A better way to get kids to learn to ride - a single training wheel. The folks at bikecommuters.com liked it too. Available December 1.
posted by ObscureReferenceMan on Oct 8, 2009 - 46 comments

"It's big, like people were back in the 70s... Big when you get that way because you're just real damn strong." Brought to you from the Wichita Falls Athletic Club, 70sbig.com will teach you how to eat, how to train, and how to style your moustache so that you can get 70s big. Not interested in becoming 70s big? Then stop by and observe the amazing feats of those who were, like weightlifter Anatoly Pisarenko, who cleaned and jerked 583 pounds, or powerlifter Doug Young, who deadlifted 711 pounds in competition despite three broken ribs. The site also feature a series of cheeky interviews with Mark Rippetoe, owner of WFAC and author of books like Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training and Practical Programming for Strength Training.
posted by ludwig_van on Oct 8, 2009 - 48 comments

Mistress Krista says: Only YOU can stop gym dorkery! Stumptuous, one of AskMe's favourite fitness sites, has both a spiffy new design and a bunch of new content (Why your excuses are crap; Lies in the gym; Things you should not lift if you want to look like Madonna). Beginners will find plenty of smart and blunt information about eating, starting and refining a training program, avoiding and recovering from injuries, and developing a home gym one way or another. But Stumptuous has also extended its domain to YouTube. Part of the original Dork to Diva web series on correct technique is now up at YT (deadlifts; biceps curl) thanks to the support of The Prevention of Gym Idiocy Society (Ladies' Auxiliary), but you can also find some more unorthodox exercise ideas.
posted by maudlin on May 7, 2009 - 21 comments

Maybe you didn't get into the oldest Santa Claus School for an elite education. So you considered schools in other places. But being Santa Claus is something you can learn on your own. It's just a matter of learning how to dress and act. If you can handle the hours, the job insecurity, the union, the corporate pressure, and the customer relations, you may just find a jolly career.
posted by twoleftfeet on Dec 21, 2008 - 13 comments

Don't like scooping cat litter? Toilet train your cat.
posted by thbt on Dec 10, 2008 - 86 comments

Business writer Seth Godin tell readers to forgo the MBA and spend six months in his company. While potential applicants have made use of social networking to show their enthusiasm, others think it's a bad idea. Great opportunity or massive scam?
posted by divabat on Dec 4, 2008 - 42 comments

MapMyRun.com
posted by konolia on Mar 14, 2008 - 24 comments

Great Training Montages throughout history And a few of my own choosing to inspire you all to keep to your New Year's resolution-mandated training regimens: Rocky, Rocky II, Rocky III, Rocky IV, Footloose, Team America: World Police, Karate Kid, the Breakfast Club, Flashdance, and arguably the best of all time, Turkish Star Wars
posted by psmealey on Jan 2, 2008 - 41 comments

First Responder Training Sites. For police training purposes, in Southern California ten locations have been set up to look like "anytown, usa", where target practice & hostage situations are acted out. These areas are known in the industry as situation simulation villages, tactical training sites, or Hogan's Alleys (?). Emergency State is an online exhibit of over 200 photographs of these strange prop towns.
posted by jonson on Apr 9, 2007 - 18 comments

Fake Iraqi Towns For Training.
posted by Sticherbeast on Jan 12, 2007 - 12 comments

Fans of the BBC version of The Office take note: in 2006, Microsoft hired Ricky Gervais & Stephen Merchant to make a pair of faux training videos for the UK Microsoft headquarters, with Gervais reprising his David Brent role. Both videos are now up on iFilm, and are pretty damn funny (if you're amused by the Brent schtick, which I am).
posted by lilbrudder on Aug 12, 2006 - 15 comments

The Smell of War -- the Institute for Creative Technologies preps Quake-happy teens to become first-person shooters in the non-virtual war on terror. Now in Odorama.
posted by digaman on Jul 25, 2006 - 22 comments

The Punch Below The Belt is a WWII U.S. Government propaganda pamphlet scanned & hosted by our own fake & jonson. [Via Projects]
posted by guruguy9 on Jul 16, 2006 - 52 comments

Goldfish can be trained to do some pretty cool stuff.[mi]
posted by bigmusic on Jun 11, 2006 - 32 comments

Shocknife!
posted by Smedleyman on Apr 12, 2006 - 50 comments

HOWTO: Kidnap someone. Originally published in the al Qaeda web magazine Mu'askar al-Battar, and written by Abdul Aziz al-Muqrin, the author of The Targets Inside Cities [pdf].
posted by brundlefly on Dec 3, 2005 - 6 comments

Fly training (embedded video)
posted by fire&wings on Nov 1, 2005 - 13 comments

Want to learn to be a CSI? It's the U.S. government's multimedia website to train police and evidence recovery personnel. You can try the tests - the advanced one will tell you if you convicted the accused or not. Pretty slick for Uncle Sam.
posted by birdsquared on Aug 8, 2005 - 22 comments

KOTO is a charity training restaurant for street children set up in 1996 in Hanoi, Vietnam by Vietnamese-Australian Jimmy Pham (pdf file).
Of the more than 100 or so former street kids who have learned cooking, waiting and bar skills, 100% of KOTO graduates have since become employed in hotels and restaurants in Hanoi.
KOTO stands for Know One Teach One and they provide uniforms, accomodation, most meals and a small wage during the traineeship.
Even Bill Clinton ate there.
Street children number something in the order of 20,000 or more in Vietnam and most head to the city from poor villages in the countryside, seeking their own slice of the wealth that transition to a market economy is said to generate. Most make little money shining shoes and selling postcards and many become involved in drugs, crime, prostitution or are harassed and arrested by the Police.
Hoa Sua restaurant is another exemplary training enterprise (French affiliation) run along similar lines to KOTO excepting that they also have bakery outlets and embroidery training.
These organizations are hopeful examples of education combatting the cycle of poverty.
(Aside: but no contribution to the Vietnamese economy will be forthcoming from U.S. chemical companies who supplied agent orange during the war)
posted by peacay on Mar 11, 2005 - 11 comments

Wendy's Grill Skill [QuickTime] is a testament to training videos. They aim to educate and entertain. [originally via nassassin]
posted by pedantic on Nov 10, 2004 - 19 comments

Forklift training video. Poor Claus just can't get the hang of this furshlugginer contraption. WMV file, German language--things start getting interesting around 2:30. (via, via)
posted by adamrice on May 10, 2004 - 23 comments

Al Gore claims the Bush administration is not helping America, but hurting it by focusing on all the wrong things. Gore:The administration is still not investing in local government training and infrastructures where they could make the biggest difference. The first responder community is still being shortchanged. In many cases, fire and police still don’t have the communications equipment to talk to each other. The CDC and local hospitals are still nowhere close to being ready for a biological weapons attack. The administration has still failed to address the fundamental disorganization and rivalries of our law enforcement, intelligence and investigative agencies. In particular, the critical FBI-CIA coordination, while finally improved at the top, still remains dysfunctional in the trenches. The constant violations of civil liberties promote the false impression that these violations are necessary in order to take every precaution against another terrorist attack. But the simple truth is that the vast majority of the violations have not benefited our security at all; to the contrary, they hurt our security.
posted by skallas on Nov 10, 2003 - 29 comments

Mabel Stark was one of the greatest tiger trainers of the 1910's and 1920's. Her life is now the subject of a novel, The Final Confession of Mabel Stark by Robert Hough. The book has created a lot of controversy because it describes the sexual nature of Mabel's relationship with her big cats. Film rights have already been sold; Kate Winslet will play the lead. Writer Rip Sense recalls seeing Mabel as an old woman, still handling big cats in Jungleland, California. Want to raise big cats in your home? See this handy guide to matters such as litter-box training, feeding, and keeping the tigers from destroying the furniture.
posted by SealWyf on Apr 8, 2003 - 6 comments

Along the same lines of sites designed to get kids to eat more red meat comes the Presidential Prayer Kids website, which instructs the young on how best to support our leader through prayer. This week's lesson instructs the Bush Youth to be faithful, compares them to dogs. "They are showing their faithfulness by obeying the commands they are given and by doing exactly the job they were trained for."
posted by jonson on Apr 4, 2003 - 42 comments

Actors hired to heckle US troops in mock Arab town The military is taking pains to prepare naive recruits for the reality of their dirty work, and at the same time diminish the regard for native populations. Oh, people whining about being attacked is so routine. Don't they know we're trying to liberate them?
posted by letterneversent on Nov 13, 2002 - 44 comments

America's Terrorist Training Camp George Monbiot asks, in the Guardian, "what's the difference between Al Qaeda and Fort Benning?" Well, is there a difference? Away you go, kids...
posted by rikabel on Nov 1, 2001 - 95 comments

Army to develop video games. According to an Yahoo article, a venture funded by the US Army is developing videos games for the home market. "The U.S. Army will provide funding, but its Training & Doctrine Command bureau will also be involved in game development, ICT said. The games will allow players to control entire groups of soldiers, ICT said, with CS-12 allowing the player to take the role of a company commander and C-Force putting the player in the role of squad leader." I kinda get an "Ender's Game" sort of feel from this.
posted by Darke on Oct 25, 2001 - 16 comments

In Virginia, Young Conservatives Learn How to Develop and Use Their Political Voices - a New York Times (registration required yada yada) story about a conservative training camp for how to infiltrate and modify media coverage. Important for correcting a liberal media bias nobody can actually seem to find.
posted by faisal on Jun 12, 2001 - 16 comments