March 25
More of the same...
Stanley Donen's "Saturn 3"
"It seemed to have everything … an Oscar-winning visionary at the helm, a hot young writer, astounding production design, a sex symbol who defined a decade and Harvey Keitel – not to mention Kirk Douglas’ butt. So what went wrong?"
23andDelete
Genetic testing and analysis company 23andMe has entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy, with the intent of putting its corporate assets for sale - including its genetic library. [more inside]
What Even Is a Mental Image?
The best way I can express what happens subjectively when I try to project a shape onto an empty canvas is "halos of attention." I don't see anything, in any common sense of the word—there are no contours, no filling, no colors, or connected patterns in my field of view—but I know that certain parts of the canvas are more important than others at any given time, and that can feel similar to seeing. It's as if those regions of the canvas are more "active," more alive than the others. from An Aphantasic's Observations on the Imagination of Shapes [Aether Mug]
Billions people not counted
There could be billions more people on Earth than previously thought. The UN estimates there are about 8.2 billion people on Earth. However global population datasets miss a significant portion. [more inside]
When the slop begins to rot, Brainrot!
'Brainrot' AI on Instagram Is Monetizing the Most Fucked Up Things You Can Imagine (and Lots You Can't)
The hottest use of AI right now? Dora the Explorer feet mukbang; Peppa the Pig Skibidi toilet explosion; Steph Curry and LeBron James Ahegao Drakedom threesome. [Content Warning for content linked from article] [more inside]
The hottest use of AI right now? Dora the Explorer feet mukbang; Peppa the Pig Skibidi toilet explosion; Steph Curry and LeBron James Ahegao Drakedom threesome. [Content Warning for content linked from article] [more inside]
Silence of the Lambs of the Sea
The first great white shark carcass washed ashore in February 2017, in Gansbaai, a town about 35 miles southeast of False Bay. Over the next several months, four more were found, all with tears to their underbelly near their pectoral fins and none with livers.
Rocky to host Olympics rowing as expert promises crocs won't eat much
Rocky to host Olympics rowing as expert promises crocs won't eat much. There are some concerns about holding the Olympic Rowing and Paralympic Rowing events in a river that is known to regularly have 4 metre [13 feet] Salt Water Crocodiles. Male Salt Water Crocodiles can grow up to a weight of 1000 kilograms to 1500 kilograms (2200 – 3300 pounds).
Adolescence, and toxic masculinity
The Guardian: “Jamie has fallen under the spell of misogynistic influencers and suffered cyber-bullying for being an “incel”. His parents admit that he would shut himself in his bedroom and be on his computer long into the night. They assumed he was safe but he was secretly being radicalised. His story highlights the corrosive impact of social media on impressionable minds and has resonated profoundly with audiences. Parents of teenagers have been watching rapt, heartbroken and horrified in equal measure – with the show clocking up an astonishing 24.3m views in its first four days of release, four times more than the number two show. It tops the Netflix ratings in 71 countries, ranging from Chile to Vietnam.” [Also on FanFare] [more inside]
inefficient, not to say absurd
The Last Drops of Mexico City One of the world’s largest and most populated cities may run out of drinking water in the near future. As Mexico’s capital struggles to quench its thirst, scenes from the parched megalopolis show how water scarcity could one day impact cities around the globe.
The theatrics of snooker have no precise equivalent elsewhere
Most mainstream sports, while awe-inspiring at the professional level, also tend to serve as fun and accessible pastimes for amateurs, even young children. Think soccer, tennis, basketball. Snooker declines to lend itself so readily to the amusement of dilettantes. The cultural status of the game stems therefore not from mass participation but from mass viewership. Bad snooker would be painful to watch; mediocre snooker is notoriously boring; but great snooker is sublime. from Angles of Approach by Sally Rooney (NYRB; ungated) [more inside]
March 24
Oh hi guys. There's a federal election in Canada.
Scientists discover second unique lizard on Scawfell Island near Mackay
Biologists discover new species of skink on north Queensland island
The discovery of the Scawfell Island sunskink marks the second unique species to be unearthed on Scawfell Island near Mackay.
Ain't No Place to Run To
The queer people who are buying guns to prepare for Trump’s America
Since Donald Trump’s reelection in November, nontraditional gun groups across the city and country have seen a flood of interest. The national Liberal Gun Club said it has received thousands of training requests since the election, more than in all of 2023. A spokesperson for the group estimated that roughly a quarter were from LGBTQ people.
Bang Bang Bang - Tracey Chapman [more inside]
Since Donald Trump’s reelection in November, nontraditional gun groups across the city and country have seen a flood of interest. The national Liberal Gun Club said it has received thousands of training requests since the election, more than in all of 2023. A spokesperson for the group estimated that roughly a quarter were from LGBTQ people.
Bang Bang Bang - Tracey Chapman [more inside]
“How do we know they’re doing the right thing? The answer is: We don’t.”
"For many on California’s North Coast, Lear Asset Management’s heavy-handed tactics in Idaho were no shock. For decades, CEO Paul Trouette has straddled the line between private security and hired gun, hired by logging companies to police forest protesters." The mercenaries who took on Northern California's hippies resurface by Matt LaFever in SFGate.
“Conversion therapy with a side of ranch”
Why Dads Take Their Gay Sons to Hooters (NYTimes gift link, archive). Consider the delicious irony that a chain restaurant famed for its cleavage and chicken wings somehow became a secret sanctuary for young gay men.
Rothko Chapel
It's like going to the zoo but they're all dead.
Improbably Poppy | Episode 6: Nature
The language and depictions of religious characters could be NSFW.
The right wing, the left wing, and then there’s the Alice Evans take
Now those difficulties are real, and governments should take those economic concerns seriously. And I’m all here supporting more affordable housing, greater access to safer, accessible childcare. However, I don’t think that explanation is a full story, because it won’t explain why it’s happening everywhere, all at once, even at very, very different levels of income. from One big reason for fewer babies: phones?, an interview with Alice Evans [Vox; ungated]
Goblin Camp Returns
Like sardines in a jar
Accounts from immigrants held at the Krome North Processing Center in Miami allege life-threatening inhumane treatment. Of 6 deaths in ICE custody in FY25 so far, half were at Krome. [more inside]
"Two other users subsequently added prayer emoji"
The world found out shortly before 2 p.m. eastern time on March 15 that the United States was bombing Houthi targets across Yemen. I, however, knew two hours before the first bombs exploded that the attack might be coming. The reason I knew this is that Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, had texted me the war plan at 11:44 a.m. The plan included precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing. This is going to require some explaining.The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans: U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat about upcoming military strikes in Yemen. I didn’t think it could be real. Then the bombs started falling. [Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic]
ALA Statements on the Elimination of IMLS Library funding
ALA FAQ about Executive Order From MeTa: "Perhaps someone else would make a MeFi post because.. I think it's something that Mefites might want to discuss? ALA = American Libraries Association" [more inside]
Free Lewelyn Dixon
Lewelyn Dixon has been a green card resident of the US for 50 years. She immigrated from the Philippines at age 15 and currently works at the University of Washington in Seattle as a lab technician. On Feb 28, while returning from visiting family in the Philippines, she was detained at Sea-Tac airport by ICE, and has now been held in the Tacoma ICE detention center for over three weeks. [more inside]
Sloan - the Canadian power pop band non-Canadians need to know
If you’re Canadian and you listen to rock music on the radio in Canada then you’ve heard Sloan. If you’re not Canadian then you need to know all about the harmonies, handclaps and guitars so please step inside. [more inside]
Be hot and steamy and sweaty in this week's Free Thread
As the song about sauna, the Swedish entry for Eurovision, continues to delight fellow musicians and climb various music charts, the Free Thread for this week asks: what situation, event, or incident were you hot, sweaty, comfortably or uncomfortably warm in, maybe needing to cool down? Either deliberately or accidentally; perhaps a trip to Death Valley or Burning Man? Eating a chilli-laden meal? Falling asleep while sunbathing? Something else?
it's not just war zones
Pilot Akseli Meskanen's cockpit is warning him that his Airbus A330 passenger plane is about to crash into the ground... But he's 33,000ft in the air. So what's happening? Why could his aircraft be telling him things that aren't true? from "Pull up! Pull up!" [Sky News]
Thermal tech to protect bilbies and night parrots from feral cats
Thermal tech to protect bilbies and night parrots from feral cats.
Cameras, bioacoustic recorders and thermal scopes are being placed in Queensland's Channel Country in a bid to bring the relentless hunters under control.
We deserve it all
Full Remarks: AOC in Tempe, Arizona - "I am here to remind you of a simple fact. In spite of what Trump wants you to believe, we are not powerless in this moment."
March 23
The Bibliotheca Bible
"The unexpected popularity of the Bibliotheca project on Kickstarter brought a whole genre of Bibles — the multi-volume, reader-friendly kind — out of the archive of past ideas. Before, the conventional wisdom had been that nobody wanted a beautifully designed and produced edition of Scripture separated into volumes so as to do away with the necessity for super-thin pages and super-small print. (Or at least, nobody wanted to pay for it.) When Bibliotheca raised nearly $1.5 million for exactly such an edition, the conventional wisdom was quickly revised." [more inside]
i need a deep dive into 2-hit wonders
If one hit is a miracle, then two hits is a near impossibility. Two-hit artists sit in a weird space ... pop stars a remembered because they are very famous. One-hit wonders are remembered for the opposite. Their un-memorableness makes them great answers to bar trivia questions. Two-hit wonders are stuck in the middle. Some might be able to parlay those two hits into careers, but others are lost in a musical no man’s land, too many hits for trivia, not enough to be legends. Still, there’s got to be a greatest two-hit wonder. from The Greatest Two-Hit Wonders [Can't Get Much Higher]
Erdoğan's endgame: outlawing the Turkish opposition
For more than 20 years, Turkey has experienced steady democratic backsliding under the rule of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, but the secular Republican People's Party (CHP) founded on the ideals of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk has remained fierce. Following the failed 2016 coup attempt that Erdoğan leveraged to push through a constitutional overhaul centralizing power, social democrat Ekrem İmamoğlu emerged as the opposition's brightest star, winning a 2019 Istanbul mayoral race that authorities first nullified, then watched him win again by an even larger margin. Further gains for the CHP in municipal contests last year amid lingering economic dysfunction gave renewed hope that Erdogan could finally be ousted. That hope faded this week as the government launched an unprecedented crackdown, pressuring the cancellation of İmamoğlu's (required) college diploma, jailing him on corruption charges, and investigating over a hundred others. The shock move, which has sparked mass protests in the streets and widespread censorship, threatens to move Turkey firmly from a "competitive authoritarian" system (where the political landscape is merely biased) towards outright autocracy.
Exploring the use of Sensorial Cartography as an Ethnographic Method
[Blurred Spaces] is proposed as part of the Embodied Ecologies project led by Wageningen University, which consists of a major collaborative investigation into how people perceive and feel exposure to toxic products, how human bodies interact with a multiplicity of these products on a daily basis, and how they try to minimise their effects.
Seattle's Draw Bridges
Seattle has nine movable bridges: six road drawbridges (Ballard, Fremont, University, Montlake, First Ave South, South Park), one road swing bridge (Spokane Street Swing Bridge) and two train drawbridges. Seattle Times: Life in the tower: Who controls Seattle’s drawbridges? (archive). Seattle DOT: How do the Fremont and Ballard Bridge Openings work in Seattle? [more inside]
Smoky mouse translocation program helps population grow in southern NSW
Smoky mouse translocation program helps population grow in southern New South Wales (Australia). Ecologists say the smoky mouse is proving it can survive on its own in the state's south, where a repopulation effort for critically endangered rodent is currently underway. Three times larger than a house mouse, with a soft blue-grey fur and bright beady eyes, this rare and cryptic animal has been the focus of a group of ecologists in southern NSW for the past decade.
March 22
The General Strike
SomaFM
"SomaFM is an independent Internet-only streaming multi-channel radio station, supported entirely with donations from listeners. SomaFM originally started broadcasting out of founder Rusty Hodge's basement garage in the Bernal Heights neighborhood of San Francisco, as a micropower radio station broadcast at the Burning Man festival in 1999. The response to the project was sufficiently positive that Rusty Hodge launched it as a full-time internet radio station in February 2000."* [more inside]
The 24-hour diner contains multitudes
Depending on the time of day, it can be: a hub where decades-long regulars grab their morning coffee; a comfy spot for families to gather over an affordable, hearty meal; and a post-closing-time oasis where the young and buzzed find post-bar grub. In her short documentary Regulars, the US filmmaker Emma Kopkowski spends an entire 24-hour day at Jake’s Diner in Greensboro, North Carolina. There, she encounters a fascinating cast of employees and patrons, each of them with stories to tell and full lives viewers only ever catch a glimpse of. from The passage of time is a peculiar thing in a 24-hour diner [Aeon]
Rogan and Vonn are the Latest to Play Footsie with AntiSemites
On March 8, 2025, Palantir co-founder and Trump ally Joe Lonsdale described the fear generated by the antisemitic conspiracy theorists recently hosted on some of America's top podcasts.
For the first time in my lifetime, a lot of successful Jewish friends called me worried this week — names we all know — asking what is going to happen as these libels re-enter the mainstream, and are shared by millions.[more inside]
The HTML Review!
4th issue of the HTML Review is out. Scroll down! This and previous issues available via the archive page, which has more conventional tables of contents. Brought to you by Maxwell Neely-Cohen and Shelby Wilson.
The Great One. Or #2.
calibre e-book manger
calibre is one of the preeminent pieces of open-source software of our time, and it just reached Version 8, so I thought I would make a post about it. [more inside]
Dissolving Certainties
To better understand "the riddles and luminosity of life," Paul Hawken chose to look at the flow of life through the lens of carbon, and the result is a a beautiful, hopeful, and inspiring merger of varying forms of knowledge that provides a welcome bit of relief from "the labyrinth of anxiety, ignorance, and fear the world bequeaths." [more inside]
Ocean cowboys
From aristocratic to mundane
‘The aim of scientific and economic progress was the betterment of the human condition, but any gains challenged established social hierarchies . . . The elite felt threatened by the new middle class, which in turn felt threatened by the rising working poor’. The pineapple was the perfect luxury good to illustrate this, and indeed, Victorian authors sometimes used it as a direct metaphor for social and technological progress. from King of fruits [Works in Progress]
March 21
Trump urges Supreme Court to limit judges' power to impede his agenda
With sweeping actions, Trump tests US constitutional order [ungated] - "With a Congress controlled by Trump's fellow Republicans largely falling in line behind his agenda, federal judges often have emerged as the only constraint on the president's torrent of executive actions since his January inauguration." [more inside]
RIP George Foreman
Storm the wedge-tailed eagle returns to skies after feather transplant
Storm the wedge-tailed eagle returns to skies after feather transplant.
Aptly named, Storm the wedge-tailed eagle has been released back into the wild more than a year after being injured in wild weather in Victoria.
An Ocean in Motion
This short NASA animation explains basics of ocean circulation (about 5 min, with nice clear narration, showing ocean currents visualized, using data from the ECCO model)
“For that money, we could buy up TV stations...not just TV ads."
Via Americans of Conscience Checklist: Rural organizers and grassroots leaders in the U.S. form the Rural Defenders Union to support under-resourced anti-authoritarian actions. [more inside]