June 12, 2008
The fix is in
Gasoline prices fixed. 11 Quebec companies and 13 individuals were charged today in a gas price fixing scheme. The Competition Bureau conducted a lengthy investigation into the allegations. [more inside]
You know less about Tetris than you think
Tetris has changed over the years. The latest game mechanics are well-documented and allow for techniques more complicated than those of us used to earlier iterations could possibly imagine. And of course, you can have it any way you want it. [via]
Goodbye yellow brick road
Bird Watching for Homebodies
Taking a look through this site, I can see why bird watching is such a popular hobby. From the common to the bizarre to the downright adorable. this site has a little... no, scratch that, a whole lot of everything. I suggest starting at the family list on the lower left hand column of the main page and trounsing about for a spell; it's good for the soul.
Go OKC!
Goodbye Seattle! Hello Oklahoma! Get ready for the NBA's newest team, the Oklahoma City SuperSonics! Whither Seattle basketball? Methinks not.
The Internet dies a little bit
Goodbye alt.* Andrew Cuomo claimed that his office found child porn on 88 newsgroups--out of roughly 100,000 newsgroups that exist. In a press release, he took credit for [Verizon's] blunderbuss-style newsgroup removal by saying: "We are attacking this problem by working with Internet service providers...I commend the companies that have stepped up today to embrace a new standard of responsibility, which should serve as a model for the entire industry." Verizon eliminates the entire alt. subset of usenet. Today, the alt.* hierarchy is by far the most populous on Usenet.
Night Vision
The Light-Painter of Mojave D: An Interview with Troy Paiva (previously) about his photography and his new book, Night Vision: The Art of Urban Exploration. [Via BLDGBLOG]
School Defends Drunken Driving Hoax
"On a Monday morning last month, highway patrol officers visited 20 classrooms at El Camino High School [Oceanside, California] to announce some horrible news: Several students had been killed in car wrecks over the weekend. Classmates wept. Some became hysterical. A few hours and many tears later, though, the pain turned to fury when the teenagers learned that it was all a hoax — a scared-straight exercise designed by school officials to dramatize the consequences of drinking and driving." While the school defends its actions, some students are protesting: "Death is real. Don't play with our emotions." [more inside]
Cette bud n'est pas pour vous
Look away, MPAA.
RestoftheMovie.com will probably be taken offline pretty soon, since it seems like they show full (screener) versions of current movies (like Kung Fu Panda and Ironman) in streaming format, so you'll probably want to check it out sooner rather than later.
all the things you once tried so hard to forget…
Kindertrauma is about the movies, books, and toys that scared you when you were a kid. It’s also about kids in scary movies, both as heroes and villains. And everything else that’s traumatic to a tyke! [more inside]
"The test for determining the scope of this provision must not be subject to manipulation by those whose power it is designed to restrain."
In a five-to-four decision, the Supreme Court ruled today that detainees at Guantanamo Bay have a constitutional right to habeas corpus review:
Security depends upon a sophisticated intelligence apparatus and the ability of our Armed Forces to act and to interdict. There are further considerations, however. Security subsists, too, in fidelity to freedom’s first principles. Chief among these are freedom from arbitrary and unlawful restraint and the personal liberty that is secured by adherence to the separation of powers.[...] Liberty and security can be reconciled; and in our system they are reconciled within the framework of the law. The Framers decided that habeas corpus, a right of first importance, must be a part of that framework, a part of that law.Decision, Summary, Analysis
plus, there's food. And bars.
With over 35,000,000 visitors a year, it could be argued that it is the busiest museum in the world. Yet most people are there to catch a plane. [more inside]
human egg makes accidental debut on camera
A woman ovulates during surgery for a partial hysterectomy, and it's caught on film.
Not Loving That Dirty Water
Hoping for the best for Mefites in eastern Iowa. I was CR born and raised, and just watching the feed on KCRG is ...disturbing. It looks like the height of the Cedar River is estimated at 25.4 feet, and it hasn't crested yet. They've lost a railroad bridge downtown so far, and the news feed keeps tracking the rise of the river by standing outside the studio and watching the water approaching. [more inside]
A Voyage for Madmen
This year marks the 40th anniversary of the ill fated Sunday Times Golden Globe round the world solo sailing race. Of the 9 starters, only 1 finished. The race featured courage, madness, and a cast of characters out of a book. The mad Donald Crowhurst, the enigmatic Bernard Moitessier, and the eventual winner Sir Robin Knox-Johnston.
one point oh four megawatts!
In 1876, the US celebrated the centennial with an International Exposition. The centerpiece of Machinery Hall, and the source of power for all the machinery therein, was the world's largest steam engine. A beam engine (previously), it produced 1400 horsepower and was built in a mere 7 months when other bids to provide motive power proved inadequate. [more inside]
Gallery of American Art by the National Endowment for the Humanities
Picturing America is a website by The National Endowment for the Humanities which aims to make great American art readily available to children, adolescents and everyone else who wants to take a look. Some personal favorites: Charles Sheeler's American Landscape, Childe Hassam's Allies Day and Martin Puryear's Ladder for Booker T. Washington. John Updike gave a speech at the opening which can be read here. [via Edge of the American West]
Modern rationalization
"This all would have never happened if their windows were closed." Runner up: "I didn't feel like a creep," he said. "I didn't feel like a Peeping Tom. I felt like this type of thing happens a lot."
On Kimchi
These days, spice is integral to ideas of kimchi in both the West and Korea—it’s always a funny game trying to convince various restaurant ladies here that I can, in fact, eat kimchi without spewing two ribbons of fire from my nostrils, thereby singing the wallpaper and confirming their suspicions that we white folks are just a bunch of food pussies. “Maeun-kot” (“spicy shit!”), they say, making flamey-flamey motions with their hands; “Yes,” I say, “Maeun umshik-ul chal mogoyo” (“I can eat spicy food, no lie, please stop looking at me like I’m a recalcitrant goat who’s about to try to eat a roll of barbed wire”).
I've Been Everywhere, Man
Are you, like many others this summer, considering avoiding the costs & hassles of pricey foreign or domestic travel by having a "staycation" at home? Daily Show commenter John Hodgman (ably backed by Jonathan Coulton on the strings) enumerates the benefits of a "Holistay" (much better name) to help you make your choice.
city of shadows
Remember the AIDS pandemic?
Remember the heterosexual AIDS pandemic? There isn't one outside of Africa. Actually, there never was. Well, at least not for straight people.
BPDG
Baby please don't go, baby please don't go, baby please don't go down to New Orleans, I love you so, baby please don't go.
Bye Bye Blackboard
Blackboards were wiped after use: they were meant for immediate communication, not for record. Even as they were being used, their messages were continuously revised, erased and renewed. But when Einstein came to Oxford in 1931, he was already an international celebrity. After one of his lectures a blackboard was preserved and has become a kind of relic. It is the most famous object in this Museum. [more inside]
Daily photos from the SF Bay Area
So you'd like to see daily photographs taken in San Francisco and the surrounding Bay Area? You can start with What I'm Seeing and supplement your viewing with the following sites. [more inside]
Mystery on 5th Avenue
It began when Mr. Klinsky threw in his two cents, a vague request that a poem he had written for and about his family be lodged in a wall somewhere, Ms. Sherry said, “put in a bottle and hidden away as if it were a time capsule.”
Sometimes when you make a simple suggestion about the remodeling of your $8.5 million 5th Ave. apartment, the designer goes a little overboard. In an awesome way. Don't miss the slideshow.
Sometimes when you make a simple suggestion about the remodeling of your $8.5 million 5th Ave. apartment, the designer goes a little overboard. In an awesome way. Don't miss the slideshow.
A Completely Original Game, Except For All Of The Parts That Aren't
Epic Theft? Epic Fail. "Steve Bovis, Tim Croucher and Laurence Francis, all from Maidstone, have dreamt of seeing Limbo of the Lost played across the globe since they first started discussing the game 10 years ago."* Conceived in the 90s as an Amiga 1200 title, the three Kentish lads went with the PC for the decades-deferred realization of their creative dream. Unfortunately, the long-delayed release of Limbo of the Lost is leaving reviewers with a profound sense of deja vu, as if they've seen this game somewhere before ... [more inside]
Beware the machines
Once home to the Naval Shipyards, L'Ile de Nantes now houses the workshop of Les Machines de l'Ile.
The 12m high Elephant made its debut last year (although a predecessor was spotted 3 years ago) and is the first of 3 major projects to be undertaken. [more inside]
Charlie the deer.
Ping.fm: update everything
Ping.fm lets you update your social network statuses, blogs and microblogs simultaneously from one place. The current sign-up beta code is "tastyping". [more inside]
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