March 2, 2010
Conflict continues over homosexuality in Uganda
Petition against Anti-Gay Bill Delivered to Ugandan Parliament. Fierce debate continues in Uganda over the Bahati Bill, a controversial anti-homosexual law currently under consideration by the Ugandan government (prev). [more inside]
Over prescribe much?
Oregon is set to become the third state in the US to allow psychologists (with no medical training) to write prescriptions. Senate Bill 1046 (PDF version on Google Docs) will become law by next July unless the Governor vetoes it. One funny twist: during public hearings on the bill, it was revealed that an out-of-state expert (who was temporarily licensed in Oregon so he could give recommendations on the panel) happened to run a school that trained psychologists to prescribe meds, which would directly benefit from the bill's passage.
Over 8000 Cartoons from Punch Magazine
Punch Cartoons has over 8000 cartoons from the pages of Punch, the long-running British satirical magazine. It cast its eye on everything from quintessentially British entertainment to children's books to computer games to optometrists. Punch ran from 1841 to 1992 and was relaunched in 1996 and finally closed shop in 2002. You can read up on the history of the magazine on their website and if you want to read some old issues to see what they were like, Project Gutenberg has quite a few. [Punch previously]
Photography of Everyday Life
love-pictures "found and taken photographs that are experienced as much by the heart as by the head."
Better Than We Thought
"The conventional wisdom that Africa is not reducing poverty is wrong." [PDF, 339.97 KB] [more inside]
Let me introduce you to The Union.
Let me introduce you to The Union. While the title refers to the illegal marijuana trade in British Columbia, the movie is more about presenting what the filmmakers see as facts about marijuana and comparing marijuana to legal but more deadly substances, like alcohol and tobacco. It is an argument for the legalization and decriminalization of marijuana and also the adoption of medical marijuana.
Caution: Film contains Joe Rogan. [more inside]
The Radium Water Worked Fine Until His Jaw Came Off
The Radium Water Worked Fine Until His Jaw Came Off: Eben Byers was just one victim of a clear case of radioactive quackery. But the theory may not have been completely bunk. It's the radiation hormesis hypothesis. Previously.
I'm Just a Viewer With an Opinion
Review of Star Trek: Wrath of Khan (Pt 1, 2, 3, 4) with bonus review of The Original Series episode Space Seed. [more inside]
A Tribute to Film Noir
The Endless Night: A Valentine to Film Noir [slyt] A montage of scenes from classic film noir. [more inside]
Rosen on Roberts
US Supreme Court Chief Justice told law professor and commentator Jeffrey Rosen, “I think it’s bad, long-term, if people identify the rule of law with how individual justices vote.” He expressed his intention to help steer the Court away from 5-4 decisions. Now, three years later, Rosen argues that Roberts has been an activist, combative chief justice, willing to risk confrontations with the other branches of government and public opinion.
Actually, I find your primitive yet clever Earth technology fascinating. Please, do go on.
A History of Obama Feigning Interest in Mundane Things, slide show courtesy of New York magazine. Can be divided into two categories: with safety glasses, and without.
Grass Doe
Chile Earthquake May Have Shortened Days on Earth
Paul Tompkins Debates Improv Everywhere’s Founder
It takes two to speak truth: One to speak and another to hear
What is Rebetiko?
What is Rebetiko?
My own opinion is that it is the range of musical styles, that arose from the interaction and combining of the following ingredients:- the music played by the Greeks who were in Smyrna until 1922 (Smyrnaika) the songs called "Amanadhes" the music used for dancing by the Zeybeks the music that was being played in Greece up to the 1920s, that had developed from folk music any other influences I have forgotten or never heard of!.
Previously on Metafilter.
My own opinion is that it is the range of musical styles, that arose from the interaction and combining of the following ingredients:- the music played by the Greeks who were in Smyrna until 1922 (Smyrnaika) the songs called "Amanadhes" the music used for dancing by the Zeybeks the music that was being played in Greece up to the 1920s, that had developed from folk music any other influences I have forgotten or never heard of!.
Previously on Metafilter.
Holy grail discovered
"This is Bob taking care of us."
"In his 81 years, Bob Moore has built a mini empire with his health food company, Bob's Red Mill Natural Foods. During his recent birthday celebration, he told his dedicated employees that he's passing the torch and ownership of his multimillion dollar business to them." "[H]is 209 employees now own the place and its 400 offerings of stone-ground flours, cereals and bread mixes." [more inside]
The Return of Governor Moonbeam
Jerry Brown announces his candidacy for governor of California. Jerry Brown was derided as "Governor Moonbeam" during his two-term tenure as California's governor in the mid-70s and early 80s. He even had a famous fling with Linda Ronstadt. Later he became a radio-show host and mayor of Oakland, and he's currently California's Democratic attorney general. Brown contrasts his experience with current governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Republican candidiate Meg Whitman, saying: [more inside]
10^27 = HELLA BIG
Apple Sues HTC for Patent Infringement
Apple sues smartphone manufacture HTC for patent infringement. Digital Daily has the court filings, and includes a list of popular HTC Android and Windows Mobile phones targeted in the concurrent ITC Complaint to block importation of those devices into the US. Engadget has a little more information, including HTC's initial response. Listed patents are all seemingly software patents, a controversial area of patent law.
(via Daring Fireball)
Sailor Twain.
Sailor Twain, Or, The Mermaid In the Hudson is a serialized graphic novel with new installments every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
Farewell, Captain Maximus!
RIP Barry Hannah Author Barry Hannah, whose fiction was laced with dark humor and populated by hard-drinking Southerners, died Monday at his home in Oxford, Miss. He was 67. [more inside]
Rube Goldberg would approve
Remember how OK Go had to explain why they couldn't let fans embed their music videos? Well, they evidently got their record label to change their tune, because the off-the-charts amazing new video for "This Too Shall Pass" is embeddable. "Picture that old board game Mouse Trap and multiply it by several thousand," says Rolling Stone.
Pupsi Blue
Prone around the world
Facedowns: spice up those boring travel photos by mefi's-own-Clippertonizing yourself. [via mefi projects] [more inside]
I think Activision is a pretty cool guy, eh kills fangames and doesnt afraid of anything.
The Arms Trafficker.
Criminals, politics, governments. The decades-long battle to catch an international arms broker.
In the Garden of Lady Worden
The primarily instrumental band Clogs finally finds its voice, with Shara Worden (mp3) -- she of My Brightest Diamond and the Decemberists -- leading the vocal charge in their new album The Creatures in the Garden of Lady Walton. (The album also features Sufjan Stevens and Matt Berninger.)
"Black Genocide"
In the US, the conservative movement’s latest rallying cry against abortion claims pro-choice groups are conducting a systematic eugenics campaign to turn African Americans into an "endangered species." The idea is finding renewed traction and condemnation in Black communities. Several bloggers at RHRealityCheck are offering counter-arguments. [more inside]
Please say it ain't true
Poland's late, great, legendary reporter Ryszard Kapuscinski is accused of making it up. [more inside]
Cybarmageddon!
Cyberwar Hype Intended to Destroy the Open Internet. "The biggest threat to the open internet is not Chinese government hackers or greedy anti-net-neutrality ISPs, it’s Michael McConnell, the former director of national intelligence..." [Via]
Whop!
Waka Waka Hey Hey - tracing a tune's spread across the world.
Coast Salish Design
Peter Boome is an artist. An enrolled member of the Upper Skagit Tribe in Washington State, Boome specializes in Coast Salish design. (More info about this art if you press the "click it" option in the last link.)
Concerts à Emporter
Les Concerts à Emporter (or Take Away Shows) is a project by French filmmaker Vincent Moon in which he records musicians playing impromptu concerts in the street, in a courtyard, or even in an elevator, with often sublime results. [more inside]
"Oh, dude, this night shift sucks."
What horror lies within
How disgusting can the inside of computer become? See now! Some people smoke near their computers. Some people secrete their chip packets inside their computer boxes. You think you can get away with it until you need someone to find out why your computer is fucked up and then.. Ah hah! Could it be.. you have an alien fetus? Mice? The detritus of your fucked up lifestyle? All living within your box? Feel bad about yourself now!
A frog who would come here of his own free will
A new kind of civil disobedience?
Boston College sociology professor Lisa Dodson does research on poverty, public policy, and low-income work and family life. Recently her research took a different turn, as she discovered through interviews with U.S. managers in charge of low-income workers that some of them feel "(a) sense of unfairness (...) as a supervisor, making enough to live comfortably while overseeing workers who couldn’t feed their families on the money they earned. That inequality, he told her, tainted his job, making him feel complicit in an unfair system that paid hard workers too little to cover basic needs." Professor Dobson talks about this phenomenon, and how it plays out in that some managers undermine the system, in interviews in the Boston Globe and on public radio. [more inside]
Be it resolved that financial 'innovation' does not boost economic growth
Basicland vs. Sorrowland
A parable about how one nation came to financial ruin by Charles Munger. For extra colour there's... [more inside]
A parable about how one nation came to financial ruin by Charles Munger. For extra colour there's... [more inside]
Dreamland
The Coney Island Amateur Psychoanalytic Society Dream Films 1926–1972 are part of an installation/exhibition celebrating the centennial of Freud's visit to Coney Island. (The films may also be viewed on ubuweb.) Previously on Zoe Beloff.
He's Gone, Oh Why?
Tom "T-Bone" Wolk, a.k.a. that guy with the hat, is dead at 58. Hall & Oates won't be the same without him. [more inside]
There's just a bit more to Valve's recent Portal Update...
On Monday, Valve software issued a small patch for Portal. A New achievement ("Transmission Received") for the game was unlocked if 26 radios in the game were carried to the end of the levels. Each radio had it's own sound file, and concealed in those sound files were Morse code, pictures, and an md5 hash string containing a phone number which, if called via modem, has an interesting login (from Gladios 3.11) and seems to be streaming some strange ascii art.
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