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It Made My Day: Little moments of WIN.
posted by allkindsoftime at 11:19 PM PST - 43 comments

The Terrorist Within is an in-depth look at the story of Ahmed Ressam. There's an interesting look at the lives of Ressam and other would-be jihadis and the way the authorities dealt with the information obtained about Ressam's activities.
posted by reenum at 8:32 PM PST - 1 comments

[",'...:.?;-) [more inside]
posted by crossoverman at 8:16 PM PST - 54 comments

25 years ago today, Vicki Dunbar Nelson and Jean Hepner played the longest tournament rally in tennis history, lasting 29 minutes and 642 shots (SLNYT). [more inside]
posted by Lutoslawski at 8:15 PM PST - 24 comments

A newly identified species of Chimaera is patrolling the waters off of California and Baja California.

California has a new star, the Eastern Pacific black ghostshark. But the newly identified species prefers to stay out of the sun—and the spotlight. And with a club-like sex organ on its forehead, the male ghostshark isn't likely to get any leading man roles.

The Florida Museum of Natural History has better photos of its Australian relative.
posted by darkstar at 7:28 PM PST - 15 comments

It's Hipster He-Man. [more inside]
posted by chunking express at 7:17 PM PST - 55 comments

Hey, Tower Defense fans: do you like cake? How about pirates? Want to combine the three? Just in time for (almost) Friday, it's Cake Pirates!
posted by sarcasticah at 7:15 PM PST - 11 comments

"A jaw-dropping feat of architecture has risen in the Italian city of Nola, just a stone’s throw away from the cataclysmic Mt. Vesuvius. Designed by Renzo Piano, Vulcano Buono is an epic cone-shaped commercial center crowned with a gorgeous sloping green roof. Piano’s 'good volcano' contributes a vital new space to the southern edge of the Nola commercial district, which is the most most important freight terminal complex in southern and central Italy."
posted by mr_crash_davis mark II: Jazz Odyssey at 6:28 PM PST - 20 comments

"Twits": dramatic readings of our most prized celebrities twitter feeds. [more inside]
posted by pwally at 4:50 PM PST - 9 comments

John Moe's Pop-Song Correspondences

Including:
An Invitation to
Joni Mitchell to Sing
at the Opening of
the Tree Museum.
"Why couldn't we have just cut the trees up? Then it would have been a log museum. And we wanted a tree museum." [more inside]
posted by ocherdraco at 4:42 PM PST - 10 comments

Why are people like Isaiah Kalebu—people diagnosed with serious psychological problems and accused of violent crimes—allowed to remain free until trial? [more inside]
posted by KokuRyu at 4:28 PM PST - 34 comments

The CTI never sleeps. A collection of LPs from Creed Taylor's CTI and Kudu labels, as compiled by Doug Payne.
posted by The Card Cheat at 4:17 PM PST - 11 comments

Thousands of students, faculty, and staff have walked out today in protest of the University of California's budget cuts. [more inside]
posted by spitefulcrow at 4:16 PM PST - 58 comments

Former child actor Kirk Cameron and his friend Ray (The Banana Guy) Comfort [previously] seek to distribute the "correct" (aka altered) version of Charles Darwin's Origin of Species to 50,000 students at the nation's top 50 universities as the book is soon to celebrate its 150^th anniversary. Their version includes a 50-page introduction which "...gives the history of evolution, a timeline of Darwin's life, Adolph Hitler's undeniable connection with the theory, Darwin's racism, his disdain for women, and Darwin's thoughts on the existence of God..." Cameron's promotional video for the project: 'Origin Into Schools.' A video response: "Origin of Stupidity." [more inside]
posted by ericb at 4:05 PM PST - 288 comments

COMBO - a collaborative animation by Blu and David Ellis. Made at Fame Festival 2009.
posted by Matthias Rascher at 2:17 PM PST - 4 comments

From bagpipes to xylophones, Dennis Havlena's legendary website will show you how to make musical instruments, cheaply. Some of them sound pretty good [YouTube].
posted by mecran01 at 1:41 PM PST - 20 comments

Zombie World News
posted by netbros at 1:37 PM PST - 26 comments

"When you're stupid, there's nothing that can be done." ... as we all know, YouTube is famed for having the worst comments on the internet. In this SLYT, Eric Idle responds to some of them.
posted by memebake at 1:07 PM PST - 49 comments

Stateside, Wild Youth, Motor Life, Roberta's World, Memento, and Sidewalks. Six collections of found vernacular photographs from reservatory.net. More found photos at Phoundfotographs, Accidental Mysteries, and Other People's Pictures. In the same vein as the better known (and previously posted) Shorpy and Square America.
posted by dersins at 12:45 PM PST - 7 comments

A still more glorious dawn awaits
Not a sunrise, but a galaxy rise
A morning filled with 400 billion suns
The rising of the milky way
posted by Earl the Polliwog at 11:36 AM PST - 33 comments

“This is my wish and no discussion or emotional tumult must come as a result.” - Much of Ingmar Bergman's personal property is up for auction. Including cars, furniture, his stereo, his awards, and yes (possibly, probably) the chess set from the Seventh Seal.
posted by HumanComplex at 11:18 AM PST - 28 comments

In honor of the 5th season premiere of Grey's Anatomy on ABC:

Boobicon.Me let's you make very pink "Obamacon-styled" avatars in support of a breast cancer non-profit org called the "Feel Your Boobies Foundation" (Gallery inevitably contains NSFW images).

Accidental Dong is a single-topic blog, and the topic is things that look like penises (via Inquisitr, which perfectly calls it "a blog of dicks"). NSFAnyoneNoticingResemblances

And for your non-prurient anatomical interest, here are Weird Al's Brain (as seen at various county fairs) and his Pancreas.
posted by wendell at 11:13 AM PST - 32 comments

Spaced is 10. Fried gold!
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 10:43 AM PST - 72 comments

Schizophrenia, a story from Darryl Cunningham's forthcoming Psychiatric Tales.
posted by Artw at 10:17 AM PST - 30 comments

José Hernández was a migrant worker when he first started to dream about becoming an astronaut. He is the first astronaut to Twitter in Spanish from space on shuttle mission STS-128. NASA wasn't happy about the controversy he caused when he advocated for the legalization of undocumented immigrants. He is not the first Hispanic-American to fly on the space shuttle. Hernández is a national hero in Mexico and has been invited to dine with President Calderon.
posted by desjardins at 10:11 AM PST - 15 comments

Functional MRI (fMRI) is a widely used technique of brain imaging in the cognitive sciences, allowing researchers to visualize what part of the brain is responding to certain stimuli, resulting in striking images of live brains. These days, fMRI is seeing more non-research use, such as forming the basis of controversial new lie detectors. Craig Bennett, a postdoctoral researcher at UCSB, submitted a whole Atlantic salmon to fMRI analysis, and found that this fish could apparently detect, and respond to, the the emotional state of human beings (poster). Remarkable science, especially considering the salmon was dead at the time. [more inside]
posted by Rumple at 9:33 AM PST - 59 comments

"I can only talk about what has moved me or intrigued me," says filmmaker Martin Scorsese at the beginning of this four-hour documentary about his passion for U.S. cinema. "I can't really be objective here." Hallelujah! A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies is the perfect antidote to the forced and artificial doctrine of the American Film Institute's so-called 100 best films. The AFI's English cousin, the British Film Institute, did a brilliant thing in enlisting Scorsese--probably the most famous student of cinema in the U.S.--to open up and speak at length for this project about the history of artistic survival among Hollywood directors. Scorsese takes a highly intuitive and heartfelt approach in describing how a number of filmmakers--some famous and some forgotten--carefully layered their visions into their work, often against the great resistance or eccentric whims of powerful producers. Film clips are plentiful, but they are also more than window dressing for nostalgia buffs." Part 1 1:: 2:: 3:: 4:: 5:: 6:: 7:: 8 Part 2 1:: 2:: 3:: 4:: 5:: 6:: 7:: 8 Part 3 1:: 2:: 3:: 4:: 5:: 6:: 7:: 8 [more inside]
posted by vronsky at 9:16 AM PST - 32 comments

No Signal - A montage of cellphones in horror movies. [more inside]
posted by flatluigi at 9:03 AM PST - 24 comments

The only woman in the French Foreign Legion. A little about the fantastic life of a brave woman.
posted by Idcoytco at 9:03 AM PST - 17 comments

A new HIV vaccine is showing promising results, reducing the risk of contracting the virus by 32 percent. While further tests are still needed, the vaccine is a combination failed HIV vaccines AIDSVAX and ALVAC, based on the Canary Pox virus. The study itself faced criticism from the outset.
posted by borkencode at 8:48 AM PST - 42 comments

Dog Hates Me is the Sam Brownyist comic ever by Sam Brown (of explodingdog fame). Expect big thick lines, bright colors, and robots. [more inside]
posted by The Devil Tesla at 5:08 AM PST - 66 comments

On October 2, 2009, the International Olympic Committee will meet in Copenhagen to choose between Chicago, Rio de Janiero, Tokyo, and Madrid as the site of the 2016 Summer Olympics. While Chicago sends some of its most famous citizens to Copenhagen, a protest against Chicago's bid is planned at City Hall. [more inside]
posted by honeybee413 at 4:01 AM PST - 69 comments

A three part profile on Glenn Beck by Salon.com's Alexander Zaitchik A morality play in three acts, or, how Glenn Beck parlayed a parlayed his finely honed skills as a drug addled morning zoo shock jock, into the media force that is making America dumber by the minute. Some excellent profiling by Alexander Zaitchik of Salon.com: [more inside]
posted by psmealey at 3:57 AM PST - 227 comments