March 18, 2014
Pixel and Dimed
When I come across the task, "Proposal Flash Mob in Central Park,” I know immediately that I am exactly the wrong person for the job. The training video opens in a mirrored dance studio, with a man in a tight-fitting black t-shirt. "Please make sure you are familiar with this choreography before you commit to that rehearsal so we don't have to waste any time,” he explains in a high-pitched voice before counting out about three minutes of what looks to me like complex choreography. During slow claps at baseball games, I'm the fan who claps on the wrong beat. A real rabbit might have a better chance of learning this dance."A journalist's month-long experiment with the gig economy.
The Battle of the Fruit and Vegetable Soldiers
So you two, um hrm, dig up dinosaurs? Oh drat. [Jeff Goldblum noises]
Jeff Goldblum, as Dr. Ian Malcolm, utters an odd little laugh in Jurassic Park. Here it is, extended to 10 minutes. And if that's not enough, try 10 hours! But that's too straight-forward, so Soundcloud user FLIPSHOT made a dance remix, which YouTube user MrTabarnaco2 made into a music video of sorts.
Coffee and its Effects on Feature Creep
In 2004, Roy Rapoport set out to write a simple chatbot to help get the development team's coffee orders straight. What he ended up with was a bank. (via)
Beastie Boys settle for an apology from Goldieblox
Remember Goldieblox who fought for their right to infringe? Beastie Boys have agreed to settle the lawsuit, for a percentage of the revenues to be donated to one or more charities selected by Beastie Boys that support science, technology, engineering and mathematics education for girls. Class.
Then the game gets interesting again as you will be back to trains.
Crates in video games. (previously) Trains in video games. Birds in video games. Wall art in video games. Luchadores in video games. Foliage in video games. (previously) Logic in video games. Easter eggs (secret content) in video games. Normal eggs (and other food) in video games. Toilets in video games. Improved women's armor in video games (slightly NSFW). (previously) Bears in video games. Mickey Mouse in video games. Love in video games.
"Stories about charming scoundrels have a built-in appeal"
[Paul] De Man may have been a scoundrel who found a career teaching a certain method of reading, but that method of reading does not turn people into scoundrels. Probably ninety-nine per cent of the people who studied with de Man wouldn’t run a red light—forget about altering a transcript or voluntarily collaborating with Nazis. If there is an ethical takeaway from what de Man taught, it would be self-doubt.In The New Yorker Louis Menand attempts to find common ground between Paul De Man's methods of literary criticism and his sordid life in a long review of Evelyn Barish's The Double Life of Paul de Man. The biography has been criticized by Peter Brooks, De Man's former student, and was reviewed unfavorably by Susan Rubin Suleiman in The New York Times.
"Let's have a bloke's question"
When Australian prime minister Tony Abbott paused on the lawn of Parliament House to engage a group of high school students in conversation, he may have been hoping to impress some future voters. However, the questions fired at him by the 14-year-olds - about asylum seekers, gay marriage and why he has appointed himself Minister for Women - seemed to take him aback (warning: camera is level with Abbott's crotch.)
The students involved later participated in the March in March – a series of protests against current government policies which took place in 29 locations across Australia over three days. Despite over 100,000 turning out, the protests was little coverage by mainstream media – leading to criticism even from within the media’s own ranks.
“I’m just not attracted to Asian men.”
220 chicken adoptions
"A place to start a conversation about inequalities of representation"
"The Harvey/Renee Index doesn’t distinguish between the different types of Renees. Any character who can be identified with one or more groups that are currently marginalized based on race, ethnicity, sexuality, or gender is a Renee. Anyone who is white, non-Hispanic, cisgender, straight, and male is a Harvey." -- Diversity in the Big Two's superhero comics being a perennial hot topic, Comics Alliance comes up with a novel way to quickly establish a diversity baseline: the Harvey/Renee index. (Named of course for Gotham's greatest cops Harvey Bullock and Renee Montoya.)
Use the subway for transport? You'll identify with some of these.
The Voluntarism Fantasy
Internet Archive Digital Residencies
Each week, the Internet Archive's tumblr account is completely transformed by a digital resident along a theme of their choosing. [more inside]
it really is a very large pig
Elderly man rides giant pig through town. I don't think there's any need to say more than that, except that there are pictures.
NSA's MYSTIC and RETRO
New Snowden disclosures: "The National Security Agency has built a surveillance system capable of recording '100 percent' of a foreign country’s telephone calls, enabling the agency to rewind and review conversations as long as a month after they take place." [more inside]
The brave men and women of the FDNY work tirelessly to keep us safe
This afternoon, the City of New York announced a $98 million settlement in United States of America and Vulcan Society, Inc. v. City of New York, a federal class action lawsuit that alleged that the New York City Fire Department engaged in discriminatory hiring practices, using written examinations with discriminatory effects and little relationship to the job of a firefighter to select more than 5,300 candidates for admission to the New York City Fire Academy in 1999 and 2002. [more inside]
Explaining the faux Irish pub revolution
It's not easy being green.
The only thing green about that bud is its chlorophyll. In California, indoor marijuana grows account for about 9 percent of household electricity use. An indoor grow module accommodating four plants sucks as much electricity as 29 refrigerators. For every pound of pot grown 4,600 pounds of CO2 goes into the atmosphere. The energy needed to produce a single joint is enough to produce 18 pints of beer and creates emissions comparable to burning a 100-watt lightbulb for 25 hours. The production and distribution of pot in America emits as much carbon as 3 million cars. And other fun facts.
Freegans Frustrated
Let Books Be Books
Gender-specific books demean all our children. So the Independent on Sunday will no longer review anything marketed to exclude either sex [more inside]
Blood Speaks
What is life like when having your period puts your health at risk and means you are shunned by society? Rose George reports from Nepal and Bangladesh on menstrual taboos.: Blood speak [more inside]
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