July 19, 2017

Fill your nightmare tank: panoramic photo fail edition

But with that worldwide surge of panoramic photos being taken comes a secondary phenomenon that no one anticipated– the nightmarish mutants that appear in failed attempts. Let's just say that when a panoramic shot goes wrong, it really goes wrong. This collection of failed photos from around the internet will haunt your dreams forever. And if you're craving more bizarre fails, there's an entire subreddit dedicated to the nightmarish glitches. [Some photos look alarmingly NSFW but are not.]
posted by Room 641-A at 11:43 PM PST - 13 comments

"criminal versatility"

Valerie Aurora and Leigh Honeywell write of The Al Capone Theory Of Sexual Harassment
posted by the man of twists and turns at 8:41 PM PST - 8 comments

Rocksteady

In 1966, on the island of Jamaica, it was time to slow down. But who figured it out first? There are four generally recognized candidates: Roy Shirley (previously) with Hold Them, Alton Ellis with Girl I've Got A Date, Hopeton Lewis with Take It Easy, and Derrick Morgan with Tougher Than Tough. On three of those four songs, the groove was set by keyboardist Gladstone Anderson. For the next two years - maybe three - before it was swept away by the political and social drive of Rastafari and reggae, the laid-back love songs of rocksteady dominated the Jamaican music scene.
posted by clawsoon at 7:56 PM PST - 8 comments

I AM THE DOOMGUY.

Doomguy's Identity by John Romero “Don Punchatz, the illustrator who created the DOOM logo and the famous front box cover art came over to id in mid-1993 with a male body model. Don brought a nice camera to take pictures. The model's job was to strike various poses for the marine who would be on the cover of the box. [...] The body model took his shirt off and started posing with our plasma gun toy. Don asked us for suggestions so I started telling him that the Marine was going to be attacked by an infinite amount of demons. It would be cool if he was on a hill and firing down into them. The model was holding the gun in various positions and none of them were interesting to me.”
posted by Fizz at 7:54 PM PST - 23 comments

The last of the Memphis Mafia..

Red West passes at 81 He was an American actor, film stuntman and songwriter. He was a close high school friend of rock and roll singer Elvis Presley. He is probably best known to American film audiences for his role as Red in Road House, alongside Patrick Swayze. He had a co-starring role in the TV series Ba Ba Black Sheep (later Black Sheep Squadron) in the late 1970s. [more inside]
posted by shockingbluamp at 7:29 PM PST - 8 comments

Unearthing the influence of Native Americans on rock 'n' roll

Stevie Salas's research has led to the documentary Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked the World, which traces the impact of Native people on America’s rich musical history.
posted by goatdog at 7:17 PM PST - 10 comments

We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason

Just trees. (From MeFi's Own Alan Taylor.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 6:16 PM PST - 24 comments

How Checkers Was Solved

From 1950 to 1990, Marion Tinsley had been the world champion of checkers whenever he wanted to be. He’d occasionally retire to work on mathematics or devote himself to religious study, but he’d eventually return, beat everyone and become champion again. In that 40-year span, he lost five total games and never once dropped a match. In 1994, he sat across a game board from a computer, dying.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 5:36 PM PST - 19 comments

Queen of Jamaican Culture

Miss Lou talks Jamaican proverbs and who is Miss Lou, you ask? She was Louise Bennett, poet, folklorist, television presenter, activist and all around Jamaican national treasure. Her archive is kept by McMaster University, and is especially rich in audio recordings, including interviews (e.g. with Sarah Ward on the BBC World Service), storytelling (e.g. her Anancy stories, part 1 and 2) and music (e.g. 1954 Folkways recording, parts 1 and 2). Her music can also be found on Spotify.
posted by Kattullus at 5:30 PM PST - 1 comments

'Analyzing the Gender Representation of 34,476 Comic Book Characters'

Female characters appear in superhero comics less often than males — but when they are included, how are they depicted?
posted by MrJM at 4:06 PM PST - 13 comments

This is the public face of startups. And it’s getting embarrassing.

I gotta ask, what's the absolute maximum number of dog collars you'd like to buy this year? Probably less than twelve? In a lighthearted column, Adam Ozimek turns a beady eye on the wave of start-up subscription services and what they may reveal about the state of tech investment world.
posted by Diablevert at 1:20 PM PST - 126 comments

Ways To Stay Motivated In This [*insert Expletive*] Era Of Epic Stupid

Author Chuck Wendig gives you a handy top 10 list article to help you Survive and keep creating Art, in this unfurling Age of Dumb "Everything is dumb right now. From nose to tail, we have become the dumbest, saddest pig at the county fair. Historians will not refer to this period as THE DARK AGES, but rather, THE DUMB AGES. The greatest question I get, right now, is how to simply persist creating art and staying motivated and creative in this epoch of syphilitic dipshittery, so I thought I’d bop in here and try my hand at answering that." - Chuck Wendig [more inside]
posted by Faintdreams at 12:38 PM PST - 18 comments

When You See a Red Toggle, That's Definitely the Toggle to Tug

British Airways safety video - director's cut [more inside]
posted by chavenet at 12:15 PM PST - 18 comments

Is it a rabbit? Is it a spider?

Metagryne bicolumnata, aka the Bunny Harvestman. Probably don't click this if you're a bit wobbly about spiders.
posted by auntie-matter at 12:07 PM PST - 30 comments

Relax, Don't Worry, Have a Homebrew

The AHA reached out to breweries from across the United States and today released its first compilation of 50 commercial clone recipes, scaled to homebrew-sized batches. Whether you want a legendary IPA, a crisp pilsner, or even a fruity mead, there's something for everybody. [more inside]
posted by uncleozzy at 11:37 AM PST - 29 comments

The Dish

Japanese Cheesecake. Chicken Gyros. Deep Dish Pizza. Giant Cookies and Vegan Cinnamon Buns. Every week, Megan Ogilvie of The Toronto Star writes The Dish, where she takes popular local eats to food scientists and dietitians to determine how good (or bad) they are for you. Readers provide suggestions and are often surprised by how many calories they're getting from their favourite food. And in the case of one popular 1.5 lbs roti, the people of Trinidad & Tabago were not amused by the recommendation that Ali's roti is meal for two.
posted by thecjm at 10:57 AM PST - 78 comments

Equal parts quixotic dreamer and accomplished visionary.

Frances Gabe, inventor of the self-cleaning house, has died. This NY Times obituary is a lengthy tribute to a remarkable woman and includes videos and diagrams of her remarkable invention. [Previously]
posted by jacquilynne at 9:29 AM PST - 11 comments

The Beginning of Urban Heavy Rescue

On July 17, 1981 a suspended walkway collapsed in The Hyatt Regency Hotel in Kansas City, Missouri, killing 114 people and injuring 216 others during a tea dance. At the time, it was the deadliest structural collapse in U.S. history. [more inside]
posted by misskaz at 8:50 AM PST - 41 comments

The philosophy behind the throne

Unfettered capitalism or democracy. You cannot have both.
Six months on and six ways Trump is 'dismantling' the US.
This is the playbook, as George Monbiot explains, of James McGill Buchanan - A despot in disguise: one man’s mission to rip up democracy.
Then there are are the men behind the cutain; Secretive Teams to Roll Back Regulations, Led by Hires With Deep Industry Ties.
What Is the Far Right’s Endgame? A Society That Suppresses the Majority.
posted by adamvasco at 8:36 AM PST - 49 comments

I'll wipe your scores clean, wipe, wipe, wipe

The great late-night show, @midnight, will air its last (and 600th) show August 4. No more "Points!," no more Hashtag Wars, no more providing a platform for mostly new and lesser-known standup comedians.
posted by anothermug at 8:12 AM PST - 24 comments

Whosoever shall squeeze thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other

Who's got squishy cheeks? YOU do! Yes you do! Yes you do! And so do all of you!

If that's not enough squee for Hump Day, then check out these Golden Retriever puppies. Awww.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:46 AM PST - 8 comments

Known Alias: How Stephen King Was Outed as Richard Bachman

In 1984, Richard Bachman's fifth novel, Thinner, came out. It was Bachman's first hardcover release, and the author thought he was on the verge of breaking out (especially since he had recently sold the film rights to The Running Man, his fourth novel). But a clerk at a Washington DC bookstore suspected that Bachman was not who he claimed to be: that "Richard Bachman" was actually Stephen King.
posted by Etrigan at 6:57 AM PST - 58 comments

You said this story was kind of like a fairy tale

Nicole Chung took her daughter to see an all-Asian-American production of The Winter's Tale. "There are so many different types of inheritances; one I still hope my children can somehow sidestep is the void, the frustration of desperately searching for yourself, or people like you, in a cultural landscape that does not seem to be for you. And what does it say about you, about your worth and your importance and the possibilities open to you, if you can’t find yourself at all?"
posted by ChuraChura at 5:16 AM PST - 6 comments

The tyranny of work

The American workplace is an unaccountable, near-dictatorial private govenment with sweeping powers over our lives. Why can't Americans see this? And what should be done about it? [SLVox] Philosopher Elizabeth Anderson makes this argument in her book Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (and Why We Don't Talk about It), based on her 2015 Tanner Lectures in Human Values. She elaborates on these themes in an interview in Jacobin. But Miya Tokumitsu, writing in the New Republic, warns that "[i]n reality, the employment landscape is even more dire than Anderson outlines." (Related previously: F*ck Work!)
posted by informavore at 4:06 AM PST - 92 comments

Trainspotter TV

Maybe you’re thinking, “the best thing I could possibly do right now while I’m sitting at work is watch live video feeds of railroad crossings and hope that the occasional train passes by.” If so, then you might be surprised to know that there’s never been a better time in recorded history than right now! Start by checking what’s currently live on the YouTube accounts of Virtual Railfan, Railstream and Big Trains TV. Most videos in this post include ambient sound — even if traffic noise is quiet the trains will be loud. For more a whole lot more, see below. [more inside]
posted by ardgedee at 4:05 AM PST - 10 comments

Not a balloon

Détour — A very short film by Michel Gondry, shot on an iPhone. In French, with English subtitles. (via Alas, a Blog) [more inside]
posted by Joe in Australia at 3:25 AM PST - 7 comments

So you guys aren't terrorists?

Basement Reels, a Canadian-based group making ~5min short films, both serious and silly, tailored to the Tamil diaspora community. (via tamilculture.com) [more inside]
posted by XMLicious at 12:19 AM PST - 3 comments

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