February 9, 2013
These outfits look better on it than on me
Russian Hockey
Florida Man!
mbv, covered
Size matters
Do you love me?
Cleverbot.com has been touted as one of the most advanced artificial intelligences ever. The website allows users to chat with the A.I. Cleverbot. But how good is it, really? I sat down with Cleverbot and collaborated on a movie script.
What follows is a movie written by a machine.
Sparks.
Sparks in 1974. Sparks in 2003. Sparks and kittens. Sparks and balls. Sparks and Morrissey. Sparks and the Beatles. Sparks and Ingmar Bergman. Sparks and Faith No More. Sparks covering Sparks.
Respect must be paid
Since March 21, 1994, when the first regular obituary segment was dropped into an Academy Awards show, a spot on the yearly scroll of recently deceased movie luminaries has become one of the evening’s most hotly contested honors. And as in most Oscar races it is the focus of sometimes ferocious campaigning.
What did you do with your snow day?
He's just a tramp-sama abroad.
Sharing is caring ... and cashing in?
AirBnB And The Unstoppable Rise Of The Share Economy
“We’re going to have to invent new economics to capture the impact of the sharing economy,” says Arun Sundararajan, a professor at the Stern School of Business at NYU who studies this phenomenon. The largest question for academics is whether this all creates new value or just replaces existing businesses. The answer is surely both. It’s classic creative destruction.[more inside]
The Other 11 Doctors
iBioSeminars
It is raining spiders in Brazil.
"Hundreds (maybe thousands) of spiders congregate between poles in the town of Santo Antonio de Plantina / PR." [more inside]
A woman walks in to a comic book shop
HaterfreeWednesdays, a new tumblr to help comics fans find shops that are friendly to those of us who aren't straight white guys. [more inside]
People Are Awesome 2013
This is Giphy. You're welcome.
In a rainforest in Gabon there lives a camera trap. And a mirror?
a herd of elephants cross a stream ... audacity of the mandrills ... panthers play with their reflection in a mirror ... a passing group of gorillas ... 52 red river hogs eat fruit ... a leopard falls in love with the camera trap ... a sitatunga frightens some ibises while crossing a stream ... two elephants fighting ... chimpanzees attack a mirror ... a slithering Gaboon Viper ... a family of elephants on the trail ... 15 animals at the same place, close to camp
"Don't you see? If no one were watching, I would not dance at all."
The Old Man at Burning Man. "When I mentioned to friends that I was going to Burning Man with my 69-year-old father, 'Good idea' were the words out of no one's mouth."
Disorganized Criminals
Rick Reuschel should be in the Hall of Fame
The Hall of Fame voters have decided not to enshrine one of the greatest pitchers of all time, despite his stellar on-field performance. No, not Roger Clemens: Rick Reuschel, who, according to High Heat Stats, was one of the 50 greatest pitchers in baseball history. Bonus: Joe Posnanski on why Rich Reuschel was better than Jack Morris.
Capote's In Cold Blood: new evidence
New documents shed critical light on the treatment of the 1959 Clutter murder case, both by Kansas investigators and by Truman Capote in his classic book. Perhaps most strikingly, it turns out that Capote changed the sequence of events whereby investigators learned of the possible involvement of Richard Hickock and dealt with that information. As Capote describes it, Alvin Dewey heard of Hickock and went to visit his parents that same night, artfully extracting crucial information. KBI documents show that instead, a group of agents went to the house five days later and recovered the murder weapon.
On questioning the quality of a publisher
Dale Askey is a librarian. He blogs. In August 2010, Dale was a tenured associate professor at Kansas State University, where librarians are granted faculty status. There, Dale blogged about the quality, and prices, of publications from Edwin Mellen Press. Edwin Mellen Press has served McMaster University (Dale's current employer) and himself with a three million dollar lawsuit, alleging libel and claiming aggravated and exemplary damages. [more inside]
Less is more and science matters
The introduction of a limit on the number of tablets sold in packets of paracetamol has led to a 43% reduction in the number of poisoning deaths. People often question what stops someone from going to different chemists and buying as much paracetamol as they want. However, this question misses the point of the 1998 legislation. The thinking behind the limit on paracetamol pack sizes is that most suicidal behaviour is impulsive. People often use what is closest at hand. So making paracetamol packs smaller means that it is less likely a suicidal person would have ready access to dangerous amounts of paracetamol. [more inside]
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