February 12, 2012
Let's tickle the ivories
Let's tickle the ivories There is an old proverb that goes “Play the piano daily and stay sane.” For me, the main word of this proverb is daily. Playing the piano daily means inevitable accomplishment, and, without a sense of accomplishment, life is an impoverished journey.
"That kid is magnificent."
"To get something like that, something that belongs to you," Jones says of that monthly pension, "it makes a big difference in your life."
And for that, the 84-year-old Jones has an accomplice to thank. For he would not have had evidence of the extent of his Negro League service time and his pension eligibility if the Center for Negro League Baseball Research's best gumshoe hadn't been assigned to the case.
"I don’t think most people could bear to pay more."
"We’re not going to say, 'Give it to me and let my grandchildren suffer.' I think they underestimate seniors when they think that way." But 71-year-old Barbara Sullivan cannot imagine asking people to pay higher taxes. And as she considered making do with less, she started to cry." (slnyt) [more inside]
Goodbye and good riddance
At reddit we care deeply about not imposing ours or anyone elses’ opinions on how people use the reddit platform. We are adamant about not limiting the ability to use the reddit platform even when we do not ourselves agree with or condone a specific use. We have very few rules here on reddit; no spamming, no cheating, no personal info, nothing illegal, and no interfering the site's functions. Today we are adding another rule: No suggestive or sexual content featuring minors. - After much complaint, Reddit gets rid of /r/jailbait and selected subreddits with similar content.
WOW Inside Minecraft
Within Minecraft’s blocky world, he has spent about 100 hours so far on a re-creation of Azeroth, the enormous setting of Blizzard’s massively multiplayer game, World of Warcraft (WoW).
His name is Ramses. Here's an interview he did with Games Beat. You can see his forum posts here. And there are pictures. [more inside]
Five people parody Somebody That I Used To Know on one guitar
Intervals
Star Wars. 2001: A Space Odyssey. Star Trek: The Next Generation. Battlestar Galactica (1978), Superman: The Movie. What do all of these iconic scifi music themes have in common? Bear McCeary discusses the physics behind them. [more inside]
Before there was Sergio Aragones drawn out dramas
"The British Library holds one of the world's most important collections of Hebrew manuscripts, of which about 300 have some decoration. All of the illuminated manuscripts and those with significant decoration are now in our Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts." [more inside]
Breathe! Breathe!
At 300 feet, the pressure is so extreme that your lungs shrink to the size of oranges and your heart beats at less than half its normal rate to conserve oxygen. You lose some motor control. Most of the blood in your arms and legs has flooded to your body’s core as the vessels in your extremities constrict. Vessels in your lungs swell to several times their normal size so they won’t be crushed by the incredible pressure. Then comes the really hard part. [Open Your Mouth and You're Dead]
Meryl Streep wins BAFTA Award and loses a slipper (SLYT)
Meryl Streep won the BAFTA Best Actress Award for The Iron Lady. Colin Firth retrieved the slipper she lost on the way up the steps and MC Stephen Fry referred to them as Prince Charming and Cinderella.
Get ahead on Valentine's Day
While most couples celebrate Valentine's Day with flowers, chocolates and candlelit dinners, archivists have unearthed evidence that a less savoury romantic gesture was practised historically - bestowing a severed head on a loved one.
JavaScript InfoVis Toolkit
JavaScript InfoVis Toolkit (JIT) - providing tools for creating interactive data visualizations for the web
"A situation in many respects similar to ours"
For a time in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, it was erroneously believed that there were canals on Mars.
Maps of the Martian canals. List of Martian Canals. Historical Globes of the Red Planet.
A modern perspective. The Planet Mars: A History of Observation and Discovery .
Maps of the Martian canals. List of Martian Canals. Historical Globes of the Red Planet.
A modern perspective. The Planet Mars: A History of Observation and Discovery .
I don't really make a living selling games. I sell an ethical life.
Principles of an Indie Game Bottom Feeder Jeff Vogel makes videogames. The oldest of old-school videogames. In this Gamasutra article he argues that there's never been a better time to be an indie developer. [more inside]
I used to be an adventurer like you, then I took an arrow in the knee.
Here is the footage from Todd Howard's keynote address at DICE 2012. This was from the Bethesda Game Jam after the game shipped in 2011, and it describess potentially new downloadable content for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.
"We thought we would empty death row, not triple its population."
"Each of us remains a staunch Republican conservative, but our perspectives on the death penalty have changed.... Each of us, independently, has concluded that the death penalty isn't working for California." The authors of California's Death Penalty Act of 1978, which expanded use of the death penalty in the state, have publicly endorsed the SAFE Initiative to abolish capital punishment in California. (Previously)
Not your average commute
On February 22, [2011], 13 [bus passengers] were crushed by an unreinforced brick building at 603-13 Colombo St. I broke half a dozen bones or so, severed a tendon, spent two months in hospital and six months off work. And I was lucky. Twelve people died. I did not know them, but they forever travel with me.Just after midday, North Carolina native and political scientist Ann Brower boarded the no. 3 bus to Canterbury University. Shortly afterwards, falling masonry from the 2011 Christchurch earthquake trapped her and the other passengers in the bus. She was the sole survivor. Now, nearly a year later, she describes her rescue and her recovery. [more inside]
6 sleds, 12 men, 66 dogs, and a lot of licorice
Tasked with monitoring 160,000 square kilometers of north and northeast Greenland, the Slædepatruljen Sirius - or Sirius Sled Patrol - is the only military dog sled patrol in the world. [more inside]
Interpol supports death penalty for tweets
Saudi journalist Hamza Kashgari was arrested in Kuala Lumpur and deported to Saudi Arabia for at the behest of Interpol. Mr. Kashgari faces the death penalty in Saudi Arabia for a series of tweets insulting the prophet Muhammad, including 'I have loved things about you and I have hated things about you and there is a lot I don't understand about you I will not pray for you.' (BBC, Al Jazeera) [more inside]
A PR department for the victims of domestic violence
You Autocomplete Me
The Mystery of the Millionaire Metaphysician
The Mystery of the Millionaire Metaphysician "In June 2000, the philosopher Dean Zimmerman moved from the University of Notre Dame to Syracuse University with his wife and three kids, only to see their new house catch fire the day they moved in." Months later, he received the second hopeful fortune cookie since the fire, which told him "A way out of a financial mess is discovered as if by magic!"; the next day, magic arrived in a letter offering Zimmerman a generous sum of money, which he later learned was $12,000, to review a sixty-page work of metaphysics titled "Coming to Understanding." [more inside]
Not changed: the Spread Gun is still ridiculous.
Super Mario Bros. Crossover 2.0 is out! An expansion on the original game, which let you play as various NES characters transplanted into Super Mario Bros., but using the rules and abilities of those characters from their original games, version 2 offers more special abilities, more characters, and your choice of audiovisual "skins" based on four Mario games from the NES, SNES, and Gameboy, along with one based on Demon Returns. There's even instructions for playing with a gamepad!
For more information, see the Super Mario Bros. Crossover Wiki or watch the exciting Super Mario Bros. Crossover trailer! [Previously]
Let there be
Life Without Lights Energy Poverty Photography.
on compensation for small farm apprentices
California Dreamin'
California rejects top rate tax increase, removes all state funding for CA libraries. Funding cut for "literacy programs, InterLibrary Loans, and miscellaneous expenses such as librarian training programs and books." Library Journal goes into more of the technicalities.
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