November 15, 2007
(Parrot Sketch Included)
Hey, Look at This!
Exhibitionism can refer to a wide range of behaviours, ranging from fun with a willing partner, to a crime when done to the unsuspecting and unwilling. As a clinical matter exhibitionism is a sexual paraphilia in which a person (usually a man) obtains sexual pleasure from exposing his or her genitals to strangers, usually in a public place. Prevalence of the condition in the general population is not known, but approximately 30% of sex offenders have exhibitionistic tendencies and it is one of the most common sex offences. Some argue that for people with this paraphilia "it should be a possible to exist happily as an exhibitionist and still stay within the boundaries imposed by our legal systems." While often the belief is that they are harmless, research is indicating that they may progress to more serious crimes. Others note that "exhibitionism...is dangerous in that it can produce traumatic experiences within its victims."
There goes the neighborhood.
From the land of the original Father Christmas
Rare Exports, Inc. They deliver the impeccable, well-mannered, and extremely rare original Finnish Father Christmases to nearly 150 countries every Christmas. Exclusively. [YouTube, NSFW.] [more inside]
Making a Cereal Killing...in Real Estate
In 1954, the producers of the radio show Sergeant Preston of the Yukon needed a gimmick to make sure its radio audience would watch the TV version of the show. Meanwhile, the show's sponsor, Quaker Oats, needed a follow-up to their ad campaign about how Quaker Puffed Wheat is shot out of guns. So Chicago adman, Bruce Baker (later the creator of Captain Crunch), dreamt up a wildly successful PR stunt for both Sgt. Preston of the Yukon and Quaker Oats by buying up one-inch plots of land in the Yukon (with legal assistance from future British Columbia senator George van Roggen) and giving away deeds to the land for free in copies of Quaker Oats cereal. (For a picture of the deed, click here and here) [more inside]
Earth gone rogue.
Would you like to read classic science fiction short story A Pail of Air? Or would you prefer to listen? [more inside]
"IT'S THE COPS!!"
Teenage partiers typically know what to do when the police show up: run. It's so common that some enforcement agencies have developed a protocol to handle the situation. But some underage drinkers came up with a new way to deal with a potential bust: barricade yourselves (and your parents) inside for about five hours (and see if the courts rule in your favor?).
Getting paid is the name of the game.
Fresh from the picket lines, it's Not The Daily Show!
The Horror And The Folly
Torture didn't work in Renaissance Europe. And it doesn't work now. Real historic accounts of real people being tortured in the 16th and 17th centuries, and it composes a body of fact and experience that speaks directly to the present.
The label says: Pull to save hostages.
The future Amazon rain forest
Romani portraits
The Roma Journeys - contemporary photographs of Roma life in Hungary, India, Greece, Romania, France, Russia, and
Finland by Joakim Eskildsen. For more photo essays and info on the Roma, see two superb prior posts by plep and taz.
Ups and downs in the world of high art
Is the high end Art market finally tanking? A week or so ago, it sure looked like it. An important van Gogh piece did not sell, Sotheby's stock price went into shock. However, all is well this week as both Christie's and Sotheby's kicked it into high gear and set some new records. [more inside]
A&P
Barry Bonds gets indicted
After nearly four years of investigation and grand jury deliberations, Barry Bonds, baseball's most controversial active player and poster boy for the steriod era, has been indicted for perjury and obstruction of justice.
Get me a Macchiato! Pronto!
Italian Spider-Man: homemade costume, cheesy 70's music, mafiosos in wrestling masks ... what more could you ask for?
Not a Cough in a Carload
Not a Cough in a Carload: Images from the Tobacco Industry Campaign to Hide the Hazards of Smoking. [more inside]
Senator On-Line
Senator On-Line (‘SOL’) is a truly democratic party which will allow everyone on the Australian Electoral roll who has access to the internet to vote on every Bill put to Parliament and have its Senators vote in accordance with a clear majority view. They will be running candidates for the upcoming federal Upper House (Senate) elections.
Two hedge funds that predicted sub-prime crisis see corporate debt as next casualty
Two hedge funds that predicted sub-prime crisis see corporate debt as next casualty Two hedge fund firms that racked up huge gains betting on the subprime mortgage meltdown have begun winding down those trades and looking elsewhere. They're now betting against corporate debt using derivatives.
Cholera and Epidemiology
Sick City - Maps and Mortality in the Time of Cholera [print version] reviews Stephen Johnson's "The Ghost Map: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic"*. Dr John Snow became the acknowledged modern father of epidemiology by identifying water as the transmission vehicle of a cholera outbreak in Victorian England. [more inside]
'Because something is happening here - But you don't know what it is - Do you, Mister Jones?' '...He's dead, Jim'
You walk into the roomJeffrey Owen Jones, a film professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology and, inadvertently, the featured metaphor in Bob Dylan's Ballad of a Thin Man, has died.
With your pencil in your hand
You see somebody naked
And you say, "Who is that man?"
You try so hard
But you don't understand...
Is journalism best served cold?
What would you think if at the next family gathering your uncle came up to you and said: "Shot, I got a great idea for a magazine. People are sick to death of reading authors responding to the news, reacting to ideas in the zietgiest. People want old writing. We will get a bunch of writing from the past (if its out of copyright, so much the better) group it by concept and sell it for $15 bucks an issue." Would you think its a good idea? What if your uncle was Lewis Lapham? Welcome to Lapham's Quarterly. Perhaps the only non-zombie related journal that "enlists the counsel of the dead." [more inside]
Orangutan Raped For Seven Years
Did the clients [at the brothel] realize that they were in fact getting an orangutan?
“Oh yeah, they would come in especially for it. You could choose a human if you preferred, but it was a novelty for many of the men to have sex with an orangutan.”
Via.
Pass the Falafel...
Battle-test your friends – in under four hours a week!
Battle-test your friends – in under four hours a week! Tim Ferriss, creator of the cold-fusion perpetual-motion machine that is the four-hour workweek (MetaFilter passim), gives you a list of stress tests you can apply to supplicants and other would-be “friends” – show up half an hour late or early, “forget” your wallet, induce them to “jostle” the lower classes. My kinda guy. (Gawker takedown.)
My Bloody Valentine announce reunion shows; shoegazers celebrate worldwide
Bring earplugs: MBV are back in town. After fifteen years of near-inactivity, My Bloody Valentine have announced three reunion shows to take place next summer in England and Scotland. Previous MBV on the Blue
No one ever cares about the opinion of farmers
Ho Ho Ho? Hellz No Fat Man!
Rapture ready, underground
Displaced places
This house at 770 Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn has been replicated around the world to odd architectural effect: Montreal, Sao Paulo, New Jersey, Buenos Aires, Milan, Tel Aviv, and seven other locations. Why? Because it was the home of the Lubavitcher Rebbe. This sort of geographic dislocation is not unique to 770 Eastern Parkway, however, as photographers Andrea Robbins and Max Becher show: German buildings in Namibia, the Old West in Almeria Spain, the last French colony off Newfoundland, the town in Washington that was transformed into Bavaria, and others.
Man wins physics (maybe)
An exceptionally simple theory of everything has been released by a snow and surfboarding physicist. String theorists are grumpy feeling it doesn't have enough dimensions to be a proper theory. Others question and discuss. In it's favour - it's pretty! 10 Mb Quicktime
Caroline Bergvall and More Pets!
Caroline Bergvall writes poems(mp3) modulated by technology(nsfw) . She also gives radio interviews (with more readings).
Sinking Ship Contains Hidden Gem
Having served as a troop transport in WWII, a luxury liner, and a sea cadet training vessel, the Texas Clipper will come to her final resting place tomorrow as part of an artificial reef in the Texas Gulf. During preparations for sinking, a long lost mural (1 2 3 4) by Saul Steinberg, best known for his work at The New Yorker, was rediscovered hidden behind wallpaper and paint and saved from a watery grave.
There's No Place Like MetaFilter...
Fear is the mind killer
Like a missing entry from Adam Pennyman's Catalogue of Obsolete Entertainments, the game Rez (previously on MeFi) combines abstract visuals with 21st century call-and-response musical theory (subscription site) for a synesthetic experience that changes through the player's on-screen interactions.
Playing through four levels; Earth, Mars, Venus, Uranus, and Eden the player's avatar evolves within a sentient computer network as you attempt to free the core AI from suicidal depression.
Woefully underpromoted upon release everywhere except Japan, and with few merchandise opportunities available to it, the game slipped into obscurity and attained cult status, retaining almost full value on the second-hand Dreamcast and PS2 markets.
Unfortunately for the second-hand market, HD Rez has recently been announced for X-Box Live Arcade in early 2008 in glorious Hi-Def and 5.1 surround. Rejoice!
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