April 8, 2019
Norfolk State University after game tunnel
50,000+ Times Going Knee Deep in the Dead Just To Get Out 1 Sec. Faster
Karl Jobst gives analysis and commentary on Doom speeedruner 4shockblast's 23 Feb 2019 world record "8 Second"* run of Doom's first map, "E1M1: Hangar", which broke the previous Ultra-Violence Speed Category two-decade-old record of "9 Seconds"* set by Thomas "Panter" Pilger on 28 September 1998. [more inside]
If I were not Alexander the Great, I would like to be Shen Wei
Shen quickly became an antihero for those tired of trying to climb social and economic ladders in a country obsessed with youth, novelty, education, fame, wealth and good looks. But Shen’s virtual fame became all too real in mid-March. One video showed a road sign pinpointing Shen’s location, and visitors soon started flooding into the otherwise unremarkable neighborhood in Shanghai’s suburban Pudong district. (SLWAPO) [more inside]
Finding Redoshi
"A researcher has discovered the identity of the last-known survivor of the trans-Atlantic slave trade in the United States. Redoshi, later given the slave name Sally Smith, was kidnapped at the age of 12 from Benin in West Africa, in 1860. She was sold into slavery, making the journey to Alabama on the Clotilde, the last-known slave ship to arrive in the U.S." WBUR's Here and Now talks with Newcastle University researcher Hannah Durkin about "Sally Smith," the slave ship Clotilde, and Alabama's Africatown. [more inside]
The digital world is very ephemeral; we see how much we might be losing
The million dollar homepage is still online, a snapshot of the internet circa 2005, but many of its links are dead, or point to different websites, their owners reaping the rewards of prior investments. Archive.org captured some iterations of the website, and the linked sites from there, and Web Archive.org.uk has been capturing UK sites since 2004, but not all sites are so lucky, either predating Internet Archive's start in 1996 (the first webpage exists only as a copy, reposted a year after the first one went up in 1991), or missed by web crawlers (Wikipedia). These are some of the reasons why there's so little left of the early internet (BBC).
I'M ONLY DOING THIS FOR DEBBIE
It was the 80s, the decade of workout videos. Everybody was making them & Hollywood veteran Debbie Reynolds was at the top of the heap with her star-studded video Do It Debbie's Way. Dionne Warwick, Teri Garr, Florence Henderson - & the video's true star, Shelly Winters.
Dressed in a baggy black sweatsuit with "I'M ONLY DOING THIS FOR DEBBIE" blazoned across it, Shelly alternates between at least trying to fake it enough to get by, just plain not having any more fucks to give & actively fomenting revolt among the other exercisers with impromptu lines including "HOW MANY GIRLS HERE HAVE SLEPT WITH HOWARD HUGHES?" & "I DID THESE MOVES IN A MOTEL IN VEGAS". A true tour de force.
This is when the Smile of Placation comes into play.
"Women do this calculus everyday, whether you are a reporter or not: How do I dress so I can be comfortable but also taken seriously, but also I want people to want me in the room?" What to Wear When You Don't Want People to Hate You, a three part series (part 2, part 3) from Lyz Lenz, Anne Helen Petersen, and Molly Priddy.
Leave No Trace
Lost-children stories and Australia's uneasy mythology. Discussed: Migrating Clothing, Nonspecific Evil, Shrilling Cicadas, Indigenous Displacement and Massacre, The Quest for Oblivion, Starchy Pinafores and Straw Hats, Lost-Child Stories, Terra Nullius, The White Vanishing Trope, The Cult of Mateship, Weird Melancholy, The Female Register, Risk Perception, Feminine Agency and Feminine Recklessness, Bloodless Murder [more inside]
Privileged
Kyle Korver of the Utah Jazz in the Player's Tribune: What I’m realizing is, no matter how passionately I commit to being an ally, and no matter how unwavering my support is for NBA and WNBA players of color….. I’m still in this conversation from the privileged perspective of opting in to it. Which of course means that on the flip side, I could just as easily opt out of it. Every day, I’m given that choice — I’m granted that privilege — based on the color of my skin.
Why is this haggadah different from all other haggadot?
The Jewish Worker has compiled a list of haggadot for your social justice seder (twitter) [more inside]
The Death of an Adjunct
As American As Apple Pie
“Schoonover is tall, blond, and ruddy-cheeked, with a goofy sense of humor that probably comes in handy during her day job teaching children about agriculture at a local museum. She’s finishing up her second year as the co-chair of the Central Iowa DSA, a position she sees as a way “to actually do something instead of being mad and upset every day after Trump became president.” Iowa’s Democratic Socialists Are Organizing To Go Beyond 2020 (The Atlantic) Chicago socialists cleaned house in last night's municipal elections, winning as many as six socialist city council members. The city's left has a historic opportunity to push back years of gentrification, police brutality, and austerity. (Jacobin) “For much of the 20th century, Milwaukee was run by socialists—and Time magazine called it “one of the best-run cities in the U.S.” (The Nation) Midwestern Socialism previously, Green Corn Rebellion, Radicalism 101
Justin Trudeau and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad [Year]
Justin Trudeau, imposter [Maclean's Magazine] The phoniness of the Prime Minister’s handling of the SNC-Lavalin file is a trait he shows the Canadian people all too often
“Long story short, the government of Canada was telling one story to itself and another to Canadians. To themselves, they said they were protecting jobs. To the rest of us, they said they were getting tough. A government that indulges in that much sustained double-talk clearly thinks it has something to hide. It’s being disingenuous. It’s being phony. And since the lot of them never stop calling themselves #TeamTrudeau on Twitter, I guess we can, without fear of contradiction, say the Prime Minister of Canada has been the phony-in-chief.”[Previously.] [more inside]
Please let me roll once again
Wowaka, a popular vocaloid producer and vocalist for the band Hitorie, has passed away at the age of 31 due to heart failure. He was known for his unique and instantly recognizable style and for his relatable lyrics.
Lluvia has a thread on twitter mourning his passing and commemorating his work.
His songs are available on his official Youtube channel, but there are no English translations. So here are a few of his more popular vocaloid songs with English subtitles:
- Rolling Girl
- World's End Dancehall
- Unhappy Refrain (turn on CC for English lyrics)*
- Two-Faced Lovers (turn on CC for English lyrics)*
- Unknown Mother Goose (turn on CC for English lyrics)*
Where did these three men go?
120 years later and still searching for the missing First men to man the lighthouse on Flannan Isles worked hard against the elements, but three of the four men simply disappeared.
Fibreglass shark, doo doo doo doo doo doo
"Any system of control must make some small place for the dynamic, the unexpected, the downright quirky. I therefore recommend that the Headington shark be allowed to remain." RIP Bill Heine, broadcaster, journalist, and the man behind one of Britain's best-loved pieces of public art.
« Previous day | Next day »