July 14, 2017
The cure for anything is salt water—sweat, tears, or the sea
Close to 200 trillion watts of kinetic energy lurk in the seas: more than enough to power the planet, if we could somehow extract it all.
Essential breaks and beats and drum'n'bass from Calibre and Mura Masa
If you're a fan of drum and bass and other beat-driven music, the past two BBC Essential Mixes have been gems. Last week saw the relative up-and-comer Alex Crossan, aka Mura Masa, blend vintage jungle sounds with a range of modern styles (BBC, MixesDB, Global DJ Mix), from Thom Yorke to MF Doom. The week prior, Dominick Martin, aka Calibre, spun two hours in the studio, oscillating between drum'n'bass and more ambient soundscapes (BBC, MixesDB, Global DJ Mix), weaving in a bit of Charles Bukowski to set the mood. Where Mura Masa presented in advance of his new self-titled album (streaming via Spotify embedded), Calibre has a dozen albums to date, with his newest, The Deep (official track samples on YouTube), released this past March. More music and musing below the break. [more inside]
Speaking truth to power--and that ain't all
Gretchen Rachel Hammond was suspended as a reporter for the Windy City Times after the journalist broke a story about women carrying rainbow flags emblazoned with the Star of David being asked by Chicago Dyke March organizers to leave a rally following the march (previously). This isn’t the first time this year Hammond has been the subject, rather than the author, of a Chicago news story. In January, she sued the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. Hammond, a former fund-raiser for the victim advocacy group, charged that SNAP exploited victims of sexual abuse by clergy in return for financial kickbacks from attorneys. In the months following the filing of the suit, both the founder/president and executive director of the Chicago-based organization resigned. [more inside]
"I am trained in gorilla warfare"
The dog is a gentleman; I hope to go to his heaven, not man's.
Humans are so disappointing lately. Here are some stories of remarkable dogs:
- Sergeant Stubby: The Most Decorated Dog of The First World War
- The memorial alone can't quite convey the whole story: "In commemoration of the devotion of Tip. The sheepdog which stayed by the body of her dead master Mr. Joseph Tagg on the Howden Moors for fifteen weeks from 12th December 1953 to 27th March 1954."
- An associate editor for the Global Journal of Addiction & Rehabilitation Medicine, Olivia Doll, lists some very unusual research interests, such as "avian propinquity to canines in metropolitan suburbs" and "the benefits of abdominal massage for medium-sized canines." That's probably because Olivia Doll is a Staffordshire terrier named Ollie who enjoys chasing birds and getting belly rubs. In all her spare time, Ollie also has sat on the editorial boards of not one, but seven, medical journals.
- The Final Resting Places of 7 Famous Dogs
Jupiter's Great Red Spot
The Great. Red. Spot. "On July 11, 2017, at 00:55 UTC, the armored tank of a space probe Juno reached perijove, the closest point in its orbit over the mighty planet Jupiter. Screaming above the cloud tops at over 200,000 kilometers per hour — fast enough to cross the continental Unites States in a minute and a half — it took eleven minutes and 33 seconds to reach the Great Red Spot. Looking down from its height of a mere 9000 km above the clouds, what it saw was ... glorious." [more inside]
The Chip Hall of Fame
Welcome to the IEEE's Chip Hall of Fame. With such estimable entries as the KAF-1300 Image Sensor, the world's first commercial CCD image sensor, TI's famous TMC0281 Speech Synthesizer or the heart of nearly ever 80's 8-bit computer, the MOS Technology 6502. The building blocks of this modern electronic world.
Fan Ho
How Fan Ho, Hong Kong’s poet with a camera, found his calling – in his own words
In one of his last interviews, Fan Ho, who died a year ago, aged 84, recalls how he rediscovered his passion for photography – and some old negatives – to finally gain the recognition and respect he longed for [more inside]
You thought your commute was bad?
Earthquake Safety Bed: The Bed That Eats!
Do you live in a high seismic activity area? Are you not in any way claustrophobic? Then the Dahir Insaat Earthquake Safety Bed is for you! It's just one of the many innovations from Dahir Insaat, including quadcopters for destroying entire air forces, drive through grocery stores, and whatever this is. [more inside]
Parliamentary fights!
Taiwan's feisty parliament, the Legislative Yuan, descended into fistfights, water balloon launches, and chair throwing again this week over a massive infrastructure spending plan. Members of the opposition Kuomintang clad in blue swarmed the podium. against the green-wearing Democratic Progressive Party, the latest in decades of dust-ups between the two camps. [more inside]
sent you sms... did you get it??
Young Actors Keep Ignoring Amitabh Bachchan's Texts And It's Twitter's Most Baghban Ongoing Saga [more inside]
Сыграем!
Tanks For The Memory
The Tank Museum at Bovington Camp in Dorset, England, is the largest collection of tanks in the world. They have the only running Tiger I in the world (which had a starring role in Fury), and the world's oldest surviving tank, the First World War Mark I. They The have an annual TankFest where they show off their tanks operating outdoors. Their YouTube channel is full of fun: Top Five Tanks with Lindybeige, Top Five Tanks with Stuntman Jim Dowdall, and David Fletcher's Tank Chats.
Simple pleasures for complicated times
Bloopdance. Press on the screen and shake your phone. Turn up the volume. (works best on a smartphone)
Coal Miners Are 0.019% Of All Workers
"The working class that actually exists bears little resemblance to the fantasies of the affluent, highly educated hacks who are paid to vomit their thoughts into newspaper columns. The new American working class is far more likely to be bussing tables at Applebee’s than wolfing down reheated appetizers until their Dockers rip. But many columnists put outsize focus on the most traditionally masculine blue-collar professions, many of which make up a negligible percentage of the total workforce." Stop Patronizing The Working Class, Alex Nichols for eThe Outline.
Happy 18th you big blue beast
Cat-Scan.com is one of the strangest sites I've seen in some time. I have no idea how these people got their cats wedged into their scanners, or why. [more inside]
In Sync We Trust
The full story, from ChimpanA to ChimpanZ
Hi, I'm Horace Rumpole! You might remember me from such previous posts as "SLYT of Things Blowing Up in Slow Motion" and "That Listicle Everyone Hated". Today I'm here to bring you a tale about the making of a little toe-tapping musical smash called Stop the Planet of the Apes, I Want to Get Off.
SoundCloud's in trouble
SoundCloud lays off 40% of its staff, only has enough money to make it to the next quarter. The audio streaming service, while popular with amateur and semi-professional musicians and podcasters, has struggled to find a viable business model that would make it competitive with the likes of Spotify and Apple Music. If it shuts down, it would mean the loss of a huge repository of music not found elsewhere. Perhaps Chance the Rapper (one of the many rappers who have achieved fame via SoundCloud) will save it?
I mean every word.
"The bombing of the little girls in Alabama and the murder of Medgar Evers were like the final pieces of a jigsaw puzzle that made no sense until you had fitted the whole thing together. I suddenly realized what it was to be Black in America in 1963, but it wasn’t an intellectual connection…it came as a rush of fury, hatred and determination." Nina Simone's husband and manager, intervened. "You can’t kill anyone. You are a musician. Do what you do." An hour later, Nina Simone had composed a song called Mississippi Goddam.
“Countless unfair deaths, mostly caused by a horribly haphazard jump.”
Crash Bandicoot: An Oral History [Polygon] “Naughty Dog released Crash Bandicoot [YouTube] for Sony's original PlayStation in September 1996. In it, the team took an old idea and changed its point of view, redesigning the idea of a 2D sidescroller and planting the camera behind its protagonist's back for the majority of the game. To learn more about what happened along the way, we recently spoke to the entire development team, contractors, musicians, marketers and others, hearing a story of long nights, groundbreaking technology, unbearable crunches and expensive parties. However, not every story lines up the same way, with some feeling that Naughty Dog discredited their contributions by burying who actually created the flagship character. One thing rings true throughout: The tales culminate in the creation of a game that redefined the platformer genre and laid some of the early cornerstones for making Naughty Dog the juggernaut development studio it is today.” [more inside]
Man gets stuck inside ATM room rescued by note
Officer Olden says," he leaves his phone in his truck, he's installing a new lock on the door, and he gets locked inside the building where the ATM is." [more inside]
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