October 16, 2013
Women gamers, queer gamers and the trolls who hate them
"I’ve realised that if you’re a woman or queer gamer, you need a strong sense of the ironic and a mind of steel to be able to breathe and thrive in a culture that can often seem to despise you to a remarkable degree." Stephen Wright describes insights gained from watching his daughter play console games.
Will Graham's No Good Very Bad Day
Crackvids are the genre of fandom videos playing out of context or absurd audio over clips of thier favorite media but rarely do they meet the heights of this video for NBC's super serious high-Gothic drama about serial killers, Hannibal. (SLYTP, NSFW audio, SPOILERS, general fandom silliness)
There was a chance the Basketball Gods would smile down on him
It's the ultimate gamble. If the young man is successful, he comes home a hero, and becomes important. His life has meaning and purpose. But in order to succeed, he must first completely open up his soul to the consequences of failure, knowing there may be no way back out. This, above all else, is the hardest thing to do. 20 Minutes at Rucker Park.
THEESatisfaction: psychedelic space-soul jazz-rap from Seattle
THEESatisfaction is Catherine Harris-White (Cat) and Stasia Irons (Stasi), the spacey future-rap duo from Seattle who (kind of) got their break from the like-minded Shabazz Palaces, a collective lead by Ishmael Butler, aka Palaceer Lazaro. Shabazz Palaces was signed to the Seattle label Sup Pop in 2010, and they released Black Up (YT, official album stream), with THEESatisfaction featured as guest vocalists. From that appearance, Sub Pop signed the duo, and released their album, awE naturalE (YT, official album stream) last year. If that's not enough psychedelic space-soul jazz-rap, then check out their Bandcamp page, which is the source of their rambling collection of genres, and contains their releases from 2008 through the present. And if that's not enough ... [more inside]
An orphan goes to church and asks someone, anyone to adopt him
This had been his idea. He'd heard something about God helping people who help themselves. So here he was, on a Sunday in September, surrounded by strangers, taking his future into his own sweaty hands.
Dumpster Digs
Do you think you could live in 33 square feet? What about a 33 square foot dumpster? Beginning this fall, Professor Dumpster will take up residence in the customized trash bin in order to spread awareness about sustainability and promote the model of "less is more."
LOGIC! REASON! CRITICAL THINKING!
Make sure you get the hot wings! They'll blow your face off!!
The flagship franchise of Los Pollos Hermanos in Albuquerque may be completely fictional, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have its own Yelp page.
jIyIntaHvIS not qajegh
Wide World of Sports Beards
"This is Brett Keisel, a defensive end for the Pittsburgh Steelers who makes the usually frustrating identifying process of having to look for pictures of NFL players sans helmet an unexpected pleasure. Consider two things: i) Why in the name of all that's holy would anyone want to imprison this cascading, oddly backwoodsesque yet pleasingly groomed beauty behind visor, mask or grille? And: ii) Given that he has nonetheless to do so, how the hell does he cram it all in? I'm picturing, in a pleasing sort of reverie, some sort of monstrous snood."
The Guardian presents the Greatest Beards in World Sports, parts one and two.
Scout!
The Scout Report "is the flagship publication of the Internet Scout Research Group. Published every Friday both on the Web and by email subscription, it provides a fast, convenient way to stay informed of valuable STEM and humanities resources on the Internet. [Best Of (by academic year): 2012-2013, 2011-2012, 2010-2011, etc.] Our team of librarians and subject matter experts selects, researches, and annotates each resource." [more inside]
I don't understand what's so hard to comprehend.
CBC host Peter Oldring discusses customer services at Canadian border crossings with Officer Murray Swift. Five minutes of unbelievable audio.
Another place I Will Never Live - The Chelsea Hotel
Get. A. Journal. Logan.
Wolverine gets fired. (SLYT)
The Russia Left Behind
The New York Times' Ellen Barry visits communities along M10, the Russian highway that links Moscow and Saint Petersburg, and finds a number of towns that are withering as the big cities grow. [more inside]
Ian Rubbish Sits Down With the Clash
The Last Gang in Town. Punk rock legends Paul Simonon and Mick Jones of the Clash sit down with Ian Rubbish of the Bizarros and talk of old times and how Ian was inspired by each Clash album. They then get together and jam an old Bizarros tune.
Surveillance City State.
"Reality has caught us" Ubisoft game Watch Dogs, scheduled for release next year, models pervasive surveillance as a game. Polygon's Charlie Hall investigates Chicago's vast camera network and finds the fiction might be not so far away from reality. [more inside]
Figuring out George Carlson
"In the year 8113 A.D., the most remembered cartoonist of our time may not be any of our currently revered comics creators. Not Winsor McCay, George Herriman, Jack Kirby, Robert Crumb, Art Spiegelman, or Chris Ware. As incredible as it may seem, long after the last comic books of our time have crumpled into dust, the cartoonist of our era that People of The Future will dig (perhaps literally) could be a guy named George Carlson — an under-appreciated, largely overlooked cartoonist, illustrator, game designer, and graphic artist extraordinaire" -- In a two part series for The Comics Journal Paul Tumey explains why George Carlson is the best cartoonist you've never heard off.
Monster
Monster. "A short fable about a village that must hold a lottery to decide who will feed a monster waiting in the forest."
<3 Books
Behind the A.D.H.D. Epidemic
To be clear: Those are correlations, not causal links. But A.D.H.D., education policies, disability protections and advertising freedoms all appear to wink suggestively at one another. From parents’ and teachers’ perspectives, the diagnosis is considered a success if the medication improves kids’ ability to perform on tests and calms them down enough so that they’re not a distraction to others. (In some school districts, an A.D.H.D. diagnosis also results in that child’s test score being removed from the school’s official average.) Writ large, Hinshaw says, these incentives conspire to boost the diagnosis of the disorder, regardless of its biological prevalence. - SL NYTimes
Ideas worth saving
Donald Glover posts a series of somethings to instagram. A cry for help from a troubled star? Poetry? Song Lyrics? Sad and beautiful no matter how you slice it. (slhuffpo)
An Orgasm in Every Office
Journalist Natasha Tiku (you may remember her from her piece on Business Insider's Pax Dickinson) takes on the cult (?) of Orgasmic Meditation. [more inside]
MEDIEVAL LAND FUN-TIME WORLD
Privilege signs are fading away
New York’s ever-changing streetscape usually transforms at a pace too slow to be discerned. All appears as it was the day before, until the day comes when you realize how long it has been since you’ve seen...a privilege sign.
Farewell Detective Munch.
John Munch, formerly a detective with the Baltimore PD’s homicide squad and currently a sergeant with the NYPD's Special Victims Unit, has put in his papers. He'll be bidding farewell to his fictional coworkers and real-life fans as he heads off to retirement on tonight's episode of Law & Order: SVU. [more inside]
Sex-trafficking, fraud and money at the Somaly Mam Foundation
Cambodia Daily just ran two controversial features on Somaly Mam, a well-known trafficking survivor and head of the anti-trafficking non-profit, the Somaly Mam Foundation that funds shelters in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. Somaly Mam, Cambodia's most well-known anti-trafficking activist, partly due to Nicholas Kristof whose "live tweeting" a brothel raid with Somaly Mam was roundly criticised by other NGOs in Cambodia, is accused of false stories of abuse, murder and kidnapping of young women, and the organization of hugely over-paying top staff including Somaly Mam herself. [more inside]
Utah Jazz...er...Hip Hop?
Historically, the state of Utah has had little relation to jazz music, giving the Utah Jazz the title (the team's only title) of the most incongruously named franchise in the world of sports. Would the Utah Hip Hop be more fitting?
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Nominations Announced
The 2014 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nominations are out, headlined by Nirvana, thanks to its 1988 cover of Love Buzz that just meets the 25-year eligibility requirement. [more inside]
and if you stare long enough i swear to god it’s pointing to up
Comics writer Matt Fraction writes a heartfelt honest blog entry to a suicidal fan telling them what saved him and what could possibly save them too. [more inside]
we're all stars now, in the NOPE show
***WARNING ALL LINKS IN THIS POST POTENTIAL NIGHTMARE FUEL*** Crocodile (Krokodil), the super-powerful Flesh-Eating Russian version of morphine, has been called the World's Most Dangerous drug by such connoisseurs as Vice Magazine. Last week, news broke that it has spread to the United States, and even [gasp] New York City. [more inside]
"There's actually no such thing as an uninteresting natural number"
io9 takes a look at why the number 1729 shows up in so many Futurama episodes. It's mathtastic!
Every customer has a name, but custRec is a database record
Mama, I've been asked to the prom
It turns out that if you cut together a bunch of scenes from Disney's Cinderella along with the audio track for the trailer of the new Carrie remake, you get something very creepy, disturbing and brilliant.
Pat Robertson in the Congo
Mission Congo is a documentary that opened in the Toronto Film Festival discusses how so many of the resources from the minister’s Operation Blessing charity that was intended to aid Rwandan refugees during the humanitarian crisis of the 90’s , apparently ended up serving another purpose. Diamond mining in the Congo.
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