"Here we present ten of the finalists from Nikon’s 35th Annual Small World Photomicrography Competition, which recognizes photographs shot through a microscope."
posted by geoff. on Oct 6, 2009 - 21 comments

Convert "Full View" books in Google Books to PDF . Download. Instructions (via )
posted by manny_calavera on Sep 18, 2009 - 21 comments

The New Liberal Arts book is out. 47 pages of free pdf about things the various authors think will help prepare you for modern life. Earlier discussion about the planning phase of the book.
posted by srboisvert on Sep 3, 2009 - 37 comments

2009 U.S. government wall calendar pdfs! We already hit the counterterrorism calendar, so let's look at the wall calendar pdfs for Biosecurity for Birds, Invasive Plants, Invasive Species, and Private Lands. We've got funky green and blue monochrome. There's a brief one from the CDC and one that overdoes it a tad from NOAA. Finally, one from the International Space Station and my favorite, the Overseas Security Advisory Council's A-OK Kids Safety Calendar (2.6 megs). A preview of March's drawing by 3rd grader Roxane Kokka with someone impaled on a tree will make sure you always ware your seat belt.
posted by cashman on Jan 11, 2009 - 7 comments

Elves Under Hoof (direct link to a zipped file of four PDFs) is a free print-and-play solitaire game from Dan Verssen. From the rules: Victory: You win when the last elf is dead. You achieve a Prancing Victory if you have 5 or more surviving reindeer. You get a Spoiled Meat Victory if you have 2 or less surviving reindeer. You lose if all your reindeer are killed and left to rot in the snow. It is included, naturally, in the Games involving Elf Death list at BoardGameGeek.
posted by Wolfdog on Dec 20, 2008 - 4 comments

The Combating Terrorism Center (CTC) at the United States Military Academy, West Point, has published another report in their analysis of captured al-Qa'ida documents: Bombers, Bank Accounts, and Bleedout: al‐Qa`ida’s Road In and Out of Iraq [pdf] (note to UK readers). [more inside]
posted by acro on Aug 8, 2008 - 1 comment

Flash, PDF, two great tastes that go great together? And now you can use PDF flash movies to put videos in your powerpoint – er… what?
posted by Artw on Jun 2, 2008 - 37 comments

"Exclusive: Help us examine the lost JFK files." The Dallas Morning News has put a chunk of documents found in a vault in Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins' office online in PDF form for the public to review for notable information. "Given the volume, we haven't been able to review most of the files. That's why we are calling on you. Here's your chance to review never-seen-before materials related to the JFK assassination." Though I was able to load one of the documents at first, it will likely require registration after a few attempts. [via]. [more inside]
posted by cashman on Mar 1, 2008 - 9 comments

Design Police : Bring bad design to justice
posted by Blazecock Pileon on Jan 24, 2008 - 44 comments

Twenty hard-boiled pulp stories from a revived Black Mask Magazine. (Unfortunately, stories are mostly in PDF form.)
posted by klangklangston on Oct 10, 2007 - 10 comments

Illustrator Rob Nance presents: The Do-It-Yourself Posable Paper David Hasselhoff and Pope Benedict.
posted by miss lynnster on Sep 26, 2007 - 10 comments

/UBU Editions--Third Series. New, handsome, pdf editions of eleven out-of-print books, including ones by Maurice Blanchot, Claude Simon, Monique Wittig, and Rosemarie Waldrop. Be sure to also look at the first two series of /ubu editions. Previous ubuweb.
posted by OmieWise on Jun 27, 2007 - 9 comments

Read classic punk 'zines, without the inky fingers! Too young to have read the first issue of Flipside? Need confirmation that Maximum Rock 'N' Roll was just as boring (does/did anyone actually read those MRR Scene Reports?) and elitist back then as it is now? Do you find it hard to believe that Soul Asylum used to be credible enough to be interviewed by Suburban Voice? Or maybe you just want to marvel/feel-sad-for the obviously painstaking effort someone went through to scan every single page of these 'zines (including HeartattaCk) into PDFs? Well here 'ya go.
posted by melorama on May 23, 2007 - 25 comments

PDF-Mags.com. "Free PDF mag's from all over the world with main focus on art, design, illustration and life."
posted by Burhanistan on Mar 26, 2007 - 8 comments

B3ta Bumper Book of Sick Jokes (flash) on Scribd, a youtube for pdfs. For extra weirdness listen to the mp3 (the link is at the bottom of the pdf display).
posted by srboisvert on Mar 16, 2007 - 12 comments

Play Pac-Man against real live crickets for science and fun.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane on Sep 27, 2006 - 10 comments

Google is now offering PDFs of public domain books. Okay, this is a direct lift from Boing Boing but I figured it was too juicy for Metafilter to miss. On my first search I found An Historical Account of the Discovery and Education of a Savage Man, E. M. Itard's account (translated) of his experiences with Victor, the Wild Boy of Aveyron. What else is there, MeFiers?
posted by unSane on Aug 29, 2006 - 55 comments

A Technical History of Apple's Operating Systems – Amit Singh posts a free, 140-page PDF "bonus chapter" to his Mac OS X Internals: A Systems Approach.
posted by timeistight on Jul 25, 2006 - 18 comments

How things do change! A short Guide to Iraq published in 1942 by the US government. The handbook was written for American soldiers who were stationed in Iraq to prevent Nazis from seizing the country’s oil. .... 63 years later.
posted by threehundredandsixty on Oct 27, 2005 - 30 comments

Autumn Omakase - A Tasting Menu from Tatsu Nishino. A nine course primer to one chef's exploration of seasonal Japanese cooking. Provided as a lushly illustrated, freely downloadable 64 page pdf.
via
posted by boo_radley on Oct 25, 2005 - 16 comments

Coffee Starbucks and the Revolution PDF
The Tatler. First post: April 12, 1709.
...wherein I shall from time to time report and consider all matters of what kind soever that shall occur to me, and publish such my advices and reflections every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday in the week for the convenience of the post. I have also resolved to have something which may be of entertainment to the fair sex...
posted by Tlogmer on Jun 11, 2005 - 10 comments

Sony explains the PlayStationPortable's launch delay. The bestselling PDF, now available on Amazon for $750.
posted by DrJohnEvans on Jan 13, 2005 - 32 comments

The DNA of Literature. The Paris Review, with a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, makes available free .pdfs of fifty years of interviews with leading writers.
posted by rushmc on Jan 12, 2005 - 7 comments

King William's College Quiz 2004-2005 (PDF) has the reputation for being the hardest quiz in the world. It's also the hundredth edition, and they've made it extra hard this year! For what it's worth, here's last years Questions and Answers.
posted by BigCalm on Dec 21, 2004 - 41 comments

George Bushes's Military record: a critical analysis This pdf file is about as definitive a look as we are likely to get on the Bush military record. Clearly most post4ers/readers of Metafilter do not support Bush, but having some clear-cut evidence at hand to use in arguments against those who attack the Kerry militaryrecord, this will give the Bushites reason to move on to other topics
posted by Postroad on Sep 8, 2004 - 64 comments

The Textbooks of Military Medicine. An engrossing collection of pdf versions of textbooks used to train military medics. My favorite one is the one on War Psychiatry, which includes summaries of studies that have been done on veterans of WWI, WWII, Korea, and Vietnam, and another section on POWs and their phychiatric reactions (perhaps it might explain some things about Kerry or McCain?). Other topics include Medical Aspects of Harsh Environments (Vol. 1), Medical Aspects of Chemical and Biological Warfare, and Medical Consequences of Nuclear Warfare (<-- pdf file).
posted by acridrabbit on Jun 16, 2004 - 4 comments

Fallujah, Sadr, and the Eroding US Position in Iraq (PDF)
Why the US Has Already "Lost" Some Aspects of its Battles in Fallujah; A Negotiated Solution Means Limiting the Scale of Defeat; No Military Solution Can Now Work and What the US Should Do Now   by Anthony Cordesman
posted by y2karl on May 11, 2004 - 19 comments

Korean Slavery - Mark A. Peterson [pdf]
posted by hama7 on May 4, 2004 - 3 comments

I am Blogger, hear me roar! (3.1mb PDF) - A new study shows that "Online Political Citizens are not isolated cyber-geeks, as the media has portrayed them. On the contrary, OPCs are nearly seven times more likely than average citizens to serve as opinion leaders among their friends, relatives and colleagues. OPCs are disproportionately “Influentials,” the Americans who “tell their neighbors what to buy, which politicians to support, and where to vacation...” " They are “canaries in the mineshaft for looming political ideas” and tend to be more young, white, single, college educated, and affluent than average. I just feel so influential. Now where's the friggin paycheck...
posted by troutfishing on Feb 6, 2004 - 16 comments

The war on drugs is unfairly targeting doctors who prescribe legal pain medication to their patients who suffer from chronic pain, according to a spokeswoman of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons. She was speaking at a press conference of patient and physician advocacy groups, sponsored by the Pain Relief Network, in support of Dr. William Hurwitz. Dr. Hurwitz has been indicted and imprisoned for prescribing high doses of opioid pain relievers, as have other pain-management doctors. But these crackdowns may end up doing more harm than good to patients in chronic pain. [More inside.]
posted by homunculus on Oct 13, 2003 - 22 comments

What Happens When Technology Zooms Off the Chart? (pdf) Singularity is the subject of the Spring 2003 issue of Whole Earth magazine.
posted by Ty Webb on Jul 10, 2003 - 14 comments

Zacarias Moussaoui's legal brief to the Fourth Circuit regarding his right to question witnesses and the United States' reply. [warning: PDF]
posted by mhaw on Jun 4, 2003 - 4 comments

The Public Conversations Project "promotes constructive conversations and relationships among people who have differing values, world views, and perspectives about divisive public issues." They offer guidelines in discussing issues with your community and family as well as a resource in creating dialogue about Iraq. When I find myself reduced to name calling, I need these sort of communication tools.
posted by ericrolph on Apr 4, 2003 - 0 comments

UN resolution 377, This makes for fascinating reading as this arcane resolution provides for collective action by the general assembly 'if the security council, because of lack of unanimity of the permanent members, fails to exercise its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security'. Hardly applicable.
posted by johnnyboy on Mar 14, 2003 - 13 comments

Posters for Peace Clever and ready-to-print in handy PDF format.
posted by sparky on Jan 23, 2003 - 32 comments

Smallpox Vaccination? The New England Journal of Medicine made available today an early release of articles from their planned January 30, 2003 issue, designed "to help inform the current national debate about smallpox vaccination" [more inside....articles unfortunately available only in PDF....]
posted by fold_and_mutilate on Dec 20, 2002 - 31 comments

Rumsfeld's Rules [For educational use only] Donald Rumsfeld's Management Rules. Once available via the DOD website; now all copies have been pulled from government servers. This is one of the only copies still online. Read it ... while you STILL can... Soon available for sale in a print edition. Does it contain Hidden War Strategies? Can a US offical make money on the sale of "management techniques" developed and revised while serving as a government agent? Is not everything Rumsfeld produced in his capacity as a government agent owned by the US public? Discuss.
posted by mfoight on Oct 3, 2002 - 28 comments

DEA leaked report on Israeli spy ring Leaked report with blacked out names and no title etc? Note that the spies, if such they are, were gathering info dealing with drug enforcement and not with American military. Is this good? No Bad? yes. But seemingly not bad enough to anything other than shipping them out. Israeli mb big on Ecstasy and DEA well aware of this (If I am, why wouldn't they?). pdf file
posted by Postroad on Mar 23, 2002 - 7 comments

An analysis of some of the web's limitations as a medium for publishing newspapers' content. It focuses on NewsStand, the service offering the NYTimes, the International Herald Tribune and others in PDF format, and says some interesting things about the respective formats' ease of use and ability to guide readers to what they're looking for. (It has me thinking, is HTML/CSS just too limited to do certain things well?)
posted by mattpfeff on Jan 8, 2002 - 13 comments

So you think the expansion of the universe is accelerating? Think again! (Contains links to full paper in .pdf etc.)
posted by stuporJIX on Dec 21, 2001 - 2 comments

Make your own custom warning signs with a killer web app that produces surprisingly authentic and official looking signs in sharp, ready to print PDF. Fool your friends and neighbors by warning them of infectious waste. Fun for the whole family [via boingboing]
posted by mathowie on Nov 19, 2001 - 18 comments

What a fantastic conspiracy theory. This article basically accuses the Department of Justice of taking Dmitry Sklyarov hostage. It has convinced me, although admittedly that doesn't take a lot.
posted by Atom Heart Mother on Aug 30, 2001 - 7 comments

Lost or broken CD case? Ripped a disc and now it's just floating around on your desk? Freewheeling College students to the rescue! You give 'em the lowdown and you get a formatted paper CD case as a .pdf file. Input your own song titles or run an album search through their DB. They even archive mixes for you to share with others.
posted by donkeysuck on May 11, 2001 - 4 comments

Is PDF the Java of digital content? Not that Java comes even vaguely close to fulfilling it's 'Write Once, Run Everywhere' promise - but Adobe's PDF has a chance to become the universal, interchangeable, cross-media delivery boy it should be. This article by Robert Morgan explores Adobe's options around a PDF future.
posted by grant on Nov 6, 1999 - 2 comments