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Photographs from the Chicago Daily News, 1902-1933. Stumbled upon whilst looking for historical info on 1933, this Library of Congress-hosted site provides access to "over 55,000 images of urban life captured on glass plate negatives" by the photographers of the Daily News. memory.loc.gov simply never disappoints.
posted by mwhybark at 11:00 PM PST - 5 comments

5 Year Old Adopted South Korean Blind Piano Prodigy Yoo Ye-eun can play songs after hearing them once. Watch her perform with Britain's Got Talent's Connie Talbot in a South Korean TV show called "Star King".
posted by MythMaker at 9:59 PM PST - 29 comments

Hello Hello Finally a myspace blog post worth seeing: funny window messages about neighbors with trash disposal concerns, vaguely reminiscent of the window messages in "You and Me and Everyone Else We Know" [more inside]
posted by srs at 9:22 PM PST - 15 comments

The Worlds Best Books (1909), One Hundred Best Books (1916), One Thousand Books for a Village Library (1895), The Book Lover, a Guide to the Best Reading (1889), The Choice of Books (1905), A Thousand of the Best Novels (1919), Comfort Found in Good Old Books (1911), A Guide to the Best Historical Novels (1911), A Guide to Historical Fiction (1914), and lots more..
posted by stbalbach at 7:12 PM PST - 15 comments

"The New Yorker says it's satire. It certainly will be candy for cable news." The cover illustration (by Barry Blitt) of the magazine's July 21^st. issue depicts Barack Obama in tribal African dress, fist-bumping his wife "in full revolutionary garb, an enormous afro making her look like a millennial Angela Davis, holding an automatic weapon and wearing military pants" in the Oval Office. On the wall -- a portrait of Osama bin Laden; in the fireplace a burning American flag. [more inside]
posted by ericb at 6:46 PM PST - 257 comments

How to Write With Style.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 6:35 PM PST - 36 comments

Vegging Out vs. Geeking Out. Romance as the MSG of film. The bifurcated careers of Lucy lawless, Sigourney Weaver, and Hugo Weaving. Characters making smart decisions vs. stupid decisions. Neal Stephenson discusses Sci-Fi/Speculative Fiction as a literary genre at Gresham College. (Warning: requires Flash 9)
posted by Navelgazer at 6:32 PM PST - 29 comments

"In one booklet, I come across the rather fabulous student error that the protesters at Kent State in 1970 were shot by 'the Federal Reserve.'" In his essay "AP Diary," Christopher Phelps shares the true story of what it's like to spend a week grading Advanced Placement exams.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 6:01 PM PST - 20 comments

The Greatest Sideshow Video Ever Made. "The Greatest Sideshow Video Ever Made was shot at the Moore theater in Seattle in 1992. The oddball cousin of Seattle's grunge music scene, the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow mixed vintage sideshow acts with novel stunts never before seen. Previously available only on VHS tape or DVD, this mind-blowing collection of feats of human daring is now available online in six parts for your viewing pleasure: 1 2 3 4 5 6 As an added bonus, watch as Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam participates." [via mefi projects] [more inside]
posted by stet at 5:39 PM PST - 21 comments

English newspaper Mail on Sunday claims to have uncovered the identity of artist Banksy claiming his name is Robin Gunningham: "People who know Gunningham are now unable to say what has become of him. His father Peter, who lives in Kingsdown, Bristol, denied that the man in the photograph was his son, and his mother Pamela was surprised by the picture, then denied she even had a son, let alone one called Robin." More information in a report from CBC. If you don't know who Banksy is visit a Flickr pool with over 7000 pictures of his work in situ or check out previous MetaFilter posts about Banksy.
posted by Kattullus at 5:03 PM PST - 60 comments

"In humans, the categories of gay and straight are socially constructed.” Researchers are now revealing that animals may engage in same-sex couplings to diffuse social tensions, to better protect their young or to maintain fecundity when opposite-sex partners are unavailable—or simply because it is fun. These observations suggest to some that bisexuality is a natural state among animals, perhaps Homo sapiens included, despite the sexual-orientation boundaries most people take for granted
posted by plexi at 4:13 PM PST - 85 comments

Ferris wheel parking versus automated stacking.
posted by Brian B. at 3:49 PM PST - 21 comments

Just when you were getting tired of all this typing and clicking, a little slice of sci-fi has finally made it to real life. Let the calm-voiced folks at Emotiv Systems usher in the latest advancements in the brain-computer interface realm, where a thought, a wink, and a wave might replace the keyboard and mouse. [more inside]
posted by redsparkler at 3:49 PM PST - 12 comments

The Weather World 2010 project at UIUC began as a comprehensive meteorology tutorial designed for a high school/undergraduate level. It has since expanded to include guides to remote sensing and reading weather maps. (Some highlights include optical effects, severe storms, and the basics of weather forecasting.) For folks in the US, it also has current surface and satellite imagery for a number of different atmospheric properties.
posted by Upton O'Good at 12:26 PM PST - 6 comments

China's secret plot to tame Tibet. "Internal Communist party documents have revealed that China is planning a programme of harsh political repression in Tibet despite a public show of moderation to win over world opinion before the Olympic Games next month." Meanwhile, the military has sealed off several monasteries in Lhasa, keeping over 1,000 monks locked up. Another 1,000 monks have mysteriously disappeared, and may have been sent to prisons in a neighbouring province to keep them silent through the Olympics.
posted by homunculus at 11:56 AM PST - 111 comments

8 Forgotten Kids Shows Sure to Give You Nightmares [more inside]
posted by miss lynnster at 11:18 AM PST - 51 comments

Food and Beverages in Hungary is a pretty excellent blog, particularly for anyone who's interested in food, beverages, and/or Hungary.
posted by Wolfdog at 10:31 AM PST - 19 comments

I'm bo, yo. Bo Burnham is a precocious 17 year old musician, singer, and rapper who displays a gift for word play and rhyme through themes such as Rehab for Fictional Characters, a romance with a larger woman, and, my personal favourite, math. Previously. MLYT [more inside]
posted by shokod at 6:03 AM PST - 79 comments

Want to know what actions can have the biggest impact on your carbon emissions? Bloom helps you choose actions tailored to your home and lifestyle, then lets you compare them by how much CO2 they save and how cheap they are. With background guides for recycling, organic foods, energy ratings, and emissions. From the BBC.
posted by netbros at 4:19 AM PST - 15 comments

Strip searching 13 year old girls is bad mmmkay. Today the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled in a 6-5 decision that students cannot be strip-searched based on the uncorroborated word of another student who is facing disciplinary punishment. In an even bigger twist, the court has found that the school official who ordered the strip search, Vice Principal Kerry Wilson, is financially liable in the case and cannot claim qualified immunity.
posted by Talez at 4:12 AM PST - 99 comments

Hiroaki "Rocky" Aoki, founder of Benihana restaurants and father of Devon Aoki, died from cancer complications on Friday. He was also an olympic wrestler, balloonist, backgammon player, and more.
posted by CuJoe at 2:26 AM PST - 14 comments