December 10, 2015
Understandably Cause for Alarm
Star Simpson, on the aftermath of the airport "bomb hoax" case, how her school failed her, and how MIT's new student law clinic could have helped. "I would have been grateful to ask questions of someone. Was I actually going to go to prison? What were my options? Should I, in the great American tradition, try to sue somebody? What would accepting a plea deal mean? Was it a good plea deal? Should I keep going with the case, instead? On top of having nobody to turn to, I was disallowed from talking about the case in public. Someone needed to make those decisions and I was completely on my own. Honestly I just wanted it all to be over, but that option was mostly unavailable. I just want you to consider for a moment asking the nearest 19-year-old with no prior interest in nor experience at all with the law for guidance on what to do with any court case. You can tell me how it goes." [more inside]
"The secret of happiness is here"
Off-Broadway's "Daddy Long Legs" musical (based on the novel that inspired the 1955 movie) is livestreaming tonight's 8 pm ET New York performance right now. [more inside]
majestic
SLYT: Pstereo by Emilie Nicolas, the music video.
Mavis Beacon: Modern Warfare
ZTYPE Dominic Szlablewski offers a game in which you learn to type (or just have fun) by annihilating words.
Autism's Lost Generation
Some autistic adults have spent much of their lives with the wrong diagnosis, consigned to psychiatric institutions or drugged for disorders they never had. Last year, Scott Hartman moved into his own apartment for the first time. He quickly learned to balance his budget, squirreling away money to buy a Blu-ray player or Xbox games. He started taking long walks to his favorite fast-food joints: Hardee’s, Papa John’s, Chick-fil-A, Taco Bell. To get to the science museum or the library, his other favorite destinations, he is learning the intricacies of public transportation. Scott can enjoy these simple pleasures because two years ago he was finally diagnosed with autism. He was 55.
Play this videogame without looking at the screen? Challenge Accepted
The People Who MacGyvered The Most Difficult Video Game Levels [slcracked] (The French lady who plays without looking at the screen only made it to #2.)
There are Other Forces at Work
"I went over to Germany, and I saw one millionth of a performance of a piece of music." John Darnielle (The Mountain Goats, Wolf In White Van) travels to Halberstadt to report on a John Cage concert that will last 639 years.
A township could not be exactly six miles on each side
Grid corrections : places where North American roads deviate from their otherwise logical grid lines in order to account for the curvature of the Earth. You could drive out there your whole life, de Ruijter realized, and not realize that certain stop signs and intersections exist not because of eccentric real estate deals, but because they are mathematical devices used to help planners wrap a rectilinear planning scheme onto the surface of a spherical planet.
Put me in your land art show
Shadows and Co: two collage noir shorts by Fabrice Mathieu
Fabrice Mathieu created something new, and an homage to the shadowy, noir films he loves with two shorts: In the Shadow, creating a film from shadows and silhouettes, and Master of Suspense, a story built from Alfred Hitchcock's cameo introduction and cameo appearances.
"I'm not really comfortable saying either of those words."
All Roads Lead to Rome(s)
Every cell of this grid contains the starting point to one of our journeys to Rome. Now that we have our 486,713 starting points we need to find out how we could reach Rome as our destination. For this we created a algorithm that calculates one route for every trip. The more often a single street segment is used, the stronger it is drawn on the map. The maps as outcome of this project is somewhere between information visualization and data art, unveiling mobility and a very large scale.Some beautiful and interesting visualizations of transportation models for Europe and the world, including all the towns called "Rome" in the United States. Also: Urban Mobility Fingerprints and Create Your Own (Europe Only).
“How did we get from Kitty Hawk to here?”
Take Flight [New York Times] [Magazine] The year’s best actors lift off in a series of tributes to the ultimate Hollywood magic trick. To watch in virtual reality on your phone, download our app. [more inside]
Lit at B-school
I was so goddamn excited about this show that it brought me to tears.
Cracked contributor Alice Jane Axness was recently encouraged by friends to check out the new Marvel series Jessica Jones (previously) on Netflix. And the reason wasn't because it's another stunning addition to the Marvel Universe, but because of it's brutally accurate depiction of sexual abusers and their victims (SLCracked).
'Why does a goat jump?'
An illustrator in Dali, China
Jason Pym is a British illustrator who has been living in Dali, China for 11 years. His love for his adopted city in an idyllic part of Yunnan province is plain to see. He also makes illustrations for Penguin Books China, and labels for his wife's homemade jam, featuring cos-playing dragons. (Here's a link in Chinese with more dragon-goodness.)
"Tintin mashups. Because the world needs them."
Had Herge had a slightly different turn of mind.
"A bold race bred there, battle-happy men causing trouble & torment"
“So at Christmas in this court I lay down a challenge: /
If a person here present, within these premises, /
Is big or bold or red-blooded enough /
To strike me one stroke and be struck in return, /
I shall give him a gift of this gigantic cleaver /
and the axe shall be his to handle how he likes. /
I'll kneel, bare my neck and take the first knock. /
So who has the gall? The gumption? The guts? /
Who’ll spring from his seat and snatch this weapon? /
I offer the axe — who’ll have it as his own? /
I’ll afford one free hit from which I won't flinch, /
and promised that 12 months will pass in peace, /
then claim /
the duty I deserve in one year and one day. /
Does no one have the nerve
to wager in this way?”
[more inside]
Nobody ever pays a political price for targeting Iranian Americans
In response to the attacks on Paris and San Bernardino, on Tuesday, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed HR 158, a bill that bars Iraqis, Syrians, Sudanese, Iranians, and people who have traveled to those countries from participating in the visa waiver program which allows passport holders from 38 countries to travel without securing a visa. [more inside]
The gulf isn't as wide as it used to be, but then was it ever?
The American middle class is losing ground. A bonus CBC story in which those of us in Canada can calculate how we compare to the US middle class.
Sometimes, a whale dies.
One of the most beautiful, amazing, and depressing things I’ve ever done is participate in a whale necropsy. This work helps us understand the patterns of whale mortality, and determine whether whale deaths are natural, or possibly man-made.
This is important stuff. In fact, their work has helped guide changes in policy, especially when it comes to designing the shipping lanes that go into and out of San Francisco Bay. Their research helped establish new, longer, and narrower shipping lanes that reduced the chances of ships hitting, and often killing, whales. This work saved whales’ lives. [more inside]
"Starving silences who you really are."
There Once Was a Girl. A work of criticism and of memoir on the false narratives surrounding anorexia in life and literature.
(Some may find the descriptions in this essay disturbing or triggering.)
(Some may find the descriptions in this essay disturbing or triggering.)
Can you own part of an asteroid?
How Asteroid Mining Is Changing Space Law
On November 24, President Obama signed the “US Commercial Space Law Competitiveness Act” into law. Among other things (like that the government should not pester SpaceX), it states that any US citizen who takes a chip off an old block of asteroid then owns that chip. [more inside]
On November 24, President Obama signed the “US Commercial Space Law Competitiveness Act” into law. Among other things (like that the government should not pester SpaceX), it states that any US citizen who takes a chip off an old block of asteroid then owns that chip. [more inside]
The Court takes its time on Fisher
Abigail Fisher, the white student who is challenging the use of race in admissions at the university which rejected her application in 2008, was back at the Supreme Court again, as she was for the first round of arguments in her case in October 2012. [more inside]
Your Right Of Passage
Neil Kaplan is fascinated by the stories told by old passports, especially those relating to the Holocaust, and the resonance they have for today's immigrants and refugees. "It seems strange to admit that in 2015, the right to exist in certain physical spaces on Earth—spaces bound by imaginary lines drawn on maps by our governments—can be prevented by a pocket-sized paper travel document."
Wanted: Star Wars Celica, last seen 1977 (or maybe 1990s?)
We've all seen weird merchandising attached to blockbuster (or would-be blockbuster) movies, but that sort of thing used to be much rarer before George Lucas famously haggled the merchandising rights for Star Wars away from 20th Century Fox in exchange for a lower director's fee and made gazillions. Forty years later, "Star Wars" has been slapped on virtually anything you can think of, including a 1977 Toyota Celica that was the prize in a nationwide sweepstakes held after the movie had become a huge hit. [more inside]
Slap Kirk - what it says on the tin.
With all the Star Wars hype lately, it's important to spend some quality time with Star Trek. To that end, smack your captain up with Slap Kirk.
Serial Season 2, Episode 1: DUSTWUN
Bowe Bergdahl without preamble, and in (some of) his own words. In the middle of the night, Pfc. Bowe Bergdahl grabs a notebook, snacks, water, some cash. Then he quietly slips off a remote U.S. Army outpost in eastern Afghanistan and into the dark, open desert. About 20 minutes later, it occurs to him: he’s in over his head.
Monkeys all love peanut butter.
Just targets.
Uncanny Valley (SLVIMEO) Short film of a possible future path for VR gaming.
Speak up, Stay Safe(r)
Feminist Frequency (the website created by pop culture critic and Gamergate scourge Anita Sarkeesian) has published a guide for protecting yourself against harassment in digital spaces.
Outsourcing, exploitation and the new reality of work
As you read this story you will recognise that the economic system that continues to keep black people very, very poor in this country has been broken for so long, and the private sector has been so strong for so long, that we have a vast imbalance that has been allowed to flourish unchecked. We the people have not been demanding when it comes to scrutiny of corporate conduct. [...] This story – this one you will read about Coca-Cola - is part of a rich canon. It exists because of First and Gqabi and Nxumalo and Jaffer and countless others.via [more inside]
"There had better be an offering to the Old Gods"
John Roderick of the Long Winters sets down the criteria for a good Christmas song.
What if Wayne Gretzky got hit by a bus before having kids?
Creatures avoiding planks - "After around a thousand generations of training, the agents became half decent at avoiding planks. Please see the final result in this demo." [more inside]
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