 'Touching Strangers'
comment posted at 1:48 PM on Nov-10-08

Never Say Die: Why We Can't Imagine Death. Why do we wonder where our mind goes when the body is dead? Shouldn’t it be obvious that the mind is dead, too? Examining self-consciousness and mortality.
comment posted at 5:22 AM on Oct-17-08

Recurring science misconceptions in K-6 textbooks: CLOUDS REMAIN ALOFT BECAUSE WATER DROPLETS ARE TINY? Wrong! SOUND TRAVELS BETTER THROUGH SOLIDS & LIQUIDS? No it doesn't. GRAVITY IN SPACE IS ZERO? It's actually strong. THE SKY IS BLUE BECAUSE OF COMPLICATED PHYSICS. No, it's simple. And many more.
comment posted at 11:44 PM on Oct-12-08

The New York Times reports that tens of thousands of voters from swing states have been illegally purged from voter registration lists using social security numbers. Unsure whether your vote will count? Check here.
comment posted at 4:50 PM on Oct-9-08

So, you watched the movie Tron, and now you want to run your computerized guy off of the game grid and into the rest of the computer system? That's exactly what Daniel Wellman did on his Apple IIgs.
comment posted at 2:44 AM on Oct-9-08

Charity Navigator is most interesting for the CEO salaries, but non-profits are a huge segment of society. Melissa Data lists all the organizations with nonprofit status for your zip. This is an excellent rant on one of them.
comment posted at 5:21 AM on Oct-6-08

The Corn Refiners Association would like you to know two things. One: High Fructose Corn Syrup is just fine. And two: anyone who says differently is an ignorant jerk.
comment posted at 12:49 PM on Sep-9-08

Clear passenger data stolen. A unencrypted laptop with the personal data, including name, address, SSi number, passport number, date of birth, etc. of every one of the 33,000+ users of the the Clear system has been stolen. The Clear system allows travelers who register and pay an annual fee to bypass airport security lines by using a smart card in some airports. TSA has suspended new registrations until Verified Identity Pass, Inc., a subsidiary of GE, figures out how to install PGP. VIP is the only private contractor allowed to register users to the Clear system. Via
comment posted at 12:12 PM on Aug-5-08

Orson Scott Card on gay marriage, which he says "marks the end of democracy in America". Not everyone is too happy about that.
comment posted at 12:51 AM on Jul-30-08

What's tougher to get than a same-sex marriage? A same-sex divorce.
comment posted at 2:20 PM on Jul-25-08

Meet Lonesome George. George is the last known remaining Pinta Island Tortoise. That's pretty lonely. He's also, according to some, the most famous reptile in the world. via. But there's good news: George might be a dad!
comment posted at 3:26 PM on Jul-23-08

Continuing the miniaturization of earlier designs, researchers at the Technical University of Delft have created a very tiny ornithopter which carries a one half gram video camera. The DelFly micro.
comment posted at 11:02 PM on Jul-22-08

Slides used to be dangerous..... After climbing up those sandy, metal crosstrax steps you got to the top and stared down at that steep ride below. The slide was burning hot to the touch, a stovetop set to high all day under the summer sun, just waiting to greet the underside of your legs with first-degree burns as you enjoyed the ride
comment posted at 2:51 PM on Jul-21-08

[SO VERY NSFW] Fake or Not? The site will show you ten pictures of boobies, a pair at a time. You must determine whether or not they are augmented. Wes Cherry, creator of Solitaire for Windows, aptly cites it as one of his three favorite websites. [via memepool]
comment posted at 10:19 AM on Jul-10-08

Psychotherapy in the Age of Obscene Wealth
comment posted at 2:27 PM on Jul-9-08

With 'Lively' Google tries something more interactive in the 3d space after buying SketchUp in 2006.
comment posted at 12:15 PM on Jul-9-08

Don't want to hassle with going to an amusement park? Build your own rollercoaster!
comment posted at 12:17 PM on Jul-5-08

"Pashe Keqi recalled the day nearly 60 years ago when she decided to become a man." In today's New York Times: an account of the twilight of an ancient Albanian tradition that permitted young women to forever pledge to live as men -- swearing completely off sex and marriage in exchange for greater social, political, and economic freedom. A last few women who took this step are still alive, and still treated as men by their communities.
comment posted at 12:12 PM on Jun-26-08

How long could you survive in the vacuum of space? Good to know.
comment posted at 5:15 PM on Jun-12-08

Eight reasons you'll rejoice when we hit $8-a-gallon gasoline.
comment posted at 2:43 PM on Jun-1-08